We voice are opinions, they absorb it and move forward, that is how it has to work. They cannot dwell on it.

The next game with a great story will join a extremely shallow list of games with a great story.

The biggest story flaw to me in DA's is blood mages and how everyone turned out to be infected by the Thing, otherwise known as a "blood mage". They were talked about as some rare clan throughout both, but whenever some action had to happen, boom, I'll go thing on your ass.

The worst technical part of each game is the ludicrously small levels sizes and load screens. There is ZERO exploration in Bioware RPG's because of that. Good to see they are finally moving part Aurora. Best decision in 10 years for them.

Frankly, I'd listen to the money too. Don't like their games? Stop fucking playing them. They'll get -that- message a lot faster, and you don't have to ruin anyone's life, career or even just a mood to pass that one along.

Whoa whoa whoa, let's hold the hyperbole for a minute please. None of those people have the power to ruin anyones career or life by posting on a forum, you're being ridiculously over dramatic.

It goes without saying that people should stop buying their games but that's not a process that happens over night when you have millions of people buying them, marketing campaigns working to the opposite effect and so on.

In the meantime, we're on the internet and people like posting their thoughts, both good and bad so it's no real shock that they are doing it on forums. As other people said, they run the forum and have direct control over how toxic it is. Other companies run forums and don't have the same issues.

So yeah, maybe it sucks to read 100000 posts saying the ME3 blew or DA2 sucked but guess what, it sucks to buy a shitty game too. Disappointment is a powerful emotion. You seem to be saying "look at it from their point of view" but that assumes they are doing the same and a lot of feedback from Bioware itself indicates the opposite.

On a only slightly related note: wasn't there a time when -this- forum was significantly less toxic than it is these days? Maybe Google has it right, and forcing people to put their real names on posts is the way to go.

I don't know, you seem to be the one getting hostile and toxic in this thread. Read other peoples posts then re-read your own. You get what you put into this and all other forums. If you don't like it there are many other forums on the internet, though I frequent many and they're all pretty much the same to be honest. Bioware in general has squandered a lot of the goodwill the community had for the company so if people seem a bit negative, that's why.

nin wrote on Jan 11, 2013, 08:40:

The other says, "This was pretty damned successful."

Frankly, I'd listen to the money too.

We call this "The George Lucas Principle". Because if something sold it must be good.

Last I checked DA2 sold far less than DA:Origins. The Lucas Principle doesn't really apply.

nin wrote on Jan 11, 2013, 08:40:

The other says, "This was pretty damned successful."

Frankly, I'd listen to the money too.

We call this "The George Lucas Principle". Because if something sold it must be good.

Haha. Yeah, what you're supposed to do is look at a trend. Will 3 sell as much as 2? It may, if it's good, but it won't week 1.

The other says, "This was pretty damned successful."

Frankly, I'd listen to the money too.

We call this "The George Lucas Principle". Because if something sold it must be good.

Prez wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 22:56:
Bioware has REALLY screwed the pooch in the last few years, no doubt, but I will say that I can understand wanting to shield oneself from the rampant blood-in-the-water hyper negative feeding frenzy that forums all too often descend into. Bioware has no one but themselves to blame for destroying a hard-earned, once-nigh impeccable reputation to be sure; there is a difference, however, between flatly ignoring all criticism and tuning out the perpetual hate mongers. Unfortunately, things done and said by Bioware developers recently indicates more of a case of largely thinking everyone else is crazy and they are doing everything right.

I was never a big Bioware fan... I've actually only played Baldur's Gate and about 5 hours of Mass Effect, but I agree with this based upon the crap that I heard about DA2.

That said, I still say that a message board isn't the proper forum to solicite feedback. What you get, positive or negative, is rarely constructive. Even if people join planning to be constructive they still get warped into the culture of being on an extreme.

It's just a very, very poor venue for that. And I don't mean to defend Bioware here - I own DA but never played it and have zero plans to get DA2 after the repetitive dungeon design people have told me about. It sounds like trash.

Prez wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 22:56:
Bioware has REALLY screwed the pooch in the last few years, no doubt, but I will say that I can understand wanting to shield oneself from the rampant blood-in-the-water hyper negative feeding frenzy that forums all too often descend into. Bioware has no one but themselves to blame for destroying a hard-earned, once-nigh impeccable reputation to be sure; there is a difference, however, between flatly ignoring all criticism and tuning out the perpetual hate mongers. Unfortunately, things done and said by Bioware developers recently indicates more of a case of largely thinking everyone else is crazy and they are doing everything right.

