Lets not discuss who of us that is trying to be annoying lol
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To not further derail the thread that the devs finally gave us answers in (in hopes they will continue to do so): I, too, am a bit devastated that we steam-users are obviously somewhat neglectable. That’s also visible by the fact that I was the one who had to copy the dev’s answers from here into the update thread in the steam forums and several people thanked me for keeping them up to date because the mods and devs sure didn’t.
I understand since everything seems to become more oriented towards mobile devices these days, but really, why even bother with steam if you don’t care about it that much? If you publish a game on a device, its interface should work equally well on all of them and it’s a fact that the new UI doesn’t do that. It’s more suited for mobile devices - I had someone with a smartphone check that for me; someone who doesn’t know the game at all and also not the old UI and he said that he finds the UI more irritating on PC than on mobile. But that’s just how it will be, I guess, and why the steam reviews don’t matter much.
Well, I was a steam-user spending money and willing to spend more. But if mobile brings in ten times the bucks, it explains a lot, I think.
I would love a poll how many of the people who complain about the UI are playing on which different device.
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- GOOD!
Glad to see people have the sense to come out and say it lol,
Yes, obviously his responses are tactics and not really anything (for the most part) that takes responsibility. At least not in an honest straightforward manner, of course they have their reasons but little is being given clearly and directly.
I’m surprised myself he (or ‘they’) are choosing to somehow deflect all this, there comes a point in certain situations it’s better to just man-up and say ‘yeah we kinda made some kind of mistake’ and then people will at least respect you for that.
I"m just wondering where the majority lie (in believing the fake facade or just wanting straight-up answers…)
" People are not scared to come out and say that they like the new ui, in chat no one has jumped on anyone for saying they like the new ui. Even in the previous thread no one jumped on anyone who commented liking the new ui. "
– Exactly, lol even I thought that was pretty low, using some sort of tactic implying that the ‘positive happy people were afraid to say anything’ lol, Sirrian you can do better lol.
There are lots of positive things with the new update, it’s just that the majority of it created more problems then it solved…
Leia, what was that business of 'since it got removed I’ll try again… ’ ?
" Lets not discuss who of us that is trying to be annoying lol "
In what way am I trying to be annoying?
How so?
(never mind nobody’s forcing you to read my posts, or the threads I start, etc…)
Yeah we seem to have gotten to the bottom of it, and in fact I posted earlier wondering why the " Magic: Puzzle Quest " wasn’t on steam, this answers that.
It came out 2 years ago, probably released a bit after Gems of War, and by then – they already realized steam was going to be a negligible part of their income – (!!),
Hence why they didn’t even bother releasing it on steam, and that’s crazy to think because the franchise “Magic” (the Gathering) has a -Tremendous- fan following. So again that shows that steam must be near-zero market for them relatively speaking.
Honestly with the amount of games on steam you can’t really blame them.
Very interesting getting to the bottom of all this stuff lol, at the end of it it just makes you wonder just how much money are they making on these kinds of games?..
That you can alienate a chunk of your market and still not worry about the cash flowing in, lol…
Why?
How can anyone look at those icons on the overworld map and not want to get some answers?..
Which reminds me I keep forgetting to ask Sirrian the questions about that, never thought I’d see him answering so promptly in a thread lol…
That surely hasn’t been my experience or the experience of anyone that I know that plays mobile. The stats on the game screen are unreadable for me on my phone. Thankfully, I can still play it on my PC as long as I can put up with the eye strain.
Beyond that, the dev admitted flat out they failed to test it on mobile screens which was part of the problem.
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Hello there Sirrian,
Quick 3 questions before I go about my travels,
-
1st, are those black/white overworld ‘icons’ (along with various others in the game) the actual “finished” icons you plan on having forever? Or are they just placeholders while you finish up the rest of the ‘new’ UI?
-
2nd, the bland white text is pretty bad… I’m all for seeing the actual unit art and graphics, but it goes without saying if you put plain white text on any given set of card art, eventually you’re going to get conflicting colours (i.e. the white text on top of some very bright section of the art, making it technically unreadable etc). It cannot be stressed enough that it ruins the cohesive fantasy art ‘feel’ so many have commented on already.
