Elemental all-purpose thread

[Dan_Theman]

Thanks for dragging me into a post about how you dislike what my husband has been doing so much that you think it’s criminal, Dan. Always classy.

I’m sorry if that was how it came across - I was simply meaning to contrast what I thought I knew about him and what I’ve been reading of late. I’ll take your name out (I also doubly apologize, as I thought I was being complimentary to yourself in order to highlight my dismay).

edit - done

[jeep]

Pre-orders, on the other hand, are something the consumer controls, and I agree that the consumer needs to take a bit more responsibility when it comes to their pre-order choices. The more games switch to digital distribution networks, the easier it’ll be for publishers to pack in all sorts of pre-order bonuses to lure in the masses. As long as the consumer can’t control their must-have-it impulse, and ignore critical thinking when it comes to making their purchase decisions, they’ll be on the losing end of pre-order decisions.

This assumes that each consumer solely suffers for his/her own choices. The reality is that in aggregate these consumers’ choices encourage early releases and half-finished games, which unravels the market for everyone else. It encourages the development of games that are easy to hype and market to indiscriminate purchasers, narrowing the kinds of games produced to just appeal to that market, continuing the cycle of preorders/burnt customers and chasing off consumers who are outside the narrowed target market. You’re left with two companies who you trust to sell you a finished game (Valve and Blizzard?) That’s not a healthy market of buyers and sellers, it’s the Lemons Problem transferred from used cars to PC games.

[mtkafka]

yeesh, whats the big deal with all this drama. I don’t get it. not like we havent seen this type of release/buggy/whatever before.

its games. so many other things to get pissed off about… you know… like the damn economy!

[jeep]

yeesh, whats the big deal with all this drama. I don’t get it. not like we havent seen this type of release/buggy/whatever before.

did you miss the links to him posting on his own board? he owned up to releasing a bad game, talked about some stuff he thinks will fix it, and then laid off some devs.

it’s not really a threat to his company or anything, but you don’t get to see the internals of someone’s decision process that often

[Cubit]

My theory as to why this thread is the way it is is that Stardock (and Brad) can’t meet their own standards. They release a document called the Gamers Bill of Rights (pure marketing, btw) stating how a game dev should do business, and then they show they can’t clear the bar. It isn’t hard to understand where the backlash is coming from as a result of Stardock’s arrogance and hypocrisy.

Bill Harris said it best:

I think much of the positive attention Brad Wardell has received is due to gamers believing that he is on “our” side. That’s true, as as long as “our” side coincides with “his” side. Otherwise, take cover.

Wardell’s biggest problem seems to be that he doesn’t want to be evaluated by his own standards, because they’re too high.

[jeep]

My theory as to why this thread is the way it is is that Stardock (and Brad) can’t meet their own standards. They release a document called the Gamers Bill of Rights (pure marketing, btw) stating how a game dev should do business, and then they show they can’t clear the bar. It isn’t hard to understand where the backlash is coming from as a result of Stardocks arrogance and hypocrisy.

Bill Harris said it best:

I don’t see a problem with the Gamers Bill of Rights as a marketing tool or an actual bar to set. Hardware-wise the game’s most serious memory leaks were cleared up at my end by July or they’d have broken #1 and #5. The objection here is still that “2. Gamers shall have the right to demand that games be released in a finished state.” needed to be met and wasn’t.

Honestly even outside the interface/play control issues the core game is just not good enough to compare to ffh2 and for $50 it pretty much had to knock it out of the park.

[Emmanuel_Goldstein]

I just have to say that you guys don’t know shit about stalking. Now I’ve lived it, or was created to live it. Whatever.

[jfletch]

I’m not sure where you are getting the “no refunds” thing from. Plenty of people have managed to get them, though some (not all) report being offered only a 75% refund if they aren’t willing to at least allow tech support to try and help them resolve issues. I’d prefer Brad just tell his CS reps to not argue and just give people what they want, but it’s not like they are blanket refusing to give money back.

They refused to give me my money back. Twice. I would say once the CEO is on the forums apologizing for his broken game, you shouldn’t be getting the run around on refunds.

[Raife]

…

You know that Legion ruined your handle forever, right?

[jeep]

You know that Legion ruined your handle forever, right?

I stopped using it elsewhere on account of Jeepform games

once you have a whole genre named after you it’s time to go forge a new identity and see where it takes you

[mtkafka]

My theory as to why this thread is the way it is is that Stardock (and Brad) can’t meet their own standards. They release a document called the Gamers Bill of Rights (pure marketing, btw) stating how a game dev should do business, and then they show they can’t clear the bar. It isn’t hard to understand where the backlash is coming from as a result of Stardock’s arrogance and hypocrisy.

Bill Harris said it best:

its just noise. i didnt even know there was this gamers bill of rights. and theres tons WAY more smug and arrogant than stardock imo. brads just an opinionated guy, wouldnt really call him arrogant… maybe too proud?! bah I dont know the guy so who knows huh?!?

it still just boils down to a game released too early (though i think its still very playable)… which happens all the time in this industry. oh well, carry on with the soap opera!

