I am not and have never been a member of Funcom’s inner circle, but I do know several people who are, and I do not get the impression that any of them feel they are unable to voice their disagreements with Funcom.
Possibly as a feeling of reciprocity, they may be disinclined to so openly bite the hand that gives them special privileges, but I do not believe there is anything in their NDAs that would enforce such behavior.
They probably are not allowed to discuss their NDAs though, so they probably cannot confirm or deny anything.
Now, NDA is just a term. I can think out-loud about it instead of waiting. I mean, if there are more details then out with it!
On the other hand, “NDA” is just a placeholder or a contribution, which can be traded. I digress, but you can see the self-promotion at this level. It’s not a point I want to defend.
A team cannot be too small for quality. That’s not a valid excuse - for the indvidual possibly, but not for the team or company.
Assuring an exceptable level of quality is part of any project. If you start too many projects, quality may go down, but the lack of quality is not a result of the team being too small, but of the team having too many projects.
If quality goes down because of workload, that’s not the worker’s fault, but management’s. But the team, company, group cannot use that as an excuse. We expect each other to set your goals realistically.
That’s what bugs me about Conan Exiles: A small, but competently lead team wouldn’t start unwarranted projects like redesigning the UI or introducing taverns, and then produce sub-par quality. A small, but competently lead team wouldn’t sink time into projects the customer base never asked for and actively rejects, like most of the control and UI changes, the dye system and so on.
If we had a small, competently lead team, barely hanging by, working with little resources, they’d do small stuff, finish half-completed projects, go for low-hanging fruits.
Instead, they do risky, complicated, expensive stuff - badly.
There is, I dare say, a lack of leadership.
From my experience, luxury pet projects, inconsistent quality, deviation between goals and action is caused by weak or missing leadership. It may also come from setting unwise goals by upper management, but I dare say that the small stuff we worry about isn’t even on the high-up’s radar. Something like changing camera control in a niche game is not a topic for a board meeting.
Good effort writing all this, but I think you’re putting more effort into this than Funcom at this pont.
Extending the major patch release timeframe from 3 months to 6-7 months and still getting the most broken update yet. You can’t even play the game anymore, constant crashing, authentication failed, thralls dying left and right, disappearing. Things that worked before are now broken beyond belief like the animations are all glitchy, inventory not working properly, delving bench on Siptah lost all functionality, etc…I could go all day.
Funcom pretends like everything is ok and keeps pumping content in the bazaar at horrendous prices.
Funcom could’ve disabled live settlements if they cared about the player base. I think this game is on its last legs and the silence is biggest red flag.
The game plays fine with Living Settlements switched off. I had one thrall run away during the 20 minutes I had it switched on after AoH dropped. Nothing major happened since I turned it off - no MIA thralls, Freya and Liu Kang recruitment was fine, no falling through the floor etc.
In my opinion, Funcom is using Conan to test features that will come in Dune, by that I mean the Funcom Live service, the bazaar and the no longer existing Battle Pass.
All concentration and resources are currently focused on Dune.
Therefore, not much will change in Conan in the near future.
I’m currently doing a run with a friend on an official Siptah server, lots of new beginners who are all excited until they get to the point that many travel steps are buggy and they realize that certain food and stamina buffs don’t work. Then they have problems with inventory management. I constantly have to tell my friend don’t do this or don’t do that because it’s buggy.
If you lack the capacity to even classify bugs with a reasonable degree of certainty, then you lack the capacity to develop quality software. You either get more resources, or you stop. The world doesn’t need more shіtty software.
I keep saying things like “reasonable degree of certainty”, “you end up having to estimate the probability”, and stuff like that, but it seems like I’m not getting through to you. From the way you talk, you appear to think that you must have a reliable repro for a bug to even classify it and assign it a priority.
If that’s the way you think, then you’re simply wrong. If it isn’t, then we’re back at my assertion that if you don’t have enough people to even classify bugs, you have no business doing development because your software will be shіt.
