Thank you Stoot. Although not everyone will agree with the outcome (in my case the jury is still out), it really helps to understand the reasoning behind some decisions. This is one such occasion. I understand what you were trying to do now and that there was another thought behind it than I - and probably many others - assumed, and that is reassuring.
@Stoot While WalruZ is correct about some Glitch, I think there are two other factors that are contributing to this. A) We know that if we complete feats, we get things like new quests, lands, stories, etc. and B) since this is a community effort, we are letting down that community by not participating or not being able to participate to the best of our ability.
Wow. I would say I can't believe the extreme reaction to this feat... but I've been here for a long while, and I've seen far worse.
Anywho, this feat does not even come close to farmvillianess. I took it as a gentle nudge to go ahead and spend the 5 minutes it would take to go through my email address book to see if there are some people in there who might like the game.
I will admit I was disappointed in the feat, but that just because there wasn't much to be done with it. I had 5 invites; I sent them.
I really didn't like this feat last night and I woke up not minding it that much (I still think it's bad but more of, to borrow stoot's words, a head-shake-and-pfft than a shake-fist-in-rage).
With that out of the way, I want to say something about the general discussion surrounding feats. There is a lot of accusation towards people who talk about how they can't really participate in feats, as if all they want is a new shiny for their own Glitch. What's being completely discounted is that people want to participate in feats because they want the world to succeed at the feat, not for the shinies. Or that they want to participate to see how much they can accomplish.
I want to share a bit of my perspective as a player if you will indulge me - I warn you that it is going to sound like I'm bragging for two paragraphs, but I really need to get this out to make my point and I hope you take my assurances that I don't think I'm a better person or that I have a more valid opinion because of this stuff.
Check this: http://www.glitch.com/leaderboards/humbaba/. I don't have 10M favor with Humbaba to get some in-game advantage - there is not in-game advantage to having it. Reida doesn't have 6M to get some advantage. In fact, if Reida had wanted first place on a leaderboard, 6M would have been enough to win any other giant. I put that favor in because A) I love Humbaba and B) I wanted to see what I could do.
What else could I have done? 10M favor requires the donation of a little over 30M currants of goods. I could have sold those and had 22.5M currants. So when people say artifact pieces are going for 3-4M... if I wanted those, I could have just bought them. If I want them now I will just save up money and buy them.
So what did I do for the deaths achievement? Well I got in 98 mourns of my own by trading back and forth with some friends. I decided I'd had enough and stopped there. Then, when there were 105 minutes left to get 7k more mourns in, I headed off to Cebarkul and died 120 times so that random strangers could mourn me. I got no credit or reward for doing this except the satisfaction of knowing that I participated to make sure we made it to the target. Given that we finished 15 minutes early we would have made it without me. But would we have made it without me and without everyone who also said to themselves, "I need to go die a bunch or we aren't going to make it."? I doubt it - I can't have been the only one.
We're out there, people who want to participate in feats because we want to hit the target. We want the world to win the feat. For most feats that is going to mean doing as much as you can to add to your own score on the leaderboard. The deaths feat was unique in that you could contribute without it adding to your own numbers. For the Qurazy Quoins feat the only way to try to make the world win was to increase your own winningness.
So that's why I was upset when they changes the QQ feat so that QQs from events didn't count. Even if I did 11 Radial Heights tickets each of the 6 days of the feat and reminisced everything and got my QQs from exploring, I still couldn't have possibly cracked the bottom of the leaderboard because I'd already explored the world. I don't mind that I couldn't win - I mind that I couldn't meaningfully help the feat. Five a day was a pretty paltry contribution.
And that's a big part of what upsets me about this feat. Looking at the numbers this is the first feat we are going to fail and I am powerless to stop it. Actually, I'm not powerless to stop it. I'm not that good at this kind of thing myself, but I know enough people that I'm sure I could put together some kind of scripts to make dummy accounts at some poorly secured free email provider, automate them accepting invites and send the invites out. I don't know if I could get that done in time, but if I wanted the world to succeed really bad, that's what I would be doing.
It bothers me that that would clearly violate the spirit of the feat. It bothers me that that would get my account banned (well, it would get the dummy account that I made to do it from banned, I'm not stupid). It bothers me that it has nothing to do with playing the game.
Normally, as one of the "hardcore" players I feel I have a civic duty to make sure I at least pull my weight to get feats done. For the first time I am not going to contribute to a feat and for the first time a feat is going to fail. I feel sorry that I can't even try to help.
