Those interested in gaming communities turning toxic should look at Starbound's subreddit[0] and community forums[1]. The climate's been growing increasingly hostile over feature delays, players unsatisfied with the product, and variance in community management strategies employed by its developers.
There's a similar theme of broken promises there. However, Chucklefish has been updating pretty regularly and acting on a lot of constructive player feedback, so the overall negativity strikes me as somewhat confusing.
Another rather notorious and perhaps more justifiable example of community backlash can be found by looking at forums[2] for, and general controversy[3] surrounding, Infestation: Survivor Stories (formerly The War Z).
I think Chucklefish started to lose it around the time there was a slew of updates about employees relocating to the UK. The initial backlash was tame. They made a lot of promises about productivity gains and more frequent updates. People cooled off.
As time went on and they didn't deliver people got agitated again. Chucklefish's response: 'Communicating so much with the community has ruined morale and killed productivity.'
The regular updates consist of art, 'what I ate for lunch today'-esque non sequiturs, and empty promises (feature lists any zealous 12 year old would make up). Those do nothing to quell the growing negativity.
The outpouring of negativity in /r/starbound did not come quickly or easily and could still be reversed. Chucklefish just has to deliver.
Did you ever finish a software project for someone impatient? I think it should be obvious that writing daily blog posts is a lot of work that isn't development. And that a camp of angry villagers telling you that you're incompetent and constantly telling you to change direction isn't going to help morale.
Comments
Those interested in gaming communities turning toxic should look at Starbound's subreddit[0] and community forums[1]. The climate's been growing increasingly hostile over feature delays, players unsatisfied with the product, and variance in community management strategies employed by its developers.
There's a similar theme of broken promises there. However, Chucklefish has been updating pretty regularly and acting on a lot of constructive player feedback, so the overall negativity strikes me as somewhat confusing.
Another rather notorious and perhaps more justifiable example of community backlash can be found by looking at forums[2] for, and general controversy[3] surrounding, Infestation: Survivor Stories (formerly The War Z).
[0] http://www.reddit.com/r/starbound/
[1] http://community.playstarbound.com/index.php
[2] http://steamcommunity.com/app/226700/discussions/
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infestation:_Survivor_Stories#...
I think Chucklefish started to lose it around the time there was a slew of updates about employees relocating to the UK. The initial backlash was tame. They made a lot of promises about productivity gains and more frequent updates. People cooled off.
As time went on and they didn't deliver people got agitated again. Chucklefish's response: 'Communicating so much with the community has ruined morale and killed productivity.'
Community's response: 'Wait what? It's our fault you aren't getting anything done?'
Chucklefish: 'No no we're getting things done.'
The regular updates consist of art, 'what I ate for lunch today'-esque non sequiturs, and empty promises (feature lists any zealous 12 year old would make up). Those do nothing to quell the growing negativity.
The outpouring of negativity in /r/starbound did not come quickly or easily and could still be reversed. Chucklefish just has to deliver.
Did you ever finish a software project for someone impatient? I think it should be obvious that writing daily blog posts is a lot of work that isn't development. And that a camp of angry villagers telling you that you're incompetent and constantly telling you to change direction isn't going to help morale.