Announcement?

altemriel

Sausage wrote: »

I also would like to know what happened to Q4 update? So are we just gonna skip Christmas DLC.

wait for August, Quakecon, I suppose there will be the next DLC announced.

According to dataminers, it might be Vvanderfell

hrothbern

Cazzy wrote: »

Just wondering - are we going to get an official word or announcement for ZOS regarding the latest IGN article?

For those who haven't read it: http://m.uk.ign.com/articles/2016/06/15/e3-2016-the-elder-scrolls-online-to-receive-new-dungeons-customisation-and-housing-dlc

Speaking to IGN, game director Matt Firor confirmed that an Argonian Dungeon Pack and character customising barber shop would arrive in August, while the much-requested addition of player housing would be added in "the first quarter of next year".
Developer Zenimax announced the content barrier-collapsing One Tamriel update and a console release for the Dark Brotherhood DLC at Bethesda's E3 showcase.
Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited Official Dark Brotherhood - Blood Will Flow Trailer
Firor says that Zenimax is aiming to release multiple, smaller DLC packs to cater to players who return to the game intermittently, creating something akin to 'episodes' for the game:
"It’s interesting to see what happens when you take away the subscription model away," Firor explained. "You don’t see a hardcore playstyle - like playing for six months and then quitting - we don’t see that. We have a lot of players who will play for two or three weeks because they want to get through a zone and then stop. Then they come back two months later for another month, because there’s no pressure to play all of it at once.
"Our DLC packs cater to that, because they’re smaller, bite-size chunks of story and associated quests."

I'm sure everything is true as IGN aren't known for false reports, but I thought we'd be told first - through official channels? Or at least immediately after.

Also, what Matt said about the audience ZOS are catering to (intermittent players) - isn't that a bit risky? I mean, some players leave due to bugs and lack of content. Offering "bite-sized" DLC may not be enough for those loyal fans. Of course it depends how small we're talking, I'm not expecting ZOS to work 24/7 for content when there's other things to be done. I'm just worried loyal, long-term fans aren't having their voices heard.

Any chance we can have reassurance and an official word regarding the article? Maybe a little something extra for us ESO buffs?

@Cazzy ,

Forgive me the wall of paper it has become.

You say: "I'm sure everything is true as IGN aren't known for false reports, but I thought we'd be told first - through official channels? Or at least immediately after."

From my feel I agree 100% with you

Well... in real life a modern company leader, a CEO, is owner of the company strategy, but is first of all busy to satisfy his financial owners and the outside world. Keeping his key people alligned. Managing expectations and changes of expectations.
So typically, we, the inside world customers, are second to know. :'(
Demanding "immediately after" an internal announcement ?
Well... again in the real world, that does typically not happen.
But I would expect, considering the magnitude of the finding and the resulting marketing stategical direction taken, that Matt shares with us on a coming ESO live.
In fact, I would really welcome when we would have a more regular schedule for ESO lives.
The minimum what I would expect is that at the end of an ESO life, ZOS tells us when the next one is.
Perhaps we get one day the communication trust, that when something "big" happens, we can rest assured that we hear something about it on the next ESO live from the relevant responsible person.
Managing the expectations of the key customers is also the normal real life responsibility of a company leader.


You say: "......ZOS are catering to (intermittent players) - isn't that a bit risky?"

I would not be too worried about that risk !
If that development is happening, visible from the account statistics, it is a fact.
And once a fact, it is most important that the management does spot it and adapts to it for the continuity of the game.
Learns to be good in handling that development.

Perhaps we see a kind of maturing of the social role of these kinds of games in the society: these games are not only for just kids and young adults, but become more and more embedded in the regular life of all kinds of people of varying age, family situation and other occupations. People that ARE loyal to this hobby, AND to their created characters and this game setting.

Perhaps these loyal intermittent players are, in the eyes of the beancounters, economically one of the two most interesting customer profiles for ZOS to secure a steady income.
I think that sub accounts and non-sub accounts of players that play on average perhaps a few hours per week, are rarely or never in PVP and buy now and then some awesome nice pet, mount or costume, are costing ZOS almost nothing in terms of server costs. I guess these two customer profiles pay the monthly bills of ZOS.
I guess that the key word for ZOS here will be: "sticky". Every company is interested in which customers.... or with uncountable customers, which customer profiles are "sticky" and what are the critical succes factors in making and keeping them "sticky".


and you say also: "I'm just worried loyal, long-term fans aren't having their voices heard."

