Follow up to the moral post. When moral is down, how do team leads try to turn that “frown upside down?” Are there any common strategies you have see companies use to try to avoid the moral death spiral you mentioned, and if so, how effective/ineffective are moral boosting tactics, and has it made the situation worse?

boynextdoornewsОставить коментарий к Follow up to the moral post. When moral is down, how do team leads try to turn that “frown upside down?” Are there any common strategies you have see companies use to try to avoid the moral death spiral you mentioned, and if so, how effective/ineffective are moral boosting tactics, and has it made the situation worse?

Most of the time, low morale is the result of the absence of sufficient things that give workers job satisfaction. Thus, providing more of those things (within the power of the leadership) will generally boost morale. For individuals, this can often mean things like feeling valued, having their work acknowledged, getting promoted, getting salary increases. For an entire team, it generally means acknowledging the team’s issues and treating them well — perks, bonus pay, parties, etc.

Buzz Lightyear is surrounded by green aliensALT

The most effective way I’ve seen of turning bad morale around for an entire team is for the leadership to talk to the team, acknowledge the team’s concerns, solicit their genuine feedback, and do things visibly to address those concerns. Obviously, team leadership must operate under some number of constraints — the budget, the schedule, the technical requirements, the corporate policies beyond their control, etc. If the situation is bad, e.g. if decisions made by the leadership got the team into a bad place, the leadership should take responsibility for those bad decisions among the team. The leadership should also have a reasonable plan to get out of the bad place — one that can stand up to scrutiny and that the team can believe in. It also is important to recognize that the leadership is also putting their neck on the line as well — by taking responsibility for the problems, they’re also accepting the blame if things cannot turn around. It is very likely that further failure will result in leadership resignation.

Jean-Baptiste Emanuel Zorg declares ALT

The fastest way for morale to fall is to lose the trust of the workers. Trust is hard to earn and easy to lose. If it becomes obvious that the leadership’s actions don’t match their words, trust will erode and the morale will tank. It will also make it significantly more difficult to regain — after being burned by leadership, the team will likely be super wary and the publisher may need to stage an intervention by replacing the leadership completely due to the inability to regain lost trust.

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What if any technical reasons are there that more PS5 and Series X games do not support offline co-op and multiplayer modes? It seems that while yes, current gen games are more demanding, current gen hardware is exponentially more capable than past generations. Why not just add a 2nd, 3rd, or 4th viewport into the world and let people game together? Any relevant answer would be appreciated. If none, I’ll just assume my suspicions are correct and you are under some NDA about this. The breaking of which would result in being blacklisted and hunted down by John Wick himself. Thank you.

boynextdoornewsОставить коментарий к What if any technical reasons are there that more PS5 and Series X games do not support offline co-op and multiplayer modes? It seems that while yes, current gen games are more demanding, current gen hardware is exponentially more capable than past generations. Why not just add a 2nd, 3rd, or 4th viewport into the world and let people game together? Any relevant answer would be appreciated. If none, I’ll just assume my suspicions are correct and you are under some NDA about this. The breaking of which would result in being blacklisted and hunted down by John Wick himself. Thank you.

Let’s assume that we have no technical limitations — infinite memory, infinite CPU and GPU cycles. We can run as many viewports as we could possibly want. What else could be holding us back? Here are a few game design considerations that make split scr…

So Final Fantasy VII First Soldier (a battle Royal game) is shutting down after just over a year. You have talked about how publishers/devs will rush into a new genre to see how large the potential market is. What is it like developing a game for a genre when it becomes clear mid development that the genre you are building a game for has reached the ceiling for the number of games/players there are for that niche?

boynextdoornewsОставить коментарий к So Final Fantasy VII First Soldier (a battle Royal game) is shutting down after just over a year. You have talked about how publishers/devs will rush into a new genre to see how large the potential market is. What is it like developing a game for a genre when it becomes clear mid development that the genre you are building a game for has reached the ceiling for the number of games/players there are for that niche?