For me, the strongly negative reaction I had stemmed from the following reasons:
1. I do not like being asked to shill for something —even a product or service that I really like. Word of mouth is a precious commodity in my opinion. I only give my thumbs up to friends in the context of a more extended conversation of some kind. And that makes my recommendation special in the eyes of my friends; they know it is carefully considered with them in mind.
2. The idea of the community being asked to pump out a high volume of invitations in a short period of time seems to run directly counter to the thoughtful, individual way that I think people should come to this game and which I believe is most likely to result in the them staying.
3. I think every Feat activity should be community-building in game. It should foster interaction and cooperation between glitchen in Ur. It should advance the world-story or promote exploration and discovery. In other words, it should be rich and deep, making us feel ever more embedded in the unique environment of Glitch. I do not enjoy repetitive, mindless activities without variation. They make me feel like a lab-rat pressing a bar over and over for a reward.
4. I couldn't care less about missing out on Feat rewards. None of my concerns have anything to do with that whatsoever. I am solely focused on the implication this Feat had for the ethos of Glitch. It stank of the social media rewards system that turns every consumer into a pitchman for the product (whether that was your intention or not). It tied gameplay to publicity and promotion of the company, which is the hallmark of ickiness in this arena.
To not appreciate the visceral response many of us had to that concept is to seriously misunderstand your most loving and loyal players. I have been an admirer of TS's way of interacting with its players for a long time now. This was, in my view, a shockingly tone-deaf failure to anticipate the likely response of your community.
Have to agree with most of the negative responses here to this feat, and am just boycotting this one not only over its tackiness, but also because I was really looking forward to a cooking and sharing food with my friends feat (something like get a point for every stack of food or drink concocted with the knife and block or blender which is shared with friends; get a 2 points for every stack of food from grilling or pan frying; get 3 points for every stack from the Awesome pot or Cocktail shaker).
However, I also appreciate stoot's 2d thoughtful response...he's always better in explaining his initial responses. I have to agree that sometimes the TS staff is pretty naive about how this stuff will affect the player base...but it only takes one 'oh darn' to destroy a history of good will. This was a major 'oh darn', but there have been plenty along this development trail, and TS has usually been good about listening to our player concerns, and attempting to get back into our good graces.
Some of us have concerns with some of the current business practices...the lean toward rewards for FB actions, spammy invites, and twittering (attempting to list from most offensive to least). I get that it is a business and needs to grow, but some of us here from the shutting down of FS debacle, still have very negative/bitter emotions to how that game was negatively impacted by embracing these types of 'normal/standard' internet business practices (especially anything tied to FB). I think many of us felt this game was going to be different and not go down those roads, and so this feat compiled with the FB and twitter rewards are de ja vu for many of us.
Much of the vocal negativity is from those who care and are trying to keep TS from destroying the community just to make a buck. Hopefully, TS is accurately tracking how many players drawn to the game by these means actually continue to play, and then who actually pays for subs. Also included in the analysis needs to be the long term player quit rates and/or their subscription rates after these types of introductions. Is it really worth the kickbacks from FB? Maybe the answer is 'yes', but also include how much wear and tear this new new batch of likely younger, non-subbing players is going to be for the moderators and devs. Just throwing some additional thoughts out there for perspective.
After reading stoot's response, I better understand their reasoning behind this mistake, and feel a bit sorry for them. their intentions were good and they can't always foresee how people will react. We may work together towards goals and frolic here, but there is a diverse group of people with tons of opinions about this failure. There is a nugget of truth in stoot's first statement, that this will make us stronger, but at what cost? I could go on and on about that last sentence, but I'll just let it sit there for others to ponder. I feel all rambly at the moment.
I still admire TS and Glitch. I am thinking of this as a bump in the road, and hope that there will be some make up for putting us through it. I know I haven't been playing much until the feats started (I got bored waiting for new content for higher players and went to other games), but I was constantly checking to see what was happening here. I want to see this game thrive.
I did honestly think about all my non glitch friends (which there aren't many) and evaluated whether they would want to play. I did this before, when we got invites, and realized that 1) none of them would probably be interested, and 2) I don't talk to them much, so asking out of the blue if they would be interested seemed wrong to me. That's when I started really thinking about the feat and the wrongness behind it. It just felt like it was a mass ad disguised as a feat.
