Why ESO rating collapsing?

Doctordarkspawn

SirAndy wrote: »

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

1. Game tried to survive entirely on PVP when it was first released.
2. And as much as you hate it, apologist, it's a valid complaint, and a valid arguement.
3. I've been dealing with this enough, and have talked to enough friends who have gone into the industry to figure it out.
4. it'll be good for a while, then -die- a few patches in. How do I know? Because I've seen it happen. So. many. ***. TIMES.

It did try to survive completely on PVP when it first released. Alot of people dont believe this for some reason.

PVP was the only form of repeatable content when the game was first released. Look at the skill system. How the *** is that designed for PVE? Pledges came with the Tamriel Unlimited patch, and the softcap system was specifically designed to limit PVP power.

It's what the game is. A hastily converted to PVE, PVP game that has never been able to figure out it's own identity.

Fuxo

There is not enough devs who can actually develop new mechanics or fix bugs. The focus is mainly on content creation and monetizing. People in suits pulling the strings. Still a great game, but with so much of wasted potential.

Banana

Doesn't worry me. Im still happy

leeux

Everyone is discussing and arguing over stuff that makes no sense (to me...), if you LOOK at the reviews you see a couple of repeated issues that are mentioned, which lead the user to give a genuine bad review:

#1: Due to some kind of bug/glitch the Steam download doesn't count for the Laucher, which want to redownload the full game again, hence DOUBLING the hard disk requirements listed on Steam page and wasting people's limited bandwidth -> There are quite a number of these and all of them mention the issue with different spellings/tones. The big issue here (that nobody seems to notice) is that as soon as you run the launcher STEAM counts that as play time thus eating on people's time for asking for refund.

#2: Many people mentioned the inability to logon after install, mentioning specific error codes and issues they were having at that time -> Probably linked to the chain of issues we had last month or so in which the server was down several times during the worse period, and many here couldn't login (including me.)

#3: Some other people mentioned that they couldn't finish the download (the official launcher's one) because network errors... this is an intermittent issue that happens depending on region and mostly attributed to the CDN service ZOS is contracting, which seem to give trouble to people in some regions.

#4: Game performance issues, bad FPS, stuttering, and general slow performance -> probably a local system issue, not taking into account the Minimum Requirement listed, etc. ect. ((not to say that there aren't genuine performance issues on the game ATM.)

#5: Some people have subjective issues: boring gameplay, fetch quests, bland visuals, etc etc. we can put these on the "Not Skyrim 2 list" and "Should have done research" list.

#6: People cite the lack of stable gameplay with game altering changes each patch (these are less than one could imagine.)

#7: I saw a total of two mentions to Bethesda and Creation Club.

Between #1 and #2 it account for more than half of the bad reviews in the last ~30 days.

FakeFox

Going after the Steam review score is honestly stupid. It means absolutely nothing. People often give bad scores because they just don't like the game, but that doesn't mean the game is bad. What actually is representative are written reviews, videos etc. Stuff were you can actually see for your self what you are getting into.

That said, how can you feel cheated about that? It's just people expressing their opinions and if you go after that it's completely your decision. Also what does it matter if the score changes after you are already playing? You have at that point already made your own opinion and the opinion of other shouldn't matter any more for you.

Kikke

This sounds like a huge l2p issue for me!

Remag_Div

I always get a laugh when a person gives a negative review that has played the game for 5,000 hours.

Doctordarkspawn

Chilly-McFreeze wrote: »

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

Chilly-McFreeze wrote: »

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

Chilly-McFreeze wrote: »

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

There's an above comment about the endless resources being demanded by the community. I say bull. Those people were outlyers, and the ammount of people who -left- the endgame community afterward shows that.

Doctor, doctor, please, just search the forum and you will find a lot of complaints about "nerf endless sustain tanks" and "i'm sick of these endless sustain, high damage, all in one pvp'ers" or how easy PvE has become because you can faceroll through everything.

So what did they do? Nerfed regen a bit, got rid of cost reduction cp, downgraded management through armor passives and touched sustain options on classes so you can go either high sustain or high damage. Made sense. Was it implemented perfectly? No, I think the last variable, the class intern sustain, was the little "too much".

And it could have ended these 24/7 tanks when they just tuned their block cost calculation a bit instead of upping the block ticks per second.

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

Issues dont get fixed. ZOS does not want your feedback. The only value you have to them, is your dollar. The story content may be good, but that is all this game has going for it anymore.

Considering that they don't listen to the community they added a lot of stuff. Housing, One Tamriel, trait rebalance, transmutation, festivals, etc. Or do you now use the knockout argument that they just add it to make more money ?

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

. As for bugfixes and everything else, it's been slow going. Not enough for the time spent.

We don't know what it takes to fix bugs in a game of this dimension. What seems like a rudimentary bug fix could effort changing to several hundred lines when it effects something else. Hence the whole "when they fix one thing, they break another" complaints.

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

Not to mention the myriad performance issues.

For what it's worth they announced performance improvement with the next update.

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

The games rating is tanking because people have stopped fooling themselves.

There are a lot of legit complaints about this game but saying basically that people fool themselves to like it is a bit over the top.

1. Yes. PVPers complained. Who are consistantly never happy. I rest my ***' case, we drove off most of the endgame community for a bunch of whiny tryhards.

2. Well, Housing was a moneysink/microtransaction opportunity, One Tamriel was a chief complaint about the game, transmutation was also something they could make money off (And are going to), trait rebalance was necessary, that I'll give you, and the festivals were really just low-work projects they could do. Batting about 50%.

3. Well, that's coding for you. That one I'll give them, it's not easy to code.

4. They -allways- announce performance upgrades. ALLWAYS. The 'kill DX9' change was supposed to bring in new glorious performance, and it actually went -down-.

There are alot of legit grievences with this game. How our feedback is virtually ignored, when it comes to a -balance- issue. (Something you like to skirt around.) How the entire game is being twisted for an audience that will never be satisfied.

