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Entry tags:
Feedback Post
Hello everybody!
It’s been a little over a month now since our new mod-team has been formed and become active and a lot of things have happened since then: the backlog of all those things that are needed to keep a game running has been cleared up and optimized, the annoying bug that kept borking the game profile page over and over again faster than you could say “It’s working again!” has been hunted down and taken care of (if you have time, give Orange a big Thank You for that, that thing was nasty!), App cycles and the handling of the intro logs were tinkered with to make them run smooth again and the first phase of a new plot that stars opponents that are neither witches nor kishin eggs has been run! This isn’t the end, though!
We know that there there’s still a lot more that can be done to make the game enjoyable for everyone and this is where we need your help, wonderful players of Soul Campaign!
We want your feedback!
We need to know where we and the game are currently standing to make it fun for everyone. To do that we need your feedback! Be it concrit, things you’d like to see more of, things that annoys you, wishes, opinions, questions you have, stuff that has caught your eyes,… Give it to us!
In the following you will find comments with headers about things that we’d like to hear your thoughts on as well as for suggestions for things that could be done in the future. That said, don’t hesitate to make your own threads with headers if you want to talk about something that we forgot to cover too! You want to talk about it, we want to hear it!! We’d also like to ask you to be brutally honest with us (I don’t mean kick your manners to the bucket, but don’t pull any punches just because we are mods either)! We all want to play and have fun here, so it’s just fair that each voice and opinion has the same weight.
Thanks a lot for participating!
Update-Edit: Wow, a REALLY BIG thanks for all the comments that we’ve gotten so far! They’re all very helpful and we are taking them very seriously – with the result that official mod replies will be a little slow as we’re considering all the points you’ve made carefully.
Juu, first of all we owe you an apology for what has happened. We’re still figuring out what went wrong and how to address the concerns you brought up. Please be patient with us.
It’s been a little over a month now since our new mod-team has been formed and become active and a lot of things have happened since then: the backlog of all those things that are needed to keep a game running has been cleared up and optimized, the annoying bug that kept borking the game profile page over and over again faster than you could say “It’s working again!” has been hunted down and taken care of (if you have time, give Orange a big Thank You for that, that thing was nasty!), App cycles and the handling of the intro logs were tinkered with to make them run smooth again and the first phase of a new plot that stars opponents that are neither witches nor kishin eggs has been run! This isn’t the end, though!
We know that there there’s still a lot more that can be done to make the game enjoyable for everyone and this is where we need your help, wonderful players of Soul Campaign!
We want your feedback!
We need to know where we and the game are currently standing to make it fun for everyone. To do that we need your feedback! Be it concrit, things you’d like to see more of, things that annoys you, wishes, opinions, questions you have, stuff that has caught your eyes,… Give it to us!
In the following you will find comments with headers about things that we’d like to hear your thoughts on as well as for suggestions for things that could be done in the future. That said, don’t hesitate to make your own threads with headers if you want to talk about something that we forgot to cover too! You want to talk about it, we want to hear it!! We’d also like to ask you to be brutally honest with us (I don’t mean kick your manners to the bucket, but don’t pull any punches just because we are mods either)! We all want to play and have fun here, so it’s just fair that each voice and opinion has the same weight.
Thanks a lot for participating!
Update-Edit: Wow, a REALLY BIG thanks for all the comments that we’ve gotten so far! They’re all very helpful and we are taking them very seriously – with the result that official mod replies will be a little slow as we’re considering all the points you’ve made carefully.
Juu, first of all we owe you an apology for what has happened. We’re still figuring out what went wrong and how to address the concerns you brought up. Please be patient with us.
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1. I was really, really displeased at how long it took for you guys to announce that the mod team was changing hands and undergoing construction. I realize it's the not the fault of the majority of the mod team since they are new but it would have been nice to have a heads up earlier since everybody was left in confusion for at least two months because the game was left in stagnation.
2. I disagree strongly with the other players opinions that we need more downtime and lighthearted events. We've had the kidnapping plot and then before that it was like three months of downtime (which granted part of it took place during the Christmas/exam season) and before that was.. the carnival thing I think? Which was a mix of lighthearted stuff and seriousness. This is a war game that advertises itself as plot heavy and therefore it would be kind of out of place to have a light/cracky event unless it was in the aftermath of a huge draining event so people can a breather. We've had plenty of breathers at this point, practically to where this game has almost devolved into slice of life before.
