Perspective: Complaint threads only indicate how much people love Warships

[Lensar]

Wrote this in a reply to another thread, but it's probably worth it's own discussion. Despite balance disagreements, arguments, etc, everyone should keep in perspective that even the most harshest critic of WG, really loves the game, otherwise they wouldn't be here complaining about it.

And when you step back and think about it, what they created is a pretty amazing accomplishment, in and of itself.

 

6 minutes ago, Lensar said:

 

For myself, and many others on these forums I'm sure, Warships is one the best games we've ever played. It has the right pacing, sense of action, and attention detail, while providing a game play that rewards both skill and progression, while still providing a fairly even playing field for all. This, in and of itself, is a pretty amazing accomplishment.

On top of the that, the visceral experience with the game's visuals and sound, helps to really capture the feeling of naval combat. The ships feel authentic and historically accurate, at least to the average player, which adds to the overall appeal.

As if that wasn't enough, they were able to land upon a monetization strategy that avoids the pay-to-win perils that haunt most games with microtransactions, while still delivering progression rewards that keep people wanting to continuously play.

One last thing they did in the last year or so, was really step up their community engagement efforts, by producing a ton of good blog and video content along with in-game tasks, missions, and campaigns that really help keep the game interesting and fun. Their community/content teams are to be commended.

With that said, any game that people love and spend a lot of time playing is going to run into issues that one group or another find frustrating or even game breaking. You'll find this sort of thing in any type of hobby that people are passionate about and spend a lot of time engaging with. I'm sure there are some stamp collecting communities out there having similar arguments about the stamp collecting world's equivalent of radar, torpedoes, or CVs.

Many of the issues you see people complaining about are, in a lot of ways, less about the game at this very moment, and more about the direction they see the game taking. Take the complaints with a grain a salt. No one who is on these forums complaining, despite what they might say, (especially including me) doesn't completely love the game. If we didn't, we wouldn't be so passionate about the things we feel are bad or moving the game in the wrong direction.

[Taichunger]

S' truth.

[BullHalsey]

Oh yeah, perhaps more plainly it is indicative of the emotional investment.  No doubt WG has some savvy folks that are quite pleased with a certain level of discontent, cause after all it's the kind of emotion that opens up bank accounts and it is a business at the end of the day.  Hell, all day and night as well.

[Komrade_Rylo]

I wouldn't necessarily say everyone playing and complaining loves WG. It would be like saying everyone that complains about things wrong with their cellphone loves the maker. I personally love the WG NA team, but am not a huge fan of WG as a whole.

[Doomlock]

Well said Lensar. I don't normally post any threads of that nature on the forums, but I truly love this game and the ships within. 

[BullHalsey]

On top of that, with naval combat games in general throughout the past 25 years or so having been sort of an niche, I believe, and thusly not at all the best money maker, seems to me we're quite fortunate to have what we do here and I don't begrudge them for doing what is necessary to make the thing work.  

[Lensar]

18 minutes ago, BullHalsey said:

Oh yeah, perhaps more plainly it is indicative of the emotional investment.  

 

Yes, absolutely.

 

16 minutes ago, Fog_Battleship_NCarolina said:

 

I wouldn't necessarily say everyone playing and complaining loves WG. It would be like saying everyone that complains about things wrong with their cellphone loves the make

 

 

I'd say without a doubt people complaining here on the forums love the game. If there were cell phone forum communities where people spent hours and hours per week complaining and debating the finer aspects of their cellphone, I'd agree with you. It's not that people complain, that means they're passionate. It's that they take the time to complain and discuss things on forums, in threads that are unlikely to even be read by the devs, let alone affect any change or fix in the game. 

[PTX_007_03C]

Complaint threads indicate that balance sucks, first and foremost.

 

You can't ignore WG's inability to adress pressing issues of the community and pretend those threads are a product of players being too passionate about the game. Let's make a quick list of things related with game balance that were never solved.

 

BB balance (Powerful before, powerful now, powerful for ever).

Better BB X CA interactions (less I delete you VS I burn you).

More engaging IJN DD gameplay (They just nerfed the torps and asked people to pretend they have good guns now, that was it).

CVs balance (Releasing the Kaga was more important).

Radar (I don't even...).

 

If you want to praise WG for what they do right that's really nice but that should not be an excuse for the mess that is being done in other areas. They may do many things right, but balancing the strenghts and weaknesses of their ships and modules sure as hell is not one of them.

[WanderingGhost]

It's why I post, it's why I used to post in WoWp (till it became clear they listen to no one, not even main WG HQ). I want the game to be good, I love the history namely around CV's, it's why I get vocal about the fact they have ignored the needed fixes for two years. It took a year just to get aircraft that could have been reskinned. And you have aspects like manual drops that are OP as hell while AA has been buffed to a point it cause a ton of issues.

 

Though I'd say the ones that have an argument thought out, examples, etc are more do it out of love. Some of the less rational "change it now" types with no argument may just be "I want easy mode not learn" can't put it past my generation and kids today sadly to do it just for that. Got hate mail over Xbox before in an FPS game cause I snuck up behind the guy instead of running at him down the hall he was camping likeI was a moron and they apparently wanted easy mode.

[Murcc]

You are correct.  We are emotionally invested.  We vent when we feel things don't seem to be right.  The greater amount of venting usually indicates a greater number of users because there are generally only a small percentage of users that will actually take the time to vent their frustrations.  The others that are discontent will just leave.  The ones that stay, usually have a vested interest.  Quite often that is time because we love the game.  Hopefully the good information gets sifted out of the rants and causes WG to make the game better.

 

 

[anonymised]

Im here for the ships and I do have a lot of emotional investment. That's why I get infuriated at a lot of the decisions made regarding game play. I want it to be better. 

[Taylor3006]

6 hours ago, Murcc said:

You are correct.  We are emotionally invested.  We vent when we feel things don't seem to be right.  The greater amount of venting usually indicates a greater number of users because there are generally only a small percentage of users that will actually take the time to vent their frustrations.  The others that are discontent will just leave.  The ones that stay, usually have a vested interest.  Quite often that is time because we love the game.  Hopefully the good information gets sifted out of the rants and causes WG to make the game better.

 

 

I agree wholeheartedly. Many of us like the game and are frustrated by either mechanics or the like and want to vent. Lets face it, if a game really stinks, you play it and dump it without much said.  Many people are passionate about WoWS and that is a good thing IMHO. Sure some of the reasons can be silly but I think most all of the criticism comes from a pretty good place.