A-net's stance on player ideas.

[ZeftheWicked.3076]

This is not a rage, or sarcasm post (a rarity in my case), but an honest question:

 

**Are player ideas regarding balance, game features etc welcomed by a-net?**

 

Pretty sure i read somewhere devs can't use ideas posted on forums for some legal reasons, but not sure if it was here or in another game.

Also as much as I love to brainstorm, let's all respect our time and effort here. If devs can't or generally don't want to use player ideas, please let me (and some of others like me) know, so I don't rack my brain over game balance and move to greener pastures if that sort of thing is not desired or welcomed.

 

Generally be it negative or positive, i would like to know the general outlook a-net has on player suggestions and ideas.

 

[AliamRationem.5172]

I've never heard the legal angle before. It seems unlikely that this would be an issue as some game companies borrow directly from player designs. For example, WoW allows players to develop their own mods and, if a feature is popular enough, they'll create their own version of it and bake it into the default UI.

 

On the other hand, players discuss all manner of things on gaming forums. It is unrealistic to expect the developer to 1) Discuss every issue players bring up, and 2) Incorporate the ideas generated in these discussions directly into the game. It's their product. Your part in it is to decide whether or not you want to spend your time and money playing it.

[Zedek.8932]

I am pretty sure it does not matter what people on the boards say. With every video game I played in the past decade, the developers like arenaNet, RIOT, Square Enix (FF14 division) never cared about the opinion of the playerbase. If it actually happened, it was either because of...

 

* ... massive outcry in several social media posts. A high coverage of an enraged playerbase is handlet not because they care, but to prevent damage control.

* ... financial interest. It's a free market study sometimes, but again, if they could've made 5,346 players happy, they would not have done it, despite the sales reach the break-even-point way earlier.

* ... their metrics and data. Mostly it's just plain coincidence.

 

I am in general very disappointed how disjointed and blind video game developers have become, but it was always this way.

There is a video game magazine called RETRO GAMER, I think it's from the UK but also makes it to Germany. You can read everywhere, no matter if DYNAMIX, SIERRA, heck, even SONIC 2 for the MegaDrive had one problem: As soon as "the suits" join games go downhill. It's not the passion anymore, it's the wallet. Stocholders, etc. Not about paying staff and bills. Look at GW2 and the quarterly updates. These numbers surely are enough to cover the development costs. But still it's high-end crying and whining about income. Or RIOT Games. I even bought LoL as DVD in early 2010. The game now is a total crapfest: Tencen ruins everything when they join. The beginning had a spirit with LOW income, now they are incredibly rich and could finally implement features not possible 8 years ago. Nothing happens. Just a cashcow. Ugly Japanese Anime skins in LoL to ruin the immersion but cater to a new portion of possible customers or FF14's cash shop within a subscription based game.. Their new gameplay mode, Eureka, took so long and is such a boring content despite the hundreds of feedback threads, they did it again.

 

So, no, video game developers do not care in 99% of the cases. The remaining 1% is the name they took from the player feedback, "Deadeye", right DeceiverX?

 

Excelsior.

[Sojourner.4621]

I think there is plenty of evidence that they take player ideas and feedback in to consideration, but that doesn't mean that they will actually act on said ideas and feedback or even respond when it is given. Sometimes things are mentioned as bugs or as unpleasant aspects of the game, and they never say a word until they quietly patch it in and it shows up in the notes. Other times they will hold contests specifically looking for designs for new weapons. Sometimes they will hear the feedback and say "That's not something we can realistically do with the resources we have available." At the end of the day, as stated, it is their game and they will always take things in the direction they feel is the best. Never be afraid to make suggestions or leave feedback but don't be angry/upset if it doesn't gain any traction is basically the rule.

[mercury ranique.2170]

It is not so much a strait forward legal issue. A few years back I made a proposal to drop worlds in WvW and have a period forced redistribution to keep things balanced. Even if a dev would have commented back then and even if I now demanded to be credited for the idea, I think I would loosse this. It is just not worth the hassle and the risk.

 

Further, reacting to a suggestion with positive of negative feedback, puts them in a corner and makes them part of debates. This cornering often leads to creative blockades. Maybe 4 years ago, Arenanet was very much opposed of mounts and would have dismissed those idea's. That puts them in the no mounts corner of the debate and they likely didnt came up the mounts they where. Specially cause the individuals commenting here have often some authority and the other employees read into them as well.

 

So they do read them. They do take them to heart. They want to please all, but time is too limited and some stances are too opposing to please all.

[TheGrimm.5624]

> @"ZeftheWicked.3076" said:

> This is not a rage, or sarcasm post (a rarity in my case), but an honest question:

>

> **Are player ideas regarding balance, game features etc welcomed by a-net?**

>

> Pretty sure i read somewhere devs can't use ideas posted on forums for some legal reasons, but not sure if it was here or in another game.

> Also as much as I love to brainstorm, let's all respect our time and effort here. If devs can't or generally don't want to use player ideas, please let me (and some of others like me) know, so I don't rack my brain over game balance and move to greener pastures if that sort of thing is not desired or welcomed.

>

> Generally be it negative or positive, i would like to know the general outlook a-net has on player suggestions and ideas.