I understand that you want to give credit where it's due, and I try to. But lets be fair. The game needs more people willing to shine a light on it's issues, because ZOS sure as *** wont, and because there are far too many who would pretend they dont exist. I'm not blind to the fact that they -have- improved great strides. I'm just too used to living with the things they have decided to leave unfixed. Or the practices they continue to do.

1. Same could go the other way around, doesn't it? Sorry to inform you, but PvP is just a part of ESO as PvE is.

2. Like I suspected, the knockout argument "but they make money with it". Doesn't change the fact that they implemented what people asked for.

3. You are a programmer at a tripel a mmo I guess?

4. Yes, I'm really interested how that turns out. Let's wait and see.

Like I said, there are a lot of legit complaints but not once hearing the community is an hyperbole. I said it earlier, there are a lot of things they could have implemented better and that I too criticize that seem easy to fix (like dead campaigns) and yes, some balancing is *** up beyound beliefe. But if we are serious here, most parts of that balance complaints are from people that have screwed view on balance themselves.

1. A consistantly unprofitable part. Game tried to survive entirely on PVP when it was first released. Yeeeeeah, that worked out greeeeeeat. It dont matter now, that they had to cave and make the majority of updates, and content fort he PVE audience, yes, lets just keep throwing game balance in the toilet for a bunch of people you can never please. *** that. Stop catering to them, cater to the people who actually fund this ***' game outside of subscriptions.

2. Yeah, they make money off it. It wouldn't bug me, if the updates themselves were more then a vehicle to tax more. People didn't ask to pay more. And as much as you hate it, apologist, it's a valid complaint, and a valid arguement. The quality of the feature suffers for it because they do this. It's well doccumented that what they can monitize is updated like clockwork, not what they cant. Sorry apologist.

3. I've been dealing with this enough, and have talked to enough friends who have gone into the industry to figure it out.

4. I can tell you how it'll turn out. At best, it'll be good for a while, then -die- a few patches in. How do I know? Because I've seen it happen. So. many. ***. TIMES. The game has this issue. It's as consistant as what hits live after PTS testing.

I was willing to give you the benefit of the doubt, but your another apologist. Stop damaging the game by trying to smother the voices of people who wanna talk about the games problems with a pillow. You are the most damaging influence on the game.

Kneighbors wrote: »

Chilly-McFreeze wrote: »

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

. As for bugfixes and everything else, it's been slow going. Not enough for the time spent.

We don't know what it takes to fix bugs in a game of this dimension. What seems like a rudimentary bug fix could effort changing to several hundred lines when it effects something else. Hence the whole "when they fix one thing, they break another" complaints.

@Chilly-McFreeze, man, the day Homestead landed GroupFinder was renewed. The new version had thousands of bugs and became simply unplayable. People stopped using it and only after several months ZoS started to fix issues one by one. By today it's still bugged. Today it just came somewhere near the point it was before Homestead. Many bugs but still usable. The only difference now is you are porting straight into dungeon without knowing your group (when its random) instead of seeing it first, looking which dungeon is it and then porting. It's like they are pulling you into loading screen and then you'll get to make a decision, stay or leave. Needless to say people still leaving without thinking twice when they see group of 30cps in vICP...

All that struggle was meaningless. Devs wasted their time, groupfinder lovers like me felt frustrated and many many people were spitting on groupfinder. All they had to do is simply roll back the day after release. No need to fix bugs. Just roll back to previous version of groupfinder. And if you don't have a good programmer for it simply don't touch it. Leave it as it is.

It's only a small example. All in all, the guy who wrote you that you are delusional is 100% correct.

Yep, got it. I'm a delusional apoligist because I don't get triggered by shortcommings of a game and don't see everything in an only negative way. Got it, sorry to bother you with my divergent opinion on this forum. Won't happen again, kind Sirs.

Triggered is a stupid term. Please, god, dont let this become a actual word people use decades from now.

Also, when you have a conclusive reason we should bankrupt the game for the sake of PVP and have any more arguements beyond 'your an idiot and ZOS can do no wrong" then we'll talk.

ADarklore

From what I have gathered from reading this and OP's comments... he's trying to justify his unhappiness with the game by making it sound like a huge amount are just as unhappy, which isn't true. As others have noted, most of the negative reviews on Steam have NOTHING to do with the actual gameplay... OP clearly knows this but is still trying to justify his arguments by including those type of reviews. It's quite clear this is just another "I'm upset because ZOS changed their game" threads, when in reality, EACH AND EVERY MMO changes their game over time. So if the OP doesn't like it, then they are playing the wrong type of game; the 'old school' MMOs are gone, either accept it and play what you have or accept that no matter what game you play you're going to be just as miserable.

WatchYourSixx

Kneighbors wrote: »

Nestor wrote: »

Kneighbors wrote: »

Wait, both Screen shots show 1062 recent reviews out of a total of 20,728. So, where is is dropping? Or did they just change the criteria or scoring system. Because, I see no evidence of new reviews.

In last 30 days it got only 66% positive reviews. Overall rating is 79% positive since launch. Although I didn't finish my math degree I still quite sure it means the rating is dropping (fast)

You didn't get a math degree, and thank God you didn't because your assumption is wrong.

If we take the total reviews, 20k~, and compare it to the statistics given, we see that about 15,800 players have a positive review on this game. Inversely, in the last 30 days there were 34% negative reviews, or roughly 340 people of 1000 did not like the game. If we compare the two, and subtract 340 reviews from the positive, we see that the score of the game drops about 2% or 1.7% exactly. So in the last 30 days if we assume the statistics were the same, the score 30 days ago was roughly 81%. So in the last 30 days the games rating dropped to a 79%. This to me does not indicate a rapidly dropping rating. This shows me that there has been a recent uptick in overall ratings, however it's impact as a whole will not hurt the game's overall rating. In order for this game to reach the "mixed" reviews rating, it would have to decline at a much sharper rate, otherwise it would take almost half a year for it to decline to a 70% or lower, assuming the same rate.

