Kondor Pendragon wrote:
Okay. I haven't posted the past couple of days. I've followed the news, all the rage, all the non-rage, and I've had time to gather my own thoughts as well. This "letter" will rationally explain my thoughts and feelings on the situation, as well as some suggestions about topics that I will touch on.
First off CCP, you've handled this whole situation terribly. The time of announcement was terrible. The where of the announcement was terrible. The mode of announcement was terrible. And the follow-up silence has not helped your case. To be completely honest, I don't know why these decisions were made, and frankly I don't care why. That's not an issue to me. From what I've heard, you should really take into consideration what your CPM and CSM suggest to you more, especially when it comes to relations with your community. As for the actual game of Legion? Cool game. I still like the concept. But the problem here is that you've sold your DUST players, especially the ones who play exclusively on consoles, Legion, but under a different name which seems to have now been chalked up as a failure to the point that you're making a brand new game. And it's not on the platform that your players play on. Despite the fact that you would have to work on building a largely new player base, this is just frustrating. And really, what makes it morally wrong is the fact that you've had these events that have pushed buying AURUM for Omega Boosters and whatnot leading up to this announcement that you must have known would be unpopular, with the knowledge that you are now making the game DUST players thought they were getting for the PC.
So now, the way I see it, you have a few different groups. You have the group of people who are at least mostly okay with this whole thing. These people tend to be the ones who played EVE or have some kind of computer that would be able to run this new game, if it's given the green light and becomes a thing that will for sure happen. That's group one. Group two are the people who think this is all a huge outrage, many of which are the forum warriors we know so well. And the problem that this group has with Legion is the fact that they probably won't be able to play the game that they were always supposed to get, because either 1) they will not get a PC because they game on a console and that's all they play on, or 2) have the inability to get a PC that would be able to run the game due to time or money constraints, or other circumstances. This is the most vocal group we've seen on the forums, and they fully have the right to be as outraged as they are, because the time and money they invested in DUST is going to be put toward the product they were supposed to receive but will no longer be able to. And group number three consists of people who are on the fence. They either have a PC and can run the game, or have the ability to get one to play your game. However, their problems include worries about what happens to the time, money and effort they put into DUST when it comes to Legion. Also, they might be worried about the morality and trustworthiness of CCP now. That's group three and frankly, you'll need to put some effort into winning them over and convincing them to invest into Legion now. I, myself, fall into this group three.
So as a member of the "on-the-fence" group, there are some things I think would be a good idea for CCP to do in order to smooth some things over with the players, both the ones who might play Legion and those who won't but are still hurt. These things include the following: