I just re-watched this
GMTK video, which contains many words of wisdom.
There's a relevant warning about
using player data carefully. This one is relevant, given how Larian used player data in their "
Bless is boring" claim.
There's a passage about feedback as problems vs as solutions. That one is for us players. "Please change X" isn't as useful "Please change X, because X leads to Y which doesn't work/isn't fun/create a negative experience for me". Indeed, the devs may have other ways to remove Y.
But the most interesting is the 4th part, "Create a conversation between developers and players". Chis Avellone is quoted as saying "
Once you explain why a certain feature is a certain way and make a very structure argument for it, we find that generally that level of frankness causes a lot of buy-in". It would be great if Larian could communicate more about what they aim to achieve in combat, and how their rules help achieve that (or will eventually help, when paired with other rules, and everything comes together).
And there's a point about insisting on wanting to make the game devs are aiming for (and the best version of that vision), rather than the "universally best" version of the game (which possibly can't be achieved, because what's better or more fun is subjective). I now think that Larian has stated clearly enough that they will focus on making the game they want to play, which is good. The only thing is that they haven't communicated what that vision looks like.
A couple of other considerations I want to add.
Like many, I have been asking for more frequent and better communication for a while. Why that ? I am not asking for more communication so as to make us feel good, special, listened to or anything. Rather, I think that
more communication would be useful for the Early Access feedback gathering.
- If they describe their vision and the associated elements that they will certainly not change, then we will get much less feedback and suggestions of removing it.
For the sake of example, Larian could say "we want more and cheaper standard actions to give more options in the early game, so the revised action economy will stay". Then, instead of "please undo, this devalues classes X and Y", feedback can turn to "please carry out the chain of changes to rebalance classes to the end, and in particular rework classes X and Y in view of the revised actions". - If they announce that fixing X or adding feature Y is at the top of their to-do list (from before EA, or player feedback, it matters not) then we can stop requesting it. They don't have to give any precise date, or commit to change A being released before change B. Just say that it's being worked on and coming soon.
Examples could include the camera, party controls, single-character movement, UI, etc. - If they announce that feature Z will come at the end, then we can stop requesting it.
Difficulty options isn't a good example, as they've already mentioned that in the Early Access FAQ. But things like the XP curve or, perhaps, the availability of scrolls and magic items, is clearly late-stage fine tuning. - If they announce that system A or path B of the game is currently not even started yet, mere placeholder, or close to what they want to do, then we can tell them if that's a bad idea, if this is clearly a bug, or wait and see, as appropriate.
For instance, assuming the evil path wasn't quite ready yet (which I'd rather want to assume), and they had said that they'd like people to try the evil path nevertheless, in order to get some early data, instead of sounding like it's exciting and players should try it even though most players don't normally play evil, then we could have known to wait and see, instead of saying how underwhelming it is, or doubting their writing skills.
Overall, a bit more communication means much less useless feedback and a better signal-to-noise ratio. Which I think is good for the people at Larian who have to process it. And incidentally for us as we can just playtest and feedback where it's useful, or do a playthrough using the things that are less buggy, depending on how we feel like playing today.