Basically is changing the fonts to something ‘tangible’ that has structure and a concrete visual aesthetic to it something you guys will be planning to do?
Or will it be basically left the same? -
3rd, if the question to the first was “Yes, those black/white icons are permanent”, then … I really can’t believe I would have to ask this, but who’s idea was it to implement those icons? What purpose were they supposed to serve? (That the other older icons weren’t able to do?)
Okay thank you, keep that Light burning…
I don’t have a smartphone, so I can only say what my friend told me when he tested the game on mobile and PC alike:
- The game looks more “gothic” on PC since there’s just so much more black.
- While the numbers on the troops were even harder to read on mobile and the numbers/stars on the borders of some of the cards (mythics) were basically invisible, my friend found the white symbols painful to look at because of their size. White text on black background is just bad.
- To quote my friend (well, translated from German): “Holy crap, I think that, given how big these bright green buttons are on PC, I have now eyecancer! What’s with that neon green and then that horrid textcolor in the box? The whole game-UI is totally goth and then there’s this radioactive crap in the middle of black boxes?!”
- My friend found the “pictures in the PVP section” really nice and the options menu. You know… the stuff with the old UI (which he didn’t know). He said the bigger images are much better to look at than the stuff that’s in the troop menu and the option menu isn’t black and that’s a total relief for his eyes.
Basically, he mainly said that while numbers are harder to read on mobile, the contrast of white, borderless text on black is horrid on PC. Black as a main background color is horrid and it’s more visible the more black there is to look at. What bothered him the most, though, were the green buttons. Or more like the hue of green of the buttons. He said he doesn’t understand why the art is so colorful and the UI has only “extreme” colors (black/white/neon green). And that this is just more jarring in “bigger size”. Hope that makes sense.
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Dear Sirrian, you are probably looking constructive criticism as opposed to all the raging, so I will try to give some. It’s difficult because I’m very upset with all the changes. But I’ve been supporting you for so long, so:
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You haven’t commented on the issue of scrapping the fantasy theme of the interface at all. Would it be possible to bring back at least some of the elements? Or incorporate new ones? Or at least make the font more interesting? I saw the fantasy theme was still done in a couple of places of the new UI (the new “symbols”/shields for mini-games, guild etc.) so it’s definitely possible. To me, and many others, the game was so fun and relaxing to play because it was such an eye-candy and aestethically pleasing. The colorful graphics, all the small details were also something that made the game so distinctive. For the record, I like the new design of the traitstones, but the gradient on the arcanes is just plain confusing. I opt for bringing the separate colors back.
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All of the specifics about the readability have been pointed out already, so I’ll just say this. You cannot just gloss over the fact that the game is now straining for the eyes and practically impossible to play for the visually imparied and colorblind. Don’t just say “we are aware of the readabilty issues”, it is a HEALTH HAZARD (what if someone has epilepsy?) and honestly sounds discriminatory. I think you owe this part of your user base a huge apology.
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I am mostly a Steam user (I played a lot on mobile, but the game stopped working on my phone some time ago, so I have no choice) and the fact that basically you said this part of your user base is less important upsets me greatly. I know that you are a business and need to follow the most profitable route. But the way you are approaching this is alarming. I run a business too and I’ve been taught over and over that the bad opinion travels way more easily than the good opinion. I.e. happy customer will talk about it with 2-4 friends, angry customer will rant to up to 14 friends. So I really don’t think getting the same amount of positive and negative feedback is breaking even. The “chestnut” of bad reviews on Steam is just one symptom of the problem and it’s gonna bite you back (the bad reviews on mobile are popping up already as well). Besides, you are saying that the mobile player base is the most important for you, yet the readability issues are the biggest on this platform! As you said yourself, you tested it the least! Please take these factors into consideration with your future decisions.
(And to address the 3% increase in the user base that you mentioned… It’s honestly baffling that you attribute it to the new UI, which is universally disliked. People came for the update, your team hyped the birthday celebration all aroud, and the new kingdom - which honestly looks like a red herring now, but that’s beside the point. Finally, controversy always generates traffic. I’d advise you to wait a couple of weeks before you draw any conclusions.)
