Forum Discussion
- Finally an intelligent and concise discussion. Bravo and Thank you
And to,kingmob31838 wrote:
http://i.imgur.com/rmWmCZK.gif
please exit carefully so the door does as little damage to, you know where - Coming back to Teo's question why we covet Shary so much: there was this interesting post in another thread about dedication to design games and the importance of "time coin".
Drumnman, could you copy and paste that here?
I think it is extremely important to remember how dedicated many of us are. After spending a lot of money and an even greater lot of time, we become so attached to our towns that we don't abandon them easily.
That's why we put up with an event like this that goes against everything we expect from our game.
If this were candy crush saga I would have walked away after a week of this grind, walked away and never came back.
But this is TSTO and so I'm doing all the things EA values as a success of an event: logging in multiple times a day (I changed my 8 hour rhythm to 4 hours so I can harvest the carrots), staying longer with every log-in (there is always one more bunny I want to find), spending more donuts than usual. All in an attempt to save my satisfaction in a game that isn't giving me much at the moment.
I might hate it but my behavior looks as if I loved it... - Dunno about the rest of you, but I do it because I'm addicted to the sweet, exquisite pain... I love being EA's b*tch.
- jukan00New SpectatorA lot of good points being made here.
If anything I appreciate this event because it's released me from the stress of trying to get everything. I realize that I simply can't. So now as I walk in the rain, I will still get soaked, but I won't be angry about it (this is the way of the samurai). - Here's that observation for the other thread by LlelanD:
LlelanD wrote:
It all comes down to what it usually does: Game play time per design time.
Quest and task based play takes more design time and does not repeat when completed, if your design team is simple-minded. You can create repeatable tasks and quests but it takes more imagination and design time.
Chance based play takes almost no design time and generates a huge amount of play time. It also frustrates and angers your player base but there are no metrics for that, just for play time. On paper, chance based play looks like the optimal play-per-design solution but history has conclusively shown that it kills games by turning players away. Since policy makers do not pay attention to cancelled games, this metric is also ignored.
Although quest and tasked based play do take more design time, the effect on the player community is far more positive and generates far more long-time players. The longer players contribute and play, the larger and more lucrative the pool of potential paying customers.
Temporal coin (time spent playing as opposed to money spent) is a valuable commodity. It increases the player pool from which you earn paying players and increases the likelihood that free players will consider the product worth real world coin. If you turn away or dissatisfy players who pay temporal coin then they will never consider your product worth real world coin, quit, and advise others that your product is not worth the time to even check out. This is how most of these types of games die.
The event design of Tapped Out is well along the way to killing the game. The utter lack of Customer Service, especially for the long-term problem of freezing, crashing, and UI bugs is already killing the reputation of both this game and EA.
This is not just my opinion, it is a marketing pattern in online games that has been proven over and over again for over 30 years (ever since text online games first went public). andrewsworld1 wrote:
Interesting but have you thought that maybe the team just thought this was a cool idea and didn't care about sales as whatever they put out people buy... You never know one of them might have been outside smoking and saw a bunny and thought that it could be cool to zap bunnies and make it all funny by having them lay eggs. The prize system could just be something fun they thought they would try. :-)
These are good points. I've mentioned previously on this forum that I don't think EA is a giant, nefarious corporate monster looking to suck the will out of their players; however, that said, I'm sure profitability remains very high in their internal corporate messaging.
I do also believe that devs are continuously on the look out for new ways to keep the playerbase engaged, and you have to hand it to them - this event has certainly engaged us all!- Man, it is so much cooler to examine why we complain, rather than to just complain. Great points here. Great topic. Makes me think.
Here's an additional thought (or two). For me, it's not so much about the gambling. I don't mind stepping up to a slot machine every now and then. I do tend to assume that I will lose on such endeavors, but hey! It's still a bit of fun (and I get: being baited into continued play). For me it's the fact that the gambling favors the house way too much in this update.
1. A game of chance WITHIN a game of chance. Well that is just maddening. As in, to achieve a SHOT at the gold box you have to gamble on two others?! No thanks.
2. Previously, by grinding away, a player could amass a wealth of gambling chips. In this update a 24 hour binge neighbor visit may net you 500 eggs. Divide that by two color options and it could take you two days to just get the opportunity to step up to the wheel. Even game-play and egg generators can't offer enough eggs in a day to gamble much more than once.
3. Zero reward to the player from the neighbors that visit. Hand shakes all around but nary an egg, or reward for the person visited. The absence of these rewards places a greater burden on the player. And, it seems to undermine a large part of TSTO game play. In my opinion, that, almost single handily, is frustrating enough to turn players away. I hope it was a mistake, or oversight.
I'm sure I'm just reiterating that which has been said. But hopefully with enough people saying it things will change.
I hope this serves more constructive criticism than complaining. My opinion is that the odds shifted way too much (in this update) to offer enjoyable game-play to the casual and/or dedicated player. Ratman5674 wrote:
http://cdn.novafm.com.au/sites/default/files/Morgan-Freeman-Falls-Asleep-in-the-late-night-audience-jimmy-fallon.gif
Yeah good speech about stuff
Seems like your tiny rat brain can't handle a few paragraphs- Bumping this in the spirit of postmortem examination.
- Thanks!
I think the further out we get from this event, the truer my points about Skinner boxes and slots will become. In this Easter event, I just couldn't shake the feeling of being seen as a lab animal, furiously hitting the bar to claim my next, random reward. And I did! I spent as many donuts as it took to get all those damned prizes knowing full well EA expects this behavior from a certain percentage of players.
So I find myself feeling both victorious and ashamed. I am happy that I've received my proverbial food pellet and can enjoy the spoils of the event, but a little ashamed that I played into right into the game's transparent psychological manipulation with the complete knowledge of what I was doing.
I don't have a problem with the fact that my money buys me nothing more than borrowed pixels living on a server ultimately at the whim of EA. I made peace with this the first time I bought donuts, but this latest tactc by EA resonates differently with me. It's a flavor of cheap game mechanics typically found in the bottom-feeders of the F2P market, and I feel TSTO is honestly above it.
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