Brilliant game... but. A letter to AH and complainers.

[hapro]

Well, let's suppose that it's not objective then. If something is considered subjectively good by all people, is that thing not objectively better than something considered subjectively worse by all people?

However, there's another problem here: you indefinitely expand your very limited personal experience (your own experience and experience of some few other forum posters) until it somehow turns into "all people". Expanding your claim from "I think this is good" to "All people think this is good" is nothing more than a rhetoric fallacy.

This is true, though I'd be very surprised to find someone who didn't think what I thought in regards to that specific example. That said, I have no way to prove it nor the means to convince every single person of it's truthfulness. If we assume that nothing anyone says is worth anything because one person's subjective feedback does not represent the masses and there's no such thing as objective criticisms, then all feedback is meaningless, because there's no way to know if something is better or worse than the current implementation. This might be true on a purely logical level but not a practical one.

[gambit37]

Well cryocore is right about one thing: there's no tone in the written word as such. People infer it themselves. I read his posts as considered and sensible. Others read them as arrogant or condescending. It all depends on one's own personal perspective, and also to a degree, maturity.

LoG is just a game, and a great one at that, with a few little flaws (far fewer than most AAA games). So what? It really doesn't warrant all this anger and negative energy. Why not invest your energy in something a little more worthwhile than point scoring on a forum?

[hapro]

Its only "bad" if the execution is contrary to the intent.
If AH made the decision that all choices are final then it succeeds. I am not saying that is what they think, but I also think that any mistake and/or choice needs a consequence. For me the inability to remove skill points seems logical. The assertion that it is flawed/bad/wrong/broken is therefore incorrect because for it to be objectively wrong means that everyone would find the same fault.

I can nearly guarantee you the "decision" was made because it either never occurred to them that people might click the wrong skill, or it wasn't worth the development time to add that feature in. I agree that you shouldn't be able to remove skill points. But you also shouldn't be able to give yourself skill points you never intended. A mistake would be purposely putting a skill point in a field that didn't maximize your character's strengths, and that deserves a punishment of never being able to be changed.

[The_ShadoW]

If we assume that nothing anyone says is worth anything because one person's subjective feedback does not represent the masses and there's no such thing as objective criticisms, then all feedback is meaningless, because there's no way to know if something is better or worse than the current implementation. This might be true on a purely logical level but not a practical one.

That's right, feedback IS meaningless for a 100% rational person. Thankfully, no human ever is going to hit that limit, and thus some feedback may be good, solely because of a possible irrational action from the developer deciding to change something or implement something just because someone wrote a post about it.

However, many complaints around feedback are rising from that sole fact that the most common irrational action is to listen to the loudest. In forum terms, it means "listen to those who post more and/or more often". And it is widely known that "haters" post quite a bit more than "lovers", simply because "lovers" are mostly busy playing the game.

[hapro]

If we assume that nothing anyone says is worth anything because one person's subjective feedback does not represent the masses and there's no such thing as objective criticisms, then all feedback is meaningless, because there's no way to know if something is better or worse than the current implementation. This might be true on a purely logical level but not a practical one.

That's right, feedback IS meaningless for a 100% rational person. Thankfully, no human ever is going to hit that limit, and thus some feedback may be good, solely because of a possible irrational action from the developer deciding to change something or implement something just because someone wrote a post about it.

However, many complaints around feedback are rising from that sole fact that the most common irrational action is to listen to the loudest. In forum terms, it means "listen to those who post more and/or more often". And it is widely known that "haters" post quite a bit more than "lovers", simply because "lovers" are mostly busy playing the game.

I agree with this. There's a lot of poorly-thought criticisms and suggestions, which are just as harmful as the idea "everything the devs did they did on purpose, and all their decisions are the best possible decisions they could have made, so stop complaining". So all we can do is post about what we think should change and hope the devs are smart enough to pick up on the right complaints and ignore the wrong ones.

[Minax]

All I am saying is that there were deliberate choices made by the team affecting a style of game they wanted to make. Your objection to it is of no consequence to anyone but yourself.

While I generally agree with your statement, lately I've seen this exact line coming up almost everytime someone is not happy with certain game mechanics and sometimes it is really only used to white-knight/defend poor design choices (of course those are always subjective, but if 90% of your target audience think they are bad then they probably are, or you miss-interpeted what your target audience wants). People sometimes forget that not everything they see in a game was done the way it was because of a "deliberate design choice" behind it (but even if that were the case it does not mean that the design choice behind a mechanic is a good one). Defending a broken game mechanic does not make it any less broken.
Side note: I personally don't think there is anything wrong with Grimrock's mechanics/gameplay and the game captures the "soul" of an old-school dungeon crawler very well (and it was obviously designed with that in mind). Just saying.