I didn't do exact calculations, but giving an estimate of the whole thing really just dismisses your whole argument. The exact values would be even lower, and would take even longer for this games rating to decline. And with a new dlc looming, an exciting brand new chapter looming, FLAME ATRO crown crates, and a constant improvement to the game, I can't see how this games rating could ever plummet in the near future.

So based off pure ratings, one that is a) subjective to someone actually typing up a review, and b) is only a very small portion of the player base, this games direction is perfectly fine.

Skander

Bad reviews are probably from pvp

Abeille

Taking by the talks I've been seeing around the internet, it is mostly due to the way Zenimax Media in general (I've been noticing it on both ZOS and Bethesda games) has decided to monetize their studios' games recently, in ways that are incredibly consumer-unfriendly even for the gaming industry's standards. People have been writing bad reviews lately to sort of boycott the games in the only way they know how.

It doesn't mean the quality of the games dropped. It didn't.

Brrrofski

This game is at the lowest of the low for me at the moment. Main reason is how bad they treat PvP. They do not care at all. Before, I'd do some Pve stuff like dungeons or trials, but I've done all that stuff and after 2 years, I'm bored of it. I've done it all way too many times.

But if I was brand new coming into this game, I would probably have 2 years of absolute fun again. The amount of Pve content is amazing. There is so much to do and they add more and more constantly.

If you like PvP, not going to lie, it's pretty dire. But maybe that's my opinion based on two years of frustrations. Even though I think it's in the worst place it's ever been, it might still be enjoyable for new players.

Reviews can be misleading. A lot of games are subject to review bombing now. There will be a change with the game that annoys me, so they give it negative ratings. These could be small or developers may listen. Just look at GTA V and banking mods. The games rating fell off a cliff. Rockstar ended up listening and lifting the ban.

It's all irrelevant anyway. If you've been playing the game or weeks and enjoy it, what's the issue?

Kneighbors

ADarklore wrote: »

From what I have gathered from reading this and OP's comments... he's trying to justify his unhappiness with the game by making it sound like a huge amount are just as unhappy, which isn't true. As others have noted, most of the negative reviews on Steam have NOTHING to do with the actual gameplay... OP clearly knows this but is still trying to justify his arguments by including those type of reviews. It's quite clear this is just another "I'm upset because ZOS changed their game" threads, when in reality, EACH AND EVERY MMO changes their game over time. So if the OP doesn't like it, then they are playing the wrong type of game; the 'old school' MMOs are gone, either accept it and play what you have or accept that no matter what game you play you're going to be just as miserable.

I didn't say they are unhappy. I hope they are happy. My only issue is they are not logging in anymore.

IcyDeadPeople

Kneighbors wrote: »

The overall rating is 79% positive while the latest 1k reviews are only 66% positive. Honestly, I feel cheated. When I purchased the game it was written OVERWHELMINGLY POSITIVE out there and the rating was above 85% positive. This was the primary reason I purchased the game.

Well, at this point you already own the game.

Do you personally enjoy playing it or not? That's all that matters.

When ESO first became available on Steam, the reviews were overwhelmingly negative. Much, much worse than 66%. That's partly why I bought a Steam copy, even though I already owned ESO. Wanted to be able to write a review and share my feedback, videos, artwork, guides etc for a game I enjoyed that seemed to be getting too many unfair negative reviews.

(At that time it was getting bad rap from people who never bothered trying the PVP, which IMO is the most fun part of this game, or never noticed the many improvements after launch.)

Kneighbors

WatchYourSixx wrote: »

Kneighbors wrote: »

Nestor wrote: »

Kneighbors wrote: »

Wait, both Screen shots show 1062 recent reviews out of a total of 20,728. So, where is is dropping? Or did they just change the criteria or scoring system. Because, I see no evidence of new reviews.

In last 30 days it got only 66% positive reviews. Overall rating is 79% positive since launch. Although I didn't finish my math degree I still quite sure it means the rating is dropping (fast)

You didn't get a math degree, and thank God you didn't because your assumption is wrong.

If we take the total reviews, 20k~, and compare it to the statistics given, we see that about 15,800 players have a positive review on this game. Inversely, in the last 30 days there were 34% negative reviews, or roughly 340 people of 1000 did not like the game. If we compare the two, and subtract 340 reviews from the positive, we see that the score of the game drops about 2% or 1.7% exactly. So in the last 30 days if we assume the statistics were the same, the score 30 days ago was roughly 81%. So in the last 30 days the games rating dropped to a 79%. This to me does not indicate a rapidly dropping rating. This shows me that there has been a recent uptick in overall ratings, however it's impact as a whole will not hurt the game's overall rating. In order for this game to reach the "mixed" reviews rating, it would have to decline at a much sharper rate, otherwise it would take almost half a year for it to decline to a 70% or lower, assuming the same rate.

I didn't do exact calculations, but giving an estimate of the whole thing really just dismisses your whole argument. The exact values would be even lower, and would take even longer for this games rating to decline. And with a new dlc looming, an exciting brand new chapter looming, FLAME ATRO crown crates, and a constant improvement to the game, I can't see how this games rating could ever plummet in the near future.

So based off pure ratings, one that is a) subjective to someone actually typing up a review, and b) is only a very small portion of the player base, this games direction is perfectly fine.

You are trying to play with the numbers to justify your opinion. When I choose restaurant it's much more important for me the last months review. If people say it's dirty and full of bugs it simply cancels all what was before. I won't go there because it has an interesting past and there were no bugs one year ago when I was there. Today there are bugs and 30% of people complaining on it. Same is here. They brought a game to a state where I simply wouldn't buy it in the first place. Thats why I feel cheated. I paid for subscription because I was expecting X (and I was getting X for a short while) but then they replaced X with Y.

Elsonso

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Who was fired?

Fired? No one, that we know of.

