How Important is a Extravagant Hard-Hitting MMO Relaunch?

[sick acorn]

It sounds like we could be looking at 10+ months minimum to convert OW into an MMO-lite. I am leaning towards frequent addition/integration of new features into the current OW over the next year as opposed to having a large market-friendly mega-relaunch of the game. I completely see the benefits of testing each feature for a week privately with the current community, then taking it away and augmenting it with player feedback, leading to an eventual title launch that will be marketed like crazy and be fully polished for new players to try.

My reservation is that without a giant MMO-centric marketing push, I'm not sure we will gain many potential players to try a half-baked OW MMO regardless, so it isn't really an issue. The benefit however of adding (que generic arbitrary timeline >>>) combat in March, quests in April, some story cinematics in May, raids in June, etc.... is that you receive months of data to fix bugs, get current player feedback, build some trust in the community, keep the project exciting.

Slowly build the MMO with the community, in public, we understand it's in beta and not the finished product, we will understand this with combat and other features rolled out over the next year. We will understand that the features will release with room to grow. I'm not sure the sacrifice of waiting is worth having a big boom mega launch in 10+ months while we hinge everything on the success of an auto battler alone. Why not use every game and mechanic we have to keep players excited and wanting to buy into the ecosystem? We can STILL have the "OW MMO-Lite is completed" megalaunch when it's all been released and fine tuned, and 99% of potential players will check it out then for the first time. In the meantime lets get some runway and trust and player excitement going.

I think this topic deserves some discussion from the team, players, everyone. Let's talk.

[lucid schooner]

I would like for illuvium to go back to its roots: 2022 vibes with an inspiring, slightly crazy person like Grant at the helm of a weekly showcase and public representation. Add in a monthly devblog that has once again stalled for close to half a year. Making games is exciting and it is a shame that the vision and its visible progression isnt shared with the community.

I agree that the OW MMO-Lite should be created transparently. I would go so far as to say fully transparently, where the economy is discussed openly with the community and all aspects of the game can be tested. Testing phases should include high level testing where you test the end game. For example: in Illuvium Zero we see clearly how high droprates are, and that 20.000 plots would have had several copies of the same highest ranking blueprints. This could have been prevented if the late game, or final stages of the game had been tested thoroughly. For Illuvium in particular, the has remained a challenge and should be sufficiently delved into prior to going to the blockchain. After all, the blockchain is immutable and is backed by investment money. There are no take-backs without (unintended) pain and corresponding backlash.

We have an Illuvium Testnet on epic games, where players can test the game and economy in a controlled Beta environment with obvious Beta warnings. The team should use this avenue for the MMO to test each of the features.

In short, I fully agree with you Nubbin.

[desert ginkgo]

The team should take note on what other web2/web3 projects with open-development are doing successfully. Building a game transparently should be something to take advantage off. But so far it has always felt like the team wanted to keep secrets to surprise the community and that IMO just hindered the project.

Take a look at the development of Ashes of Creation. Over 8 years of development with the CEO Steven Sharif investing over 50 millions of his own pocket and the game still isn't complete. Every month they do a livestream showcasing what they've been working on and what's the game's current state. Then they take the community feedback and iterate based on it.

[sick acorn]

I do miss the weekly updates and leaks with Grant, it made the common viewer feel like part of the team just in terms of inclusion, I'm happy they're doing the Going Hyper podcast with some leaks, hopefully they can have team members as guests frequently to talk about what they're working on. I think we need more transparency especially if they want to do a capital raise this bull run, the main MMO promise is too far in the future to be exciting, and not everyone cares about Arena.

I just can't imagine waiting a year for combat because other features aren't ready yet. Give us combat so we can enjoy OW in the meantime, then add skill trees once they're ready and make tweaks with feedback, then add quests so the gameplay mechanics don't go stale. I think this is the way.

[clever swan]

Agree. OW players are not going to become Arena players if they are locked out of OW. They are very different games that attract different people. Giving exclusivity to current community retains customer loyalty and also hypes up outsiders more for opening day when they can get in.

[grizzled elbow]

I agree. I ranted a bunch about this lack of insight in the last few months in this video: https://youtu.be/40M8_-XDieg?si=iCFSlgjyuyFPXgBu

[sick acorn]

I watched this one, lots of good insight. I appreciate that they're releasing more formal well laid out blogs on things, it's very helpful, but I hope they also get back to the fun exciting leaks in between those well laid out blogs. I like when Kieran floats ideas on AMA's because a lot of them are exciting and I'm sure he can track engagement with them, but it also allows for feedback like when you disagreed in an earlier video on copying bad raid loot systems of the past from successful games because the mechanic is outdated. We hit a pinnacle of open communication with the community and I hope we get back to that, along with earlier more piece meal game mechanic leaks and integrations.

[queen hound]

i understand with what being asked here.
unfortunately, we are a crypto gaming with token and nfts.
us launching incomplete/half/baked features was received negatively by CT, which drove the sentiment down

the web3 gaming space is rather harsh, unforgiving

i believe we should only release and do marketing when the game is really ready