I am one of those competitive players. I wasn't really til I got here. Working hard at an achievement, trying to stay on the leaderboards, etc- all of it gives me a rush, and I find myself getting up extra early to work on my goals. It drew me into Glitch even further. This feat is a dead end to me. I spent several hours working on the last two, only to have one that I couldn't and refused to work on bring me to a screeching halt. That was another let-down: it kinda felt like first beta, when glitch would close and I came down from a gaming high and was deeply saddened that I couldn't keep playing. I felt, like others probably did, a familiar question go through my mind: Well, now what?"
I will say this and try not to keep rehashing- TS is a good force in my eyes. I don't think of myself as a kiss-up like so many are (or were). I like TS's spirit about listening to and engaging with the community. I love the fact that they made Glitch. I am disappointed about this feat, but am holding out hope that they won't shaft us for not completing it (ie not giving us new content or giving us some crappy new feat). I won't be rash and cancel my subscription and rage quit over something that wasn't thought through on all angles.
From Stoot"......for people who are playing more "casually" than the most hardcore players (partly because we think that's healthier for the long term, partly because it's just how we think of the game, and partly because there are a significant number of players who do play more casually — while they like it when the points go up, they play more for the socializing, exploration/discovery and the spontaneous bits of fun)."
Ya, that's me.Been playing for over a year. When I logged on yesterday and saw the dead feat, I attempted to play for awhile, got in some lineups to mourn someone then decided it wasn't for me and went back to organizing my cubimal collection.
There are always going to be more feats, more new things to collect, more fun challenges and quests......probably only if more players come and buy credits though. $$$ is probably the only thing to keep this game going for the people that love it so much. Such a polite Canadian you are Stoot. "Glitch sinks or swims for the players who enjoy it and the people who work to make it happen both."
I've sent one, just because I'd been wanting to send an invite to my aunt for a while now and couldn't. But I kinda agree that this Feat is in bad taste.
I do understand what stoot was saying and I think we should give them a break. I know what it's like to think someone will react one way and the complete opposite happens. Its been done, so do it or don't. It's too late to change it now, and with only 10 hrs left, it's obvious it is going to fail, which will be a message in itself. After the high energy and community participation during the last 2, the fact that this one fell flat in such an EPIC way will speak volumes.
I still love this game and the people are wonderful. I think it's a little funny to see how people (while still objecting) all of a sudden sound calmer since stoot replied.
^_^
(P.S. I was also looking forward to a cooking feat. Got my cooking gear out of storage and dusted it off. Now I'm craving a Glitchen Cook-Off.)
While I still do not like the implementation of this feat TS' record from what I've seen is good enough that I strongly believe that they are sincere in how they did try to consider all angles before implementing this event, which is good because it does show that they care.
+ 1 to you and everyone else who has shared their views. And let us hope that the next feat shall be more inclusive for everyone!
Perfectly stated Humbabella (brag and all :)). Truly, you gave my feelings and frustrations on all of this words. And I appreciate it because now I can deal with them and let them go. Thank you.
Stoot, I really appreciate the thoughtful response. I work in a field where I'm dealing with designing experiences for a community. I know how ideas can seem great in the office and, once in the wild, take on a very different life of their own. The thought of letting players grow the world is a good one. Though, as we all now know, the execution of the idea was not so great. That happens. Learn from it and move on.
Perhaps the biggest lesson, here, based on what you wrote, is to not underestimate the desire of the community to participate. You're at a really interesting stage of community development here. There's a gap in the player experience. You have folks who have been around a long while and folks who have been around a not-so-long while. There isn't a healthy middle due to the rebeta closing. This feat not only crashed up against social media mores of not spamming friends, but against the divide in the community (new players might not have invited anyone yet whereas those of us who have been around for awhile have brought our interested friends in).
We all want to participate. And we're all just now getting used to these crazy new things so we want to participate even more so. I'd even wager that those of us that have been around for a while are more eager... something new! yay!
((Hugs)) Stoot! Hearing your (TS's) side of the story makes things a bit more palatable. Good intentions count for something with me. As I said above, as long as we learn something from our mistakes then it was a worthwhile experiment.
I totally get that this game will need more players to continue on, but as many have already said "any of my friends who would like to play-already are". I don't believe there are too many solutions to this but of course my viewpoint is limited to personal experience and not TS corporation experience. It seems like for the average demographic (35-50yo) playing here, that it would be difficult to add to their friend list. Seriously think about how many NEW people you come into contact with during a year and how many you STAY in contact with to consider them friends. Then think, of those, how many have the time and desire to play a game like this. Younger players may have more people available but older players may have less. Remember also, that when this game moved into beta a little more than a year ago, that there was a huge influx of players from another game that were the exact target market you were looking for. This group was also looking for a game just like this to satisfy their needs. It happened to coincidentally be perfect timing for all involved. You will likely NOT have this happen again. So search around TS, there has got to be another way.
