Hey everybody!
Our first major Community survey came to a close on the 18th of July with over 1,800 responses! We would’ve been happy with 1000 responses considering the length of the survey, but really appreciate you all for spending your time and putting lots of great feedback into it. While we won’t post everything that was learned from the survey responses, we’re hoping this blog can be the start of a series of community updates we release as a step in the right direction in ensuring that your voices are being heard in future developments.
So let’s start by shining a spotlight on you, our incredible Gems of War players, and explore where in the world you all hail from. It’s always exciting to see the global reach of our community and celebrate the diversity of players who make this game what it is. Looking at the survey results, it’s clear that our player base truly spans the globe, from North America to Europe, Asia, Australia, and beyond. It’s amazing to see how Gems of War has become a part of daily routines around the world.
How would you rate and Recommend and Rate Gems of War as an overall game? 7.55 & 7.89
Average: 7.55 & 7.89 Midpoint: 8 & 8
A great start to work from! Especially as this is the first time we have really dug into community sentiment with a survey and collated data.
There is a lot of passion and love for Gems of War which helps support these overall positive scores and we know that you really want the game to continue to improve to nudge it into the 8+ marks. We know that some parts are great, but we know there is a lot of work to be done so that sentiment is felt throughout the game here as well.
This ties directly into the next point.
How satisfied are you with the overall development of Gems of War? 6.60
Average: 6.60 Midpoint: 7
On the other hand, your satisfaction level with the game’s development didn’t get the same love and the reason behind the community rating this 6.6 score is evident throughout the survey. Seeing the data and reading your comments, there was lots of mentions from players wanting QOLs to start being addressed, a bigger focus on bug fixes over new content, and updating existing game modes to have new and more relevant resource rewards. Those were just a couple of the pain points that stood out among the many insights shared through the survey results. While every player’s experience is unique, certain themes appeared frequently enough to help us identify areas where we can improve and better support the community moving forward.
“We’re encouraged by the bulk of your scores being in the 8-10 range, as evidenced by the high mid-point values. But the averages are lower than we’d like, so we still need to address the fact that fans who have given us many years of loyalty are not enjoying the game as much as we would like. Free-to-play games have had a roller coaster ride in the last 10-15 years. We’ve always strived to keep Gems of War as free as it can possibly be – it’s been a tricky balancing act – but there’s always room for improvement there, and we suspect (from the data further down) that this is where some of the friction is coming from. So our goals for 2025 and 2026 are really centered around listening to the things that you, the players, are all asking for, and seeing how we can adjust our plans, priorities, and processes to get you more of what you want, and less of what you don’t want.” – Gems of War Production Team
Candidly, the results were all over the place with “No Preference” leading the pack and “Monthly” following as a close second with another even split for the remaining options.
Also, I (Jeto) do not think some people who selected “Monthly” may have read that this means “minor feature updates & some bug fixes.“
Emphasis on SOME BUG FIXES, but no QOLs, and only a small number of bug fixes. We know that the overwhelming majority of you want to see QOLs and bug-fixing focused updates into the future so we’ll take into consideration how best to roll these into the game with our future updates.
Something to keep in mind, a monthly update cadence only leaves the team with a small timeframe to work on content and bug fixng, before it all needs to be QA’d, submitted, and launched. By that time, the next update is already underway so as simple as a quick update cadence is, there’re a lot of moving parts that make some of this very difficult
“For the moment, we’re switching back to a 2 month cadence. Sadly, that wasn’t a direct option in the survey above, but it gives us the best chance to get lots of small things, especially QoL changes and bug fixes done for you all. We’re also looking at less “new big features” and lots more improvements to things you are already enjoying.” – Gems of War Production Team
Now let’s dive into the parts of Gems of War that you interact with on a daily basis. There’s no shortage of things to do in the game, between events, guild activities, kingdoms, explore runs, and more, the variety can be a great way to stay engaged and find something that suits your playstyle. For many, this constant stream of content helps keep the experience fresh and rewarding.