Honestly, I never understood where this "impeccable" reputation came from, but for the sake of argument, let's assume that everyone agrees...they used to be the best thing since Sid Meiers.

So maybe they've turned their back on everything that made it worth allowing them to live...on the other hand, there -are- other indicators one can use. Let's compare the toxic waste dump of the forums against the number of copies sold. One says, "Everything you, your parents, and your children through the ninth generation have, can, or will do is shit." The other says, "This was pretty damned successful."

Frankly, I'd listen to the money too. Don't like their games? Stop fucking playing them. They'll get -that- message a lot faster, and you don't have to ruin anyone's life, career or even just a mood to pass that one along.

On a only slightly related note: wasn't there a time when -this- forum was significantly less toxic than it is these days? Maybe Google has it right, and forcing people to put their real names on posts is the way to go.

Stormsinger wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 22:33:

Dades wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 22:10:

Stormsinger wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 21:10:

RollinThundr wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 21:00:

Stormsinger wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 20:53:
Wow...I don't know why, but I actually expected a bit better than this BS here.

To each and every one of you "He's an asshole who only wants to ignore criticism" types, you clearly have never read any of those forums as if they were addressed to you. It's a completely safe bet that reading shit like that for six months would send anyone into a meltdown. So if you actually like your career, you find ways to avoid that result. In no way are the cesspits of company gaming forums a useful source of critiques...but they're great ways to destroy a team, good or bad.

You obviously haven't read much of Gaider's posts.

Not one word of my post referenced anything he ever said or posted. How about you address my comment, rather than some figment of your imagination...

He chooses to sit down and read the forums, no one is prying his eyeballs open and forcing him. He's a game writer, not a community rep. When you're dealing with the public you better have a thick skin. Your average McDonalds employee probably puts up with more shit in a year than David Gaider.

If he actually meant what he said he could have quietly stop posted instead of announcing it and declaring the reasons. When people were happy with the games he was fine to sit around and collect praise. Now that people are unhappy he's leaving, I don't know that seems pretty convenient.

- DADES - This is a signature of my name, enjoy!

And yet again, someone who chooses to quote my post, then talk about something completely different. Did I ever say someone forced him to read it? Did I ever say he was anything but an asshole? Did I ever say ANY FUCKING THING ABOUT HIM? No, I didn't.

I said those forums are so toxic that nobody who wishes to keep a job would read them...nothing valuable can be gained by doing so. But you go ahead and rant about what a douche he is, that's clearly what you're invested in.

Bioware's forums weren't always toxic, that didn't really come about til the social site and more accurately when info for DA2 started filtering out. Giving the guy a pass for being a douche, when he's ALWAYS been a douche towards the fanbase going back even to the BG2/NWN days is pretty ridiculous.

Bioware has REALLY screwed the pooch in the last few years, no doubt, but I will say that I can understand wanting to shield oneself from the rampant blood-in-the-water hyper negative feeding frenzy that forums all too often descend into. Bioware has no one but themselves to blame for destroying a hard-earned, once-nigh impeccable reputation to be sure; there is a difference, however, between flatly ignoring all criticism and tuning out the perpetual hate mongers. Unfortunately, things done and said by Bioware developers recently indicates more of a case of largely thinking everyone else is crazy and they are doing everything right.

Dades wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 22:10:

Stormsinger wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 21:10:

RollinThundr wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 21:00:

Stormsinger wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 20:53:
Wow...I don't know why, but I actually expected a bit better than this BS here.

To each and every one of you "He's an asshole who only wants to ignore criticism" types, you clearly have never read any of those forums as if they were addressed to you. It's a completely safe bet that reading shit like that for six months would send anyone into a meltdown. So if you actually like your career, you find ways to avoid that result. In no way are the cesspits of company gaming forums a useful source of critiques...but they're great ways to destroy a team, good or bad.

You obviously haven't read much of Gaider's posts.

Not one word of my post referenced anything he ever said or posted. How about you address my comment, rather than some figment of your imagination...

He chooses to sit down and read the forums, no one is prying his eyeballs open and forcing him. He's a game writer, not a community rep. When you're dealing with the public you better have a thick skin. Your average McDonalds employee probably puts up with more shit in a year than David Gaider.

