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The great divide between EVE's players and developers
Once upon a time, there was a game about internet spaceships set in a vast galaxy, just waiting to be explored and conquered. It wasn't a huge game in terms of subscribers, in fact it was quite niche, but its small following was devoted. The size of the community allowed the developers to really interact with them and refine the game. The devs were approachable, open, and direct. In many respects, the players and developers were friends. All seemed well in the internet spaceships game, until the player base's numbers grew, and so did the collective din of their voices. The developers soon found they had to be careful about what they said to the players, in case they'd be accused of going back on their word somewhere down the line. At the same time, the game company grew to handle all of these new faces. As with most internet communities, the ever-growing numbers of players became more and more hostile, and the developers grew more and more silent...Then, a developer -- let's call him "t20" -- used his knowledge of the game to cheat a little. Some players received an unfair advantage over others because of this lapse of judgment, and it was revealed publicly. The players became enraged. The developers were embarrassed and apologetic. Many players left the game, or at least loudly professed that they would. Many perceived that the developers, seen as a whole, were untrustworthy. Given how bad this situation was, and seeing no real way to change these perceptions, the game's creators had to accept that this was how things were. The people who built up the game from nothing saw little recourse but to withdraw even further from the very community which was so vital to their success. Does our story end there?
Lappin' up the goss
Despite conversing freely about a bunch of important Nintendo information, Nintendo Australia's Rose Lappin was inundated with more unanswered questions, as Wii owners sought specific responses to their own queries. Being a good sport, Lappin took to the challenge.Of course, therein lay the problem. Most were very specific queries and resulted in the standard "contact our service department," "we have no current plans ...," and "we haven't had any feedback" responses. There's a slight problem when a spokesperson responds to outright feedback by stating they haven't received any feedback (after a question commenting on the supposedly complex Wii Message Board system).Not the most conclusive of interviews, but Lappin's intentions were very noble. It's difficult for one person to save the day of every gamer out there, but giving the most information available at the time, to as many people as possible, is worth a great big chocolate appreciation cake. For the full interview, make link go now!
Former GameSpot reviewer sheds light on more PR hijinx
In an interview with former GameSpot reviewer, Alex Navarro, MTV Multiplayer Blog was able to extract a telling tale from the newly appointed community team member at Harmonix regarding the oil-to-water relationship public relations practitioners have with the press.When tasked to review an unnamed Wii launch title, Navarro was sent a note along with his copy of the game--which he provided as evidence to Steven Totilo.The note read: If the review is 9.0 or higher you can post immediately. Lower than 9.0, could you please hold until launch day, November 19th? Thanks."And that's not the first time I got something like that," Navarro told MTV. Navarro, who left GameSpot after the public and controversial firing of then-reviews editor Jeff Gerstmann, said GameSpot ran their review for this game based on a copy bought in a store and they panned it for what it was.
Eidos closes down their marketing department
As a result of the recent deal with Warner Bros., Eidos has now announced it will close down its North American marketing, sales and PR departments completely. This coming after their parent company SCi's announcement to cut 25% of its worldwide workforce earlier this year. It hasn't been an easy year for the publisher of such successful titles as Hitman, Deus Ex and the Tomb Raider series, but this may just be the restructuring they've needed.Most importantly for us though, we wonder what this means for Age of Conan, which is handled by Eidos. SCi mentions the fact that they have discontinued development on 14 different game projects in an effort to stem the company's financial losses, including a $161 million deficit in the second half of 2007, and a refocus on high profile games likely to generate a larger return. We can only hope they're talking about Age of Conan.
What is it those WAR devs do all day, anyway?
Ahh, to have the life of an EA Mythic developer. Sit at the beach all day, sipping margaritas, getting massages from Adriana Lima and Jessica Alba. Occasionally taking a break from that to write a line of code or answer a support request. That is truly the life, am I right?Sadly, that is not the rock star life of a dev, no matter what you may want to believe. The main PR guys (Jeff Hickman, Paul Barnett and Josh Drescher) from the makers of the highly-anticipated Warhammer Online sat down with MMORPG.com to let us know what really goes on in their hectic lives. While it's not all fun and games, there is an element of hard work and rigorous travel schedules to contend with. Despite the fact that MMO developers are achieving a celebrity status lately, they have their work cut out for them in not only creating, but maintaining a successfully organic game.
Sony places twice in list of business blunders
Given the PS3's precipitous fall from presumed console war winner to a seemingly perpetual runner-up status in domestic and foreign sales, we could probably fill a list of 101 dumb business moments using Sony alone. While Fortune's list of 101 dumb business moments of 2007 isn't so narrowly focused, Sony still manages to show up twice for two separate PR blunders.Fortune gives the 61st position on the list to Sony's over-the-top God of War II launch party and the furor it drew from animal rights groups. Never mind that the reality of the event was much tamer than the media sensationalism -- in public relations, perception quickly becomes reality (In fact, even now Fortune repeats the Sony-denied claim that journalists were invited to "reach inside the still-warm carcass of a freshly slaughtered goat to eat offal from its stomach.")Trailing right behind at No. 63 on the list is the Church of England's vocal objections to the use of Manchester Cathedral in Sony's Resistance: Fall of Man. Again, it doesn't really matter that Sony apologized twice or that the cathedral's use wasn't any worse than that seen in popular movies. Once the story is out there, the PR damage is hard to undo. Dumb, but true.[Via GamesIndustry.biz]
Microsoft launches Japanese PR Blog
Here's a thankless way to make Microsoft's payroll: running the equivalent of GamerScoreBlog for Xbox Japan. Undeterred, Shigeo Tatsumi and the marketing team in the Land of Low Expectations recently launched a new employee blog and a community site called Xbox Friends. Here's hoping they find a few.
National Semi hands out pink slips, snatches "gift" iPods
He who giveth can also taketh away -- our parents used to use that line when threatening our young lives, but in the case of manufacturing giant National Semiconductor, it also holds true for iPods. You'll recall that in a transparent bid for publicity genuine show of appreciation for its employees last month, the company "gave" all 8,500 of them a 30GB iPod to celebrate record profits from the previous year -- although spokespeople were careful to only say that National Semi was "equipping" staff with the players, and apparently refused to speculate on whether or not terminated employees would be able to keep their "gifts." Well as it turns out, 35 workers recently laid off from the company's Arlington plant were in fact asked to hand in their 'Pods as they walked out the door, and those folks who had given theirs away were charged a "fair market value" to be paid from their soon-to-be-non-existent wages. Now we're no experts in public relations, but it seems that if you're going to make a big deal about how much your company values its employees, you'd want to do your best to avoid the sort of seemingly hypocritical behavior that publications such as ours just love to cover.[Via digg]