However, we also recognize that having so many options can sometimes feel overwhelming or unfocused. That’s why, in this survey, we wanted to take a step back and do a bit of a self-evaluation. By gathering your thoughts on the different areas of the game, our goal was to better understand which features are working well, which might need refining, and where we could potentially streamline things to make the overall experience smoother and more enjoyable.
We asked you to tell us what parts of the game you enjoy the most, and which ones might not be hitting the mark. Based on the survey results, here’s how your favorites (and least favorites) stacked up:
Aspects
Top 3 Favourites
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Collecting Troops
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Events
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Match-3 Gameplay
Top 3 Least Favourites
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PvP
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Story
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Boss Raids
Game Modes
Top 3 Favourites
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Dungeon
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Guild Wars
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Treasure Hunt
Top 3 Least Favourites
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Arena
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Treasure Hunt
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Guild Wars
Seeing Guild Wars and Treasure Hunt in both the top favoured and top least favourite was interesting!
We know Treasure Hunt is long overdue for some sort of update, even just updating the rewards. There are a lot of players who really enjoy playing it, but want it to be refreshed and there are a heap of players who don’t enjoy Treasure Hunt at all.
A Note on Guild Wars
Guild Wars stood out as both a favorite and a least favorite among players, a clear sign that while it offers intense strategy and competitive excitement, it also comes with pain points that can affect the experience. We hear you, and we want you to know that Guild Wars improvements are very much on our radar.
As we mentioned before the recent changes rolled out, the new version of Guild Wars is a work in progress and will evolve over time. What you’re seeing now is just the first step in a larger series of planned updates. We’re committed to making iterative improvements based on your feedback, whether that’s in matchmaking, reward structure, scoring clarity, or overall balance.
This won’t happen all at once, but with each update, we’re working to move closer to the experience we all want Guild Wars to be.
Thanks for sticking with us as we shape the future of this mode together.
Events
Top 3 Favourites
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Vault
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Campaign
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Holiday Events
Top 3 Least Favourites
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PvP Season
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Journey
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Tower of Doom
One thing worth highlighting is that Journey events are an area the team plans to revisit in future updates. The last changes made were in May; we know there’s more potential to make the experience more engaging and rewarding. Over time, we’ve been gathering and reviewing all of your feedback to make thoughtful and meaningful improvements that reflect the community’s needs and expectations. It may take some time, but we’re committed to getting it right.
Features
Top 3 Favourites
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Gnome-a-palooza
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The Soulforge
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Kingdoms & Dailies (almost a tie)
Top 3 Least Favourites
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Shines
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Variant/Limited edition Troops
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Battlecrashers
We know that variant and limited-edition troops are closely tied to the many different resources now available in Gems of War—and that those resources can be earned in a variety of specific ways.
We even have a whole Game Guide on the different types of troops and where they are located in-game, because there are so many.
Feedback in the past has been shared about the cycle of new troops being released every week for existing players who already have their team metas, who don’t find a lot of new troops very valuable. Then, on the flip side, how overwhelming this is for new players to see when they jump in.
With none of that even starting on your feedback around the difficulty to collect all the various troops, from Underspire Sentinel drop rates, Dragon crafting RNG in the Soulforge, to collecting Immortal Souls and Shiny keys.
“All that being said, we’re not planning on changing the cadence of troops releasing. We feel that’s a core part of the Gems of War DNA. But you’ve probably already seen us streamlining the new-player experience this year, and there’s certainly more planned there, because we all want the game to be as appealing as possible for new players.
Our ultimate goal is for you to start any play session, to be able to set a clear goal, and to know how to progress towards achieving it, and then have fun doing it. Sounds simple enough, but there are a lot of systems in the game that need to be tinkered with to bring some of that together.
That’s a big-picture view of where we’d like things to go, but shorter-term, and more related to this feedback here are just a few upcoming things that we can’t wait to share
– Lots of Guild Wars improvements coming in the next 2 updates – version 8.8 and 8.9 – including lots of visibility into the data to see how your guild is performing
– Soulforge improvements to make it more useful to everyone
– Some Pet Gnome improvements to help you get the pets you want” – Gems of War Production Team
One major goal of our recent information-gathering efforts was to better understand what Quality of Life improvements players would most like to see, both across the game in general and within the new version of Guild Wars. The feedback we received through the survey helped us pinpoint the updates that would make the biggest impact on your overall experience.