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

SirAndy wrote: »

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

1. Game tried to survive entirely on PVP when it was first released.
2. And as much as you hate it, apologist, it's a valid complaint, and a valid arguement.
3. I've been dealing with this enough, and have talked to enough friends who have gone into the industry to figure it out.
4. it'll be good for a while, then -die- a few patches in. How do I know? Because I've seen it happen. So. many. ***. TIMES.

It did try to survive completely on PVP when it first released. Alot of people dont believe this for some reason.

PVP was the only form of repeatable content when the game was first released. Look at the skill system. How the *** is that designed for PVE? Pledges came with the Tamriel Unlimited patch, and the softcap system was specifically designed to limit PVP power.

It's what the game is. A hastily converted to PVE, PVP game that has never been able to figure out it's own identity.

You make it sound like the game was intended to be primarily PVP and that PVE was an after thought. That is not true.

Doctordarkspawn

lordrichter wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Who was fired?

Fired? No one, that we know of.

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

SirAndy wrote: »

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

1. Game tried to survive entirely on PVP when it was first released.
2. And as much as you hate it, apologist, it's a valid complaint, and a valid arguement.
3. I've been dealing with this enough, and have talked to enough friends who have gone into the industry to figure it out.
4. it'll be good for a while, then -die- a few patches in. How do I know? Because I've seen it happen. So. many. ***. TIMES.

It did try to survive completely on PVP when it first released. Alot of people dont believe this for some reason.

PVP was the only form of repeatable content when the game was first released. Look at the skill system. How the *** is that designed for PVE? Pledges came with the Tamriel Unlimited patch, and the softcap system was specifically designed to limit PVP power.

It's what the game is. A hastily converted to PVE, PVP game that has never been able to figure out it's own identity.

You make it sound like the game was intended to be primarily PVP and that PVE was an after thought. That is not true.

It absolutely is true.

And that is what it is. The game was made, it is said, by some staff that worked on Dark Age of Camelot. I dont know whether or not that's true, come to think of it, but it -was- a selling point for many people when the game was new. PVP, given the setting, and the mechanics involved was clearly ment to be a major, if not the major, activity. And given it was the -only- repeatable content on release, it's reasonable to assume this was a PVP game. Hell. Most of the PVPers I talk to on the regular, say the same.

Sorry if you dont see it. But it was. It was only after the sub was cut they figured out they couldn't survive off it, at least not on a sub model.

As for 'fired', there was a massive ammount of layoffs record in about 2015. We dont know who. We do know, the then creative director left the game, who was responsible for much of the old back (IE, softcaps, and such) that was the design norm back then. It is directly after this that many changes (Block-regen among them) were implimented. Some PVP. Some PVE. And it''s here I can generally point to the design split. Some large PVP changes occur. Then PVE changes. Large, sweeping changes with no real aim aside from 'different'.

It's been a staple of the design. Large sweeping changes like Morrowind which *** many people off and dont seem to do anything aside from mix things up. Did it improve PVE? No, it slowed it down, most people hate it. Did it improve PVP? Well, I still hear all the zerg talk so I assume no. The more things change, the more things stay the same.

Elsonso

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

lordrichter wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Who was fired?

Fired? No one, that we know of.

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

SirAndy wrote: »

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

1. Game tried to survive entirely on PVP when it was first released.
2. And as much as you hate it, apologist, it's a valid complaint, and a valid arguement.
3. I've been dealing with this enough, and have talked to enough friends who have gone into the industry to figure it out.
4. it'll be good for a while, then -die- a few patches in. How do I know? Because I've seen it happen. So. many. ***. TIMES.

It did try to survive completely on PVP when it first released. Alot of people dont believe this for some reason.

PVP was the only form of repeatable content when the game was first released. Look at the skill system. How the *** is that designed for PVE? Pledges came with the Tamriel Unlimited patch, and the softcap system was specifically designed to limit PVP power.

It's what the game is. A hastily converted to PVE, PVP game that has never been able to figure out it's own identity.

You make it sound like the game was intended to be primarily PVP and that PVE was an after thought. That is not true.

It absolutely is true.

And that is what it is. The game was made, it is said, by some staff that worked on Dark Age of Camelot. I dont know whether or not that's true, come to think of it, but it -was- a selling point for many people when the game was new. PVP, given the setting, and the mechanics involved was clearly ment to be a major, if not the major, activity. And given it was the -only- repeatable content on release, it's reasonable to assume this was a PVP game. Hell. Most of the PVPers I talk to on the regular, say the same.

Sorry if you dont see it. But it was. It was only after the sub was cut they figured out they couldn't survive off it, at least not on a sub model.

As for 'fired', there was a massive ammount of layoffs record in about 2015. We dont know who. We do know, the then creative director left the game, who was responsible for much of the old back (IE, softcaps, and such) that was the design norm back then.

Yes, there is some similarity to DAoC, but the game was not intended to subsist on PVP. I was there. Don't confuse the fact that ZOS likes to roll out stuff before it is fully developed as being an indication that the game was intended to be held up by PVP. PVE end game elements that did not make it into the intial release, due to the fact that ZOS figured they had time to slip this stuff in, were being developed long before the game was released.

In fact, the game rolled out with a major emphasis on single player PVE, the only problem being that ZOS was slow in developing the end-game because of their "MMOs are never done" mentality that made them think they had time.

It is not safe to say that Sage, or Konkle, or any of the top staff that left, was "fired". It is also not safe to say that these people left for any reason other than they wanted to go do something else. They have not said. No one else who has any credibility would gossip about it.

DaveMoeDee

FakeFox wrote: »

Going after the Steam review score is honestly stupid. It means absolutely nothing. People often give bad scores because they just don't like the game, but that doesn't mean the game is bad. What actually is representative are written reviews, videos etc. Stuff were you can actually see for your self what you are getting into.

That said, how can you feel cheated about that? It's just people expressing their opinions and if you go after that it's completely your decision. Also what does it matter if the score changes after you are already playing? You have at that point already made your own opinion and the opinion of other shouldn't matter any more for you.