It does. I won’t say that every company I ever worked for did it that way. Some of the companies I worked for were small and existed before the industry best practices were established. Some of them were big, but they weren’t software companies and they didn’t invest properly into what they saw only as a “cost center”.
But the best among the companies I worked for had robust processes in place. What I’m talking about not only works, it’s the way to successfully develop quality software.
In such scenarios, I would expect the spokespeople for the company to not blatantly lie about it.
At the expense of your customers
Let’s not move the goal posts here. This is what you said and what I initially replied to:
There’s nothing here about insults and denigration. In fact, if all you want is the absence of insults and denigration, then you don’t need any understanding of software development, you just need manners.
What I’ll say here is just my opinion, which I haven’t discussed with anyone from CEA.
What I would expect from CEA is to try to gather input from anyone interested among the players and then present it to Funcom in a way that doesn’t leave Funcom any excuses about how it was “improperly presented”'.
A key point there is “anyone interested”, as opposed to a handful of people picked by Funcom.
It isn’t, because I was honest. You can count the number of times I had to sign an NDA on the fingers of one hand without dropping a teacup you’re holding in it. I’m also not a lawyer, or even a US citizen, so there’s a bunch of stuff that I might be missing. That’s why I thought that @LostBrythunian was explaining something I didn’t know about NDAs.
I’m not at your throat. I strongly disagree with your assertions about best practices in software development and how they apply to Funcom.
how exactly would you propose to have that “conversation” that has not be done before? again i am looking for something new to do , because previous attempts has NOT worked
based on experience they react with things can explode into something bigger, being nice has not worked before, and only when the stuff starts go out of proportion is when they come and reappear to do some damage control, being nice is not a sign of there is a problem… its a sign of acceptance (Without liking it ) some people might say it is a sign of weakness, (i dont think so) . what i do know from funcom is they only act when they do see a problem,
mark my words, the minute they think CE issues will be a problem for Dune awakenings, it is the time we will see them all over the place trying to solve it, or to gain time.
you just have to see the level of engagement ehy have in dune, and compare it with the level of engagement in CE. the difference is abysmal, and yes i get it, its their new toy they want to promote to make money,. but that does not mean it gives then the right to LIE to our faces, and to provide really terribly executed updates, with more broken stuff.
let me put it this way. if they DONT have what it takes to keep developing this game into acceptable levels, they better of stop developing altogether, no more big changes, no more new systems, just leave it as a decently performing product and add if you wish new stuff to the bazaar for getting more money.
throwing updates that breaks the game , lack of commuinication , creates frustration, what they are doing is just a formula to generate frustration and that frustration is what makes people go to the company throats.
there must be better ways to deal with this , because what funcom is doing is only going to cause more pain and more problems for them, and they DONT need people angry for their Dune awakenings launch.
i wonder why the mood is heating up? food for thought.
agree, yet some people bring the narrative that it is the community fault, because we are hurting a corporation feelings…
or the lack of good management… that can also be it.
this… why would to add more and more complex things if we are about to close CE? there was NO NEED for the settlement system that it did exactly the opposite of what it tried to achieve. i mean the EXACT Oppposite. why would they make a tavern system to leave it half baked? they promised us new adventures from it, they said they will use it as a framework to add more stuff to the game, right now it is irrelevant, it is just an RNG thing to get thralls , just as the cages, but at the expense of more performance (brining really very low value to the user experience)
the only thing i m ok is the new companions, it is engaging, (yes it has bugs) but none of them game breaking. but the other things are a total disaster, why would they add more complexity to a dying product? escapes me…
what i would expect is honesty from them, give CE a proper good bye if they must, and that does not mean to leave it broken…
it worked better when crafters were inventory items, they never had issues, what is the overall value of having a cook weild a sword with how bad their AI is? what about the performance side of the game tha has been strugling,? add more complexity and more AI to a game that was not performing good? to what end?
oh i agree with you at so many levels!
again the “lying” seems part of the problem that makes people really angry, no one likes their intelligence being insulted by a corporation …(in your face)
I think you’re looking to far into this. All that is needed for a bug report is a description of what the bug is, and steps to reproduce. The more reliable the reproduction steps are, the better the chances of getting the bug fixed. They aren’t required, as I’ve frequently given bug reports without them.
