Multiplayer is the future

[Dionysus9]

Read this:

"Multiplayer. The biggest regret I have, in hindsight, was the decision to have a multiplayer mode in The Political Machine. The game features a full-blown matchmaking service, in order to make it relatively easy to play multiplayer. I love playing games multiplayer, and I've played a lot of games online with people. That said, based on the sales statistics, and based on the server stats, less than 1% of players are playing the game multiplayer."



Any opinions?

What are your opinions on this point, Gil? All we can assume is that you agree with the above statements since that has consistently been CA's position and the point has been consistently raised again and again. I take this to be your position--please correct me if I'm wrong.

I have many. First of all, I'm tired of being told that my opinion doesn't really matter because I'm in the minority. Maybe that is an illogical emotional response, but its my knee-jerk response all the same. CA's position has been, and apparently still is -- MP is not worth developing or supporting. Sure, you'll take my $50, but thats where the relationship ends. Fine. We are used to it by now.

I'm so sick of this 1% argument I could scream. How bout someone come out with a game with NO single player mode? eh? Then we wouldn't have to hear this damn argument after every buggy release. The peace of not having to hear how much of a voiceless minority I am (or should be) would be worth paying any price for good MP support. Thats where the untapped market share is.

Secondly, if TW didn't have multiplayer--I'd be playing chess or poker and CA wouldn't have any bit of my $200 some-odd-dollars I've spent on TW in the last few years. And I'll bet that is the same response you'll get from several hundred other players--if not here, then certainly at the .net. CA knows this, which is why you give us what you consider the minimum necessary to keep us paying.

Third, defeatism is a self-fulfilling prophecy, and btw--I've never even heard of this game you are referring to, which suggests the MP side sucked or I would have heard about it. Maybe the SP was good, but I don't play SP games so I wouldn't know. MP spreads by word of mouth, if it sucks, it goes nowhere. Players who like MP experiences talk to eachother and share new "gems" of games and also share bad experiences with games. It doesn't take long for a good MP game to build up a following and a momentum. Also, you can't make UNO (the card game) have a good MP following--the underlying game has to be good. The MP implementation has to be focused. The company has to set a GOAL of having good MP.

Have you ever played a team sport where your morale was really low? "We're going to lose this game, we're going to lose...they're going to destroy us." Its a self-fulfilling prophecy--every time. If you think you will lose, you will. You have to believe that you can win before you have a chance to win.

In this case, CA wrote off MP before Shogun was ever released. Is it any surprise to anyone that MP is and always has been riddled with problems? If half the MP community that left when MTW came out was still around, we'd have 500 signatures on the petition. Those people were chased away by poor MP implementation and support a long time ago. If you want to go further back to the Shogun release and the MP problems that surrounded that-- we are talking about another 300 or so people who could still be part of this community if the initial Shogun release was not flawed in MP.

Look at games like WCIII, and Unreal Tournament-- are you telling me that MP is only 1% of their sales? NO WAY thats true! Those games are primarily MP games why? Because they FOCUS on MP, and guess what-- their MP sales increase. Is that so surprising?

Fourth, I'll tell you a way to guarantee that your MP sales never increase beyond 1%-- introduce an MP mode that is incomplete, poorly supported, and buggy. That way you can sell lots of copies to MP hopefuls and then when you tell then they are only 1% you will be correct, since the MP side of the game will never flourish. This is the strategy I think CA has employed-- rope-a-dope the MP fiends and then pocket their money and tell them they are a minority who has (or should have) no voice.

Fifth, TW SP is maxed out. You can't really do much more with the strategy map in my opinion-- the future is the battles, and MP ones at that. The AI is limited (look, Kasparov can still beat Big Blue). If I wanted to play strategy map, I'd play CIV III or something. TW is different because of the battles--why is CA de-emphasising that? To "fit in" with the other big titles? Wake up--you can't take their market share, you have to create your own niche.

Sixth, if MP is such a headache and such a drain on R&D, then why does CA include it? Even more frustrating-- why has CA been essentially complaining about MP players being less than 1% from day ONE when they could have gone forward with an SP only game? I think its because they know they HAVE to have MP to be competitive--see my 4th point.

Seventh, I'm tired of this same old discussion. If CA wants to take our money and give us a half-assed MP product-- fine. Just do it and stop rubbing it in--it really gets me mad when I'm told my $50 isn't as good as the next guy's because of the portion of the game that I play.

I guess what Gil is saying is that we are 1% of sales so they allocated 1% of development funds to us. Ok, that is a facially logical marketing decision. I think its self-defeatist, short sighted, and flawed in the long term--but its what we have, so enough said.

Or as Bomil would say-- enough words lost.