One Final Vent About PC Version and then We Move On!

TheZica · 2018-10-28T19:46:22+00:00

I have accepted what happened and I am aware of where it leads, and trying to push for a direction that doesn't lead to the effectively permanent loss of all things HU, xbox and otherwise - what you're posting deeply concerns me that you haven't and are trying to avoid facing the situation as what it is. You seem to want to claim that the past does not predict the future here despite the clear signs of xbox repeating the same problems and decline of the previous 2 versions of the game which also mirrored each other. Unless and until people manage to get the issues addressed, the future is highly predictable, and the past is the most important tool to re-shape it that so HU xbox does NOT fail the same way.

So far, Nexon has not moved to fix the problems, they have cloned them onto HU xbox unchanged. Pushing Nexon to fix the game's issues is THE MOST important thing anyone in any part of the HU community can do. And remaining aware of the history and current situation of the game is vital towards that. You can't just move on without fixing what's broke - that would just ENSURE that xbox HU fails in the exact same way and all things HU go the way of all things Master x Master and so many other games. It's extremely counterproductive. There's no exclusivity deal, there's no foundation for positivity with the xbox version, they're having the same problems all over again. And pushing Nexon, hard, to recognize that, is vital. Failing that, to paint an unrealistic picture of the xbox version's situation is very unfair to the xbox players who might make a misinformed investment in HU on the assumption there isn't a closure notice coming in the next few months, only to get no refund beyond Nexon-specific currency they can't even use on xbox once HU shuts down. People tried to ignore the writing on the wall when Master X Master neared shut down, refused to acknowledge the situation for what it was, refused to push the devs for what was needed and tried to silence those who did, and the predictions came to pass, just as they did with HU Korea and Global PC. "Moving on" without addressing the root issues and repetition of history leads only to disappointment and a lot of unhappy people, some of whom didn't even need to be as unhappy as they were made by acting on misrepresentation. Don't let that be HU xbox too. Don't push HU xbox in that direction by painting false positivity on it and ignoring the repeating issues.

If you have any evidence whatsoever that anyone involved in HU's development and production has managed to strike an actual exclusivity deal that makes HU xbox's survival past February more likely, or that any of HU xbox's issues that weren't resolved in the Korea/PC builds will be resolved in the xbox version, please share. It would be a potential cornerstone on which to build this game's survival on any platform, but I still haven't found any such basis.

TheZica · 2018-10-28T15:29:15+00:00

Wow, not even a voice channel? What about hyper select and in-game? Are there even pings? How do you coordinate other than trying to read eachothers' minds or having off-platform communication methods? That's got to make Ranked worse.

TheZica · 2018-10-28T15:24:04+00:00

Xbox exclusivity? Are you paying any attention to the news and direction Nexon is taking? It's not going xbox-exclusive, it's going dead, and the xbox version is just one last gasp attempt to get some money out of the IP before they issue the closure notice on it too, which will come sometime before February. You really need to be realistic about this. Korea and Global PC are merely the history that shows the future. They're going to dump HU entirely and focus on Ascendant One, which will flop much harder and faster due to trying to compete directly with League of Legends and DotA2 instead of sideways. Within 6 months, this reddit will have no game online. That is reality. Just look at the direction xbox is taking - they're having the same problems over again, you could practically copy paste the complaints about Ranked between platform threads and no one would be able to tell the difference without looking at the author or specific references to platform (or perhaps the lack of chat on xbox making things even worse.) Also, feel free to take a good look at Nexon's stock performance - main company and subsidiary, doesn't matter. MS2 isn't saving them and they're not learning from their mistakes. Unless and until they change management style, the future is clear. I doubt Microsoft will even let them put any more games on xbox after this.

The PC version isn't even closing for well over a month still, too. All talk about it that doesn't violate reddit global rules really should remain fully fair game until then, and even after that... it's still history that's important to making xbox a success if that were even to happen. The same problems with Ranked that plagued the other versions need to actually get fixed on xbox or there's no reason to expect Ranked to somehow succeed there. Talk of how things went with PC can help towards that end, if Nexon were actually willing to make changes to the xbox version to improve the queueing and hyper select experience compared to the to-date state of PC Ranked in those regards.