But even then, what should be happening is having reasonable expectations that just because something is easy to reproduce, easy to identify, and may even seem to be easy to fix from a modder’s point of view may still take time to fix. We don’t always see the connections issues have with other systems or even with systems that are yet to be developed.
This group needs to understand, and accept that their efforts may not yield immediate results or have results in any amount of time if ever for the issues they bring up. They are sacrificing time because they have the time to use and are freely choosing to use it of their own accord, and shouldn’t expect any form of compensation in the form of results, or even acknowledgement.
At the end of the day, just because a group has put some effort to come together, put time in to figure things out, and then presents them in a clean and well edited manner doesn’t mean their voice has any more consideration to the random person playing. At best they can hope for is maybe Nicole, Carrol, or Andy will pop in to the discord channel and monitor the discussions from time to time. Just don’t expect frequent communications outside of pasted announcements, at least I haven’t seen frequent in the discords channels (about 12 of them related to Conan) I’m in. The Community discord might be different.
NDAs simple means you can’t talk, publish, or broadcast what you see or experience in unreleased content. Once the NDA is lifted you can talk about those things. You can criticize the company or its people in anyway you wish (following normal slander and libel laws as anyone should even if not under NDA) just so long as unreleased content covered isn’t used in that criticism.
While my discussion with @Testerle has been almost entirely about QA, release planning, and software development processes, the part where I talked about the necessity of CEA goes beyond that scope. I said that I believe the CEA is necessary precisely because those who remain in the select group of closed beta testers tend to justify Funcom’s actions beyond what’s in the players’ best interest.
What I expect from CEA has little to do with bug reports and more to do with distilling the feedback from those of us who aren’t yet quite willing to completely give up on this game, but don’t have the (mis)fortune of having Funcom’s ear.
That’s perfectly true, and I agree with it, but the bar is even lower than that. If you implemented a feature for the upcoming release, put that release into beta, and your beta testers reported a critical bug, you either fix it or you don’t release that feature.
Again, the bar is much lower than “immediate results”. How about “doubling the time to release should not lead to the same QA outcomes”?
An idea doesn’t have to be perfect to be better than status quo. Just like everyone else here, I can’t know whether CEA will achieve anything or not, but at least it’s not shrugging and giving up:
Again, this is not an attack on @Testerle. On the contrary, @Testerle is a valued contributor to the Conan Exiles community, with his mods and his contributions to the wiki. His only flaw here, in my personal opinion, is that he’s too willing to justify Funcom’s mistakes.
Should we all give up if he’s fatalistic about the way Funcom is handling the game? Maybe we should, but maybe it’s a sign we need to try something different.
Thank you, and also to everyone else who provided additional information about the NDAs. Like I said, I didn’t actually know their limits.
I don’t think there is anyone who would disagree with this. Including Dennis and everyone working with and subordinate to him. Your issue is the people who make the decision aren’t here in these forums and aren’t in any discord channel. At best complaints are heard by the community managers and sent up.
I highly doubt the CEA (and they correct me if I am wrong here), have any plans to compile a message to CEO Rui Casais, about the issues being collected. It seems to be they intend to collaborate common issues, form a consensus about the fixes, and then nominate someone to make a nice pretty little forum post in the hopes that Carrol, AndyB, or Nicole… or even Dennis himself will see it and then take it into consideration.
Well I can say this, everything we talk about on the forums already fits that criteria. I don’t want to say the CEA is a waste of time. I don’t think it is a waste of time. I think it could yield positive results. But I don’t think its going to result in bug fixes happening before they are released.
The ones we are trying to talk to about these issues aren’t in positions from what I’ve seen to dictate release schedules. This isn’t an attempt to excuse anything. I think whomever is keeping them to the tight schedule in such a rigid fashion is being an ass hole.
