I dont think there are any developers that i trust period, the only one i can think of is Re-Logic for developing terraria, but thats definitely not a MMO
I feel like It's best to always be weary of developers. I guess the closest thing to trust i have would be blizzard, i never expect their products or expansions to be outright bad, they're always at least decent.
Mark Jacobs and CSE if only because, Mark doesn't blame players for hiccups. He understands that some people just see things certain ways. So far with CU, he tells it how it is, we knew when he was having server issues, small as they were, short staffed, ect. If there's something going on, we know about it good or bad. That's how a CEO should operate, transparency is a key to trust, and Mark does this well. Also an honorable mention for Square Enix. I'll wait to say anything about Chris Roberts, since the Star Ctizen project isn't like anything he's done in the past, I hope it turns out to be the space game everyone always wanted though.
The only thing I trust to get from other companies are lies, and the run around jargon. Unfortunately even from Arena Net these days, although some of the Anet staff are genuine at least.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
For the games in development I find the artcraft team and mark jacobs to be very open with what they do. I haven't actually listened to what they say, but albion online and shards online guys seems to run a fairly open development as well. I have no idea if those games will end up good but I trust them on what they attempt to do.
There are plenty of other projects that have a high level of BS so I don't put much trust in what they say.
Iselin: And the next person who says "but it's a business, they need to make money" can just go fuck yourself.
I dont think there are any developers that i trust period, the only one i can think of is Re-Logic for developing terraria, but thats definitely not a MMO
I feel like It's best to always be weary of developers. I guess the closest thing to trust i have would be blizzard, i never expect their products or expansions to be outright bad, they're always at least decent.
I felt this way about Blizzard until Diablo 3 when it launched. They've since taken steps to make that game better, but my original trust is gone.
Blizzard does still have the best customer service around, but then they should seeing what they charge for character transfers and other services.
Nope, none of them anymore. A good five years ago I would have named several developers that I trust, but they've pretty much all burned their bridges at this point.
CCP: The Incarna release was a huge trust breaker. Then the way things went with World of Darkness completely and totally eroded my trust in this company. None left at all. Doesn't mean I won't still play EVE, but when CCP's lips are moving I now expect lies.
No big hopes for Valkyrie now that we know it's tied to the Oculus Sellout Rift. Legion... no information for months, just a big black hole. Probably being mismanaged and rotting from the inside just like World of Darkness. I bet it needs more Psshhh!
Funcom: The way that they abandoned Age of Conan and left us in the dust to make a shitty failure of a game really breaks my trust. Then they abandoned TSW to make the Lego game that has driven them to bankruptcy. If only they'd support the games they make and stop abandoning them.
SoE: Sure SoE sold all of their games to Daybreak studios so I guess I'm pissing on a dead horse here, but SWG and Planetside were both ruined by them. Then they tell us they're making a successor to SWG and all they do is carbon copy another zombie survival game? That's a spiritual successor to SWG? Ummm, no.
BioWare: One of the greatest game studios ever put together sells out to Electronic Assholes and consequently produces one of the most lame, on-rails, boring, carbon copy MMO's made this decade. How the mighty studio that produced Baldur's Gate II has fallen.
I think the people who have the most issues with developers/publishers are people who actually pay attention to all the crap. For the vast majority of people, they buy a game; they play it; then move on if they don't like it or they're finished with it. They then move onto a new game that peaks their interest, without a care in the world for the big picture. I think they're the happiest.
I do like devs that actually post here with their own names, like Marc Jacobs. Or at other forums for that matter, had a good discussion with Jeff Strain at an old Guildwars forum some years back (and I really miss him as Arenanets boss, I hope his Undead labs actually releases their planned MMO eventually).
Publishers I trust as the day is long (21st of december in Nome, Alaska). That goes twice for EA and Activision.
I think that people are way too critical of developers, and probably have unrealistic expectations. I understand that maybe developers don't meet your expectations all the time. They probably make some promises they don't keep. However, people walking around calling them evil is hilarious, like their sole purpose, their company mission is to rip people off, piss people off, or be as deceptive as possible. It's American Paranoia at it's best.
All I can say is that I hope your children are more forgiving than you are, because if you don't think that you've ever let anyone down, not met expectations, or lied, then you are lying right there.
Totally. I trust and have a ton of respect for ANET. Following that I think Zenimax is pretty amazing.