Well I would again not be worried.
I think that ZOS is very much interested in what loyal, long-term, dedicated fans bring as feedback.
IF they would try to develop this game over time without us, that "1%", ..... they would need to hire lots, and lots, ...., and lots of additional employees to do the testing. Much to expensive.
We do that for free !
With tests, observations, findings, conclusions, suggestions, great thoughts, and mostly coming from a lot of love and dedication....
So our voices are heard !
(but as a "help" only)
And yeah, ofc, also sometimes our Forum, our posts are totally overgrown with strongly opiniated outburst of emotions.
Is sometimes a nuisance, diluting informative posts with non-info.... but as long as it is kind of decent..., so what !

so... it is a kind of trinity:
The role of the big volume of easy going players is to secure the bulk of the income of the game.
The role of us, the "1%", is to help ZOS improve the game.
( and to be crystal clear on that "help": in my opinion we "help" ZOS and never do tell ZOS what to do !)
The role of ZOS is to cater us all.

Ashtaris

I'm also a bit worried about Matt's comments at E3. No DLC of any major importance was announced, just a remake of Tamriel with "One Tamriel", which I do NOT consider as NEW content. We have the Argonian Dungeon pack, but have no clue yet on what that will be like, but it seems more like the small content releases like we have seen with the Thieves Guild and Dark Brotherhood. We already know that player housing is being delayed until the first of next year.

I was so looking forward to Clockwork City, Vvardenfell, etc., but from what we have seen so far, there is no indication that any of that will happen this year. Unless something changes soon and we hear otherwise, this might be a very disappointing year for ESO.

Tiedän

Enodoc wrote: »

Sounds more like they've taken the dungeon content they initially designed for Murkmire and have pulled it out to release separately.

Yeah...the more I think about it and how Matt worded it, the more I'm thinking Murkmire might not actually be the case...which is a bit of a buzzkill. I do hope it eventually makes it to the game and whatever improvements that come with it someday make it to Craglorn.

Then again maybe we'll all be pleasantly surprised and the 'bite size' content he's referring to is actually just inadvertent bad wording for the quarterly DLC we've been getting since Imperial City. After two mini DLCs back to back the fan base clearly wants another Orsinum sized update. Maybe ZOS will deliver.

*fingers crossed*

altemriel

Ashtaris wrote: »

I'm also a bit worried about Matt's comments at E3. No DLC of any major importance was announced, just a remake of Tamriel with "One Tamriel", which I do NOT consider as NEW content. We have the Argonian Dungeon pack, but have no clue yet on what that will be like, but it seems more like the small content releases like we have seen with the Thieves Guild and Dark Brotherhood. We already know that player housing is being delayed until the first of next year.

I was so looking forward to Clockwork City, Vvardenfell, etc., but from what we have seen so far, there is no indication that any of that will happen this year. Unless something changes soon and we hear otherwise, this might be a very disappointing year for ESO.

but wait, it is only June now, so we are still in Q2, I believe that in Q3 we will get Barber shop (as announced by Matt as comming in August) and maybe some smaller DLC to it too (Argonian dungeon pack).
And in Q4 we will get either Vvanderfell (as datamined) or Clockwork City

Tiedän wrote: »

Enodoc wrote: »

Sounds more like they've taken the dungeon content they initially designed for Murkmire and have pulled it out to release separately.

Yeah...the more I think about it and how Matt worded it, the more I'm thinking Murkmire might not actually be the case...which is a bit of a buzzkill. I do hope it eventually makes it to the game and whatever improvements that come with it someday make it to Craglorn.

Then again maybe we'll all be pleasantly surprised and the 'bite size' content he's referring to is actually just inadvertent bad wording for the quarterly DLC we've been getting since Imperial City. After two mini DLCs back to back the fan base clearly wants another Orsinum sized update. Maybe ZOS will deliver.

*fingers crossed*

You know what I think? I wrote it in my earlier post above too. Murkmire was supposed to be an adventurer zone as Craglorn (Craglorn is really big province), but they realized, that Craglorn was a failure (group grinding zone now), so might be that they rather decided to divide the Murkmire zone into smaller DLCs, with more soloable content and maybe they focused more on the stories and graphics and so on, than on a large adventure zone. I hope I am right

Hallothiel

Was actually considering subbing due to playing this game a lot - far more than is probably that healthy - but apparently this means nothing to Zos so why should I bother. The comments were a slap in the face to those who have played for an age & have been loyal to a game they love.

jeevin

I really think Matt Firor needs to clarify just what an Argonian Dungeon Pack contains as far as content is concerned and also if this is the future of content releases from now on. For me his statement is a little vague.

If the future game releases are dungeon packs I'm tipping the game will go free to play and packs will be micro transactions. Pure speculation of course.