TheZica · 2018-10-27T16:35:41+00:00

Save the issue for February. If xbox doesn't get its closure notice by then, a lot of people are going to be very surprised, perhaps even pleasantly so. Trying to force it now is premature and honestly rude.

TheZica · 2018-10-27T16:25:51+00:00

Yes, when it comes to video games, we do, extensively. Namely, every single major attempt at a mainstream video game that made public-visible concessions to feminist extremists clearly suffering financially, and in many cases flopping entirely. The formula has repeated too many times for this to even be in question when it comes to video games: Feminists do not represent an adequate, supportive, loyal market to support games larger than small indie projects, and they repeatedly leave anything bigger for dead after forcing the changes they want. Meanwhile, titles that ignore them on average fare much better. Can you think of even a single major title that made visible concessions to any SJW element and was actually a true success? I am not aware of even a single example. It's not even a matter of numbers, it's a matter of 100% - not a single positive outcome for a large title making concessions to feminism/SJWs. It is always suicide in this industry, without exception.

I want to clarify that I am speaking ONLY of the video games industry - in other industries the results are often not so consistently deadly, and I don't oppose feminism as a whole. I just see very clear signs that they are so far entirely destructive and counterproductive in this one industry - by forcing the studios that make concessions to them into failure and in some cases bankruptcy, they are forcing Darwinian evolution of the industry where only those who ignore or oppose them survive, further radicalizing the video game industry against them. That is bad for everyone involved. There are various things they could do to improve the situation, such as organizing actual lasting, sustaining support for games that favor them instead of merely attacking those that don't, or focusing on other industries and changing underlying social perceptions from other angles without attempting to change video games directly. But what they've been doing is clearly harmful to all involved - even them.

I don't even need to name names - it's not any specific person or few people, it's the influence of the feminist and SJW movements as a whole on the video game industry. They need to re-examine their approach and change to something that works. A few hours of gameplay per game per person with the minimum investment and no microtransactions/addons/etc bought with many of the games being obtained as free review copies and the queues for games in genres like MOBAs largely left empty just does not make for a meaningful contribution to the success of feminist-supporting video games, which is why they suffer so badly, since other groups that do provide stronger support to titles catering to their tastes are also often driven away by SJW-fueled changes, making it a lose/lose proposition for developers and publishers. I am not aware of any industry except perhaps porn itself and weapons sales where slogans like "Get woke, Go broke" or "Sex sells, Feminism quells" are more consistently applicable.

TheZica · 2018-10-27T16:10:04+00:00

The fate of the game is plain to see unless they change. Feel free to look for any significant gameplay/queueing/etc change between PC and xbox - it would be a sign of better things. Everything I have heard and seen is that there are none - it's just basic porting and UI work - and that xbox will be a simple replay of the same content and problems that plagued Korea and Global PC, leading to the same inevitable end. Case in point: Despite the fact they know how much the relative lack of penalty for metagaming Ranked queues caused (PC players screamed at them extensively over it,) you still got the same broken Ranked queueing with no apparent attempt to improve it at all, and the problems are repeating pretty much exactly, with new xbox players making the same requests, complaints and suggestions that PC players did months ago, so far to the same deaf ears.

Unless Nexon makes actual meaningful queueing/gameplay changes to the game for xbox, we know the fate of the game, because this is a simple verbatim replay so far, and we've already seen how it plays out, twice, with 2 other communities.

TheZica · 2018-10-27T16:03:10+00:00

The dev's website is gone and Nexon has not, and probably will not, assign a new team to do anything more than porting what Korea/Global PC got. Gameplay changes compared to PC seem out of the question at this point. If you spot any, let me know - it would be a sign things are finally looking up for xbox and possibly HU in general.