This kind of question fits in with the greater metric known as morale. Morale is the word used to describe the general attitude of the overall team towards the project. When the team is in good spirits, trust each other and their leadership to do their…

Even though you are a video game designer and not a tabletop one, you have mentioned you play tabletop rpgs before. with that in mind, what are your thoughts on the WOTC OGL fiasco as a game designer and what are your thoughts as a tabletop player?

boynextdoornewsОставить коментарий к Even though you are a video game designer and not a tabletop one, you have mentioned you play tabletop rpgs before. with that in mind, what are your thoughts on the WOTC OGL fiasco as a game designer and what are your thoughts as a tabletop player?

For those who weren’t paying attention, Hasbro (owners of Dungeons & Dragons) looked at D&D as a franchise whole and decided that it was under-monetized. This is understandable — the IP is one of the most popular and well-known in the world. D&D is ess…

How do community suggestions on official forums fare as unsolicited suggestions? We often see developers in a dialog with a community about various features. I know that Vermintide 2 made a major balance pass a few years back which was largely inspired by community feedback, but I don’t remember signing away any rights when creating accounts on various forums.

boynextdoornewsОставить коментарий к How do community suggestions on official forums fare as unsolicited suggestions? We often see developers in a dialog with a community about various features. I know that Vermintide 2 made a major balance pass a few years back which was largely inspired by community feedback, but I don’t remember signing away any rights when creating accounts on various forums.

ALTFeedback is different from content. When we act on feedback, we’re taking the things that players say they like and dislike and incorporating that into our own future designs. We’re not taking content (or specific ideas for content) that the users c…

Why is it that even/especially on mobile, micro-transactions are as expensive as they are? That is, at least the ones I’ve seen I have to think whether the value is even there. I would have thought that “giving away” obviously great value would get more people to bite. Are big spenders worth that much more than getting more small spenders? Is there some floor where even the cheapest good deal won’t entice a new spender?

boynextdoornewsОставить коментарий к Why is it that even/especially on mobile, micro-transactions are as expensive as they are? That is, at least the ones I’ve seen I have to think whether the value is even there. I would have thought that “giving away” obviously great value would get more people to bite. Are big spenders worth that much more than getting more small spenders? Is there some floor where even the cheapest good deal won’t entice a new spender?

You might be surprised at how much others are actually willing to pay for things they like. Big spenders do a lot of the heavy lifting, and most choose to spend because they get sufficient positive value (for them) out of the game overall. My cousin’s FIFA league is an example of that — all participants are highly-paid professionals who really like soccer, so they all engage without a spending limit because it’s fun for them.

Jonathan Pine, of ALT

For pricing determination, it’s something of an optimization issue — we don’t want to charge more than most spending players are willing to pay or the value proposition isn’t there and they won’t buy at all, but we also don’t want to charge too much less than most spending players are willing to pay or we’re leaving money on the table that the players would be willing to give us. Many sufficiently-large mobile games will feel this out via A/B testing, where they distribute two slightly different versions of the same game and microtransaction offerings to their players and track spending behaviors to see which set of prices do better overall. They will also do this A/B testing to try other potential changes as well — game flow, visual design, level design, etc.

Zoe Walker says ALT

You are quite correct, however — the “regular” microtransaction offerings usually aren’t for the budget-minded or newer spenders. Most developers create different microtransaction products aimed at different types of players. Converting non-paying players to small spenders is extremely important to any microtransaction business model. Getting someone to spend the first time is a lot more difficult than getting them to spend the second, fifth, or fiftieth time (especially in a free-to-play environment). For new players, devs usually offer a variety of one-time introductory packages that are more budget-friendly and help with early- and mid- game content more than elder game content. These introductory products ease the transition from non-spending player into spending player.

Dr. Strange says ALT

For regular spending players that are more budget-minded, devs typically offer a different set of options — often more limited quantity time-based “deals”. These often aren’t the latest and greatest things released, but can provide more value to the player for the price — instead of offering the newest coolest costumes to come out, this month’s deal offers a bundle of several older costumes together at a reduced price. The fact that they are better value (if not the latest and greatest) and time-sensitive tends to make the buyers feel better about their limited purchases — they’re getting a better deal that isn’t always available.