Hey, everyone makes mistakes. Just bear in mind that a good few of us really don't want this to turn into a FB game or similar, and you should be ok. :~)
I dont't think this was a good idea though, because as people have already said, a lot of players have either already invited their friends or have no friends that would be interested. (Both of which is true for me).
Kaelyn Renai says it very well, and I especially agree with the part about looking forward to a cooking feat. :~/
stoot - Thank you for your explanation of the thought process behind this most recent "feat." I most heartily concur that we are all in this together. I love Glitch, and I want to be able to keep playing Glitch for years and years. I know that this will happen only if Glitch attracts and retains new players, including players willing to pay for subscriptions or credits and players who add value to the game by their presence. Consequently, I hope the discussion of this can become an opportunity for TS and some of its current players to exchange ideas about how to partner in that process.
Speaking as a player to other players: Social marketing makes sense for Glitch not only because it is cost effective, but also because it helps to build the type of community and player interaction that so many of us value. So Glitch needs to "use" us, and I think we have a choice in whether we treat that as exploitation or treat that as partnership. I think we have a choice because I don't think a small company like Tiny Speck can exploit a community like this one without our complicity. We have a choice.
We exercise the choice of partnership by giving feedback that is honest, but that seeks to be helpful rather than hurtful. Sometimes, in a partnership, there will be negative emotions. That's not fun, but in the end the partnership will be strengthened if we can find it in ourselves to express our negative emotions in a civil and respectful manner. But sometimes we fail in this, so there's also a time for cutting each other some slack.
If, however, we exercise the choice of feeling powerless and exploited -- and I do believe that is a choice -- then we will be the worse off for it. I see Tiny Speck as a group of sincere and and talented folks in a business structure that's currently small and vulnerable. Yes, TS staff write the code for the game, but they have set things up in a way that gives this community a great deal of control as well. The need may thus arise in both directions for speaking truth to power.
The rewards will go to players who knew a lot of people they -could- invite, and those people all want to play, but they never got off their behinds and sent out the invites.
Also to the minority who create dummy alts to invite.
Those of us that have sent out invites in the past to help Glitch get to where it is now lose out.
Stoot, it was brave and generous of you to reply and I thank you.
I am sorry to say that, so far, the Feats have not been particularly good for me. I missed most of the first one but enjoyed it and would like to have more like it. It could be done alone or in public and I did it both ways. It did not annoy other people (except maybe those wishing to deal with the Cebarkul vendor). I might even have gotten into the top contributors had I started at the beginning and not near the end.
I missed the second Feat (which required more than one player) completely but I would not have participated. It was very annoying! I have no desire to blow my conch at others and I especially don't want tens of others blowing theirs at me!
The Death Feat required others also and although that was not a problem for me exactly, it did seem unfair. I died but oddly was sometimes not mourned (very strange!) and the only chance I had to Mourn was to do it on a Home street with friends who took turns (a good thing!). Still, a Feat that requires going to Hell ought to have let doing that count as well as being mourned (just MHO).
Now comes this Invitation thing. This lets me out completely (and probably many others for various reasons). I came here near the end of the Alpha Test. I came with 300+ Friends at the time and more have entered the game since. Who could I possibly invite? My Friends are mostly here already! A few are not here and that is because they do not want to play Glitch. I have told them about the Game and have shown them screenies. I have several Glitch Sets at Flickr which promote the game to friends and Strangers alike. I have used my invites in the past to send to family members who play other games. I e-mail these family members often and always discuss Glitch with them. They are NOT interested, they play Minecraft and FB "ville" games and Wizard 101 and WoW. They do not want to come here :(
So, this Feat is one I cannot participate in. Furthermore, it is one I do not want to participate in. Like some others, I do find it a blatant and offensive method of advertisement for a Game that I constantly advertise anyway. Nuf said.
I do have hopes that one day soon there will be a Feat that is made for "me", one that I can fully participate in and maybe win a Big Rock instead of the tiny Pebble that I have glorified in a gold SDB. Until that Feat happens, I will wait and hope and look forward to a successful second launch of this good and fun Game. Thank You!
Well, I completely agree that social marketing makes sense for Glitch. And not just because of the cost, but because of the community nature of the game.