There is actually no developer that has released a game I like who I "don't trust" though. I mean I give them my money play the product and if its good stay on, if its bad move on. I like ANET in particular because of how they have stuck with their vision for the game, its business model, and the innovations they brought to the genre. Similarly with Zenimax, imo they listen to the community but stuck to their guns on key gameplay decisions despite heavy criticism from some areas, and as a result were able to bring us a very immersive and well made mmo.
The only devs I "don't trust" are the ones trying to do what imo are ridiculous things like charging subs/box price etc for a game that is not even properly released, or kickstarters from devs with no track record at all.
I feel like It's best to always be weary of developers. I guess the closest thing to trust i have would be blizzard, i never expect their products or expansions to be outright bad, they're always at least decent.
I felt this way about Blizzard until Diablo 3 when it launched. They've since taken steps to make that game better, but my original trust is gone.
Blizzard does still have the best customer service around, but then they should seeing what they charge for character transfers and other services.
I agree with this. When Diablo 3 was going to launch, I thought to myself, it's going to be fine, its blizzard. was not fine at all.
However, seeing how they still work on diablo 3, still balancing and patching, they have taken big steps to redeem that trust.
I think they might handle things a bit different than before, but at least, with blizzard, I trust that their game is at least going to have some sort of quality control, and is going to at least last 5+ years. I don't know if I can say that about any other publisher/developer.
I also have a special place for Paradox publishing, might not always be perfect, but I at least know what I'm going to get, which is usually games not other publisher dare touch.
I think Blizzard might be the only one. I've played their games since warcraft 1, and I've never been disappointed. Diablo 3 was kind of meh, but Blizzard has turned it around. It's now one of my top 3 games I play.
Anyone that trusts anyone else that is trying to make money off them is woefully ignorant of the principles of modern business practices.
What I think is woefully ignorant is any company these days who thinks that they can engage in shady business practices and get away with it. Fact is that companies are more accountable today then they were 10 years ago. If a company believes that something isn't going to leak to the public then they're ignorant.
That's not to say that there aren't shady people, still. I'm sure there is. However, the general mission of the company as a whole is not going to be to rip people off. Sorry, I think it's ignorant to believe that companies in a business where customers are so knowledgeable (and have such a lack of knowledge at the same time), critical, and have paramount access to information, that they could get away with anything. Take a look at Destiny, Borderlands, etc. recently. You don't think that companies will be held accountable for things? Damn! And that stuff isn't even anything that was justified (in my opinion).
Anyone that trusts anyone else that is trying to make money off them is woefully ignorant of the principles of modern business practices.
Thats unfair, my buddy owns a small gamestore, he earns enough money to survive on it but he certainly don't do it because he want to get rich, he just loves games and enjoy working with them (not computer, P&P RPGs and boardgames even if it is Magic the gathering that pays most of his bills). -He don't rip people off and assuming everyone who works with computer games want to is just too cynical even for me.
Now, big publishing houses like EA are run by suits and they would most likely sell their won mothers for the right price but many people works in the genre because they love games and they make games they believe in. Not all of them turns out great but sometimes something sounds good until you actually do it (like going on a diet).
I think that people are way too critical of developers, and probably have unrealistic expectations. I understand that maybe developers don't meet your expectations all the time. They probably make some promises they don't keep. However, people walking around calling them evil is hilarious, like their sole purpose, their company mission is to rip people off, piss people off, or be as deceptive as possible. It's American Paranoia at it's best.
All I can say is that I hope your children are more forgiving than you are, because if you don't think that you've ever let anyone down, not met expectations, or lied, then you are lying right there.
Totally agree - I often wonder how many people who are critical about developers here are themselves so incredibly efficient, competent and passionate in their own profession work in RL that their clients and employers never had a excuse to admonish or complaint about some perceived short-comings in their work or service.
Every profession has its own challenges, so I feel that unless a person has some real qualification in this field, his criticism should be more measured - ask yourself how would you feel if some stranger call out that he doesn't like your work or service so you must be lazy or incompetent.
"A game is fun if it is learnable but not trivial" -- Togelius & Schmidhuber
People who talk about a "company" and if you can thrust them or not have no idea of how business works. (not about the business itself, but how it works. I also don't have any clue what people are working at which company atm and who's in charge there)
You should focus less on the "company" and more and certain people working there. It's the CEOs, CFOs and CIOs who are mostly responsible. A company can be pretty thrustful and then there is a swap in the upper positions and everything will change.
