Blizzard's poor excuses

[Sansnom]

Care to tell us why it doesnt work? Seems like simple math to me, more people=work done faster

So, one million people rowing the same boat should be one million times faster than one person rowing a boat.

[Vankrys]

So, one million people rowing the same boat should be one million times faster than one person rowing a boat.

you have to factor weight and water resistance, but more people rowing should bring more rowing power, the boat would be faster, but the relation might not be a linear one.

OT, i think blizzard is investing the minimum resource to insure the maximum return on investment. It's up yo us to tell them if it's enough or not, but the only meaningful statement is with your wallet.

[Sunaka]

but the relation might not be a linear one.

A lot of people seem to think it is. Or an exponential one.

[Lumineus]

Silvermoon would need to be remade from the ground up, as most buildings in there apparently aren't real buildings according to GC I believe

https://twitter.com/OccupyGStreet/st...05899304177664

So it would take a long time.

You're missing the point. Why do the same (thirteen? ...really?) people who work on raids/dungeons have to be tasked with it?

[Sansnom]

you have to factor weight and water resistance, but more people rowing should bring more rowing power, the boat would be faster, but the relation might not be a linear one.

OT, i think blizzard is investing the minimum resource to insure the maximum return on investment. It's up yo us to tell them if it's enough or not, but the only meaningful statement is with your wallet.

Right. If you want be technical, why stop there? Please continue with your explanation.

[Sunaka]

You're missing the point. Why do the same (thirteen? ...really?) people who work on raids/dungeons have to be tasked with it?

They're the world/dungeon asset team. You're suggesting they add more people to do the job and then they do what afterward? They can't necessarily work on the 'next patch' or 'next expansion' assets in all cases, which, again, people seem to be ignoring.

This is pathetic logic. You can't apply the limits to the equation for rowing a boat to anything other than rowing a boat. A million people is a massive weight, oars require a volume of water to generate sufficient resistance to move the boat all of which have dick to do with the limits associated with developing a video game. A million people, resource allocations equal, working on a research project will always get their goal done faster than 1000 people

The question is efficiency. You can have a million people working on something, but there's no automatic reason it's more efficient than a thousand people. It requires context. And in context, doubling the team doesn't double the speed or even often increase it enough to warrant it.

[randomengine]

This is ultimately a failure in management.

Ideally, if Blizzard wanted to keep content flowing they would split their development team in two. One team would be considered the content team and work on content patches. The other team would be the expansion team and always be working on the next expansion. The way it is designed now is that all the developers work on both content patches and expansions. Content for Mists was coming out very well in the beginning but stopped dead around the time Warlords was announced - which tells me all the content devs are working on it instead of content patches.

It was mentioned earlier in this thread that you cannot get a baby a month with 9 mothers. This is true, however if your goal is a baby a month this can be achieved with 12 mothers. Proper management of the mothers would allow for each one of them to produce a baby once a year, each of them giving birth in a different month. Again, this is a management problem, a mismanagement of resources.

I know this can be achieved, but Blizzard is really old (their upper management is all old coders) and they like the way their jobs are, so they won't change until those old men retire. To see a company that can achieve such content delivery look no further than Wizards of the Coast. Their Magic: The Gathering sets are released, like clockwork, every year. This is accomplished through amazing management and layering of teams.

So really the only people to blame here are the founders and old managers at Blizzard who are just too old and too set in their ways to change how the developers are managed. Hence, they cannot walk and chew gum at the same time.

[Sunaka]

Magic: The Gathering

Wait...a TCG releases a new set every year that requires a far higher monetary investment per person than an MMO. A product that suffers from oversaturation and release fatigue. You're using that as an example of proper product management versus a video game? The two aren't even remotely comparable, even from a business standpoint.

Sure, Blizz could step up their management style to be more with the times, but acting like M:tG is a good example is pretty ridiculous. I can think of many better examples within the games industry that're better examples, including ones I've actually worked with/for.