3. Tying into the above thing, I'd like a bigger more wide scale plot to happen. Something to really shake up status quo and can't be fixed by a bunch of heroes coming in to save the day. Something to advance the metaplot too. Like idk, a witch's stronghold surfaces near Death City and everybody has to be temporarily evacuated from it for like 1-2 months oocly (and two weeks icly I think?) because the witches are too close and putting everybody in danger. And when they can finally return there's still some changes that happened like the Kishin Chamber is broke and now a new place is used for arrivals. But that's just something I came up with off the top of my head and I know very little about Soul Eater aside from the game information given.
4. I can't really comment on the pacing so far because it's only been one month since the new mods were introduced and events were brought back. But I think it's okay for now?
5. Minor, but the timeline of events hasn't been touched since December.
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It seems that, lately (and by lately I mean for the past few IRL months or so), plotting/events have happened in spurts. There’s a little bit of plotting/build-up, then the event or mission happens, then there’s a lighthearted downtime period that lasts for a long while, and then the same thing happens all over again.
I think it would really help make everything more interesting if there was a bigger event to shake things up, with an equally important build up. Maybe a sequence of game wide events, like the ones that have happened recently, building up to a massive, earth shattering one? The thing that comes to mind when I think of something this big is the TYL event from 2010, which was pretty spectacular as a whole and ended up having an equally spectacular wrap-up event. I’m not saying you guys have to do something like that again (I can only imagine how much work that took), but it would be pretty amazing to have an event that epic once more.
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It's good to have breaks, but it feels like the lightheartedness and slice-of-life attitude make the game fall into a lull, as there's not much truly pushing it about. I liked getting the longer break, but it felt a little lagging the longer it continued. It'd be nicer to see something large and truly impacting the entire game and the game's whole plot, as opposed to these smaller ones which have a little impact that fades after a while.
For 1 & 2
2. I agree fully. This is a war game, based in a setting where we are supposed to be fighting, having lives at risk and training to survive for when Kishin Eggs/ witches rampage in the city. It feels almost too slice-of-life right now. Of course... you said it much better than I did. XD
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I do think something big and drastic would be a good change of pace, something that gets us away from the whole "slice of life" routine from a bit without just being another "whoops the city was attacked but we took care of that and now it's back to normal again". Especially considering we have a number of villain characters here with muns literally begging to get them doing evil stuff. Even without actively outing anyone as being evil, something dramatic that raises suspicions of there being traitors in the city might help in getting the characters in the city feeling like this is an actual war.
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For example, this is directly copy and pasted from one that I found: “The worldwide madness wavelength is screwing with the local weather patterns again, and it's raining frogs! Or fish. Or grasshoppers. Or meatballs, whathaveyou. You're sheltering from the deluge with a companion, but not for long--you need to get out or get stuck.”
At the top of the meme it reads: “This meme is here to let prospective characters mingle ICly with the characters already in the game and each other. It helps us introduce various scenarios that you're likely to encounter in Soul Campaign and the different places used in the game. Hopefully, this helps you figure out if the game is really suited to your needs or not -- otherwise, just have fun!”
In the 8 months I've been here there's been the welcoming I came in on that was taken over by Excalibur, the carnival which ended in disaster and other than a side plot or two with other players I haven't actually seen any silly game-wide events (that I can remember...).
On the flips side there has been 2 game-wide missions involving the madness emitters, (Heavenly Mountain & Noctune Bazaar) An ongoing plot about a murderer, then the civil unrest followed by the kidnapping plot as well as the monthly training posts and a couple classes.
All I ask is that we find a balance.
EDIT: I wanted to add that I really like your idea for #3
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Also I think a really good idea for a lighthearted plot would involve something that gets characters to interact outside of their normal CR circles. A sudden appearance of frogs or forcing your character to wear opposite gender clothes is cracky yes, but it's not a very good plot for a lighthearted plot. And I would come with a good example that isn't more festivals or organizing a sport competitions when it's not 3am here lol.
So yeah.
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What's great about crack is exactly what you said, it can force people out of the woodwork that may be too shy or anti-social to do things or go outside their normal CR circles. And again, I'm only talking about a 1 day long event maybe every other month or every two months or something.
I can't remember exactly but in SE I believe they throw a dance party right before shit hit the fan at one point. So as far as a lighthearted event goes something like that would work, but spiking the punch with something that makes a person who drinks it do something asinine would make it cracky.
I can say with 100% certainty that I would not have joined this game if I hadn't seen the Test Drive Meme when I was looking for a game. I was specifically looking for a game with lots of plot, some slice-of-life and occasional crack.