Dave Skylark walks forward with hand outstretched for a handshake. Caption: Do we have a deal?ALT

Obviously, those who spend the most will get the most offerings. Not only are they the ones who support the game most financially, they are also the ones who consume the most paid content and demand more. Those who spend less are still valuable, which is why we will still offer them things, but they spend less so they also consume less. New players get special treatment, because new players can bounce off of a game easily and we want to keep as many new players around for as long as we can.

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A common criticism for live service games at the start is that they give too few rewards. When you hear this criticism, how do you go about fixing the issue?

boynextdoornewsОставить коментарий к A common criticism for live service games at the start is that they give too few rewards. When you hear this criticism, how do you go about fixing the issue?

Usually, those kind of complaints come from not having enough to do in the elder game — the max level, end game content — and the designers deciding to time-gate rewards in order to maintain engagement and keep players from burning out while grinding a…

One question I see once in a rare occasion is “Why not just give game developers assets someone else has made for free in their own time?”whether it’s sent to them from a fan or a dev off work, without using the production’s budget to make them. I know this isn’t fundamentally possible, but I don’t know how to describe it. Maybe you can?

boynextdoornewsОставить коментарий к One question I see once in a rare occasion is “Why not just give game developers assets someone else has made for free in their own time?”whether it’s sent to them from a fan or a dev off work, without using the production’s budget to make them. I know this isn’t fundamentally possible, but I don’t know how to describe it. Maybe you can?
Dale Baskets calls someone on the phone and says ALT

The primary issues with accepting external content submissions are legal. There would need to be some kind of legal agreement set in place to establish the rules (as well as potential damages if those rules are breached) for the use of that content that all parties agree to. This would protect the developer from issues like the content submitter later reconsidering and deciding to sue for partial ownership of the game that their work was used in or for an injunction to stop sales of that game altogether. If that game content was created using libraries, tools, assets, etc. from others, those other rights owners could also have a legal stake in any game created with that content. This is why writing credits and payouts in music get so complicated — sampling other music is similar in principle.

Splash image of Final Fantasy XIV Fan Festival 2019 in ParisALT

These legal issues are why any sort of fan content submission contest is accompanied by a hefty legal contract that all participants agree to, including granting a perpetual license to the publisher to use that content without needing to pay for it, or even granting full ownership of that content to the publisher outright. This is also why the rank and file developers like me are forbidden from even looking at external content submissions. If something like that inspires me and I use some of those ideas in future content, that’s potential grounds to sue. Any such lawsuit probably won’t be successful, but it’s still enough of a potential problem that default policy is “we never read unsolicited submissions”.

Batman says ALT

Beyond the legal hurdles, there’s also the normal issues of content functionality. Even if content gets submitted that we want to use, there’s no guarantee that it is compatible with our workflow. A texture might be the wrong dimensions or format, there might be certain assumptions made about a particular piece of data that don’t work in all game modes, the submission might overwrite an existing asset and we’d have to create a whole new asset instead of replacing an old one. There’s a fair amount of effort that may need to be expended in order to incorporate external work into our internal workflow, and that kind of overhead is often not trivial.

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I’m interested in scaling of the enemies to the character level in those games that do that. In some of the open world games I play an encounter will be death until I level up (or skill up). When I do get higher level it gradually becomes more doable until eventually it is trivial. What kind of scaling mechanisms are common? Is it linear, a percentage boost/penalty compared to player, or something else?

boynextdoornewsОставить коментарий к I’m interested in scaling of the enemies to the character level in those games that do that. In some of the open world games I play an encounter will be death until I level up (or skill up). When I do get higher level it gradually becomes more doable until eventually it is trivial. What kind of scaling mechanisms are common? Is it linear, a percentage boost/penalty compared to player, or something else?

In order to answer you question, I think it helps break down the way things work. Usually, any combat encounter in a game that has level differentials assumes certain underlying stats for the agents involved. All combat actors have some set amount of h…