RareLtd Reddit AMA Answers

@tavishhill2003 said in RareLtd Reddit AMA Answers:

@clutchachu Even forcing ppl to spend real money as the exclusive means to acquire a pet is not close to 'overly aggressive' let alone 'predatory'. A lootbox setup is predatory. Purely optional DLC is not.

IMO It's predatory in the sense that if I want to enjoy all the content the game has to offer I am forced to pay additional cash with no recourse.

@tavishhill2003 Only if the developer doesn't provide me with a way to obtain that piece of d-l-content in question, forcing me to spend money, praying on my OCD and completionist tendencies for the sake of making more money from a AAA game that i purchased at full price not even 3 months ago.

So happy they answered my question about "The Ship of the Dammed? or Pirate Ghosts" can't wait to see what they come up with ;c)

no one remember here the launch of wow, vanilla was pretty basic, just give time from now to 1 year and see what the game looks like

I'd kind of like to see the ship name plank outside the ship, maybe at the top of the stern.. so other players can see my ship name. Like with real boats, the name is usually on the back.

@tavishhill2003 said in RareLtd Reddit AMA Answers:

@clutchachu ...if you can't control your OCD that is your problem, not theirs. It's optional content. By allrights, games should cost much, much more than they do today due to inflation and dev costs btw. The $60 tag is a steal.

It's not a question of if I can control it or not, the point is optional or no, it's still content they're denying players access to unless they pay them, and this isn't a free mobile game where micro-transactions can get a pass because the devs need to keep the lights on or whatever, this is a AAA title with the full backing of Microsoft who boasts a net worth of well over 500 Billion dollars...certainly if people want to go above and beyond and express their support for Rare by purchasing micro-transactions that's absolutely fine, all I'm saying and have been saying, is that come launch or June or whenever Rare decides they want to implement micro-transactions, they shouldn't make them exclusively obtainable through spending real world cash.

@tavishhill2003 said in RareLtd Reddit AMA Answers:

From a marketing pov, I agree with you, but from a profits pov they are already giving us EVERY SINGLE MAJOR CONTENT UPDATE FOR FREE! If that gesture needs to be subsidized by purely optional paid DLC, there is nothing wrong with it. And MS is giving us this game via Game Pass, which is already the best deal in gaming by far. Both MS and RARE are being more than a little generous as is mate.

Blizzard has the same model in place for overwatch, all content updates are free and that game retails for $20 less than SoT. Also as you no doubt know, Overwatch features cosmetics as well and they can be purchased with cash or with in game coins. This model has proven to be a massive success for Blizzard, so why not apply it to SoT?

I understand Blizzard uses lootboxes which inherently adds a little more revenue in the short run as people try and unlock these boxes, but perhaps with that extra $20 per unit Rare and MS are getting they could eat that small initial dip in Micro-transaction sales.

Also I don't think it's any secret that MS needs this game to succeed for the sake of the Xbox brand and so of course there going to do whatever they reasonably can to facilitate that success, including the game pass deal.

Thanks for putting this here @xCALYPT0x , I don't dive into Reddit if I can help it. :P

@tavishhill2003 said in RareLtd Reddit AMA Answers:

@clutchachu Overwatch likely cost a fraction of what it cost to develope SoT.

If we include the era in the game's development where Blizzard was working on Titan, (the mmo that would eventually become Overwatch) I think I can confidently say that's not true, but neither of us have reputable figures of either games dev costs so we'll never know.

In any case, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on this as we won't learn anything else about their micro-transaction system until June or if Rare announces something. I'm still beyond hype for launch day and am really pulling for this game to succeed, I just hope that once the game is out in the wild Rare will breathe a sigh of relief and really focus on building trust within the community through honesty and regular developer updates of substance going forward.

@program-024 said in RareLtd Reddit AMA Answers:

@clutchachu I would agree that being honest would be the best course of action.

That being said, there is a phrase "you can lead a horse to water..." that I think applies to the situation. Rare could be as open and clear as they possibly could, within legal limitations, and still have to deal with backlash. There will be players who miss the m**o, or see the m**o and through some feat of ingenuity obfuscate the words from their clear meaning. The ones that make this mistake will probably be very vocal about it.

I definitely see where you're coming from here and there's no doubt something like this would happen from time to time but my philosophy is as long as the rest of the community can present those who misconstrued the dev's words with proof of what the devs actually said through an article or a video or what have you, any resonable person would see that they made a mistake, and for those who don't want to admit they made a mistake, all it would take is a Rare employee to step in and clear things up.

I agree mutual understanding would be best for all parties involved. The reality is that mutual understanding can be difficult depending on individuals involved.

Certainly, but I still believe that facts are facts and that they can serve as a pretty powerful unifier.

Perhaps Rare is being over-cautious?

IMO waay to cautious lol, I'm hoping post launch they'll take steps to be more transparent about SoT's development process.

@gholin said in RareLtd Reddit AMA Answers:

Creative Assembly, makers of Total War, became more like Rare in the way they communicate because it was more of a loss when they shared more info and couldn't deliver everything on time or couldn't get something to work in development. They were, as someone else said here, damned if you do, damned if you don't, So they decided to "don't" when they figured it could cause problems.

I understand what you're saying, it's certainly gotta be disappointing waiting on a feature to be developed that you're really excited for only to see it not come to fruition but I still feel as though with the "do" method, at least the community knows the circumstances of why that feature couldn't be implemented rather than being left in the dark to assume that the devs have been sitting on their hands for the past month, you know?

@xcalypt0x no one said ship types

The nature of these questions are quite alarming. Answers to most of the questions should have been obvious and yet the devs gave nothing to fill them. Plus, some of the questions should have been so obvious even that they should have not been asked to begin with. Now, after many months if not over a year, some of these questions were taken in again and still left without answers. Now I have even worse feeling about the issues in place.

Some obvious answers should have been outright yes's (does the Kraken have a body too) while some should have been clear no's (no to NPC-driven market, yes to player-driven market) and then given some further thoughts with couple lines. The game has major flaws in place that reveal too much from the presented content already, it offers a very low surprise value if we exclude players themselves and their cunning, and they think anything they may say could possibly reveal "too much"? They haven't even been able to build anchors for the ships for crying out loud!... sigh... Begs to ask the question, but where's your focus team? What went so wrong with the so gorgeous ocean that wasn't worth the effort to make sealoving anchors for? What did you do?!

I'm tired of this type of demeanor toward customers. We are not as fragile as some of you devs treat us. Just stop the sugar-coating nonsense. Build a spine. I'm so disappointed at you (some of the devs) right now. You should know better. You are to direct the whole industry to a better future and you still treat clients this way. You don't have to use those accessory sentences with us. Be blunt.

If you don't want to tell us about some pieces of content because you are too afraid to ruin the surprise for us, don't be. The tier based reward system basically did the worst punch below the waistline already. You cannot ruin it much further than what is to be expected from the answers given here and the gameplay this far in case the reputation system stays the exact same. If you don't want to discuss about a feature, get a grip over yourselves and just tell that to us, with a straight face. We understand. We are not that idiot. You have your limits, the engine has limits, everything has their limits. There's no shame in them nor admitting them. Be brave. Stay hungry.