No offense but that preview for the update 43 was a horrible letdown

wrrn519_ESO · July 3

Not only was the housing announcement a big disappointment the small incremental QoL you could have done throughout the year in small patches. That was a big letdown. Please do not hype us up for announcements only to tell us, ummm we are making it so anyone can come into your house.

ComboBreaker88 · July 3

tsaescishoeshiner · July 3

I don't think there was any hyping-up for the update, other than "watch the stream to see what's coming." We got a long-requested feature that will bring some new life to housing, and a big update to the Archive. It makes sense to be disappointed, but I think all the hype happened in players' heads.

Syldras · July 3

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

I don't think there was any hyping-up for the update, other than "watch the stream to see what's coming." We got a long-requested feature that will bring some new life to housing, and a big update to the Archive. It makes sense to be disappointed, but I think all the hype happened in players' heads.

Yes, they only said "feature" in the roadmap:

But it's not exactly much for a Q3, especially comparing it with what we got in earlier years.

I'm not sure anymore how hopeful people should be for Q4, to be honest, as they only call that one "feature", too.

RobertJFCalais · July 3

Considering I've never heard a single good thing about the company behind this game - and I myself am still relatively new to it, which means I haven't seen them do anything good and thus, my expectations are very, very low - I wasn't expecting anything of substance to come from today's preview.

I was hoping for an ESO+-exclusive, infinitely-sized furniture bag or increased furniture slots, but I was expecting nothing at all.

Within my very first week of playing this game, it became abundantly clear that the target playerbase are console players, because I can't imagine anything but a controller with which the controls in this game aren't absolute ***.
Console players have inferior hardware that would go up in flames if Zenimax allowed as much as a single extra spoon in some random person's mansion filled with 200 giant boulders and 300 even more giant statues... and the 200 ugly pieces of shrubbery that come with every other home. Hence why we PC players won't have the luxury of being more creative. Ever.

Alas, we can take any of the 700-slot homes they keep giving away for free because noone wants to buy them and just shove all our excess furnishings into these. Unlike in Guild Wars 2's housing, where you don't even get to choose what goes where because your furnishing process is as much as predefined assets being added the further you get into the expansion story, we can actually do that.

If you truly want Zenimax to finally start working for their money, you need to stop giving them your money in the first place. A capitalist never changes a running scheme. Making your voices heard is the first step in the right direction, making consequences follow suit is the next logical step you need to have the balls for if what you're hoping to achieve is more than just needlessly venting your frustration.

fizzylu · July 4

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

I don't think there was any hyping-up for the update, other than "watch the stream to see what's coming." We got a long-requested feature that will bring some new life to housing, and a big update to the Archive. It makes sense to be disappointed, but I think all the hype happened in players' heads.

Maybe it's because we're floating in different ESO circles, but I don't know a single person who wanted or felt the need for something like what they announced. Most people I know like to keep their homes private to just friends/guildies, and sometimes not even those. And the biggest thing to note.... calling this a "new feature" is a reach. It's a QoL system at most.
Being able to list a house in a little UI panel adds nothing to the game for most people who are seriously into housing. All this really does and what it will be mostly used for is to help people who lack creativity or inspiration for homes (not throwing shade with this, just stating how it is) to get it from someone else.... which was technically already possible, just not conveniently put together in it's own little section of the Group & Activity finder.

Soarora · July 4

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

I don't think there was any hyping-up for the update, other than "watch the stream to see what's coming." We got a long-requested feature that will bring some new life to housing, and a big update to the Archive. It makes sense to be disappointed, but I think all the hype happened in players' heads.

I had no hype at all and no expectations other than “housing update”, “not dungeons”, “maybe bug fixes again”, and I’m still disappointed.

TaSheen · July 4

fizzylu wrote: »

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

I don't think there was any hyping-up for the update, other than "watch the stream to see what's coming." We got a long-requested feature that will bring some new life to housing, and a big update to the Archive. It makes sense to be disappointed, but I think all the hype happened in players' heads.