We all (at least those of us participating in this specific subtopic) have experiences of various forms with software development. But arguing about how to release something is pointless. We all known when to release a piece of software. The problem is the people setting release dates probably don’t. Its why bureaucracy almost never works.
Honestly, I could pull up various examples from this thread. You insist that people who complain about the abysmal quality are unreasonable because they don’t understand QA and release planning. You claim that Funcom didn’t have enough information to delay the release. Your refusal to acknowledge that Funcom has a systemic problem that has led to the decline in quality.
I can provide quotes for all of these.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that you’re okay with the state of the game itself. But you have been saying a lot of things that make it sound like Funcom couldn’t have done better because they’re a business that needs to make money.
Okay, now we’re really quibbling about word choices here. Is Funcom, as an organization, “incompetent” or “dysfunctional”? Is their blatant disregard for quality and satisfaction of their players a “mistake” or a “very targeted business decision” that just happens to not be in their customers’ best interest?
Let me be really blunt. Funcom is doing a terrible job with Conan Exiles. No amount of knowledge of QA and release planning will justify that. Stating that it’s “a business decision” does not make the players’ demands unreasonable.
If we can’t agree on that, then we have a fundamental, irreconcilable difference about what customers are right to expect and demand.
See, this is precisely what I’m talking about. We’re not asking for a “bug free game”. That would, indeed, be unreasonable. The bar we’re setting is much, much lower than that.
I’ve been trying to make it clear that I’m not attacking you and that I simply disagree with you, because I respect you and I don’t want to “fight” you, but rather express my disagreement. In light of that effort, it is incredibly frustrating to see the goalposts move like this, even if you’re not doing it on purpose.
Anyway, I’ve been trying to make sure this doesn’t become anything personal and I feel that, despite that, it’s veering in that direction. I’ll happily argue about software development practices and processes, and I stand by my ideals about what should be considered reasonable or not.
I’ve made it clear that my disagreement with you isn’t personal, and that it doesn’t indicate a lack of respect for you. Whether you take it that way or not is out of my hands.
That’s an assumption. I don’t have firsthand information to confirm or refute it. The secondhand information that I do have is not mine to share. What I can say is that I don’t have any reasons to trust that assumption. Not anymore.
Given that, I would rather deal with the factual situation, which is that broken releases get pushed out regardless of who, exactly, is to blame in the organization.
I already said that my hopes and expectations for the CEA go beyond the scope of bugfixes. I don’t see the need to keep repeating that.
As for whether it’s a waste of time, we’ll have to see, won’t we? The 200+ posts in this topic are mostly concerned about whether CEA should even exist, and I think that the arguments for its existence are pretty compelling. Whether it will be successful is an open question that we won’t be able to answer through speculation here.
It’s not pointless to argue about X when knowledge of X is being used as an argument to decide if your complaints about X are “reasonable”.
If the sentence above is too convoluted, what I’m saying is “take it up with the one who brought it up in the first place”
I prefer to blame the person directly responsible, and not those who are not. I’ve been in such a position where you get blamed for a policy or decision outside your control and it sucks. I may not know exactly who is responsible, but from my perspective I know pretty who isn’t. So I’m going to make my decisions based on that.
I’ve said numerous times that I don’t believe its a waste of time. I think its a good thing. I’m not one of those who argued against it. I had concerns, voiced them, and got answers I found acceptable. I’m merely pointing out to expect the worst and hope for the best. Its how I’ve operated my feedback for 8 years now and I think its served pretty well in the reaction its gotten.
Consider it to be addressed to everyone involved, and I’ll apply that to everyone not involved if anyone things its relevant or helps.
Small point of order.
No one from Funcom ever has to actually face anyone except their manager/supervisor/director/ect, and their masters at Tencent.
No matter how a thread goes or how much outrage there is on any social media.
No matter how polite or perfidious, no matter how reasonable or raving.
At nearly no point can anyone here hold anyone at Funcom accountable for anything.