In fact, Steam added graphs so people can track when basement dwellers get together and spam bad reviews for a game for some reason unrelated to the quality of the game. Great games often see a serious drop in score a year after release for so political reason.

For example, look at Skyrim. The recent reviews are now "mixed". Why? Almost every new negative review is about Creation Club. We have imbeciles re-rating an old game based on a minor feature being added. Sure, Creation Club is pathetic. But it is an insignificant part of the game. Yet the OP wants to evaluate the quality games based on reviews that aren't at all based on the quality of the game.

I assume that if the OP played Skyrim, he is pissed now because he would not have purchased it if reviews were mixed.

DaveMoeDee

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

lordrichter wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Who was fired?

Fired? No one, that we know of.

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

SirAndy wrote: »

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

1. Game tried to survive entirely on PVP when it was first released.
2. And as much as you hate it, apologist, it's a valid complaint, and a valid arguement.
3. I've been dealing with this enough, and have talked to enough friends who have gone into the industry to figure it out.
4. it'll be good for a while, then -die- a few patches in. How do I know? Because I've seen it happen. So. many. ***. TIMES.

It did try to survive completely on PVP when it first released. Alot of people dont believe this for some reason.

PVP was the only form of repeatable content when the game was first released. Look at the skill system. How the *** is that designed for PVE? Pledges came with the Tamriel Unlimited patch, and the softcap system was specifically designed to limit PVP power.

It's what the game is. A hastily converted to PVE, PVP game that has never been able to figure out it's own identity.

You make it sound like the game was intended to be primarily PVP and that PVE was an after thought. That is not true.

It absolutely is true.

And that is what it is. The game was made, it is said, by some staff that worked on Dark Age of Camelot. I dont know whether or not that's true, come to think of it, but it -was- a selling point for many people when the game was new. PVP, given the setting, and the mechanics involved was clearly ment to be a major, if not the major, activity. And given it was the -only- repeatable content on release, it's reasonable to assume this was a PVP game. Hell. Most of the PVPers I talk to on the regular, say the same.

Sorry if you dont see it. But it was. It was only after the sub was cut they figured out they couldn't survive off it, at least not on a sub model.

As for 'fired', there was a massive ammount of layoffs record in about 2015. We dont know who. We do know, the then creative director left the game, who was responsible for much of the old back (IE, softcaps, and such) that was the design norm back then. It is directly after this that many changes (Block-regen among them) were implimented. Some PVP. Some PVE. And it''s here I can generally point to the design split. Some large PVP changes occur. Then PVE changes. Large, sweeping changes with no real aim aside from 'different'.

It's been a staple of the design. Large sweeping changes like Morrowind which *** many people off and dont seem to do anything aside from mix things up. Did it improve PVE? No, it slowed it down, most people hate it. Did it improve PVP? Well, I still hear all the zerg talk so I assume no. The more things change, the more things stay the same.

Definitely not. Cyrodiil is just one homogenous zone. There was a ton of fully voice-acted PvE at launch. It is not reasonable to assume this was a PvP game considering they clearly focused their development budget on the PvE.

I don't see the relevance of "repeatable content". Most people they were targeting would spend months completing the base game PvE. Most wouldn't be close to completing that before Craglorn came out. Because most would be TES fans like me who gon't give a crap about "endgame".

I have been anti-rebalancing from day 1. It never satisfied the people crying about balance and it just inconvenienced those of us who just want to play the game. I can't disagree with your critiques there.

Alexandrious

Kneighbors wrote: »

Chilly-McFreeze wrote: »

11 months in the forum, nearly 500 comments, over 70 discussions, 5 star forum rating so you're definitely not new here.
An attitude that is hostile against ZOS developers and community ambassadors,
demanding vet trial nerfs because playing on a crappy pc but also demanding a price dip because of in-game nerfs
and last but not least feeling cheating because some other guys rated the game into mediocrity after you played it for nearly a year or longer.

I've come to terms to not take you seriously anymore.

Crappy PC? I've got this years MSI gaming laptop

Aaaaaand thats where I stopped reading and had to lulz.

Alexandrious

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

Chilly-McFreeze wrote: »

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

Chilly-McFreeze wrote: »

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

Chilly-McFreeze wrote: »

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

There's an above comment about the endless resources being demanded by the community. I say bull. Those people were outlyers, and the ammount of people who -left- the endgame community afterward shows that.

Doctor, doctor, please, just search the forum and you will find a lot of complaints about "nerf endless sustain tanks" and "i'm sick of these endless sustain, high damage, all in one pvp'ers" or how easy PvE has become because you can faceroll through everything.

So what did they do? Nerfed regen a bit, got rid of cost reduction cp, downgraded management through armor passives and touched sustain options on classes so you can go either high sustain or high damage. Made sense. Was it implemented perfectly? No, I think the last variable, the class intern sustain, was the little "too much".

And it could have ended these 24/7 tanks when they just tuned their block cost calculation a bit instead of upping the block ticks per second.

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

Issues dont get fixed. ZOS does not want your feedback. The only value you have to them, is your dollar. The story content may be good, but that is all this game has going for it anymore.

Considering that they don't listen to the community they added a lot of stuff. Housing, One Tamriel, trait rebalance, transmutation, festivals, etc. Or do you now use the knockout argument that they just add it to make more money ?

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

. As for bugfixes and everything else, it's been slow going. Not enough for the time spent.

We don't know what it takes to fix bugs in a game of this dimension. What seems like a rudimentary bug fix could effort changing to several hundred lines when it effects something else. Hence the whole "when they fix one thing, they break another" complaints.

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

Not to mention the myriad performance issues.

For what it's worth they announced performance improvement with the next update.

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

The games rating is tanking because people have stopped fooling themselves.

There are a lot of legit complaints about this game but saying basically that people fool themselves to like it is a bit over the top.