[randomengine]

Wait...a TCG releases a new set every year that requires a far higher monetary investment per person than an MMO. A product that suffers from oversaturation and release fatigue. You're using that as an example of proper product management versus a video game? The two aren't even remotely comparable, even from a business standpoint.

Sure, Blizz could step up their management style to be more with the times, but acting like M:tG is a good example is pretty ridiculous. I can think of many better examples within the games industry that're better examples, including ones I've actually worked with/for.

Magic: The Gathering releases 4 sets a year, actually and it is a great example. The sets release like clockwork, they are never late and are known about a year in advance. It is actually a great example, because that is a TON of content, delivered on time, multiple times a year. You may gripe about the QUALITY of the game, but that is irrelevant to the quality of the delivery model. If Blizzard had a similar model, they might actually have content out all the time and fans would know ahead of time what is coming and when.

I remember back in vanilla days and the "future development" web page. They were always keeping players informed on what is coming next. They are far less transparent today and Mists started so well and then all of a sudden its a California-drought level content desert.

[Surfd]

This is ultimately a failure in management.

Ideally, if Blizzard wanted to keep content flowing they would split their development team in two. One team would be considered the content team and work on content patches. The other team would be the expansion team and always be working on the next expansion. The way it is designed now is that all the developers work on both content patches and expansions. Content for Mists was coming out very well in the beginning but stopped dead around the time Warlords was announced - which tells me all the content devs are working on it instead of content patches.

It was mentioned earlier in this thread that you cannot get a baby a month with 9 mothers. This is true, however if your goal is a baby a month this can be achieved with 12 mothers. Proper management of the mothers would allow for each one of them to produce a baby once a year, each of them giving birth in a different month. Again, this is a management problem, a mismanagement of resources.

I know this can be achieved, but Blizzard is really old (their upper management is all old coders) and they like the way their jobs are, so they won't change until those old men retire. To see a company that can achieve such content delivery look no further than Wizards of the Coast. Their Magic: The Gathering sets are released, like clockwork, every year. This is accomplished through amazing management and layering of teams.

So really the only people to blame here are the founders and old managers at Blizzard who are just too old and too set in their ways to change how the developers are managed. Hence, they cannot walk and chew gum at the same time.

Because anecdotal evidence like "well, content dropped off around the time warlords was annoucned" actually means squat. And because you have ANY idea AT ALL what blizzards internal development structure and resource distribution actually looks like.

Blizzard has most of these expantions in various stages of development for an incredible amount of lead time before we actually see the content as users. For all you know, the core "content" for Mysts was already largely finished WAYYYYY before any of it actually needed to be released, and most of that content is simply being released on a fixed schedule, along with things like feedback / balance passes made to adjust to user input when the time for the next item on the schedule to pop out hits.

I mean, if you honestly think they were still doing core content design for "seige of orgrimmar raid instance" for example up to a short while before it went up on the PTR, you are insane. To put it into perspective, they quite likely have a fairly firm idea of the names, environemnts and moves / abilities for every boss for every raid at every raid tier from start to finish in WoD already set down somewhere and will only be doing tweaks and balance passes on them in order when they release.

The "core content" people for mysts probably fininshed with mysts 6 months ago or more and passed everything along to the "balance and finish pass" team so they could move on to setting up WoD.

[randomengine]

Because anecdotal evidence like "well, content dropped off around the time warlords was annoucned" actually means squat. And because you have ANY idea AT ALL what blizzards internal development structure and resource distribution actually looks like.

Blizzard has most of these expantions in various stages of development for an incredible amount of lead time before we actually see the content as users. For all you know, the core "content" for Mysts was already largely finished WAYYYYY before any of it actually needed to be released, and most of that content is simply being released on a fixed schedule, along with things like feedback / balance passes made to adjust to user input when the time for the next item on the schedule to pop out hits.

I mean, if you honestly think they were still doing core content design for "seige of orgrimmar raid instance" for example up to a short while before it went up on the PTR, you are insane. To put it into perspective, they quite likely have a fairly firm idea of the names, environemnts and moves / abilities for every boss for every raid at every raid tier from start to finish in WoD already set down somewhere and will only be doing tweaks and balance passes on them in order when they release.