>

 

I have seen a large number of player ideas on the forums become reality in game. Granted that doesn't say that a dev didn't already have the same concept. I think you are mixing concepts/ideas with artwork and imagery. When artwork/design is created that can be a bit more dicey on who owns the rights to something. But for un-trademarked ideas and concepts....nope have seen concepts discussed on the forums appear in game quite a bit overtime.

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

The Devs actively state they are interested in feedback. Over in the PvP-type sub-forums, I see the Devs commenting, and sometimes saying they will incorporate something, when they can.

 

Here's the legal stance on submissions, including ideas:

 

... _by submitting User Submissions to ArenaNet, you hereby grant ArenaNet a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sublicenseable and transferable license to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, broadcast, license, post, sell, translate, distribute, prepare derivative works of, display, and perform the User Submissions for any purpose whatsoever, commercial or otherwise, in any medium now known or hereafter devised, without compensation or credit to the provider of the User Submissions_.

 

_Feedback shall be deemed, and shall remain, the property of ArenaNet from the moment of creation. Accordingly, ArenaNet shall exclusively own all now known or hereafter existing copyrights and all other Intellectual Property Rights to all Feedback of every kind and nature, in perpetuity, throughout the universe. To the extent that any of the above may be void or unenforceable, you agree that any and all Feedback is hereby irrevocably assigned to ArenaNet, together with all Intellectual Property Rights therein._

 

In other words, if you post it on the forums, ArenaNet has the right to use it as they see fit.

 

 

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/legal/website-terms-of-use/

 

 

[Randulf.7614]

Devs can only use ideas submitted via their forum. They can't use them submitted privately for example by post or by private messages. They must be publicly posted in the forum

 

The weaver is a great example of a player idea incorporated into the game that was posted on the forums

[robertthebard.8150]

Most of the time, it's in their best interest to ignore suggestions. I did say "most of the time", and I'll explain exactly why:

 

In DDO, there was an outcry for years to get a hard mode for the players that had all the top tier gear, past lives, since they use what equates to a New Game + mode as part of their endgame, wherein you reincarnate your character, and start over with stat buffs, and bonus feats for whatever life/lives you had, up to 3 times per class, just to simplify it. After years of debate, wherein there were lots of people that pointed out that, if we got it, some of the people rallying to get it would be on the forums within a week demanding that it be toned down because it's too hard. Fast forward a couple of years, and they got Reaper mode, and sure enough, there was, and maybe still is, I don't know, since melting a snowflake over it got me banned, an outcry that it was too hard. These hardcore players, that insisted they needed this difficulty, were now unhappy because it was too hard for them to play the way they had been playing, and insisted that it needed to be nerfed. All of this from listening to player feedback and suggestions. It was funny, but from a developer standpoint, kind of sad. All that work that went into providing what the community insisted it needed, only to find out that it's not what they needed after all.

 

I've seen this happen a lot over the years. In an old Korean Grinder I used to play, the "hardcore" pvpers played on Pantera server. On this server, if you died to a player, and didn't have your lak guard filled up enough, you could drop your gear, and the player(s) that killed you could loot it. You needed a canoe to navigate that server forum, and sometimes it bled over into the general forum, with suggestions to remove the hardcore elements from the server, after a whale lost about 200 dollars of investment after a PvP battle. They didn't want to hear "Roll on a new server" just like the players in the previous example didn't want to hear "Play a lower difficulty". They wanted the rewards from being there, but didn't want the risks. These are a couple of "off the top of my head" examples, and I'll ignore the obvious "buff my class and nerf everyone else" posts that permeate PvP sub forums genre wide.

 

Sometimes there are good ideas, sometimes. However, the ratio of good ideas to "make me happy, or I'll take my ball and go home" posts is, generally, ridiculously high, in favor of the latter. It's usually bad enough that I wouldn't want the job of sorting out the trash from the genuinely good ideas.

[Gaile Gray.6029]

> @"ZeftheWicked.3076" said:

> This is not a rage, or sarcasm post (a rarity in my case), but an honest question:

>

> **Are player ideas regarding balance, game features etc welcomed by a-net?**

>

> Pretty sure i read somewhere devs can't use ideas posted on forums for some legal reasons, but not sure if it was here or in another game.

> Also as much as I love to brainstorm, let's all respect our time and effort here. If devs can't or generally don't want to use player ideas, please let me (and some of others like me) know, so I don't rack my brain over game balance and move to greener pastures if that sort of thing is not desired or welcomed.

>

> Generally be it negative or positive, i would like to know the general outlook a-net has on player suggestions and ideas.

>

In a word, "Yes!" Or in more words, **"Yes, we very much value player input on any element of the game."** That's not a "company line" or fluff and nonsense, that's the absolute truth. In fact we had a meeting yesterday about how to get more feedback -- it's something we value greatly. I think you've seen more communications in recent months. I believe you'll continue to see more in the future.

 

Let's clear up an misunderstanding in this post: **We absolutely CAN use ideas posted on our official forums.** That is one of the very real values of your sharing your ideas, suggestions, feedback, and input on our official platform. Ideas submitted by e-mail, sent through in-game whispers, posted on other media, shared via sky writing, or transmitted via carrier pigeon cannot be used. But if you share here, we can accept, assess, and potentially develop that suggestion.

[Ghos.1326]

i'm excited to get an istani mount select license. that griffon is looking pretty bad ace.