If he actually meant what he said he could have quietly stop posted instead of announcing it and declaring the reasons. When people were happy with the games he was fine to sit around and collect praise. Now that people are unhappy he's leaving, I don't know that seems pretty convenient.

- DADES - This is a signature of my name, enjoy!

And yet again, someone who chooses to quote my post, then talk about something completely different. Did I ever say someone forced him to read it? Did I ever say he was anything but an asshole? Did I ever say ANY FUCKING THING ABOUT HIM? No, I didn't.

I said those forums are so toxic that nobody who wishes to keep a job would read them...nothing valuable can be gained by doing so. But you go ahead and rant about what a douche he is, that's clearly what you're invested in.

It wasn't just the last 2 widely criticized games that were the problem. Bioware has always been bizarrely lauded as some pinnacle of story telling when their games usually have the same characters, and cliches. Especially the melodramatic plot: "You are the chosen one out to save the universe from the ancient evil while having embarrassing romances with poorly written party members along the way." It's consistently terrible. It's not like they're putting the resources they saved by not bothering with a story into gameplay either. Even games like Sine Mora had better writing in the blurbs between bullet hell.

Stormsinger wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 21:10:

RollinThundr wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 21:00:

Stormsinger wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 20:53:
Wow...I don't know why, but I actually expected a bit better than this BS here.

To each and every one of you "He's an asshole who only wants to ignore criticism" types, you clearly have never read any of those forums as if they were addressed to you. It's a completely safe bet that reading shit like that for six months would send anyone into a meltdown. So if you actually like your career, you find ways to avoid that result. In no way are the cesspits of company gaming forums a useful source of critiques...but they're great ways to destroy a team, good or bad.

You obviously haven't read much of Gaider's posts.

Not one word of my post referenced anything he ever said or posted. How about you address my comment, rather than some figment of your imagination...

He chooses to sit down and read the forums, no one is prying his eyeballs open and forcing him. He's a game writer, not a community rep. When you're dealing with the public you better have a thick skin. Your average McDonalds employee probably puts up with more shit in a year than David Gaider.

If he actually meant what he said he could have quietly stop posted instead of announcing it and declaring the reasons. When people were happy with the games he was fine to sit around and collect praise. Now that people are unhappy he's leaving, I don't know that seems pretty convenient.

- DADES - This is a signature of my name, enjoy!

RollinThundr wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 21:00:

Stormsinger wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 20:53:
Wow...I don't know why, but I actually expected a bit better than this BS here.

To each and every one of you "He's an asshole who only wants to ignore criticism" types, you clearly have never read any of those forums as if they were addressed to you. It's a completely safe bet that reading shit like that for six months would send anyone into a meltdown. So if you actually like your career, you find ways to avoid that result. In no way are the cesspits of company gaming forums a useful source of critiques...but they're great ways to destroy a team, good or bad.

You obviously haven't read much of Gaider's posts.

Not one word of my post referenced anything he ever said or posted. How about you address my comment, rather than some figment of your imagination...

Stormsinger wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 20:53:
Wow...I don't know why, but I actually expected a bit better than this BS here.

To each and every one of you "He's an asshole who only wants to ignore criticism" types, you clearly have never read any of those forums as if they were addressed to you. It's a completely safe bet that reading shit like that for six months would send anyone into a meltdown. So if you actually like your career, you find ways to avoid that result. In no way are the cesspits of company gaming forums a useful source of critiques...but they're great ways to destroy a team, good or bad.

You obviously haven't read much of Gaider's posts.

Wow...I don't know why, but I actually expected a bit better than this BS here.

To each and every one of you "He's an asshole who only wants to ignore criticism" types, you clearly have never read any of those forums as if they were addressed to you. It's a completely safe bet that reading shit like that for six months would send anyone into a meltdown. So if you actually like your career, you find ways to avoid that result. In no way are the cesspits of company gaming forums a useful source of critiques...but they're great ways to destroy a team, good or bad.

Julio wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 18:48:
I'm guessing he thinks DA2 was top notch too. We can call DA3 a failure now, if Bioware's not open to criticism and learning why they did a horrible job on DA2.

Time for a new lead writer if DA3 has any hope of succeeding.

He still does think DA2 is top notch, he said so over and over before it shipped, even though all the long time actual CRPG fans, pretty much knew DA2 was going to be a disaster 6+ months before ship.