The "core content" people for mysts probably fininshed with mysts 6 months ago or more and passed everything along to the "balance and finish pass" team so they could move on to setting up WoD.

I cannot imagine that those people who designed everything (as you describe) are all just sitting around now waiting for other teams to do their work. I also cannot imagine that they are working on design for the expansion after Warlord exclusively. The thing about old coders is that they do many things, wear many hats and that is part of the problem. Ideally you want the design team to always be working on design, once Warlords is done, then work on what comes after. The thing is IF, and that is a big IF, this is how Blizzard is doing it they are the slowest, most inefficient goddamn company there is. Either some team in the chain is lolligagging OR they have too many people doing too many different things and they need to specialize their teams more.

[Sunaka]

Magic: The Gathering releases 4 sets a year, actually and it is a great example. The sets release like clockwork, they are never late and are known about a year in advance. It is actually a great example, because that is a TON of content, delivered on time, multiple times a year. You may gripe about the QUALITY of the game, but that is irrelevant to the quality of the delivery model. If Blizzard had a similar model, they might actually have content out all the time and fans would know ahead of time what is coming and when.

A single card set requires far less work than even a single Scenario. I can't even begin to fathom how you're ignorant of this fact. Even including the balancing discussions, the major holdup is people drawing/painting the pictures for the cards. They don't have to worry about a timetable...the worst thing that happens is their artists have hand cramps. If they release them every 3 months (again, serious market fatigue here, which actually does matter), the majority of that time is not because of some behind-the-scenes grand work involved.

You tried acting like the 12 mothers thing is a better example, but it's still not. First off, sticking with the babies analogy, you can't PLAN THE DATE A BABY IS BORN. And unless you're a rabbit, 12 babies a year IS WAY TOO GODDAMN MANY. Just like 4 card expansions a year is way too many. Just like a raid every 3 months is way too many (unless you're a diehard, which has been proven time and again to not be the source of the money nor their primary focus). Further, sticking with the babies analogy, maybe there's a problem with the baby and it's miscarried or has to be aborted. Or maybe the mother even dies. As in, the patch has to be completely scrapped and now they have a whole slew of problems going on because further plans (aka: baby preparations) are thrown around because now you have a misallocation of resources that's just been wasted.

[randomengine]

A single card set requires far less work than even a single Scenario. I can't even begin to fathom how you're ignorant of this fact. Even including the balancing discussions, the major holdup is people drawing/painting the pictures for the cards. They don't have to worry about a timetable...the worst thing that happens is their artists have hand cramps. If they release them every 3 months (again, serious market fatigue here, which actually does matter), the majority of that time is not because of some behind-the-scenes grand work involved.

You tried acting like the 12 mothers thing is a better example, but it's still not. First off, sticking with the babies analogy, you can't PLAN THE DATE A BABY IS BORN. And unless you're a rabbit, 12 babies a year IS WAY TOO GODDAMN MANY. Just like 4 card expansions a year is way too many. Just like a raid every 3 months is way too many (unless you're a diehard, which has been proven time and again to not be the source of the money nor their primary focus). Further, sticking with the babies analogy, maybe there's a problem with the baby and it's miscarried or has to be aborted. Or maybe the mother even dies. As in, the patch has to be completely scrapped and now they have a whole slew of problems going on because further plans (aka: baby preparations) are thrown around because now you have a misallocation of resources that's just been wasted.

Im not asking for new raid content. I think they should make content, a lot more, that has nothing to do with raids and dungeons.

You are wrong about planning the date of a birth. You can. It happens all the time. There is a drug called pitocin that induces labor. Sure a baby may come early, but that is what management is for, to keep things going smoothly.