PS. I am a long-term player - have been playing GoW nearly every day for around 2 years. It has brought me lots of fun and joy throughout, I have forged some great friendships too - for that, I am grateful. I’ve always supported your team and tried to spread good word about it. That being said, the recent changes are bordering on a dealbreaker. Please don’t dismiss the feedback from your players, no matter how negative it is. I really wish you well.
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If you see the changes they made (like by actually ‘using’ them), they all smack of being changed into a format that someone would have an easy time using if they were ‘swiping’ and dragging with their fingers.
The letters are terrible can barely see them on a 15 by 10 foot (that’s ‘feet’) wall, no wonder people are getting headaches playing now, couldn’t imagine playing with this new format on a 15-20 inch monitor…
(It’s feet on a wall because it’s a projector image, sharp as a tack)
Honestly I’m surprised this fact (that I’m sure they heard about many times over by now) is so easily dismissed.
Games are much (if not exactly…) like people, most of the attraction others feel for them is based off the aesthetic they put off, they must be getting some serious ‘developmental’ bonuses for switching to this new UI because there’s going to be a massive die-off in the game from people just not liking the ‘vibe’ it gives off anymore.
Hmm, upon thinking I think I get it, the ‘whale’ types won’t see it as such a deal-breaker, and will trudge on regardless, and the types that were basically liking the aesthetic as their main choice of playing the game, probably weren’t the big spenders anyways.
I’m sure this was said before in one way or another, but I can see it now clearly having been discussed and ‘understood’ by the devs long before.
No other way to look at it I would think, the production stream-lining to make content for the ‘whales’ using the new UI offset enough the losses from people liking the game for it’s aesthetics.
(or the current icons are just placeholders and this post is meaningless, lol…)
K interesting stuff lol…
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Can players stop with the “devs don’t care about Steam players”? They never said that… The only thing that they said is that the Steam charts are not representative of their playerbase…
They also said that the new UI was tested mainly on PC so the “new UI is for Mobile” seems incorrect.
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lol that’s definitely one way to put it (lol…)
Yeah along with those ridiculous black/white icons in the overworld (and the ‘black/white’ chat box etc) those new ‘green’ “radioactive” (lol!!) buttons are a close second…
Really, you don’t know what they were thinking doing that…
Until you realize mobile users need something ‘big’ and ‘obvious’ to ‘tap’ on their phone, while at the same time being ‘small’ and concise enough on the screen to not be ‘tapped’ by accident by moving the phone around (it used to be you could ‘click’ anywhere on the screen to ‘hurry’ animations, menus along etc, now you physically have to click that ‘radioactive’ button, which is a big pain for pc mouse users but makes sense for mobile, so you don’t get ‘accidental’ clicks when shuffling your phone around.
It’s obvious they knew exactly what they were doing with the new UI interfaces etc, in regards to making it more mobile friendly etc…
He also said some other things which I added in the suggestion topic (since they were not mobile/PC differences which this topic was about). Here’s the rest of what he said since this is now also about colors (copied from the other thread):
- He says the font looks cheap. Like someone selected Arial because they were too lazy to look for a nicer one.
- He says the fact that the sidescrolling is automatic is bad. He doesn’t mind sidescrolling in general, but the automatic movement bothered him and made him feel a bit nauseous (but only on PC, not on mobile). He was not bothered by the transparent board background.
- He said chat is nicer to look at than the rest of the UI because chat background is not pure black.
- He was confused that the art is traditional but the currencies are all 3D-like. He found that not really fitting each other and wondered if the game would get an art update so that the troops would match the 3D-style of currency and items. He says he feels like it’s two designers both designing half a game. He found the difference between the troop art and items extremely obvious while not being bothered by the fact that the option menu and other parts still have the old UI (I didn’t tell him that’s the case, he just thought they were supposed to look like that).
