Hello everyone,

We have answered in another thread since there are similar topics: https://www.spacelordsthegame.com/community/index.php?topic=26542.msg39479;topicseen#msg39479

Thank you!

Hi.

Thanks for answering at least but you've only talked about your 4v1 vision, not my other points.

And about the 4v1: "As we have explained before, separating both modes would result in higher waiting times, impacting negatively on the experience."
This is not completely true: It would ... for antags.
When I manage to get a full team grouped before searching for a mission, currently we still wait some time for the game to try and find an antag: if we could turn it off, we would play right away, so less waste of time.
So, the negative impact would not be for every player and is ALREADY ingame ...

"as our data reveals, there are also plenty of people that enjoy Antagonizing"
Again, we can understand your vision and don't ask to remove that mode. I'm happy for players who enjoy it but forcing everyone, including new players into a badly design + reward system feels dumb.

And if you really want to be transparent, could you please post the data of new players and what percentage of them quit on first game ? if those games had an antag or not ? which MMR / mission difficulty ?
How many players in general quit / disconnect / surrender when the match has an antag ?

I'm honestly asking and wouldn't mind to be proven wrong and it would stop both sides from argumenting on feelings only.

Currently, I really hope for you that your antagonist players are enough to sustain the game financially because "raiders only" players may not ...

Hi.

I played the game last year for 2 months when it was re-branded as "Spacelords"
I've stopped playing it for frustration reasons.
I've re-launched the game recently (so, after a 6 months break) to see how it has evolved.
After 2 weeks, here's my feedback.

1- Antagonist mode: still forced ... and still broken
- High antags on mentor matches are still a thing (a really fun one for MSE, I would assume)
- Even when winning a mission with an antag, the rewards are far too low for the lost time and highest difficulty
- I'm still for a complete switch so players can choose if they want it or not.
(And I haven't changed about NOT spending any more money on this game until this switch is added)
- By default, it should be turned off for mentor matches.
- Forcing players to play a game mode they don't like is a bad design
(and yes, here it is a game mode, since you can play solo or PvE)
And I can see that the future is darkening on this end with the mission score "forcing" you to play both sides on each mission for better reward ...
As a reminder, Fortnite and Warframe, for examples, have both PvE and PvP but they are separate game modes and you can "choose" to play 1 or both but are NEVER forced to do so ...

2- Mentor matches
Only change I see is that MSE removed the text telling me it's going to be a mentor match so now, I only know it once it's too late and I can't refuse it.
(again, really fun when wanting a high score for a daily reward with 3 new players)
- I would also like a switch to turn them off while I do my dailies, at least, since the grind is high and I (still) need a high score to progress.

3- Forge: still frustrating.
I (still) don't want to spend 30 to 80k gold to build a weapon just to try it out: I may not like it and I would have wasted a lot for it...
I'm (still) hoping for being able to choose at which level I build my weapons: if I'm forge lvl 10, I should be able to build from lvl 1 to 10.
So I would first build a new weapon at forge lvl 1 or 2, for instance, to test it and if I like it, I may upgrade it to a higher lvl (8 or 10 depending on the gold)

4- Solo mode still badly designed
- Needing to win a mission 5 times to play it solo is dumb.
- I would like to play solo from time to time just to play at my pace, while earning the same rewards as in public
I'm NOT talking about the quantity, but the type: I should be able to win small in solo, more in public PvE, and even more in public 4v1

On the "added features" side of things:

- 1 character has been added: Aneska
She seems very nice (don't have her) but I trust MSE on the character and weapon design, which overall are great in this game

- Spaceguilds: kind of "meh".
I've joined one to see, but it doesn't bring anything I did not have on Xbox live (friends list, chat, ...)
I can even see how it's a bad idea: with how the game currently works, if you're in a guild with non trolling players who never play as antagonists (;p) your bonus XP will decrease so, at one point, I think I will leave my guild when the bonus XP is lower than the current tier I'm in.

- Duplicate blueprints giving gold
That took time but at least MSE did it, so very nice!

So, overall, my feelings haven't changed in 6 months:
- Frustrations points are still the same ones (mainly antag mode and mentor matches)
- The friends I played the game with, stopped playing the game around the same time I did, so I'm only playing in public matches
- Matchmaking can take a looonnnnggggg time
- The grind still "feels" a bit too much seeing the content hasn't changed in 6 months
(Every game is repetitive but since the maps are not procedurally generated and none has been added ...)
(In the same time frame, Warframe added a huge open zone, as well as new characters, weapons, game modes, ...)

