The Weekly Update this week finally is forcing me to state something that has gnawed at me for months now.
Fans have asked for six months for reasons for certain decisions made by Bungie- the number of which is too large to say here. Yet this whole time, Bungie has developed this arrogant, or at the very least misguided, attitude of being aloof and vague. Many terrible choices have been made regarding Destiny, which is made all the worse for the parts that were done right. Fans speak up and are patted on the head and sent away with smiles and lollipops if they are acknowledged at all. The interaction becomes one of somebody asking for something then the 'adult' being condescending.
The fans (I hesitate to use the term 'community' since it seems to be official policy to stamp out any communities that exist here) analyze everything to death. They are constantly demanding explanations. And if I were at Bungie, I would be very tired of having to rationalize every little decision I made over the last few years. So why is it that the fans are still the ones asking the questions at all?
The straw that broke the camel's back. Vault space. It is great that explanations for why only so much space could be added were in the weekly update. I'm sure that culled a lot of threads, though clearly not all of them (ignorance will persist no matter what is done- the most we can do is limit it). But there is a part where it is said that only so many players have full vaults. The implication behind this is that while more space is highly demanded, it is not something really needed. So if people at Bungie are doing all the explaining, why on Earth did they not delve into the reasons [i]for[/i] these numbers? My vault isn't full. Do you know why? It's because I've had to delete so many things, and store so many items on my characters so I have room to move gear around. Why did nobody question why these numbers are such before using them as the basis for their decisions?
Another problem is this statement:
[quote]
Different players have different needs, but our goal was to find a solution that could deliver more Vault space to the greatest number of people in the short term. [/quote]
I keyed in immediately on 'short term.' Why is every decision Bungie is making about short term goals? Bungie was always community focused because it provided longevity- they were successful because of it. Bungie wants this series to last a decade as Halo did, but already people are stopping. Admittedly after an extravagant amount of time played, but we all know the complaints about repetitiveness in those hours so I won't get into them now (I'll provide more details after Queen's Wrath 2, coming this time two years from now after Iron Banner #30). Bungie keeps addressing the superficial problems and won't even [i]talk about[/i] the underlying issues we all know about. The fact that all we can get out of Bungie are such superficial sentiments about how they want to 'do better' is just staggering.
Why are players leaving? Well, every event is the same exact one- Iron Banner over and over again which provides nothing for those already level 30/32 (depending on when the event was), Nightfalls and Heroics are the same strike so you have to do it twice, and there aren't any major changes to them each week so they're repetitive, enemy spawns are consistent, etc. Crota's End was not mechanically difficult, just artificially difficult because enemy levels were higher. That isn't fun at all. Why do so few people care about PvP? Well, because all we have is Slayer and variations of Slayer, there are no private games (God only knows what the hell happened when that conversation came up in the office, though something akin to [url=http://www.fbcomics.com/images/comics/New%20idea%20for%20Memes%20D.jpg]this picture[/url] seems the most obvious).
These are big problems, and we all know it. Yet Bungie has repeatedly shown they are either uninterested or unwilling to fix or even talk about these issues. We cannot get a serious statement out of them without a condescending tone or a 'well I cannot talk about it yet.' And this is not at all a rant about Deej- this is about Bungie's [complete 180 degree turn from the Halo era] policy towards their fans in general, and their continual insistence on ignoring the deeper issues or dubbing insignificant the real flaws in their title.
Bungie needs to let their PR team stop with the condescension and let them give us an actual conversation worth having, because these one way conversations of fans posting and someone like Deej randomly going 'we are listening' are not in any way conductive to anything substantial aside from increasing the volume of whining that gets pushed in as a whole. The black curtain policy has failed, is failing repeatedly, and needs to be changed. The PR team needs the green light from whomever their boss is, and the developers themselves need to start asking questions instead of leaving that just up to the whim of the day by the fans- especially since so many of these developers seem to be new to Bungie and possibly inexperienced with such a title.
[spoiler]
By the way, regarding vault space I'll admit I'm curious why games such as Borderlands on last-gen consoles and the likes can show so many items at once without a problem, but Destiny can't even show their pictures let alone the weapons themselves at once. That's sort of unrelated, though.[/spoiler]
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Edited by Helveck: 3/27/2015 1:24:27 PMI've thought about this several times... Your sentiments, I mean. Pretty much ever since I realized how Destiny had stumbled on a multitude of levels. "What happened? And why are they being so vague and enigmatic about their design plans and fixes?" Clearly the game has changed internally. And not for the better. The condescending tone I don't think is maliciously intentionally, but it's all that they really have to lean on to keep people on a short leash. If they just said "We're stuck and we're not sure how to proceed." People would lose faith. Saying, "Guys, we're listening and we're trying to make this the best we can for all of you dedicated players..." Is nothing but a cheesy, cookie cutter PR response. And I've read it so many times, I feel like they have poor old DeeJ stuck on repeat. The magic that once existed inside the studio has clearly withered. The studio is now a shadow of its former self. And it's a shame to have to admit that. There are so many talented people there, but it's almost as though they all can't get on the same page. What's shocking to me when I take a look back, is that 13 years ago I picked up Halo CE in 2002. I played that game regularly until 2004 and only stopped to pick up Halo 2. And the same was true with every Halo game that followed. Destiny hasn't even been out a year, and I'm pretty much done with it. What's scary, is that I know for certain I'm not the only one. What's disappointing, is that I was - like many others - relying on Destiny to be that game that never left my disc drive, and that I never got tired of. Unfortunately do to the lack of reaction and corrective planning to rectify errors or poor designs, I don't believe it will ever be. Now if Destiny is a sign of things to come, and this process repeats come time for Destiny 2, I truly find myself worried about the future of state of Bungie.