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Comments
"This food is bad" is criticism. "This food is too salty, the asparagus is overcooked, and the mushrooms would be better with some parsley" is constructive criticism.
I'm not saying "don't criticise" or "don't dislike". What I'm saying is more along the lines of, if you dislike the name and want to say so, cool, but if the only thing you say about the whole project is "I don't like the name" - nothing good about the parts of it you do like - then the sum total of your feedback is discouraging.
Imagine you're an artist and you paint a picture. You show it to a friend or family member. The only thing they say about it is to point out one little part of it they think looks weird or bad. They don't say the rest of it looks good, or that they like it, or that you've done a good job. Fuck them, right? Maybe they do like what you've done, but you wouldn't know that from anything they've said.
Criticism is valid. Whether someone paid for a full-priced game, or plays a persistent MMO and sees part of it that could be better, I think it's totally valid to not like things and to be critical.
I don't think a lot of what applies to the games industry and to large-scale publishers applies to Achaea, with its 90% volunteer staff and its relatively tiny playerbase. Criticism is still valid though.
I'm sure people are grateful. But go back and read this thread. The first response is "Targossa: Divine testament that just because you are a god, doesn't mean you can come up with good names". You have to hit the thirtieth post before you get any positive feedback: "Personally, I like the new name. Kudos for the new area! " Second page before you get "This is really cool, and the concept is really awesome too. I know everything is still temporary still, but I love the layout and all the water." and "Not sold on the name but maybe it will grow on me. Still very grateful for everything. Know it must have taken a lot of work and still will in the coming future." Third page before you get anything substantial. Imagine you're some hobbyist who just spent hours a day in their spare time for 2-3 months conceiving, designing, mapping, and writing this huge area. It gets released, so you come here hoping to read about whether people like it. You would be out of luck.
I'm certainly not saying "only give positive feedback, never say bad things". But if you like something, you should say so. People like knowing that you like what they have done.
No movie reviewer would write an entire review about how s/he thought the movie's name was stupid, while writing nothing about the movie itself.
Agreed. People don't criticise stuff they don't care about. Even negative feedback is a sign that someone is invested in the game.
But to turn around what you said, there's just as much value in praise as criticism - and people rarely praise. (Actually there is way more value in praise than criticism, possibly because of its limited supply.) If you are a volunteer, what are you running on if not praise, enthusiasm, and satisfaction?
You should express it when you like something or think something was done well. Everything in this game took someone's time to create. People need to know that their work is appreciated - especially if they're doing it for free.
I haven't met Deucalion yet. I think he's trying to heighten tension for our eventual meeting.
(above genuine, below joke)
Now the voltori can have their evil castle to spread terror from.
@Blujigsawpuzzle said most of what I wanted to say (and likely said it better) but, of course, expressing criticism and expressing negativity are not the same thing. And while you're right that the name might have come from anywhere, what is fairly certain is that the vast bulk of the work on the Dawnspear will have come from the relevant patron gods, supported by the other volunteers. This wasn't a thread (like the one Sarapis started) discussing the name, it's a thread discussing Targossas in general. I was intentionally "painting with a wide brush" because it was standing back, and reading all 7 pages of the thread at once, that really prompted the response, rather than any single poster.
All I was asking was that in those kind of threads people remember that there's a few people likely waiting with bated breath for player feedback for the work that they've poured in, and they're grown-ups, they don't expect everyone to swoon just because it exists, but they are human. Mixing a bit of "wow" with a bit of "Lol name" is just... good manners, and leads to a better game (as I argued up-thread). It's not that any one person here was entirely objectionable, it was the cumulative focus and, in my usual vituperative way, I was just asking people to reconsider that.
I think criticism of the Gods is vital - they can certainly be as short-sighted, stupid, poorly expressed and wrong as the rest of us. However, I think it's more important to be... sensitive in how you criticise when you are criticising something that will have taken time, blood, sweat and tears.
I particularly wasn't singling out @Cooper (and props for a reasoned, mature response), just the attitude in Cooper's follow-up post which seemed to suggest that being a paying customer exonerated him from any of the other obligations I was hinting it in my post. I'm sure he didn't mean it that way, but it is an attitude you hear sometimes, and I do think it stinks.
...
=>evade west
...
==>evade south
See @Tesha - no problem!! Now how about we go indiscriminately prop us some totems and call people whiners?! Ohhh wait! Have we dunn that already?
Technically not Naga.
Also, it's a two-part activity. Don't forget about the calling-people-whiners part, it's the most fun!
"hahahahahahahaha
edit: no"
edit: tagging @Antidas & @Tvistor for lols
*chokes*
I think I s-spilled some water on my eyes. *wipes his face*
Tvistor..please c-c..come back.
I don't care about any other griefers. I can f-forgive you. We can mend it. We can take this relationship one..one step further.