Examples: Trion with Rift - Archeage (although I don't know if there were different people responsible or not, but it seems so, considering the difference in business models) Sigil Games and Vanguard - A change at Microsoft and they changed the priorities, cutting all support. So they had to release earlier. (Didn't they become independent because of that and then later on had to sell to SOE?)
tl;dr A company is just a name, it's the directors who are responsible. A company can be changing from thrustworthy to uber greedy within a week, with the change of just one responsible person.
Excellent post. Some companies are not even the same company they were a year before, rather just a name/brand that was sold to a new group. An example of that would be Atari which has changed hands from Namco to Hasbro to Infogrammes and most recently resurfaced again with a new social/gambling-focused strategy.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein "Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
I think that people are way too critical of developers, and probably have unrealistic expectations. I understand that maybe developers don't meet your expectations all the time. They probably make some promises they don't keep. However, people walking around calling them evil is hilarious, like their sole purpose, their company mission is to rip people off, piss people off, or be as deceptive as possible. It's American Paranoia at it's best.
All I can say is that I hope your children are more forgiving than you are, because if you don't think that you've ever let anyone down, not met expectations, or lied, then you are lying right there.
Totally agree - I often wonder how many people who are critical about developers here are themselves so incredibly efficient, competent and passionate in their own profession work in RL that their clients and employers never had a excuse to admonish or complaint about some perceived short-comings in their work or service.
Every profession has its own challenges, so I feel that unless a person has some real qualification in this field, his criticism should be more measured - ask yourself how would you feel if some stranger call out that he doesn't like your work or service so you must be lazy or incompetent.
So all of the developers are beyond reproach because we ourselves aren't perfect.
Well shit, lets just shut these forums down. No point in discussing what we like and don't like about games and their publishers since we aren't game developers and/or aren't perfect.
I think that people are way too critical of developers, and probably have unrealistic expectations. I understand that maybe developers don't meet your expectations all the time. They probably make some promises they don't keep. However, people walking around calling them evil is hilarious, like their sole purpose, their company mission is to rip people off, piss people off, or be as deceptive as possible. It's American Paranoia at it's best.
All I can say is that I hope your children are more forgiving than you are, because if you don't think that you've ever let anyone down, not met expectations, or lied, then you are lying right there.
Totally agree - I often wonder how many people who are critical about developers here are themselves so incredibly efficient, competent and passionate in their own profession work in RL that their clients and employers never had a excuse to admonish or complaint about some perceived short-comings in their work or service.
Every profession has its own challenges, so I feel that unless a person has some real qualification in this field, his criticism should be more measured - ask yourself how would you feel if some stranger call out that he doesn't like your work or service so you must be lazy or incompetent.
So all of the developers are beyond reproach because we ourselves aren't perfect.
Well shit, lets just shut these forums down. No point in discussing what we like and don't like about games and their publishers since we aren't game developers and/or aren't perfect.
I agree, and simply put developers 100% need to be objectively scrutinized for the work they are doing. I also disagre about the "field qualification" as aside from posting a photo with your name on a plaque or certificate from a college you really have no way, at least on the internet of proving you have these qualifications. So what the, does everyone without a degree or prior experience have a null opinion? To me thats a bit of a stretch, especially since we are the "users" who are experiancing their product first hand.
For example a man could say he is a great chef, and good at making burgers. Serve me and you the burgers simply as consumers and not as head chefs, and we could both agree the burger was absolute crap. We dont have to know what goes into the creation of said burger to find the objective reasons we dislike IE: Its too soggy, its burnt to shit, etc.
Would intimate knowledge of cooking help us to deduce what could have gone wrong in the process? Most definitely, but it doesnt make our original opinions any less substantiated because again, as consumers we are given the full right of the producer/creator to judge his work. Simply put, if developers didnt want to be scrutinized then they wouldnt put their work out there to begin with.
I used to trust ArenaNet because of their beautiful job with GW, but now I play GW2, and ArenaNet customer service is still very good, but not like they once were, which was godlike.
Anyone that trusts anyone else that is trying to make money off them is woefully ignorant of the principles of modern business practices.
Thats unfair, my buddy owns a small gamestore, he earns enough money to survive on it but he certainly don't do it because he want to get rich, he just loves games and enjoy working with them (not computer, P&P RPGs and boardgames even if it is Magic the gathering that pays most of his bills). -He don't rip people off and assuming everyone who works with computer games want to is just too cynical even for me.
Now, big publishing houses like EA are run by suits and they would most likely sell their won mothers for the right price but many people works in the genre because they love games and they make games they believe in. Not all of them turns out great but sometimes something sounds good until you actually do it (like going on a diet).