I disagree on the feeling of exploitation and whatnot. It is, absolutely, exploitive to place a marketing goal in a feat. Whether or not we participate is, yes, up to us. However, feats are brand spanking new. This is the very first epic. The community nature of glitches will drive us to want to participate. Then there's the fact that participating would give you a chance at brand new items in game that are, currently, going for many many currants. So if the social temptations didn't get you, the intrigue and greed is definitely tempting. Was the intent exploitation? To a degree, yes. It was dressed up nicely and I can totally get how, in a brainstorming session, it all made sense and was fun and friendly and whatnot. But that does not take a way from the fact that it was exploitative. And, frankly, I would be surprised if Tiny Speck didn't see that in hindsight. They are good and smart folk.
And, as good and smart folk, I believe they will come to find better ways to get us to help them with their social marketing. Some of those may be explicit (the credits for the like, the snap contests) and some probably won't be. Personally, and because it's what I do so I'm totally biased, I'd love to see them spill the Ur world out into the real world a bit. I think it's a great fit and would be outstanding "social marketing" for the game.
Tiny Speck has always been very good about respecting the sanctity of the experience. They have made it perfectly clear that there will never be an in-game advantage that can be paid for. Yet, here, they violated that. You may not think that your social network is valuable, but it is. Companies like Facebook bank on it (you are not Facebook's customer, you and your data are their product). Tiny Speck explicitly asked us to give them some of our social network for an ingame advantage. If we did not give them this, we could not participate in the feat. That is what people are upset about. It goes counter to everything that Tiny Speck has done in the past. It broke trust and seemed to signify a change in philosophy. If there's anything that freaks a community out, it's change.
Was there an actual change in philosophy? I don't think so, but I can see how others might, even if they don't quite make the connection that their social network is valuable. There's just something that seems dirty about it all.
Yes, I know that time is money and that the more time you spend in the game, the more advantage you have on things. So my argument there is a bit wonky. But people who play internet games are far more giving of their time than they are of their money and friends.
I know my social network is valuable. I am protective of it, and I decided immediately that I would not be participating in this feat. In talking about partnership vs. exploitation, however, I was referring not to this one episode but rather to the entirety of the relationship between TS and players. I think TS made a mistake with this feat. Nevertheless, I still view my relationship with TS as one of partnership.
I've been in partnerships where I've experienced the feeling of being exploited or having my trust abused. Sometimes, after better understanding the intentions and point of view of the other party, I've changed my mind. Other times not. But if I choose partnership, my response to that feeling of exploitation or abuse of trust needs to go beyond saying "You did wrong and our relationship will never be the same again." Otherwise, there won't be very many partnerships. Also, the shoe will be on the other foot someday.
The folks at TS are among my heros. I have learned, though, that worshipping human heros does a disservice to both them and me. So I say to the folks at TS, who have my admiration and respect, "I think you made a mistake that has done some damage to your relationship with your players." I can also hope that both TS and the majority of players have the wisdom and maturity to work it through.
Another issue, on a different note from the simple issues with finding people to invite without feeling like you're spamming them, is that this feat is achieved entirely outside of the game. I mean, yes, the servers have nearly melted from all the people coming in to play during the last few feats, but...
I guess I sort of liked the idea of achieving something as "Salyavin, the little orange goblin with a bad sense of style", as happened in the first part of this sequence, rather than "Salyavin, the user name of the real person sitting in front of a computer".
This may just be me. And it may have been said earlier in the thread, in a different fashion, and I just missed it.
This feat is easy. I just went to Meet-an-Inmate, got four emails (the incarcerated love emails) and sent them out. Oh and one to Justin Trudeau, just 'cause I think he is cute.
The real problem with this feat isn't the act of sending invites to others. The real problem is that sending invites to others will earn the "top performers" a rare and desired in-game item. That makes it an invitation for unprincipled players to cheat.
My contact list is divided into three sets of people:
Those I like too much to hit with unsolicited invitations to a game they've not heard of.
Those I don't like enough to want to game with and people I work with.
Those I have already invited to play.
Almost three weeks ago me and 6 players who came into the game with me (and have all since subscribed) wrote to TS and general sort of feedbacky-with-ideas email. It didn't get replied to. And that's okay, I thought, because TS are clearly busy doing Game Stuff and don't have time to respond to the mail they must get from players all the time. Fine.