Maybe it's because we're floating in different ESO circles, but I don't know a single person who wanted or felt the need for something like what they announced. Most people I know like to keep their homes private to just friends/guildies, and sometimes not even those. And the biggest thing to note.... calling this a "new feature" is a reach. It's a QoL system at most.
Being able to list a house in a little UI panel adds nothing to the game for most people who are seriously into housing. All this really does and what it will be mostly used for is to help people who lack creativity or inspiration for homes (not throwing shade with this, just stating how it is) to get it from someone else.... which was technically already possible, just not conveniently put together in it's own little section of the Group & Activity finder.

I.... think.... this just shows the disconnect between what players want from this game - and what the devs *think* the players want. Or what the devs want and to hell with the players?

Now, mind - I'm fine myself with what they've "added" - because I don't care personally about any of it (as long as the "house tour" silliness is absolutely optional - as it seems to be at this point). But none of it is anything I care about at all, in the long run (or even in the short run).

I have my way to play - and it does not in any way equal whatever these devs seem to have in mind as how "MMO players" actually play.

There will come a point when I will simply not renew 4 annual subs and bid ESO a (more or less....) fond farewell. That day is not today. I don't have any idea when that day will be.

But I'm pretty certain it will happen eventually.

LittlePinkDot · July 4

I don't know why anybody even bothers with housing. It's seems boring. It's just a place to store a few storage chests and that's it. Everything else about it is useless.

OtarTheMad · July 4

Given what Q3 was last year I had no expectations going in. I think the announcement stream went fine.

TaSheen · July 4

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

I don't know why anybody even bothers with housing. It's seems boring. It's just a place to store a few storage chests and that's it. Everything else about it is useless.

There are some of us who just enjoy tweaking a place to our tastes. Sure, there's real life houses - but tweaking them costs a LOT OF RL MONEY.

I am really happy to spend in game gold on tweaking in game housing, since retirement income doesn't really allow me to change my house on a regular basis.

Nharimlur_Finor · July 4

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

I don't know why anybody even bothers with housing. It's seems boring. It's just a place to store a few storage chests and that's it. Everything else about it is useless.

Alts get ports to sometimes difficult to get-to areas. Free travel is secondary.

I'm used to snap-to grid placement as per that housing simulator. This system generally frustrates me.

Placing storage chests is the limit of my housing interaction now.

Amottica · July 4

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

I don't think there was any hyping-up for the update, other than "watch the stream to see what's coming." We got a long-requested feature that will bring some new life to housing, and a big update to the Archive. It makes sense to be disappointed, but I think all the hype happened in players' heads.

You are correct that each of us sets our own expectations.

fizzylu · July 4

TaSheen wrote: »

Or what the devs want and to hell with the players?.

This has been my opinion on how Zenimax operates for awhile. But most of all, my problem isn't that this is being added over something else.... it's that they behave as if they consider this a whole new feature that warrants some big announcement and hype instead of treating it like a small QoL update, which is what it actually is. And imagine what's to come when they use this QoL system as a reason to ignore housing for how many more years, just constantly throwing overpriced homes at us and more furnishings that we barely already have room for.

I have always struggled with my thoughts on Zenimax and haven't liked how they handled this game since it first released (the limitations of the engine and servers being on the very top of the list of problems, obviously). There are things that keep me coming back to the game though; the love I have for my Khajiit sorcerer, the housing system that allows me to be creative and get actual use out of it via crafting stations/storage/etc, evergreen features and zones, the no need for constant gear farming at endgame, the fact that this was my best friends favorite game, and once upon a time even the PvP.... but I have to draw a line somewhere and it looks like this is where I'll be doing it.

I can't keep giving my money, because I'm never going to pretend like I have a lot of it, to a company that I don't think deserves it and sadly continues to make me feel that way more and more. And as the years have gone by, with new chapters there has definitely been less and less for me to even put my time into within the game. I seriously haven't consistently played ESO in 2 or 3 years.... more of just play for a month or two then go to another game, rinse and repeat type situation. But I've loved MMOs since I was young and I do want to see the genre thrive.... there's just a little voice in my head that can't stand when I choose to support ESO over MMOs from game studios that are putting so much time, effort, and thought into ACTUAL features (and QoL systems) that their players actually want and the game actually needs. And I'm simply going to stop ignoring it. I do think it's great that you still can be happy within ESO and I hope that for you that doesn't change though.