In short, I guess what I'm saying is sometimes I just like doing stupid stuff. (because my job sucks and job searching also sucks) =/
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Using a form of crack as a plot devise. We could use the kidnapping plot that people seemed to have taken issue with being a small group over a short period of time and not really serving a purpose and instead say that that was a diversion to sneak witches in to Death City while everyone was busy with rioters (mob mentality) some of the people who got violent could have been hit with Demona's wand of madness or whatever it was.
Now Soul Eater has all kinds of magic, witches, and magic tools/items a lot can be done using stuff like that. A witch could put some sort of spell on the guests that enter them into someone's dream I'm going with Keroro because of his more crack canon and basically caused them all to hallucinate everything gundam and for some reason Keroro is Intergalactic King or something (the crack element in this example). In the end everyone could wind up wandering in the desert only to find that witches and the anti-shibusen folks have taken over Death City which goes into your idea that was posted in #3
Another idea for lighthearted/crack elements related to SE would be, like Blair (the magical cat from Soul Eater) there's a magic dog that wanders into town and has an obsession with bones so it summons an army of skeletons for a midnight snack.
I believe it was Fabiola who wanted to do a paintball war, this could be an exercise for everyone to learn about using a gun and potentially lead to some hilarious shenanigans especially if teams are assigned and you end up with enemies becoming allies or friends becoming enemies or in some cases, there would be infighting where two team members would gun for each other anyway. Also, Matt is a portal gun so him cheating with at teammate would be hilarious.
Then there's the relaxation pampering day I attempted to do after the two game-wide events happened when I joined but that didn't pan out as I didn't know enough people and didn't have a plurk at the time to get more people involved. Hotsprings fun is a little done but would still be fun.
I'm not saying that it literally has to rain frogs but there's so many ways to help a bit of crack along so that those of us who can't take downer plot after downer plot have time to recover. Also, as a person playing a character who is often pretty cracky, I feel like I have a harder time playing her all out because people are so serious and it was even worse because I felt incredibly OOC for the first five months I was here which is kinda sad because Soul Eater has Death and hello Black*Star and other really crazy quirky people.
Also I would like to say that I certainly don't want people to be forced to do something they don't want to do, so if this is something that the majority is vehemently against then I don't want to do any of it here because that's not fun for anyone.
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The issue is that I feel like putting too much importance on them takes away from the plot and seriousness and ends up making it look very jarring when the plot stuff should take priority first especially when it's been on hold for so long. How about putting together a post for that on the OOC comm so you can reach more people that way?
When it comes to playing a gag character, while there's room for Nanami to be cracky you can also use the setting for her to grow. That way you wouldn't feel so limited or breaking your character by having to embrace the harsh reality of the war.
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When I joined the game I felt like there was a greater emphasis on the city being a war zone and all of the characters who'd lived through the last even were clearly affected by it. It had a different feel than just "welcome and you don't have to fight if you don't want to." In some of our (relatively) recent events Shibusen came out victorious, so in some ways it makes sense ICly that people are more relaxed right now. Still, I'd like to return to that sense of urgency and danger.
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I think the mods should focus on creating really amazing wartime plots. It's a problem when my own character notices that something bad happens once per month and then everyone defeats it and people get rescued and life goes on. But I think that to really call Soul Campaign "plot-driven" the plot can't feel like the filler episodes. Even though we've had some really good events, they still feel like "events"--separate bubbles that happen in a stream of normalcy. Something drastic needs to change as a result of our events or else I get the filler vibe instead of "oh, this is the actual plot."
And from the other side of dark plot vs. cracky fun: I think that lighthearted fun and games can be supplied by smaller, player-driven plots. Don't get me wrong--I love lighthearted fun and silly romantic entanglements probably more than the average player, but I don't think it should be the focus of the mods. I am more than happy to suggest ideas for people who want to have silly fun with their characters, and given that I play an outgoing one I am also very happy to ICly make it happen. Considering that Death City has all of the things required for a slice of life romcom funfest (hot springs, cabaret, school, weird new neighbors, people with magical powers, aliens, office drama, date spots, creepy neighborhoods, an OCD child leader.... you name it and we've got it) I think it's fair to have the mods throw in an Excalibur event twice a year and figure the rest out ourselves.
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I do however agree wholeheartedly with three, that the overarching war plot should have a more cohesive thread tying it together to keep it from feeling like islands of activity.
Also the plot you suggested sounds absolutely fantastic ngl.