But, having thoughtfully burned through my invites twice, with every player I invited joining the game AND giving the game money AND THEN seeing a feat about inviting people NOW being emphasised sort of cheapened the whole "Yay! Playing a game with my buddies!" part of the experience. Because, suddenly, it was about quantity not quality of invites sent. Because to invite people in who not only play the game with a sense of joy and devotion but also decided to give it money didn't merit as much as a "Thanks!" but to invite people I barely knew (the rest of the folk I didn't invite the first time round) would have made me a winner.
I was happy to spend three hours dying for people to mourn while only contributing 2 mourns to the feat myself. I was happy to spend a similar amount of time drafting an email to TS and not get a reply. I was happy to give much of what I had at level 19 - not to mention most of my free time for two weeks - to my friends when they joined the game.
But this feat - and the explanation that somehow forgot that people who play stuff do so to compete - has taken the shine out of a game that seemed to deliver on its promise of being player-centric. Especially as, after all the "We got it wrong" talk from the staff, the feat - and its target - is still live with its timer ticking down. And I'm guessing that, even though the players' concerns have "been listened to", the people who sent the most invites regardless of the impact those invites will have - and not the people who have previously invited thoughtfully and carefully before spending lots of their own time settling people into the game - will get the big shiny community prizes.
An apology doesn't mean much when it doesn't change anything at all; "Gosh we are so naive" doesn't go far when the naivety has been acknowledged without it changing a single thing.
"An apology doesn't mean much when it doesn't change anything at all; "Gosh we are so naive" doesn't go far when the naivety has been acknowledged without it changing a single thing."
Hey, why's everyone yelling about how TS "destroyed their trust forever?" TS is a group of people, and people make mistakes, and if people raised a storm every time you made a mistake how would that be??
I still like TS. One mistake of theirs will not change that.
hoooooly crap. I think the key word in stoot's response was perspective. I cannot believe how many people have written pages upon pages of vitriol on this "issue", when we are dealing with a casual online game. if this feat is really that morally offensive to you, I think you need to direct your intense energy elsewhere, like an actual real-world issue that deserves this level of analytical response.
obviously some people will find this point of view distasteful, but I felt I had to put in my $.02.
Stoot, thanks as always for your thoughtful replies and engagement with players both in and out of game. This is something that I've always appreciated about the TS team (way back from the GNE days) and one of the things that appeals about Glitch.
As Soupie and WalruZ pointed out this has certainly encouraged the making of large numbers of alts and I hope staff are on top of removing them and sending the Funpickle to attack the perpetrators. Some are quite obvious.
I wholeheartedly support the thoughtful influx of new players into Ur and would actively help with that effort. I post enthusiastic "come join me in this awesome game" raves to my Facebook and Twitter without prompting or incentive. I give lots of real-world cash to TS. If all I cared about was "GET ALL THE BADGES," I'd surely have let my Glitch die by now, wouldn't I?
For me, the real problem is that when money or spam-your-friends incentives grant significant in-game advantages, it skews the gameplay unacceptably, and it calls the game's motives into question. Duh, games need to make money and attract new players. We all get that. But doing it like this...as the finale of a promised weekend of feats, in a way that actively encourages cheating, alts and spamming RL friends, and then being so disingenuous about the understandable outcry....it's disappointing.
@slugbug and other "anti-complainer" complainers. I haven't read a lot of vitriol or overreaction. Yes, a bit, but mostly what I'm seeing is a lot of long-term players calmly (but sadly) expressing concern that the very things that draw them to Glitch may go away, or change in ways that cause us to go away. It's not only OK for people to be upset, it's proof that for many of us, Glitch is not a "casual online game" but a community we really care about.
OMG I was totally unhappy when I saw the feat, then I said, well yeah there is still a couple of my friends that I think will like this game but have never invited mainly because I know their R/L hours are pretty much booked up with kids, work, etc. But I sent them the invites anyway. What gets me is all the people who said TS has gone Zynga!!! Most of my annoying Zynga requests come from my Glitch fb friends! Interesting....
I also have not lost ANY TRUST in TS because of this feat. It's not like they sold us out to another company that is going to pull the plug in a couple of months.. like some others have done to me about 6 times in the past. Rigth TS? right?
Stoot has apologized, so why go on and on about it? The clock is ticking and soon this will be over and the will be another feat for a WHOLE other group to complain about :)
*pastes here from my update* I wanted to put it here as well.