Soarora · July 4

fizzylu wrote: »

TaSheen wrote: »

Or what the devs want and to hell with the players?.

This has been my opinion on how Zenimax operates for awhile.

I'll never forget how they talked about ToT. We wanted Legends because the game was wonderful and is now in maintenance mode and will never be updated again. ESO could've possibly saved Legends somehow, at least that's what I hoped no matter how impossible it really was. But we got ToT, and ZOS employees talked about how much they loved playing it. Felt like an appeal to the community as one of us but missed the mark when people's response was "we didn't ask for this".

Araneae6537 · July 4

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

I don't know why anybody even bothers with housing. It's seems boring. It's just a place to store a few storage chests and that's it. Everything else about it is useless.

Well playing a game is pretty useless, isn’t it? We play to have fun, and different activities are fun for different people. Housing can be incredibly fun and creative. It’s perfectly fine that it’s not your thing.

TaSheen · July 4

Araneae6537 wrote: »

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

I don't know why anybody even bothers with housing. It's seems boring. It's just a place to store a few storage chests and that's it. Everything else about it is useless.

Well playing a game is pretty useless, isn’t it? We play to have fun, and different activities are fun for different people. Housing can be incredibly fun and creative. It’s perfectly fine that it’s not your thing.

It's not useless. Those of us who play this sort of game get at least some fun out of it....

For me, it's a lot more than just "some fun". It's an escape from the real world that's currently not.... fun.... at all. And no, I'm not going to go into detail.

But thank the Divines for ESO. And no one can be wishing for TES VI more than I am.... because it might literally save my lift....

cmetzger93 · July 4

Really wanted some simple gardening mechanic like in Skyrim for housing. Or mannequins which you could dress up

BretonMage · July 4

So... no increased furnishing limit? No houseguest emotes? What about the teased furnishing deconstruction at least?

Araneae6537 · July 4

TaSheen wrote: »

Araneae6537 wrote: »

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

I don't know why anybody even bothers with housing. It's seems boring. It's just a place to store a few storage chests and that's it. Everything else about it is useless.

Well playing a game is pretty useless, isn’t it? We play to have fun, and different activities are fun for different people. Housing can be incredibly fun and creative. It’s perfectly fine that it’s not your thing.

It's not useless. Those of us who play this sort of game get at least some fun out of it....

For me, it's a lot more than just "some fun". It's an escape from the real world that's currently not.... fun.... at all. And no, I'm not going to go into detail.

But thank the Divines for ESO. And no one can be wishing for TES VI more than I am.... because it might literally save my lift....

My post was in response to @LittlePinkDot who said that housing was useless other than a place to put storage chests.

My point was that the same things that they, or you, get from playing the game however you prefer, many also get from housing. Including an escape for that matter. It may be utterly boring to most, but I even enjoy arranging my virtual bookshelves and I have created spaces that change my mood just to be in.

Anifaas · July 4

I wonder if content has slowed in ESO because of the new game they're developing and they're short staffed or if its because they're coddling the vintage consoles due to their many limitations? Or is it an organizational, Zenimax, condition? Bethesda's Starfield also came with numerous complaints over lack of content and unclear messaging too. WoW is flourishing this year so it is unlikely a Microsoft thing.

Whatever the case, ZOS doesn't seem very enthusiastic about ESO for the last while.

Tandor · July 4

I think the content was very disappointing, and the presentation very amateurish. I'm also amazed that when dealing with something like this staff are still working from home.

spartaxoxo · July 4

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

I don't think there was any hyping-up for the update, other than "watch the stream to see what's coming." We got a long-requested feature that will bring some new life to housing, and a big update to the Archive. It makes sense to be disappointed, but I think all the hype happened in players' heads.