I think you are shortchanging the amount of effort it makes to work on a TCG. You have to not only balance all the cards in the set against each other, but also against every other card they have previously made - in various configurations because they do have various tournament formats, so these things do matter. This requires a shitload of playtesting. It just so happens Wizards of the Coast can do what Blizzard cannot. Just makes them better at management which was my entire argument.

[Whidbey]

For those who keep saying it will only be one face per model read this quote as Robinson is saying it's just an example :

" What you’re looking at here for the Human female is a single face option and a single skin tone on the base model without any animation or posing. "

thats all they are showing for now as an example of the work they are doing, a single, face OPTION.

[Zamfix]

"the development time needed would take away from time spent on something else."

THEN FFS HIRE MORE DEVELOPERS!

I'm so sick of this excuse.

"Oh, you made an awesome suggestion and we really like the idea too? - Well, too bad that we here at Blizzard are greedy as hell and even though our budget would totally suffice to double our staff, we'd rather just sit on it."

We are talking BLIZZARD here! One of the most prestigious video game companies in the world. They have the resources to please everyone, but they just can't bring themselves to take action. And the only reasonable explanation for this is their avarice.

But beware, community, if you bring this sensitive topic up on the official forums your thread will either get deleted OR what they say is:"You know nothing about our company." My response to this is:"Then publish some numbers! Show us that your budget wouldn't allow it!" At this point Blizzard just ignores our concerns.

What's your opinion on this matter?

You think can magically conjure talented developers out of thin air? You obviously have no idea how a business is run, let alone software development. They don't need to answer to you.

[Elestia]

Most of their worth (2/3rds to 3/4ths) is held by shareholders. They sunk their profits into buying the company back from Vivendi entertainment. The rest is budgeted on developing new games, new expansions and maintaining wow, in addition to writers working on the Warcraft movie.

[runedhill]

THEN FFS HIRE MORE DEVELOPERS!

I'm so sick of this excuse.

What's your opinion on this matter?

My opinion is that they should just buy more money.

[Sunaka]

Im not asking for new raid content. I think they should make content, a lot more, that has nothing to do with raids and dungeons.

Raids and dungeons are content. I fail to see your point, so I'm assuming there isn't one.

You are wrong about planning the date of a birth. You can. It happens all the time. There is a drug called pitocin that induces labor. Sure a baby may come early, but that is what management is for, to keep things going smoothly.

Thank you for making the point. You're saying that they have to plan with no room for error, no matter what happens. This is how bugs pop up. It's also dangerous, potentially far more costly than just a little more time for things to come out right, and lowers public opinion.

I think you are shortchanging the amount of effort it makes to work on a TCG.

No I'm not. I'm aware of the playtesting. I knew a lot of the WotC crew when I was younger. There's still nowhere near as much QC going into playtesting the sets versus testing MMO content.

Just makes them better at management which was my entire argument.

Managing a school is not the same thing as managing a construction team. Both tasks have different requirements. You can make them both efficient, of course, but you can't approach them the same way. Again, not saying their system is optimal, but you're comparing two completely different things.

[Stir]

Magic: The Gathering releases 4 sets a year, actually and it is a great example. The sets release like clockwork, they are never late and are known about a year in advance. It is actually a great example, because that is a TON of content, delivered on time, multiple times a year. You may gripe about the QUALITY of the game, but that is irrelevant to the quality of the delivery model. If Blizzard had a similar model, they might actually have content out all the time and fans would know ahead of time what is coming and when.

I remember back in vanilla days and the "future development" web page. They were always keeping players informed on what is coming next. They are far less transparent today and Mists started so well and then all of a sudden its a California-drought level content desert.

Actually, M:tG IS a great example.

The game sucks. Because they release so often, and every set needs to be sold, sold, sold. Meanwhile, they need to prevent card overlap. New, unique things need to be invented that are at the same time attractive. Result is ability bloat, value bloat, cumulative power-per-card increase and a network of inelegant, inconsistent band-aid rule fixes only the judges know.

Magic: the Gathering is a bad game because they release too much, too quickly.

[Hooliganz]

im with OP
we pay monthly
if we don't it doesn't matter