The only folks Gaider and Laidlaw wanted to listen to were the action rpg crowd that encouraged the less tactical combat with wave combat, and those who considered actual character customization that was a hallmark for past Bioware rpgs instead took to calling it "playing dress up" trying to be edgy.

And then when the game failed sales wise in comparison to Origins, they wondered wtf happened. Now he's disenchanted? Ohh poor little pretentious full of himself David Gaider. Boo fucking hoo.

Julio wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 18:48:
I'm guessing he thinks DA2 was top notch too.

He did, yes.

We can call DA3 a failure now, if Bioware's not open to criticism and learning why they did a horrible job on DA2.

Hmmm, we'll see. They've released a few statements that seem to indicate they have taken the biggest criticisms of DA2 to heart. And hopefully the art work will improve with the bigger development time it'll have.

Time for a new lead writer if DA3 has any hope of succeeding.

In the end, Gaider isn't the guy who decides that there is an Awesome button in DA2, or that it needs Final Fantasy style swords and people who explode in clouds of blood, or that it's a great idea to just re-use the same dungeon over and over and over again. The guy who decides that is Mike Laidlaw. And he is returning in full fucking force for DA3, just as Hudson and that fucker Mac Walters are returning (rumored) for ME4...

Creston

I'm guessing he thinks DA2 was top notch too. We can call DA3 a failure now, if Bioware's not open to criticism and learning why they did a horrible job on DA2.

Time for a new lead writer if DA3 has any hope of succeeding.

Kajetan wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 15:53:

Beamer wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 15:22:
There are much better ways to hear from your consumers.

For example?

Talking to them, rather than going to a venue that's basically 100% anonymous people screaming loudly to be more heard than the next guy? Large developer forums tend to be complete herds. For some developers (Epic's is like this, for one you guys would disagree with) it's people falling all over each other to tell the dev everything is wonderful and nothing should be changed. For others, like BioWare, it's people falling over each other to make sure BioWare knows that they will all burn in hell.

The feedback is mostly worthless. It's exaggerated hyperbole. It's squeaky wheels that don't represent the audience as a whole.

Why not? Just needs more supervising. I was part of a team, managing customer forums of a commercial daytrader site, way larger than that of Biowares little joint. We had our share of attention whores and outright CRAZY bums, but you can manage those people. Its a full time job, the company has to invest, but in the long run you keep a healthy community AND happy customers.

But this is not possible with one or two underpaid community managers and admins picked from the user base. This is WORK. Most companies dont see the profit in that, so forums deteriorate at a certain point and become a useless waste of money.

I have no clue why you're saying this. Most game companies have one or several community managers. They do just that - manage the community. That has nothing to do with whether the dev team goes in and reads each thread to get feedback. Community managers foster the community, answer questions, etc. This is what developer forums tend to be used for. They aren't typically used for responding to "THIS GAME SUCKS!" or "YOU DID EVERYTHING PERFECTLY YOU ARE GODS DON'T NERF THE SHOTGUN TRICK I GO 100-0 WITH I WANT TO HAVE YOUR BABIES PLEASE HIRE ME!"

Verno wrote on Jan 10, 2013, 10:05:

I tend to largely avoid [the BSN forums] these days, myself. Why? Because spending too much time there starts to make me feel negative—not just about the games we make, but about myself and life in general. That's not a good feeling to have. I'm sure there are folks there who would bristle at that comment, suggesting that all negative feedback is justifiable and that ignoring it is the equivalent of us sticking our heads in the sand. How will we ever improve unless we listen to their scolding and take our lumps like good little developers? That is, of course, ignoring the idea that we haven't already digested a mountain of feedback—both positive and negative—and there's really only so much of it you can take. Eventually you make decisions (informed by that feedback, though only in part- it can only ever be in part) and move on.

First of all, this clown lives on those forums so who is he kidding, everyone knows hes going to be there no matter what. He was a big part of ruining EAs marketing efforts for DA2 even, trumpeting ridiculous feature changes as revolutionary and trying to justify the shittier elements in the game. It's funny how when everyone was a sycophant tonguing his balls that he thought feedback was worthwhile but now that those people have turned into angry detractors it's time to move on with the "design" and ignore them.

DA2 gets a lot of crap, but there are people out there for whom the game really clicks. Lara Crigger and Karla over at Gamers With Jobs did a podcast on it. Each of them has done 3 playthroughs or something.