I think a lot of people also had unrealistic expectations for something happening in Q3. Quarter 3 is for quality of life changes. It's big thing is systems that improve activities we are already doing and bug fixes. Last year, the big hype was group finder and Grandmaster Crafting Tables. Quarter 3 prior to the change to QOL was literally just 2 dungeons every year. A lot of people were expecting the type of things we traditionally got in Quarter 4 or with the chapter. I guess that first year was different, but at least since Morrowind, that's how it has been. It's a filler quarter.

XSTRONG · July 4

Im not an housing player but I own and built/paid for a guildhouse that I spent hundreds of millions gold on (ps5eu)

Letting me list it to show to random players dont interest me at all.

tomofhyrule · July 4

spartaxoxo wrote: »

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

I don't think there was any hyping-up for the update, other than "watch the stream to see what's coming." We got a long-requested feature that will bring some new life to housing, and a big update to the Archive. It makes sense to be disappointed, but I think all the hype happened in players' heads.

I think a lot of people also had unrealistic expectations for something happening in Q3. Quarter 3 is for quality of life changes. It's big thing is systems that improve activities we are already doing and bug fixes. Last year, the big hype was group finder and Grandmaster Crafting Tables. Quarter 3 prior to the change to QOL was literally just 2 dungeons every year. A lot of people were expecting the type of things we traditionally got in Quarter 4 or with the chapter. I guess that first year was different, but at least since Morrowind, that's how it has been. It's a filler quarter.

I have to agree with that.

We really didn't get any hints about what was coming, which led to widespread speculation about various things it could be. And, in true speculate-about-upcoming-features-in-a-video-game fashion, people immediately looked at every possible time the devs said "Thing X is not possible because of reasons Y" and decided that Thing X had to be the new feature because it was a heavy request. Despite the devs repeatedly saying that it wasn't coming, with reasoning behind it.

And as a result, since it obviously didn't turn out to be Thing X, people who expected Thing X are let down.

I'll admit, I had zero expectations going into this since I really don't interact with housing. It was always a free update, so I'm not disappointed by it, but I'm not blown away either. it's a thing. I can imagine that Housing Tours did require quite a bit more in the background than we realize since there seems to be a lot of UI involved in it, and there are still some things I think the community would have been able to use better (like paragraph descriptions instead of just house nicknames), but it is what it is. We were never going to get increased furnishing limits - at least not until ESO finally says "Hey, PS4/XB1 are now 11 years old, get a PS5/XBX already."

Yes, I'd obviously have preferred going back to Q3 dungeons, but then again I love dungeons.

The other thing to remember is Q3 is usually the major combat balance patch as well, so on Monday we'll get to see what's going on there as well.

But I do hope people remember this for Q4 as well. We know it's PvP related, and a lot of the PvPers on the forums are expecting it to be some big new mode that will basically make everyone who hates PvP all of a sudden love it and want to get farmed for AP. It's obviously not going to change most peoples' playstyles. And if it's also something too big, it'll essentially empty out the current PvP modes. I agree that adding two new BG maps is not sufficient, but it can't end up being something like Cyro v.2 while still keeping Cyro v. 1 around as well. I'm expecting ranked duelling as something that's small enough to not disturb the current populations but also something that will give rewards - it's weird that duelling is a thing in game that rewards a single achievement and a title and... that's it. Give it a queue, give it reward boxes, and give it a leaderboard, and it'll seem a lot more like a thing.

Arrodisia · July 4

I wish. I didn't have to say this, but here goes. Housing tour? omg, face palm. We can already visit player homes with EHT and see everything. How can this possibly take priority over increasing slots, new areas and dungeons, finding a positive solution for surveys, completely new PvP, classic PvP revamps, bug fixes and better maintenance? Yes I'm aware about the pvp content update, but to be fair it isn't what we asked for either. We had many ideas in mind for PvP and PvE but are getting so little. I'm playing since Beta. This is disappointing.

I like housing but come on this is far too little compared to what a lot of players want for housing and for the game as a whole.