My friend actually thinks that the UI would look really good if the background color would not be black but “more blue like in the options” and the text would have a border and maybe not be white. He also strongly suggests a different color for the neon-boxes and to make the troop pictures “as big as they are in the PVP battle selection”. For my friend who didn’t know the old UI, it’s mainly a color issue.
lol…
I would ask you read over your statement, and note that to most people saying, “You don’t represent what I like” is equivalent to saying, “I don’t like (care about) you”
(meaning that’s exactly what people understand, understood and have a right to ‘feel’, that by saying steam isn’t representative of their market they’re basically saying (or ‘proving’, as it’s their actions people are noting) that steam isn’t such a big deal to them.
They are obviously not ‘insulting’ steam players but what’s happening is steam players are venting their frustration at the situation and seeing how being a steam player isn’t seen as that relevant is making them vent further.
You can’t blame them for that.
Since this is popping up more than appropriate it seems that it has to be said, …
If you do something knowingly and know if you admit you ‘done it’ you will get massive flak, what do you do?
You make the statement that you did the opposite, so people can’t directly take out any anger on you.
What I’m saying is that of course they’re going to give you some bs line like, “we didn’t test on mobile…that much…” to deflect the responsibility of their (rather obvious) actions.
It’s unbelievable people are falling for this but do you seriously think nowadays, a bunch of devs that are probably making millions off a game, directly designed for ‘casual’ mobile type players, who -obviously- come into work with a cell, talk on their cell, play with their cell, etc
Are all the sudden going to somehow ‘forget’ to test their very ‘mobile marketed’ game on a cell? (or whatever ‘mobile’ device they have laying around?..)
come on people, please don’t be so naive.
If it looks like a duck acts like a duck quacks like a duck, it’s a duck.
If all the UI changes look like they were made for mobile, their biggest market is mobile and the game itself is designed for quick simple mobile play,
they tested it for mobile.
(lol…)
(please don’t be offended that was the third/fourth time I seen that ‘rose-coloured’ glasses take on that “we didn’t test on mobile” line so had to finally straighten it out…)
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Yeah that would sum up a lot of what most would feel (matches most of my own opinion as well).
Main points are the ‘Frankenstein’ effect the game now has, which seriously makes me so curious to know why they did it (lol, since it seems like such a step backward, for the most part), how things are now ‘drag-friendly’ (which again points to pro-mobile design choices), and the horrible text…
Until you realize Magic: Puzzle Quest has the same type of fonts, etc and they are probably stream-lining the UI to be the same for easier software development purposes (I guess? )
The borderless cards is another shame but again, matches the "Magic: Puzzle Quest " game directly.
I think at this point most can agree on the various problems and issues the new UI has, it now becomes a waiting game to see what kind of changes the devs will make to try to make it all more cohesive in the future.
(and if the players want to stick around to see those changes, lol…)
Again you’re making your own interpretation of what devs said.
Devs came here to explain what happens and you don’t want to believe them. So if I understand well, if their answer is not what you want to hear, it’s a lie?
Is not easier to say nothing better than lying?
You really believe that the few (compared to the whole playerbase) players who read this forum/are satisfy by Sirrian’s answers count that much in the balance?
Several players said that the UI was even worst on Mobile (ie smaller screen) and you keep saying that devs focused on the mobile…
And I don’t see how the UI is worst for PC players than mobile ones (who I am)…
I understand why devs prefer to say nothing: at least, no chance that players misinterpret what you said…
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Wait a sec,
Are you the guy responsible for Warlords Battlecry 3?
And the incredible music in it?
on top of that games like Puzzle Quest 2 etc?
LoL man you’re amazing!!
Guys, do you know this guy did some of the best games of all time??
I have no idea how much you were involved with the above games, but yeah, you must’ve had some serious arm-twisting done to you if you felt compelled to bring out this new update here (and on top of it ‘defend’ it…), you’re way too good a game developer to have done all this intentionally.
Guys!! Let’s all take a break from this Gems of War update convolution, and get (or at least try the demos) the games " Puzzle Quest 2 " (on steam) and by all that is good and holy get that game " Warlords Battlecry 3" it’s freakin amazing!!