Also since when has suggesting improvements/changes to a game become the same as demaning it? Do people really believe that?
Everyone might enjoy how "thing A" works, but someone might not like "thing B". Then this person posts about that on the forums and it turns out that 100 more people don't like "thing B". The developers realize that a lot of people are unhappy with "thing B" and start thinking about ways to make it look more attractive/less frustrating for them (ideally done in a way that does not piss off the people who already liked "thing B"). Now, if this one person hadn't posted about that issue there would be 101 people that would still be unhappy with how "thing B" works.

TL;DR: Providing feedback for the developers is a good thing, and offering reasonable suggestions to improve elments of the game is a major form of doing so.

What I don't understand is how one non Almost HUman person is speaking for them here. If a dev was saying 'look we've read all your points and although we appreciate some people are finding <insert issue here> difficult the game is intended that way' I'd be quite happy.

I would also love to see developer statements to certain suggestions that really don't go well with what Grimrock was designed to be. Just so people get a general gist of what is "resonable complaining" and what is not.

[Kurgen]

To OP: i have enough. i was silent for quite a long time, but now i have to say: every thread you are posting the same and now you need your own thread to further boost your inflated ego? Your constant bashing of people who demand nothing, but only want some options that are perhaps implemented or not sometime in near or far future or never at all, is disgusting. You are 35 and behave like a 10 year old? I would like to meet you in person, jsut to see i you are the same in real life as you are here at the boards. I never thought that I would personally take offense with someone i even do not know, but here are my hearty congratulations: you are my winner! and your price is first place on my ignore list. Not that you would bother...I know.

To all others: sorry i had to went my anger but i could's keep my mouth shut any longer.

Well, he and others like him will ensure that the devs hear nothing but "You're the BEST!!!"... "Everything in this game is PERFECT, don't change a THING!!!". If that's how this game will progress in terms of future support and add-on material, I don't hold up much hope for it. It seems that any criticism of the game on this forum, constructive or otherwise, is to be shot-down with the arrow of intolerance. For what it's worth, I won't be sticking around much longer to find out.

[Pipsissiwa]

An interesting point just occured:

Noone (as far as I have read anyway) seems to have a problem with there being an Easy/Normal/Hard setting for monster toughness - we can all play on the setting we are happy with - the devs included that to reduce/increase challenge as the player sees fit. Thus the game experience and difficulty is partially user customisable anyway. How is suggesting something similar such as a setting for the time on timed puzzles to be easy/normal/hard (just adding a second would help many of us) any different? It wouldn't have a negative affect on the game any more than the monster setting does. Those happy with how things are wouldn't need to change a thing.

[Kurgen]

This is the most annoying thing of all in regards to those complaining about criticism or suggestions... that's all it is... no-one is suggesting that the devs change things only to suit that point of view, but to possibly implement options to allow the player to decide how they play the game. This simple fact seems to be completely lost on those hell-bent on creating a rift between the "100% happy" crowd and those who while liking the game, can see value in voicing an opinion for the potential betterment of the game.

[Pipsissiwa]

To OP: i have enough. i was silent for quite a long time, but now i have to say: every thread you are posting the same and now you need your own thread to further boost your inflated ego? Your constant bashing of people who demand nothing, but only want some options that are perhaps implemented or not sometime in near or far future or never at all, is disgusting. You are 35 and behave like a 10 year old? I would like to meet you in person, jsut to see i you are the same in real life as you are here at the boards. I never thought that I would personally take offense with someone i even do not know, but here are my hearty congratulations: you are my winner! and your price is first place on my ignore list. Not that you would bother...I know.

To all others: sorry i had to went my anger but i could's keep my mouth shut any longer.

Well, he and others like him will ensure that the devs hear nothing but "You're the BEST!!!"... "Everything in this game is PERFECT, don't change a THING!!!". If that's how this game will progress in terms of future support and add-on material, I don't hold up much hope for it. It seems that any criticism of the game on this forum, constructive or otherwise, is to be shot-down with the arrow of intolerance. For what it's worth, I won't be sticking around much longer to find out.

Aye, those being like this will indeed drive the rest of us away, make people afraid to post genuine concerns/issues and even bugs and ultimately they could potentially harm/kill the game/future games which would be an utter utter tragedy as this game is amazing and so are AH. Feedback of ALL kinds (negative & positive) is a good and healthy thing.

(I posted about an issue, got suggestions to help, posted to say they didn't work, and then got massively abused (and had my typing style dissected) for not listening and preferring to whine. - I'm still not quite sure why I bothered to come back after that - probably the other people who have been so friendly and helpful...)