While we wish we could implement every suggestion right away, the results gave us valuable direction and the good news is that several of these improvements are already planned for our upcoming 8.8 Update!
GUILD WARS
We shared a list of nearly 20 potential Quality of Life improvements for Guild Wars and you let us know which ones mattered most. Here are the top 5 most requested features, along with where they stand in our development plans:
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Guild Member Leaderboard – See how your fellow guildmates are performing throughout the event.
- In discussion, and more information coming soon!
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More Guild Wars Scoring Information – Greater clarity on how scoring works.
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: Coming in Update 8.8!
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Active/Inactive Guild Wars Indicators – Easily tell who’s participating.
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: Targeting Update 8.9 or shortly after
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Defender Team Information – Get more details on your guild’s defense setups.
- :: Coming in Update 8.8!
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Daily and End-of-Day Guild Wars Summaries – Quick summaries to track progress and results.
- :: Coming in Update 8.8!
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These updates are just the start, and we’re excited to continue improving Guild Wars with your feedback in mind.
There was an overwhelming call to have Guild Wars show more Guild information, and as mentioned above, you can expect to start seeing some of these from 8.8 onward.
GENERAL QOLs
When it comes to general Quality of Life improvements, you gave us clear insight into the updates that would have the biggest impact on your overall gameplay experience.
We presented a list of just under 20 potential QOL changes, and here are the top 5 features you prioritised most:
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Update Treasure Hunt Rewards – Many of you want to see better and more relevant rewards from this classic game mode.
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Chest Open Slider – A long-requested feature to let you open multiple chests at once, more efficiently.
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More Ways to Spend Gold Keys – With a large number of keys piling up, players want new ways to make use of them.
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More Ways to Target Pet Gnomes – A better chance to hunt down those elusive gnomes and their adorable rewards.
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Tower of Doom Map Shows Revealed Rooms – An impactful change to help track progress more easily.
At the end of the survey, many of you took the opportunity to share final thoughts and open feedback—and some clear themes stood out across your responses:
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A strong desire for more QOL-focused updates – or for Quality of Life improvements to become a regular part of game updates moving forward.
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More attention to bug fixes – with players noting lingering issues that need addressing.
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Concerns about content overload – many of you feel that the game currently has too much to keep up with, making it time-consuming and overwhelming.
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A call for refreshed end-game content – especially for long-time players looking for new challenges or goals.
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Feedback around monetization – including a perceived decline in free rewards and an increase in microtransactions, especially related to the growing number of Passes.
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Requests for better translations – ensuring all players, regardless of language, can enjoy the game fully.
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More customization options – particularly for hero avatars and chat profiles, allowing for a more personalized experience.
We truly appreciate the honesty and thoughtfulness behind this feedback. It helps guide where we go next and reminds us of the areas where we can do better for the community.
“We’ve talked a lot about a renewed focus on QoLs and bug fixes earlier, but there are a few other great points here to address. Refreshed end-game content is the first one, and this was going to be our focus right after the new-player experience this year. While Bastions (a 100% end-game feature) is going to step back into 2026, we still want to make certain the next few updates are ones for our most loyal players.
We’re always very attentive to monetization concerns too – like we said earlier, the original intent was to make a F2P game that was as free as it could possibly be. We feel we’ve delivered on that for the most part, but we’re certainly going to renew our focus on making sure it doesn’t go over the top.
As for customization… We hope to have some more news on that later this year.” – Gems of War Production Team
Lastly, we noticed many of you mentioned that you understand the Gems of War team is small, and we truly appreciate the recognition and support you’ve shared. It means a lot to us!
Looking ahead, we plan to run more community surveys like this one on a regular basis or more targeted surveys on specific areas that we want to do a deeper dive in. We’re also excited to start releasing Community QOL blogs, where we’ll highlight the top Quality of Life features and content we’re working on, all based on your valuable feedback and suggestions.
Stay tuned! There’s more to come soon