If you’re into real-time strategy games Warlords Battlecry 3 is hands down one of the best (if not ‘the’ best) rts games around. You have units and Heroes that carry over to the next maps, items and magic, amazing graphics (even though they’re ‘older’) and the freakin music, it’s incredible. (Make sure you get the Warlords Battlecry 3 version that has permanent ‘summons’, as there have been recent patches released that make summons temporary as opposed to the way Steve designed them in the original game, as permanent (until death)). GoG or Steam has one version of the either, double-check you get the right one.
Yeah this guy is serious and for real (again assuming he was responsible for the overall design of those games, lol) , I do feel sorry for the flak he’s getting here, there must be a lot going on behind the scenes for him to have been okay (or ‘forced into’?..) the changes put in here recently.
(Or maybe he made his one big ‘career mistake’ here now, lol… : P…)
But yeah, Warlords Battlecry 3 is the type of game that is ‘just right’, indeed much like Gems of War was in it’s prime, and the Puzzle Quest series are amazing too. You don’t make games like that by accident, I honestly suggest the people unhappy with the recent GoW changes try the “Puzzle Quest” series of games, they are amazing and has that obvious GoW mechanics, but with amazing rpg mechanics.
They would be a great break from this while it cools off and gets it’s rough edges patched up,
then come back and continue enjoying Gems.
Anyways, I seen a thread somewhere about "What would you like to see in Warlords Battlecry 4 if it was to be made? " anyone know where that is?
Keep up the good work Steve
" Purge the World of Darkness " …
" In Sartek’s Name "
You’re the exception if you ‘believe’ the devs at face value here, most can see/sense something’s up, if only that they’re not being taken seriously in the long term view of things.
lol it’s not really up to debate just scroll up and read the majority of posts… What’s interesting is that it’s not even based on one ‘technical answer’ or not, but the general sense that they’re hiding stuff , not being forthright etc.
That’s what’s putting people on edge and many have stated it explicitly.
To make sure we’re clear, the devs haven’t said much at all, that’s the point, lol. They didn’t ‘explain’ anything other than try to deflect people’s anger at having something put on them nobody really wanted.
It’s that deflection and lack of explanation that’s off-putting to most…
As for your " I don’t see how the new UI is worse for pc than mobile " etc… that’s pretty obvious and multiple posts have stated why, but to add some pointers that new horrendous ‘bright green’ click here button in most interface dialogues now, lame beyond belief. Makes no sense unless you realize mobile users need a big obvious button to click on to progress things along, but at the same it has to be a ‘button’ (before it was a ‘click anywhere on the screen’ type thing), since accidental mobile taps would be very common while trying to manhandle a cell while doing whatever with yourself.
The chest opening ‘dialogue’ is another blatant one, it’s designed for quick ‘swiping’ and dragging, sideways etc, with a finger etc (you know, on a mobile device), whereas before it was a specific ‘drag down’ using a mouse at the side of the list thing.
Which is absolutely horrendous to do with a finger on a cell.
I’m sure the examples could continue…
Make no mistake though, although tons know how awesome these following games are, I think few people can fully understand and respect Steve for his work on his games like Warlords Battlecry 3, Puzzle Quest 2 etc, he’s the type of guy that not only can make an awesomely entertaining game, with all of it’s design elements put in cohesively, but also knows how to weave that essential Masonic (cough, ‘Illuminati’ cough…) Esotericism in for those with the ‘eyes to see’.
Absolutely masterpieces, anyways point is he must’ve somehow pressured into making these changes, in one way or another.
I’m satisfied with finding out the whole reason behind the marketing of the game thing, and hence the changes they implemented etc, so for the most part I’m not blaming anybody or anything, I just wanted to get to the bottom of things. Everyone’s got their ‘own interpretation’ of things anyways,
part of ‘growing up’ is realizing you have the choice between pushing that interpretation either towards fictional fantasy, or logical reality, in any given discourse you have with someone else.
I just got the feeling they were pushing more fantasy on us than reality, lol…
(lol, if it has to be said…
This guy spent/spends his life making fictional worlds (never mind Masons are basically trained to be ‘psychological magicians’, lol…), for people to spend years of their life in…
but yeah, he would never fudge a bit in a forum eh?..
‘lol’ would be an understatement, lol…