There are exceptions to most every generalization. When making generalizations you go with what is predominately displayed and or common place, which is not your friend.
The video game industry especially has little to no legal recourse available to consumers. Consumer protection laws dont seem to apply to game companies, nor does quality assurances, functional products on sale or even basic return policies for faulty products.
Hell I even remember Bioware charging me "tax" when I bought points for some me3 dlc. After demanding tax code info from them they finally admitted it was "Bioware tax" and had nothing to do with state or federal sales tax.
The video game industry is the wild wild west of profiteering and anyone t hat trust anyone else in the industry is just asking to get taken advantage of.
Anyone that trusts anyone else that is trying to make money off them is woefully ignorant of the principles of modern business practices.
What I think is woefully ignorant is any company these days who thinks that they can engage in shady business practices and get away with it. Fact is that companies are more accountable today then they were 10 years ago. If a company believes that something isn't going to leak to the public then they're ignorant.
That's not to say that there aren't shady people, still. I'm sure there is. However, the general mission of the company as a whole is not going to be to rip people off. Sorry, I think it's ignorant to believe that companies in a business where customers are so knowledgeable (and have such a lack of knowledge at the same time), critical, and have paramount access to information, that they could get away with anything. Take a look at Destiny, Borderlands, etc. recently. You don't think that companies will be held accountable for things? Damn! And that stuff isn't even anything that was justified (in my opinion).
So you are saying that delivering faulty products with no ability to return products, having federal consumer protection laws not apply to their products and blatantly misleading or even lying to their customers is protection? Please man you cant be serious.
Sure when it comes to physical locations selling products consumer protection has increased. But when it comes to the gaming industry it is nothing but profiteering and exploitation.
You talk about game companies pissing off people with sub standard products and "paying" for it, yet EA is still a titan despite some of the worst products, lies and substandard products on the market. Borderlands? great game by gearbox, Aliens Colonial Marines? A complete lie being sold as a game by the same company, with little to no effect on their earnings reports.
Sure we as consumers have become smarter, but that doesnt mean companies will try and screw us over any less. When you put profit before people you cannot be trusted period.
Comments
I feel like It's best to always be weary of developers.
I guess the closest thing to trust i have would be blizzard, i never expect their products or expansions to be outright bad, they're always at least decent.
The only thing I trust to get from other companies are lies, and the run around jargon. Unfortunately even from Arena Net these days, although some of the Anet staff are genuine at least.
Keeping an eye on some of the indie efforts however.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
There are plenty of other projects that have a high level of BS so I don't put much trust in what they say.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Blizzard does still have the best customer service around, but then they should seeing what they charge for character transfers and other services.
CCP: The Incarna release was a huge trust breaker. Then the way things went with World of Darkness completely and totally eroded my trust in this company. None left at all. Doesn't mean I won't still play EVE, but when CCP's lips are moving I now expect lies.
No big hopes for Valkyrie now that we know it's tied to the Oculus Sellout Rift. Legion... no information for months, just a big black hole. Probably being mismanaged and rotting from the inside just like World of Darkness. I bet it needs more Psshhh!
Funcom: The way that they abandoned Age of Conan and left us in the dust to make a shitty failure of a game really breaks my trust. Then they abandoned TSW to make the Lego game that has driven them to bankruptcy. If only they'd support the games they make and stop abandoning them.
SoE: Sure SoE sold all of their games to Daybreak studios so I guess I'm pissing on a dead horse here, but SWG and Planetside were both ruined by them. Then they tell us they're making a successor to SWG and all they do is carbon copy another zombie survival game? That's a spiritual successor to SWG? Ummm, no.
BioWare: One of the greatest game studios ever put together sells out to Electronic Assholes and consequently produces one of the most lame, on-rails, boring, carbon copy MMO's made this decade. How the mighty studio that produced Baldur's Gate II has fallen.
I self identify as a monkey.
Publishers I trust as the day is long (21st of december in Nome, Alaska). That goes twice for EA and Activision.
All I can say is that I hope your children are more forgiving than you are, because if you don't think that you've ever let anyone down, not met expectations, or lied, then you are lying right there.