1. Yes. PVPers complained. Who are consistantly never happy. I rest my ***' case, we drove off most of the endgame community for a bunch of whiny tryhards.

2. Well, Housing was a moneysink/microtransaction opportunity, One Tamriel was a chief complaint about the game, transmutation was also something they could make money off (And are going to), trait rebalance was necessary, that I'll give you, and the festivals were really just low-work projects they could do. Batting about 50%.

3. Well, that's coding for you. That one I'll give them, it's not easy to code.

4. They -allways- announce performance upgrades. ALLWAYS. The 'kill DX9' change was supposed to bring in new glorious performance, and it actually went -down-.

There are alot of legit grievences with this game. How our feedback is virtually ignored, when it comes to a -balance- issue. (Something you like to skirt around.) How the entire game is being twisted for an audience that will never be satisfied.

I understand that you want to give credit where it's due, and I try to. But lets be fair. The game needs more people willing to shine a light on it's issues, because ZOS sure as *** wont, and because there are far too many who would pretend they dont exist. I'm not blind to the fact that they -have- improved great strides. I'm just too used to living with the things they have decided to leave unfixed. Or the practices they continue to do.

1. Same could go the other way around, doesn't it? Sorry to inform you, but PvP is just a part of ESO as PvE is.

2. Like I suspected, the knockout argument "but they make money with it". Doesn't change the fact that they implemented what people asked for.

3. You are a programmer at a tripel a mmo I guess?

4. Yes, I'm really interested how that turns out. Let's wait and see.

Like I said, there are a lot of legit complaints but not once hearing the community is an hyperbole. I said it earlier, there are a lot of things they could have implemented better and that I too criticize that seem easy to fix (like dead campaigns) and yes, some balancing is *** up beyound beliefe. But if we are serious here, most parts of that balance complaints are from people that have screwed view on balance themselves.

1. A consistantly unprofitable part. Game tried to survive entirely on PVP when it was first released. Yeeeeeah, that worked out greeeeeeat. It dont matter now, that they had to cave and make the majority of updates, and content fort he PVE audience, yes, lets just keep throwing game balance in the toilet for a bunch of people you can never please. *** that. Stop catering to them, cater to the people who actually fund this ***' game outside of subscriptions.

2. Yeah, they make money off it. It wouldn't bug me, if the updates themselves were more then a vehicle to tax more. People didn't ask to pay more. And as much as you hate it, apologist, it's a valid complaint, and a valid arguement. The quality of the feature suffers for it because they do this. It's well doccumented that what they can monitize is updated like clockwork, not what they cant. Sorry apologist.

3. I've been dealing with this enough, and have talked to enough friends who have gone into the industry to figure it out.

4. I can tell you how it'll turn out. At best, it'll be good for a while, then -die- a few patches in. How do I know? Because I've seen it happen. So. many. ***. TIMES. The game has this issue. It's as consistant as what hits live after PTS testing.

I was willing to give you the benefit of the doubt, but your another apologist. Stop damaging the game by trying to smother the voices of people who wanna talk about the games problems with a pillow. You are the most damaging influence on the game.

Kneighbors wrote: »

Chilly-McFreeze wrote: »

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

. As for bugfixes and everything else, it's been slow going. Not enough for the time spent.

We don't know what it takes to fix bugs in a game of this dimension. What seems like a rudimentary bug fix could effort changing to several hundred lines when it effects something else. Hence the whole "when they fix one thing, they break another" complaints.

@Chilly-McFreeze, man, the day Homestead landed GroupFinder was renewed. The new version had thousands of bugs and became simply unplayable. People stopped using it and only after several months ZoS started to fix issues one by one. By today it's still bugged. Today it just came somewhere near the point it was before Homestead. Many bugs but still usable. The only difference now is you are porting straight into dungeon without knowing your group (when its random) instead of seeing it first, looking which dungeon is it and then porting. It's like they are pulling you into loading screen and then you'll get to make a decision, stay or leave. Needless to say people still leaving without thinking twice when they see group of 30cps in vICP...

All that struggle was meaningless. Devs wasted their time, groupfinder lovers like me felt frustrated and many many people were spitting on groupfinder. All they had to do is simply roll back the day after release. No need to fix bugs. Just roll back to previous version of groupfinder. And if you don't have a good programmer for it simply don't touch it. Leave it as it is.

It's only a small example. All in all, the guy who wrote you that you are delusional is 100% correct.

Yep, got it. I'm a delusional apoligist because I don't get triggered by shortcommings of a game and don't see everything in an only negative way. Got it, sorry to bother you with my divergent opinion on this forum. Won't happen again, kind Sirs.

Triggered is a stupid term. Please, god, dont let this become a actual word people use decades from now.

Also, when you have a conclusive reason we should bankrupt the game for the sake of PVP and have any more arguements beyond 'your an idiot and ZOS can do no wrong" then we'll talk.

Its too late, even japanese anime is using it now ._., saw a Gintama episode where Gintoki literally said "Triggered" in the Japanese word for it.

It made me lulz.

Turelus

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

lordrichter wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Who was fired?

Fired? No one, that we know of.

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

SirAndy wrote: »

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

1. Game tried to survive entirely on PVP when it was first released.
2. And as much as you hate it, apologist, it's a valid complaint, and a valid arguement.
3. I've been dealing with this enough, and have talked to enough friends who have gone into the industry to figure it out.
4. it'll be good for a while, then -die- a few patches in. How do I know? Because I've seen it happen. So. many. ***. TIMES.

It did try to survive completely on PVP when it first released. Alot of people dont believe this for some reason.

PVP was the only form of repeatable content when the game was first released. Look at the skill system. How the *** is that designed for PVE? Pledges came with the Tamriel Unlimited patch, and the softcap system was specifically designed to limit PVP power.

It's what the game is. A hastily converted to PVE, PVP game that has never been able to figure out it's own identity.

You make it sound like the game was intended to be primarily PVP and that PVE was an after thought. That is not true.

It absolutely is true.