You know, I hated this feat at first. I think it struck me the wrong way because TS really hasn't done mugh invite-rewarding before, and then all of a sudden boom. It hits us in the face with a big feat. But, while I'm still not sure I like the premise, this feat is starting to grow on me. Why? Because wandering around today, I've seen new players everywhere, exploring the game. It made me remember my first days. Now, I'm glad we had this feat, because it let more people come explore this beautiful world.
i feel compelled to confess: i had already sent invites to the people i thought would enjoy playing, so when this feat came up i sent a few invites to dummy email accounts that don't even exist. i wanted to participate in the feat, but didn't want to spam people that i knew wouldn't be interested. i feel dumb.
Stoot, thank you for the reply. Its made the think about this feat a little more and now I can see where TS is coming from. I still don't like this feat but I can see the good intent behind it.
I agree with Salyavin very much.
Terribelle the glitch with the sheep hat very much wanted to work on these feats. Not Terri the human sitting at the computer. This feat broke the 4th wall a little too much for my tastes and that makes me a little sad.
...and people thought I was crazy when I said Glitch could start being more facebook/zynga-like...
This is right out of the Zynga, "invite xx friends and receive a y." playbook.
I haven't been visiting glitch as much the past few months, mainly due to their being a lack of public community, with the lack of new public street projects and the new house/tower changes which have made the public streets mostly empty and useless (why go out and mine/pick/harvest/nibble when you can warp from private street to private street).
This (feat) just makes me less want to play and socialize on Glitch because these types of "gameplay" rewards systems lead to shallow communities (lots of low or no level accounts and users who don't have true curiosity on what Glitch is).
I joined Glitch a few weeks before the "unlaunch" occurred. Registered without being invited by a friend, or clicking posted links to glitch on a social network.
I found Glitch from an article on one my frequent visited tech sites covering, the Co-founder of Flickr's new game that takes a new approach at being a massively multiplayer game.
(I've read stoot's response and I believe his (and TS's) intentions were somewhat good, but the implementation reeks of slimy, greedy desperation; 10,000!? in 24!?)
This is the worst feat, ever. I will not participate in this, and as stoot said......I am playing something else until this is over. Bad idea. Terrible idea, actually.
Stoot - I'm a subscriber opting out of this feat. I think I can help elucidate why players (like me) are distinguishing between incentivizing invites and the way this feat is structured. There are two reasons, one about participation, one about rare items.
1) participation. People who play MMOs _love_ to feel like they're part of the story arc, that their existence in the virtual world matters. The feat system is an ingenious way to tap into that need to feel necessary, or at least to feel integrated into the very fabric of the game. This need is not pecuniary... it is social and actually quite visceral when it comes to the real life world, as it should be - it's the stuff the web of society is made of. For some people, it is painful to be presented with an opportunity to be integral but have that opportunity denied to them because it to do it comes into conflict with their personal values.
2) rare items. Participation in a feat grants a chance at a rare item. The only way to acquire said items is to participate or to wait until those items show up on auction at considerable cost. There is a material difference between that sort of compensation and getting 50 credits for signing up a friend. It's the sort of difference that makes it very hard to offset... this feat wouldn't feel so dirty if I could just give away my profit from it without effectively creating a big "ripple effect" by doing so. Basically a valuable incentive is an anti-incentive to a non-negligible part of the population whereas a moderate incentive can be negated by those who find direct friend-to-friend marketing distasteful. And as you have found out, a lot of people do find this type of direct marketing distasteful.
I hope that clarifies the issue from someone who doesn't like the feat but doesn't have a lot of anger over it, either. I do believe the folks at TS are trying and learning without any malevolent intent. Better to try this stuff in beta than when the lights are on and the show is in progress.
Well i will be boycotting this feet because ...A, i already have invited anyone i think would love Glitch and B, it make me feel like im doing something for TS and not for me. I have been here since alpha and know full well how hard TS have worked to get us all where we are today. So I showed my appreciation with parting with real cash in the form of a subscription. I may well do this again once it is up. But for me this feat feels a little like blackmail. The only way i can now take part is to do as im told/asked or as Stoot said earlier not bother playing for however many hours :( I'd of preferred it had Stoot suggested i just played my usual way and try to enjoy glitch. Now i feel like my presence is a little unwanted if i don't chose to play ball :(
That said what's done is done. I'm sure the TS team have lernt from it and that is a good thing. We are after all still beta. Better be now than later when the doors are fully open :)
I responded in this thread yesterday. I don't like the feat. I don't think it is a "feat" in the spirit of the game.