Crazkanuk
----------------
Azarelos - 90 Hunter - Emerald
Durnzig - 90 Paladin - Emerald
Demonicron - 90 Death Knight - Emerald Dream - US
Tankinpain - 90 Monk - Azjol-Nerub - US
Brindell - 90 Warrior - Emerald Dream - US
----------------
There is actually no developer that has released a game I like who I "don't trust" though. I mean I give them my money play the product and if its good stay on, if its bad move on. I like ANET in particular because of how they have stuck with their vision for the game, its business model, and the innovations they brought to the genre. Similarly with Zenimax, imo they listen to the community but stuck to their guns on key gameplay decisions despite heavy criticism from some areas, and as a result were able to bring us a very immersive and well made mmo.
The only devs I "don't trust" are the ones trying to do what imo are ridiculous things like charging subs/box price etc for a game that is not even properly released, or kickstarters from devs with no track record at all.
I agree with this.
When Diablo 3 was going to launch, I thought to myself,
it's going to be fine, its blizzard.
was not fine at all.
However, seeing how they still work on diablo 3, still balancing and patching,
they have taken big steps to redeem that trust.
I think they might handle things a bit different than before,
but at least, with blizzard, I trust that their game is at least going to have some sort of quality control,
and is going to at least last 5+ years.
I don't know if I can say that about any other publisher/developer.
I also have a special place for Paradox publishing,
might not always be perfect, but I at least know what I'm going to get,
which is usually games not other publisher dare touch.
That's not to say that there aren't shady people, still. I'm sure there is. However, the general mission of the company as a whole is not going to be to rip people off. Sorry, I think it's ignorant to believe that companies in a business where customers are so knowledgeable (and have such a lack of knowledge at the same time), critical, and have paramount access to information, that they could get away with anything. Take a look at Destiny, Borderlands, etc. recently. You don't think that companies will be held accountable for things? Damn! And that stuff isn't even anything that was justified (in my opinion).
Crazkanuk
----------------
Azarelos - 90 Hunter - Emerald
Durnzig - 90 Paladin - Emerald
Demonicron - 90 Death Knight - Emerald Dream - US
Tankinpain - 90 Monk - Azjol-Nerub - US
Brindell - 90 Warrior - Emerald Dream - US
----------------
Now, big publishing houses like EA are run by suits and they would most likely sell their won mothers for the right price but many people works in the genre because they love games and they make games they believe in. Not all of them turns out great but sometimes something sounds good until you actually do it (like going on a diet).
Every profession has its own challenges, so I feel that unless a person has some real qualification in this field, his criticism should be more measured - ask yourself how would you feel if some stranger call out that he doesn't like your work or service so you must be lazy or incompetent.
"A game is fun if it is learnable but not trivial" -- Togelius & Schmidhuber
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein
"Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
Well shit, lets just shut these forums down. No point in discussing what we like and don't like about games and their publishers since we aren't game developers and/or aren't perfect.
For example a man could say he is a great chef, and good at making burgers. Serve me and you the burgers simply as consumers and not as head chefs, and we could both agree the burger was absolute crap. We dont have to know what goes into the creation of said burger to find the objective reasons we dislike IE: Its too soggy, its burnt to shit, etc.
Would intimate knowledge of cooking help us to deduce what could have gone wrong in the process? Most definitely, but it doesnt make our original opinions any less substantiated because again, as consumers we are given the full right of the producer/creator to judge his work. Simply put, if developers didnt want to be scrutinized then they wouldnt put their work out there to begin with.
The video game industry especially has little to no legal recourse available to consumers. Consumer protection laws dont seem to apply to game companies, nor does quality assurances, functional products on sale or even basic return policies for faulty products.
Hell I even remember Bioware charging me "tax" when I bought points for some me3 dlc. After demanding tax code info from them they finally admitted it was "Bioware tax" and had nothing to do with state or federal sales tax.
The video game industry is the wild wild west of profiteering and anyone t hat trust anyone else in the industry is just asking to get taken advantage of.
So you are saying that delivering faulty products with no ability to return products, having federal consumer protection laws not apply to their products and blatantly misleading or even lying to their customers is protection? Please man you cant be serious.
Sure when it comes to physical locations selling products consumer protection has increased. But when it comes to the gaming industry it is nothing but profiteering and exploitation.
You talk about game companies pissing off people with sub standard products and "paying" for it, yet EA is still a titan despite some of the worst products, lies and substandard products on the market. Borderlands? great game by gearbox, Aliens Colonial Marines? A complete lie being sold as a game by the same company, with little to no effect on their earnings reports.
Sure we as consumers have become smarter, but that doesnt mean companies will try and screw us over any less. When you put profit before people you cannot be trusted period.