And that is what it is. The game was made, it is said, by some staff that worked on Dark Age of Camelot. I dont know whether or not that's true, come to think of it, but it -was- a selling point for many people when the game was new. PVP, given the setting, and the mechanics involved was clearly ment to be a major, if not the major, activity. And given it was the -only- repeatable content on release, it's reasonable to assume this was a PVP game. Hell. Most of the PVPers I talk to on the regular, say the same.

Sorry if you dont see it. But it was. It was only after the sub was cut they figured out they couldn't survive off it, at least not on a sub model.

As for 'fired', there was a massive ammount of layoffs record in about 2015. We dont know who. We do know, the then creative director left the game, who was responsible for much of the old back (IE, softcaps, and such) that was the design norm back then. It is directly after this that many changes (Block-regen among them) were implimented. Some PVP. Some PVE. And it''s here I can generally point to the design split. Some large PVP changes occur. Then PVE changes. Large, sweeping changes with no real aim aside from 'different'.

It's been a staple of the design. Large sweeping changes like Morrowind which *** many people off and dont seem to do anything aside from mix things up. Did it improve PVE? No, it slowed it down, most people hate it. Did it improve PVP? Well, I still hear all the zerg talk so I assume no. The more things change, the more things stay the same.

You seem to be taking a lot of partial information and making something which fits from it.

Yes there are DAoC devs here, the CEO of the company is one of them (Matt Firor).
Yes there were massive lay-offs in the past, most of that was customer support positions IIRC.
Two prominent devs left for other companies, they were not fired.

Every change you speak about was a change in reaction to developing the game. When this game launch the idea of skills were "cool things you used and mixed" then the player base optimised the hell out of it and we create Stam vs Mag as build concepts and forced ZOS to spend the next three (and still going) years trying to balance that.

Morrowind changes were large because they needed to bite the sustain creep in the butt and as Rich said (somewhere) if they did it one step at a time we would be waiting two years for full sustain/max damage to be fixed.
The change in that was that now we need to actively consider sustain and not just stack every single enchant and set bonus as damage.

Is it perfect? No. There are a lot of changes I don't like such as light weave being the only meta for damage now, that heavy attacks do less damage (lol wot?) etc.

However we see threads and comments on these forums daily where people whine and cry about how terrible this game is, how it's dead, how ZOS doesn't listen etc.

However if people take a moment, take a deep breath, and think rationally about how the game is now vs launch and what ZOS are currently doing then you can see the game is progressing and has a team who are passionate about it.

I was like OP and others on these forums in the past, I whined and ranted, I complained and call ZOS bad in the end I quit the game for six months. However in taking a step away I was able to look objectively at the game, at ZOS and at my life and realise the reason the game sucked and I didn't have fun was because of me, not ZOS or the game.

So I came back with a "take it for what it is, be critical but shrug off the stuff you hate" and I actually have fun now, I even see where ZOS is going with some things and like it. They make changes I don't like and I leave my feedback critically but respectfully and I try to show others how bone headed they can be over things.

If your entire focus in ESO is how much you hate it and how you hate ZOS then go, you're only making yourself unhappy and there is more to life than being mad about a video game.

That's my rant done any way.

FriedEggSandwich

I've played since launch with no longer than a 4 month break. My opinion of the game has declined because of all the complete overhauls and heavy handed balancing. I cba to keep up any more if I'm honest. I'm currently just playing to try to rescue some value out of a game I have too much invested in.

idk

Kneighbors wrote: »

rotaugen454 wrote: »

My wife had negative ratings from ex-boyfriends, but I'm happy with her.

Well maybe its simply that your expectations are lower than theirs.. I buy high rated cars (not expensive, high rated, like toyota), high rated cell phones.. anything I buy I check the reviews before I push "Buy it now". You think this is wrong? Well it's up to you. Go for the bad reviews and I can assure you will find what you are looking for. If 66% of people tell that the car is good this is really bad rating. Its 34% who had problems with it. Same for the cellphone. Same for the game.

Cars are fairly irrelevant to the conversation. Those that are playing ESO clearly like something about it or they would find a game that fits their style.

Just because there was a wave of players of the small group that play ESO via steam that gave bad ratings this month does not really offer much meaning in itself. Small time period of a minority group that have played ESO. Many have played ESO for 2-3 years and the strong raiding community I see and avid PvP players I see demonstrates something is still appealing to a great many players.

A reminder, steam statistics demonstrates a doubling of players year over year for ESO. A picture of a month versus the previous month offers meaningless value in addition to it being a minority view of the games population.

So if you enjoy the game keep playing it. If it is a real drag for you or you prefer to let other's opinions decide your fate then follow the path that suits you.

@Turelus

You are correct.

For one, shortly after the game launched Zos reduced their workforce of developers. Most, if not all, were contract workers and it is common game developers reduce the size of the development teams shortly after launch. That was the initial workforce reduction and it is common in this industry after the game launches. More were probably released after the console launch, but they were probably brought on after the PC launch since I do not think Consoles were in the initial plans, but an idea added later in development.

Also, you are correct that the two senior developers were not fired but went on to other opportunities. Of course we do not know the reasons for their choice but after working on a game for near a decade it may have been wanting to do something different. Not unheard of.

And yes, @ZOS_MattFiror came from DAOC and his influence is seen especially in PvP with the varying terrain and large area for Cyrodiil as well as the distance we have between possible objectives. Much, including a map design that essentially pushes players to pass through small areas comes from DAOC. Anyone who played there would recognize some of this. Even having PvE dungeons in Cyrodiil comes from DOAC. It is why so many players used to play DOAC.

thedude33

Stopnaggin wrote: »

Just play the game and enjoy. Ratings are from people mad at developments they dont like.

Good advice.

Huyen

I only buy and play games I like. I do reference the reviews a bit more, but thats more gameplay related tbh, like if 90% says "Its a huge grind" then I'm more likely to decide not to buy it. But still...people opinions are no guarantee for the future of a game.

