I genuinely don’t get it. I’m a long time player and occasional forum user. I’d love to spend more time in the forums but man alive, it wears you down. There are some users whose EVERY post is negative - bashing the devs, the moderators, the publisher and the game. I don’t get it: if I hated something that much I’d step away. I’d move onto something else - for my own mental well-being.
The fury and vitriol that’s meted out here is unlike anything I’ve seen. So people didn’t like lycanthropy, the gnome-a-palooza thing backfired a bit, the AI has a bug, people haven’t found every single new gnome yet, people don’t like the campaign stuff…OK…but it is just a game! It’s a game that I love and have ploughed a hell of a lot of time and cash into and that’s fine, but it is JUST a game.
This relentless bashing of the devs and accusations (usually pretty baseless) does no-one any good - it’s like mass trolling and rare posts of positivity are trashed.
I’d love to see more posts from the devs on here but I totally get why they stay away for the most part as everything they post is then quoted and dissected and torn apart.
I wish this place felt less toxic but fear that the atmosphere is poisoned for good now
Spending thousands on a game with no respect from the people you paid the money to and then having players tell me to give up the negativity.
I spent the money, you will be right if you respond with that captain obvious statement, but when you spend money you have a certain expectation. Prior to 4.7 Which is when I spent 95% of that money, I had no issues. After 4.7 they put QA in our hands, added more content to buy, disrespected players saying we exploited cpvp and needed to nerf gold 2-3 times. You know a system that was in place for years just randomly becomes a problem? They added this stupid nonsense called lycanthropy then added a way to spam it on a team with that 3rd trait on 4-5 gem matches.
I could go on, but there is no need. They deserve every single piece of negative feedback they get.
Agreed wholeheartedly. I know online communities, particularly video game oriented ones, can be overwhelmingly awful, but some of the forum users here are so out of whack with reality or a sense of proportionate response to disappointment that it’s frankly unsettling.
This is a game. The devs didn’t shoot your dog. They didn’t push you down the stairs. They didn’t fire you from your career. They have released some updates with bugs in them of varying degrees of inconvenience, or new gameplay features that aren’t super popular. So what? Provide your negative feedback in a constructive way and move the hell on. Does this forum need 100 posts beating the same dead horses over and over again?
The Gnome-a-Palooza post-nerf has all kinds of loot practically raining out of the sky, giving hundreds of vault keys, lots of solid resources, fun gameplay. Every single person in my guild loved this event and were so happy that it was introduced, but according to a very vocal segment of the GoW forums you’d think Infinity Plus Two committed war crimes instead due to the band gnome drop rate.
People need to grow up and learn to handle disappointment like actual adults. And no, you can criticize a game that you are passionate about because you care and love it while still doing it in a way that doesn’t dehumanize the actual people who create the thing you love so much. Being passionate about Gems of War is NOT an excuse to act like an entitled brat to people.
I have been playing this game for over 2 1/2 years on the Switch and my only complaint was that it was behind mobile and console versions. That was explained to me and it’s all good. This is a game and no one forces you to spend money on it. If you don’t like it, stop playing it, plain and simple. Being married to a dev, I see how bugs happen or how things don’t go as planned. Stuff happens, and when they do go south, fixes get made and changes get implemented. Someone is always going to be unhappy with the product, it’s never going to be 100% perfect or satisfy everyone.
I remember way back when seeing something that suggested somebody who had a good experience somewhere tended to share that with one person, whereas somebody who had a bad experience tended to share with (on average) thirteen. Mind you, this was in the days before social media was a thing, let alone as omnipresent as it is now, but the idea is that people are far more likely to remember and share experiences when they feel they have been treated poorly.
And I think that’s something we see here to an extent. I suspect the overwhelming majority of players never come to the forums, assuming they even know forums exist. And for those of us who do visit and linger here, we’re far more likely to express ourselves if there’s something we’re unhappy with rather than something we enjoy. We’re also more likely to get cheerful feedback from the rest of the community when we complain.
I don’t know that I’d take the sentiments of those people who do post here a fair amount as being reflective of the GoW community at large. Maybe it does, but I’m inclined to think that most people probably lie somewhere in the middle. That they’re happy or they’re unhappy and they deal with it on a more micro level if they share it at all.
Or that they’ll simply move on to another diversion if GoW makes them unhappy without feeling the need to share that with everybody who gives them a read.
I see that you’re conveniently neglecting to read the part where I say that criticism is totally valid, just be proportionate and rational in response. Devolving into a squalling child that lashes out because a player doesn’t get there way ain’t that. What’s the common phrase used for people that act atrociously while still having a point? “It’s not that you’re wrong, it’s that you’re acting like an asshole.”
If someone is going to fling mud nonstop on the forum, don’t get mad if you get messy.
I will say that I personally tend to read and not respond to a lot of posts here because of what you mention, OP.
But I do also agree that my time and money is being disrespected more and more as time goes on. I first played early on, after a TotalBiscuit recommendation. They lost me because of how some of the systems work BUT they were able to bring me back with certain changes.
However, the more and more they make this game a casino, they are losing me.