I didn't participate for many of the same reasons others have given. I joined a year ago after a good friend kept raving about it. I loved it immediately. I invited 2 other (less close) friends to play. They both tried it but it wasn't to their liking. But I did ask them first if I could send an invite. Recently, I invited my best friend to join. She has been listening to my Glitch stories for a long time. She joined and she loves it.
I would have never invited anyone just to pump up a feat number.
That being said, I appreciate Stoot's thoughtful response and admission that not every aspect of this idea was successful. My faith in TS has not been shaken. We all make mistakes.
@Stoot thank you for your explanation. I admit I find it a bit disingenuous to say that you didn't intend for people to spam others when everything around the feat (language, concept, three levels of goals to reach, and prize) pushed the idea of "all of you, invite as many people as possible", but I definitely understand that even if that were so, you didn't imagine we'd all be so invested in how the community was built to have so many concerns and that you figured those who were interested would and those who weren't interested wouldn't. Which I think is basically happening, except that those who aren't interested really want people to understand why they weren't so we can build the game toward something we ARE all interested in.
To those who are commenting on people needing to chill and/or the level of vitriol, I really haven't seen either in this thread. I've seen a lot of people explaining why they are upset and trying to make it clear so that TS is aware of their concerns and the game gets developed toward what they've come to love in it, as well as mentioning where it's caused problems for them that won't go away so easily. Everyone's seemed very calm, polite, and clear. Disagreements or speaking of the game negatively in this case I don't think is flying off the handle, but attempting to help shape the game in a way that they're powerless with except through dialogue.
I notice that one of the current feat leaders has a very suspicious-sounding series of new friends, none of whom have done anything in the game. I expect that only a small minority of players would invite dummy alts, but the top feat awards are likely to go mostly or entirely to such players.
It was utterly obvious to most of the players I've talked to that things would go this way. If TS didn't expect it, 'naive' isn't really a strong enough word.
Throw me into the camp of not participating because this rewards spamming, and for all reasons annotated in the many wonderful comments above. I'm loving this thread, frankly, because it assures me that my fellow players are accountable and ethical.
"If this feat is really that morally offensive to you, I think you need to direct your intense energy elsewhere, like an actual real-world issue that deserves this level of analytical response."
Some of the players here actually DO deal with actual major real world issues daily, but come here for a mental break from that in an anonymous fashion...however, many of these same players bring that level of analytical expertise to a beta session of an online game, which is what this is. This was a very poor implementation by TS, and people are providing the appropriate level of analytical response to that poor decision, since it is apparent from stoot's response that TS is admitting to be apparently naive/clueless about their player base when it comes to issues like this. Besides, many of the analysts here appreciate the well thought out/detailed responses as much as the flippant short ones.
I see little comparison to Zynga. I played a FB game for a while (not a Zynga game). It was beautiful and I really loved it. The catch was that when I reached a certain level I could not progress without "friends" and/or without spending real money on upgrades. I think Zynga games also do this. I can play Glitch as long as it lasts and progress as far as I wish without spending a cent on the Game. I can also get almost as far without "friends". There are some Quests and "Feats", etc. that do require some amount of cooperative effort but they are not required, you can still "progress". You do NOT have to do them! Therein lies the difference. Feats are NOT something we must do to get ahead. So, as much as I dislike this "Invitation" Feat, I do NOT have to do it and I am not doing it. No harm here just some disappointment that TS would create such a Feat and then feel they have been "naive". I don't get it but I am moving on.
do you really want to be known as "the game that causes people to spam EVERYBODY" like they are?
The best this feat could be said to be is a representation of absolutely BLINDNESS to human nature. If the feat was "most shiny rocks in a home" you know that people would be going through decorated streets and collecting all the rocks that took people so many hours to place. If it calls for invites, people are going to invite.
For Tii's sake... get the game out of BETA before you try to recruit swarms of people, this would be, barely, acceptable, if it was to celebrate passing BACK out of beta. Putting it in with those other two...
No. I want this feat to fail.
Because the less people we invite, the less groddle is going to be crowded with people who won't know how to play. The less that general chat is going to get filled with the same 5 questions over and over, and the less we will be overcome with trying to tend to people who are genuinely clueless how the game works, how the community works, and how WE work.
What we want to do, is invite those who are going to like the game. Going to play the game. Going to stay and help make this game a better place. But not today, please do not invite them today.
What we don't want, is to have the newbie areas so terribly crowded with people, fighting with each other to get started, and then giving up and saying horrible things about how bad a game this is.
This is honestly the worst feat that could have been chosen. Even "spend money" would have been better. This goal? It's going to be a RP nightmare.