Edit: typos

Elsonso

Huyen wrote: »

I only buy and play games I like. I do reference the reviews a bit more, but thats more gameplay related tbh, like if 90% says "Its a huge grind" then I'm more likely to decide not to buy it. But still...people opinions are no guarantee for the future of a game.

Edit: typos

It is hard to tell whether a game can be "liked" prior to purchase, and while user reviews can help, they are risky when used as a purchasing decision. User reviews tend to be filled with the "Uninformed Consumer", who really does not know what they are talking about, the "Axe-To-Grind Customer", who is just in it to get people to not buy or use the product, and the "Sheeple", who really don't have original thoughts so they just say what sounds like the popular thing to say. I tend to use professional reviews as they are more reliable to base decisions on. It is usually much easier to tell the bias of a professional review.

Wifeaggro13

Turelus wrote: »

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

lordrichter wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Who was fired?

Fired? No one, that we know of.

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

SirAndy wrote: »

Doctordarkspawn wrote: »

1. Game tried to survive entirely on PVP when it was first released.
2. And as much as you hate it, apologist, it's a valid complaint, and a valid arguement.
3. I've been dealing with this enough, and have talked to enough friends who have gone into the industry to figure it out.
4. it'll be good for a while, then -die- a few patches in. How do I know? Because I've seen it happen. So. many. ***. TIMES.

It did try to survive completely on PVP when it first released. Alot of people dont believe this for some reason.

PVP was the only form of repeatable content when the game was first released. Look at the skill system. How the *** is that designed for PVE? Pledges came with the Tamriel Unlimited patch, and the softcap system was specifically designed to limit PVP power.

It's what the game is. A hastily converted to PVE, PVP game that has never been able to figure out it's own identity.

You make it sound like the game was intended to be primarily PVP and that PVE was an after thought. That is not true.

It absolutely is true.

And that is what it is. The game was made, it is said, by some staff that worked on Dark Age of Camelot. I dont know whether or not that's true, come to think of it, but it -was- a selling point for many people when the game was new. PVP, given the setting, and the mechanics involved was clearly ment to be a major, if not the major, activity. And given it was the -only- repeatable content on release, it's reasonable to assume this was a PVP game. Hell. Most of the PVPers I talk to on the regular, say the same.

Sorry if you dont see it. But it was. It was only after the sub was cut they figured out they couldn't survive off it, at least not on a sub model.

As for 'fired', there was a massive ammount of layoffs record in about 2015. We dont know who. We do know, the then creative director left the game, who was responsible for much of the old back (IE, softcaps, and such) that was the design norm back then. It is directly after this that many changes (Block-regen among them) were implimented. Some PVP. Some PVE. And it''s here I can generally point to the design split. Some large PVP changes occur. Then PVE changes. Large, sweeping changes with no real aim aside from 'different'.

It's been a staple of the design. Large sweeping changes like Morrowind which *** many people off and dont seem to do anything aside from mix things up. Did it improve PVE? No, it slowed it down, most people hate it. Did it improve PVP? Well, I still hear all the zerg talk so I assume no. The more things change, the more things stay the same.

You seem to be taking a lot of partial information and making something which fits from it.

Yes there are DAoC devs here, the CEO of the company is one of them (Matt Firor).
Yes there were massive lay-offs in the past, most of that was customer support positions IIRC.
Two prominent devs left for other companies, they were not fired.

Every change you speak about was a change in reaction to developing the game. When this game launch the idea of skills were "cool things you used and mixed" then the player base optimised the hell out of it and we create Stam vs Mag as build concepts and forced ZOS to spend the next three (and still going) years trying to balance that.

Morrowind changes were large because they needed to bite the sustain creep in the butt and as Rich said (somewhere) if they did it one step at a time we would be waiting two years for full sustain/max damage to be fixed.
The change in that was that now we need to actively consider sustain and not just stack every single enchant and set bonus as damage.

Is it perfect? No. There are a lot of changes I don't like such as light weave being the only meta for damage now, that heavy attacks do less damage (lol wot?) etc.

However we see threads and comments on these forums daily where people whine and cry about how terrible this game is, how it's dead, how ZOS doesn't listen etc.

However if people take a moment, take a deep breath, and think rationally about how the game is now vs launch and what ZOS are currently doing then you can see the game is progressing and has a team who are passionate about it.

I was like OP and others on these forums in the past, I whined and ranted, I complained and call ZOS bad in the end I quit the game for six months. However in taking a step away I was able to look objectively at the game, at ZOS and at my life and realise the reason the game sucked and I didn't have fun was because of me, not ZOS or the game.

So I came back with a "take it for what it is, be critical but shrug off the stuff you hate" and I actually have fun now, I even see where ZOS is going with some things and like it. They make changes I don't like and I leave my feedback critically but respectfully and I try to show others how bone headed they can be over things.

If your entire focus in ESO is how much you hate it and how you hate ZOS then go, you're only making yourself unhappy and there is more to life than being mad about a video game.

That's my rant done any way.

The Dev team is from many different games AOC eq 2 and doac. my biggest problem with ESO is they focus primarily on content for single player RPG the old school traditional MMO gamer really was abondoned for a lower hanging fruit.IC was a great value lots of content for all players for 15 bucks. If you look at games with smaller budgets they were able to add races classes new starter zones and evolve AA advancement while keeping up with the end game player base content consumption. EQ2 had 3 major expansions by this point that evolved their AA system added new races and so much new content for max players you kept busy for months not weeks . the game direction did change when Paul and knick left its that simple. Matt from day one wanted online RPG and Paul wanted a game for MMO in genral. look at all the things that were scraped Murkmire , spell crafting and a horrible point buy system to replace VR. the CP system could have been ,wonderful guilds should have been active not passives just like the fighter guilds. the game went in a different direction with them quitting or being fired you will never hear them talk about it in interviews, both were talented not that matt is not. he just does not make a good pve MMO nor does he care too.