[Andrew]

The mind boggles - I hope they don’t work for Stardock!

If you look through the comments on the review (the only one above 3 stars), the reviewer admits to being a friend of Brad’s wife. Although given their somewhat mangled English, I can believe that they are not bothered by poor grammar.

[Angrycoder]

Not sure how people who preordered over impulse are supposed to ship back an unopened box. Really it should be easier to get the refund because they credit your card and pull the game’s registration, but that’s not what’s happening.

Way to miss the point there. It doesn’t matter if its a boxed copy or the purely digital version. Stardock didn’t even want me to ship the box back.

You have rights as a consumer regardless of Brad’s gamer’s bill of rights. All you need to do is let the CSR know you are aware that you can dispute the charge with your credit card company or paypal and typically they just give you your money back.

Disputed charges are bad for a company. Enough of them in a small period of time will result in your merchant/paypal account being frozen.

[jeep]

Way to miss the point there. It doesn’t matter if its a boxed copy or the purely digital version. Stardock didn’t even want me to ship the box back.

You have rights as a consumer regardless of Brad’s gamer’s bill of rights. All you need to do is let the CSR know you are aware that you can dispute the charge with your credit card company or paypal and typically they just give you your money back.

Disputed charges are bad for a company. Enough of them in a small period of time will result in your merchant/paypal account being frozen.

Yeah I’m seeing a lot of posts like this guy’s around the internet

They refused to give me my money back. Twice. I would say once the CEO is on the forums apologizing for his broken game, you shouldn’t be getting the run around on refunds.

it’s a problem

[Cubit]

Sorry if this was already posted, but Gamespot’s review is finally out:

Elemental: War of Magic Review

[rune_74]

I have lurked here for awhile reading some of the posts on here. All I have to say say is wow.

I understand some are upset by the game, it was released buggy as hell and needs a lot of work. But to character assasinate a person like this? It is very disgusting. I don’t know the whole history of you guys and Brad, but I wonder why he even bothers to deal with this forum. You don’t find it funny how the only new people you got from the Elemental forums were the ones that were banned?

You have a member of this forum actively stalking Brad(Mike thats you) and fully supported by his wife(Angie thats you) and you all stand around playing dumb to it? Seriously? If you are supposed to be developers and insiders from ther companies no wonder the gaming industry is shit.

I cannot believe it is allowed here to attack a person like this thread has done for nearly 153 pages.

You all should be ashamed of yourselves…you are adults?

(Notice I said nothing about the game, other then it was released to early, so take your fanboy stuff an shove it)

[AndrewMyers]

Damn you, Mike!

[Steve_G]

New guy has a point. Seeing the vitriol in this thread spread over to Amazon now is pretty pathetic.

I have Elemental; it’s okay now, and it will get fixed.

[John_Reynolds]

I have lurked here for awhile reading some of the posts on here. All I have to say say is wow.

I understand some are upset by the game, it was released buggy as hell and needs a lot of work. But to character assasinate a person like this? It is very disgusting. I don’t know the whole history of you guys and Brad, but I wonder why he even bothers to deal with this forum. You don’t find it funny how the only new people you got from the Elemental forums were the ones that were banned?

You have a member of this forum actively stalking Brad(Mike thats you) and fully supported by his wife(Angie thats you) and you all stand around playing dumb to it? Seriously? If you are supposed to be developers and insiders from ther companies no wonder the gaming industry is shit.

I cannot believe it is allowed here to attack a person like this thread has done for nearly 153 pages.

You all should be ashamed of yourselves…you are adults?

(Notice I said nothing about the game, other then it was released to early, so take your fanboy stuff an shove it)

The fact that you got Matt’s name wrong makes me think you’re channeling a certain Stardock employee’s angst for them.

[Cubit]

I have lurked here for awhile reading some of the posts on here. All I have to say say is wow.

I understand some are upset by the game, it was released buggy as hell and needs a lot of work. But to character assasinate a person like this? It is very disgusting. I don’t know the whole history of you guys and Brad, but I wonder why he even bothers to deal with this forum. You don’t find it funny how the only new people you got from the Elemental forums were the ones that were banned?

You have a member of this forum actively stalking Brad(Mike thats you) and fully supported by his wife(Angie thats you) and you all stand around playing dumb to it? Seriously? If you are supposed to be developers and insiders from ther companies no wonder the gaming industry is shit.

I cannot believe it is allowed here to attack a person like this thread has done for nearly 153 pages.

You all should be ashamed of yourselves…you are adults?

(Notice I said nothing about the game, other then it was released to early, so take your fanboy stuff an shove it)

This is certainly one of the most clueless posts I’ve read in at least a couple hours. How do you enjoy working at Stardock, rune_74?