There ARE positive things in this game - but it’s not enough. I specifically do not talk to anyone about this game because I know they will see the same things I see.
Thanks for the comments here - it is heartening got know that I’m not totally alone in my view. And I don’t think anyone is pretending the game is without its flaws - but which game is? It’s a great distraction though - I still enjoy getting new troops, trying new combinations, still love Guild Wars. I’m in an incredibly chilled Guild which helps, there’s no pressure and a lot of support for newer players. Those are the aspects I love.
But it must be pretty depressing to only come to the forums to post attacks and negative comments like some on here do - my sentiment will always be the same: if you hate it (and the devs) that much - walk away!
Something to keep in mind is that in the past game improvements requested by the community only seem to be taken up by the dev team once an issue has been completely blown out of proportion, after years of complaints and a large number of players pour negative comments.
Otherwise we might still be waiting for things like the hero class change fee, making older event weapons available, the top27 GW scores or removing the gem creation “upgrades” from some doomed weapons. Things that are raised less negatively (doomed scroll availability comes to mind) just never happen, unless negativity snowballs.
In short I agree on your assessment of the community here being overly negative, but I think the near absolute disregard of reasonable community feedback by the dev team in the last 3-4 years has greatly contributed to the current attitude of the majority of the forum.
If you want less negativity, how about the devs stop treating the playerbase as “beta testers” and adding insult to injury by then refusing to listen to the “beta testers” feedback.
Man, topics like this are so well-intended and always end up turning into a furious storm full of bickering. I would know - I made one myself a long time ago. These threads continue to pop up from time to time, which I’m glad about.
There is absolutely a lot that could be done better and a lot that is a cause for disappointment. However, as the OP mentioned, this shouldn’t be a cause for the vicious/cruel posts against devs. Nerfs and bugs and lack of QA should not be seen as a personal attack nor “how DARE they treat PAYING CUSTOMERS like this.” It’s a game, and you got what you payed for; nobody owes you anything.
So while there are many issues, I fullheartedly agree with the OP that disappointment and discontent can and should be expressed in a more mature way.
I hear what you’re saying. To some degree, I even agree with you. But what keeps echoing in my head is that it didn’t used to be this way.
I’ve been here as long as anybody else who’s still in the game. I remember when updates didn’t come with game-crushing bugs. I remember when the forums were a place where we could interact with the devs on a semi-equal basis. I remember when new events didn’t feel like a jackhammer in my wallet.
Sure, things change, grow and develop. But the changes didn’t used to make me feel disrespected. My first thought at an update used to be excitement, not “What fresh hell is this?”
I have made no secret of the fact that I intend to leave the game when this campaign is over. If I hadn’t foolishly paid for the pass before I found out what lycanthropy was, I’d already be gone. The bug-filled releases we’ve had lately feel like the result of careless incompetence, not honest mistakes. If the devs can’t be bothered to care about their product, I can’t either.
This game is not in a good state so you can’t expect people to be posting unicorns and roses right now. I’m sure many people posting right now are in the exact same situation I am in. I rarely post and only come here for @Hawx and @gary_dils helpful posts to share with my guild or when the devs mess something up (which has been happening more and more every patch). I’ve been coming here for a week now waiting for updates on this bug and have not had any definitive updates so now I (and others) am posting to show frustration.
Like someone else said its been pretty bad since 4.6 -4.7. You can look back at all the updates after that and find a couple peanuts in the turds but something for sure changed.
Its like they are trying to squeeze every last drop out of the game but 2 early. There was still plenty of juice so now they are just making a mess.
Idk if a new person came in thats more profit minded and maybe they lost some creative people but thats what it seems like. Probably wrong cuz idk anything about them but its just what it feels like to me n i wouldnt be surprised.
Of course i make money off the game instead of spending money on it so i have no room to complain and i do appreciate all the new content every week.
This is a thoughtful and well-articulated response. I appreciate you taking the time to write out your experience with a different viewpoint.
I’ll freely admit I’m not an old hat player who has been playing for 6 years. I started January last year, so I can’t speak to how things used to be and haven’t been around to see the decline you mention. I can understand it being painful to hit a threshold with a long-held hobby where you’ve decided to walk away due to any number of reasons. Everyone has their own metric for when enough is enough.
It just gets demoralizing to see the the line where the negative feedback stops being about the game mechanics, bugs, inconsistency in applications and other things that genuinely can be helpful to the direction of the game, and where that starts to be conflated into personal attacks on the value and intelligence of the developers. I don’t think making mistakes, even many mistakes, equates to someone being a bad person, or meaning they have nefarious intent.
I’m sure I empathize with the devs as much as I do because I spent more than a decade dealing with people in frontline jobs in retail and customer service. Oftentimes the people providing services somehow get downgraded to less-than-human when things go wrong for customers. I just wish folks would remember that there are actual people on the other side of the coin who have their own hardships, failures, and struggles. It doesn’t handwave away mistakes, but is being frustrated at a game really worth making actual human beings miserable and feel worthless?
Anyway, I’m sorry to hear you’ve decided to step away. Hopefully you find something else to invest some time in that brings you the happiness you had with this game.