I'm trying to wrap my head around this needing an extra announcement and wasting a whole update cycle for this instead of getting a new area and this stuff on the side. Sadly, I think. this is an investor decision and not a dev decision to deliver as little as possible and as cheaply as possible with the skeleton team left.

Many of us are beyond disappointed. We're paying the same sub, paying for an expansion and same op prices for the new crown crates and items, but we're getting less content anyway. It doesn't take 12 weeks to patch and balance a once top 5 game. That happens here in the elder scrolls, and in low budget games because the devs rarely have enough staff to get things done. Coorporate doesn't understand what investments are needed to make games great enough to be profitable.

If the investors aren't going to support staff, of course, we're going to see this level of disappointment. We're going to see less content and QoL than other games. Making cuts may work in other businesses, but in an online mmorpg it doesn't. The whole reason we're here is to have fun in new content with solid patches and servers. We're not getting this at he same level anymore.

So the new question is this. You see from most of our reactions this Update 43 is way too little. Players want a new completely fleshed out zone, some awesome PvP revamps and modes, more housing slots and QoL. So what are these investors going to do for our devs to make sure we get what we're paying to get inside of 2024? probs nothing but they should want their buisness to thrive. It won't with update 43 like this.

This is an anniversary year. The presents in the daily rewards are supposed to be additive. We expected a huge anniversary expansion when gold road arrived and a couple good content increasing dlc's to pop up. Free crown crates will never make up for the lack of new content my friends would like to be queueing for this year....

This is supposed to be your big year and our big year for investing in this franchise. Throwing recycled crown crates into daily rewards does not do a 10 year anniversary justice. I shall contain myself now and meditate. I can only hope. The near future holds better outcomes for The Elder Scrolls, because the U43 announcement was too little.

Have fun everyone.

Alinhbo_Tyaka · July 5

Arrodisia wrote: »

I wish. I didn't have to say this, but here goes. Housing tour? omg, face palm. We can already visit player homes with EHT and see everything. How can this possibly take priority over increasing slots, new areas and dungeons, finding a positive solution for surveys, completely new PvP, classic PvP revamps, bug fixes and better maintenance? Yes I'm aware about the pvp content update, but to be fair it isn't what we asked for either. We had many ideas in mind for PvP and PvE but are getting so little. I'm playing since Beta. This is disappointing.

I like housing but come on this is far too little compared to what a lot of players want for housing and for the game as a whole.

I'm trying to wrap my head around this needing an extra announcement and wasting a whole update cycle for this instead of getting a new area and this stuff on the side. Sadly, I think. this is an investor decision and not a dev decision to deliver as little as possible and as cheaply as possible with the skeleton team left.

Many of us are beyond disappointed. We're paying the same sub, paying for an expansion and same op prices for the new crown crates and items, but we're getting less content anyway. It doesn't take 12 weeks to patch and balance a once top 5 game. That happens here in the elder scrolls, and in low budget games because the devs rarely have enough staff to get things done. Coorporate doesn't understand what investments are needed to make games great enough to be profitable.

If the investors aren't going to support staff, of course, we're going to see this level of disappointment. We're going to see less content and QoL than other games. Making cuts may work in other businesses, but in an online mmorpg it doesn't. The whole reason we're here is to have fun in new content with solid patches and servers. We're not getting this at he same level anymore.

So the new question is this. You see from most of our reactions this Update 43 is way too little. Players want a new completely fleshed out zone, some awesome PvP revamps and modes, more housing slots and QoL. So what are these investors going to do for our devs to make sure we get what we're paying to get inside of 2024? probs nothing but they should want their buisness to thrive. It won't with update 43 like this.

This is an anniversary year. The presents in the daily rewards are supposed to be additive. We expected a huge anniversary expansion when gold road arrived and a couple good content increasing dlc's to pop up. Free crown crates will never make up for the lack of new content my friends would like to be queueing for this year....

This is supposed to be your big year and our big year for investing in this franchise. Throwing recycled crown crates into daily rewards does not do a 10 year anniversary justice. I shall contain myself now and meditate. I can only hope. The near future holds better outcomes for The Elder Scrolls, because the U43 announcement was too little.