So I'm still very sad for this game because I would like to play it more but I'm sure I'm going to quit it again at some point in some weeks, maybe months because nothing important has changed in 6 months, so I don't think it will.

Hoping I will be proven wrong be MSE ...

Many problems here:
- 1: the new player experience is very bad
(made a topic for this one: https://www.spacelordsthegame.com/community/index.php?topic=2314.0)

- 2: the reward system forcing you to play one mission and win it, with a high score.
Clearly, I don't want to play mentor matches when doing my dailies, so I decline them several times but since they come back a minute after, I may be forced to play them (and curse new players when it's not their fault) or go play another game for a while.

- 3: Antagonists.
I have a problem with PvP in general and only like this game when not playing with an antagonist, because I mainly play with random players, sometime in mentor matches and the MMR system is always wrong (team of lvl 80 raiders with a lvl 10 antag or mentor match with 3 beginners and an antag lvl 275!)

When you put all that together, it makes a horrible game that I usually rage quit mid game and go play Warframe ...

I really hope so for you but, still, you need to communicate more.

On all the issues I've reminded here, what are the devs thoughts ?

We're not always asking for it to be patched already but would want to know the dev team views on it.

What do you agree or disagree with ?
What are you willing to change and how ?

So far, we've always seen those once a patch is released and that is not a good communication.

Coming here just to say "we're listening" is as good as nothing.

What we want to hear is "We're listening and agree to change this and that in this way" or "We disagree on this because of that" but so far, it's not transparent enough to stop the frustration and coming on multiple topics to say "wait for our big announcement" which wasn't even related to the topics in the end even made the feelings worse ...

So... a few days ago, MSE_Tenka came on several feedback topics to tell us to wait for the "big announcement" to come.
It came and I'm really disappointed.

What it contains may be nice, but NOTHING about the big issues raised in the past month: reward / BP system, new players experience, antagonist, ...

Another recent example: I again had a duplicated BP after trying the mission 4 times!
This waste of time was due to matchmaking with very low players (and / or high antagonist), new players on hard campaign (4th), don't know what the BP would be, duplicates are worthless...

By the way, currently, I only log in to do the common BP mission (if 1) because I don't want to level too much until I've built the weapon because of forge cost.
@MSE: what good is a game that makes you not want to play it and level up ?

We've heard several times "we're listening to you, blablabla" but it seems it was EA style... a shame.

Quote from: JestersShade on September 20, 2018, 09:40:37 AM

You could say that if MSE was communicating far more frequently but it's been a month since Spacelords was rebranded/released and we only get a  post when something has already been decided and seems ready to launch.

Again, to compare to Warframe and Digital Extremes: we get dev streams every 2 weeks, community streams every week, a lot of posts / answers on their forums ...

MSE needs to communicate more and not just to announce stuff, but just to show what they are working on and that they are listening.

i love warframe but you cant expect the same comunication level and update rates, i think warframe is like 2nd or 3rd place for most played free to play on steam, meanwhile spacelord got like 2000 (i actually dont know) players if you combine all platforms, stop comparing every game to warframe.

Not true: I compare to Warframe because they precisely started very low, with a very small game.
They started their devstream at the end of closed alpha / beginning open beta and this kind of stuff.
They understood very early the importance of communicating with their players to build their game.
Look at what they did from the start and how they did it.

On Spacelords, so far, during the past month, we got small balancing updates and skins ...

So I compare what is comparable, precisely: 2 medium Dev studios, launching their games independantly, directly to players.
Warframe is now big and successful but can be used by other studios as an example.

So again, my comparison is and will be relevant.

You could say that if MSE was communicating far more frequently but it's been a month since Spacelords was rebranded/released and we only get a  post when something has already been decided and seems ready to launch.

Again, to compare to Warframe and Digital Extremes: we get dev streams every 2 weeks, community streams every week, a lot of posts / answers on their forums ...

MSE needs to communicate more and not just to announce stuff, but just to show what they are working on and that they are listening.

nop, sorry.
All I can do is cancel, requeue for every mission ... and maybe have the same mentor mission again!
I've tried it several times but had to resign accepting it in the end most of the times.

So you're right, I know it's going to be a mentor one, but I can't avoid mentor missions if I want to play (yesterday evening with a friend: we only played mentor missions ... sometimes with antags 207 by the way!)

And again, the problem is not helping new players (since the game can't do it itself!) but having them when you try to get a high score for a blueprint or else.

Personally, I would turn off antags and mentor for daily rewards, then put mentor back on (and maybe antags, if I play with friends in an organized team)