Have fun everyone.

EHT being an addon is for PC only. Adding the function to the base games gives console players access to something they could not do before.

MidniteOwl1913 · July 5

Alinhbo_Tyaka wrote: »

Arrodisia wrote: »

I wish. I didn't have to say this, but here goes. Housing tour? omg, face palm. We can already visit player homes with EHT and see everything. How can this possibly take priority over increasing slots, new areas and dungeons, finding a positive solution for surveys, completely new PvP, classic PvP revamps, bug fixes and better maintenance? Yes I'm aware about the pvp content update, but to be fair it isn't what we asked for either. We had many ideas in mind for PvP and PvE but are getting so little. I'm playing since Beta. This is disappointing.

I like housing but come on this is far too little compared to what a lot of players want for housing and for the game as a whole.

I'm trying to wrap my head around this needing an extra announcement and wasting a whole update cycle for this instead of getting a new area and this stuff on the side. Sadly, I think. this is an investor decision and not a dev decision to deliver as little as possible and as cheaply as possible with the skeleton team left.

Many of us are beyond disappointed. We're paying the same sub, paying for an expansion and same op prices for the new crown crates and items, but we're getting less content anyway. It doesn't take 12 weeks to patch and balance a once top 5 game. That happens here in the elder scrolls, and in low budget games because the devs rarely have enough staff to get things done. Coorporate doesn't understand what investments are needed to make games great enough to be profitable.

If the investors aren't going to support staff, of course, we're going to see this level of disappointment. We're going to see less content and QoL than other games. Making cuts may work in other businesses, but in an online mmorpg it doesn't. The whole reason we're here is to have fun in new content with solid patches and servers. We're not getting this at he same level anymore.

So the new question is this. You see from most of our reactions this Update 43 is way too little. Players want a new completely fleshed out zone, some awesome PvP revamps and modes, more housing slots and QoL. So what are these investors going to do for our devs to make sure we get what we're paying to get inside of 2024? probs nothing but they should want their buisness to thrive. It won't with update 43 like this.

This is an anniversary year. The presents in the daily rewards are supposed to be additive. We expected a huge anniversary expansion when gold road arrived and a couple good content increasing dlc's to pop up. Free crown crates will never make up for the lack of new content my friends would like to be queueing for this year....

This is supposed to be your big year and our big year for investing in this franchise. Throwing recycled crown crates into daily rewards does not do a 10 year anniversary justice. I shall contain myself now and meditate. I can only hope. The near future holds better outcomes for The Elder Scrolls, because the U43 announcement was too little.

Have fun everyone.

EHT being an addon is for PC only. Adding the function to the base games gives console players access to something they could not do before.

That is true, but I'm on the console and I too would have much rather had something else, just about *anything* else.
This so insignificant that mentioning as a major feature is truly weird.

kind_hero · July 5

Arrodisia wrote: »

This is supposed to be your big year and our big year for investing in this franchise. Throwing recycled crown crates into daily rewards does not do a 10 year anniversary justice. I shall contain myself now and meditate. I can only hope. The near future holds better outcomes for The Elder Scrolls, because the U43 announcement was too little.

Have fun everyone.

Agree on what you are saying. Just wanted to add something else, as well.

What bothers me the most, and this has been the case for probably more than 7 years, when I started to be more passionate about the game, is this studio's lack of communication and engagement with their player base. The impression I get all the time when browsing the forums, is like I am dealing with a bank or some law firm, very "need to know basis" communication. A game studio is very open and passionate, because they are gamers as well, and have that guild mind set, but I don't see that in this team, or the team who is responsible of communicating with the players. I can't remember when I saw Gina or Jess replying to some game related issue, other than some malfunction.

There is very little acknowledgment of issues that players deal with, moderators are very active on the forums, but other than that, there is very little response.

Which brings me to your post, where you mentioned investors and costs. Communication costs nothing.

ZOS_Icy · July 5

Greetings,

Because there is a thread already open on this topic, we're going to close this one down so that all feedback can be consolidated in one place. You may continue the discussion here.

Thank you for your understanding.