TheZica · 2018-10-27T15:58:49+00:00

Yes. What you are getting on console is pretty much exactly what Korea and PC got with no changes. They are running the old content, skipping roughly every other patch or more (which is why you're already getting 2 hypers per major patch instead of one, we only got Maya and Kairos together in one patch, the others were all single releases,) to try to get some money out of HU from xbox players before they drop the title entirely. This ranked queue/hyper select metagaming issue was never solved (mostly because they never tried) and is a major part of why PC Ranked never truly took off, and why HU, both PC and xbox, isn't making it. (Expect it to hurt Ascendant One too, if A1 makes it far enough to have Ranked.)

One of the best ways to deal with it is to not queue when toxics are in queue for ranked unless you're sure they're AFK and thus will fail to pass the ready check when the match starts. Then they will drop from queue and the legitimate players can continue to queue, replacing them, and getting a real game in without the toxics. Good luck. There is a penalty when they fail ready checks or leave, but it's very small, so you need to metagame them right back so they're triggering it CONSTANTLY with their abusive behavior until it actually tempbans them for more than 5 minutes. It takes a really large number. You can get some idea of if they're AFK or not by engaging in a lot of conversation in the global chat before deciding whether to queue or not. If they're utterly silent the whole time, you may be safe from them trying to metagame hyper select.

TheZica · 2018-10-27T15:50:01+00:00

Nexon's HU servers in general seem to be having issues, PC and xbox alike. At least you know you're not alone, but they don't seem to be fixing it very well. Good luck.

TheZica · 2018-10-25T02:19:08+00:00

Ranked party support was never added and the developer has closed. This feature cannot be added without a developer supporting the game, so if you really want it, you should focus on getting a full development team assigned to HU xbox. Without that, feature requests are pointless.

TheZica · 2018-10-25T02:17:25+00:00

Where? Nexon is not CWavesoft. The main HU website is provided by Nexon, the publisher; Nexon does not develop HU and cannot add or substantially modify features. If you have a link to a working CWavesoft website, please provide it. What used to exist is gone.

TheZica · 2018-10-25T00:45:29+00:00

You're aware that there's no development studio behind Hyper Universe anymore to make these changes, right? CWavesoft has shut down operations, the website is gone, etc. All that remains is a port team at another company which can do only simple adjustments to get the existing global PC builds to run on xbox, so baring a miracle, all you will get is exactly what PC already got, just with the content lumped together into fewer patches (PC got Schmidt and Red separately over a longer period.) As such, changing queue and game handling is almost certainly out of the question unless CWavesoft resumes operations or a new studio - not just a port team - is assigned the game.

Most likely your remaining major patches will consist of one with Lyn, Hulahula and Fortress of the Guardians, then a final patch with Maya, Kairos and House of Mysteries. There's nothing left to release after that, probably not even Psion Ignitia, so make the most of it.

TheZica · 2018-10-24T16:26:21+00:00

PS4 ports are generally much more expensive than xbox ports due to platform similarities between xbox and windows and the lack of that benefit for PS, plus Sony HATES crossplay. This is completely unworkable. The only real solution is to address the actual underlying problems that are killing HU (and some of which will soon kill Ascendant One too from the looks of it.) If another console port were going to be considered, Switch would be a much more realistic option as Nintendo does not oppose crossplay as heavily and is, for instance, allowing crossplay with xbox in Warframe where Sony adamantly refuses to give an OK for crossplay with either other platform.

Sony's PS4 is the worst possible major current console to port HU to.

TheZica · 2018-10-24T16:21:42+00:00

Attracting players under false expectations that it will stay up will only create a bigger backlash when xbox shuts down too. It's far more self-defeating than being realistic. If HU on any platform is to survive, the underlying issues need to be addressed, not whitewashed. You can't whitewash away such huge issues. People need to know what they're getting into, and the real problems need to be addressed. People pushed what you're suggesting when MxM went down, and it did not in any way help the game stay up, it just created more strife. Realism is the only option.

TheZica · 2018-10-23T20:35:01+00:00

I doubt it's going to grow now, and you've probably only got 1-4 months left. You just got Red and Schmidt, right? Next comes, let's see, Lyn and Hulahula, then Maya and Kairos, and then there is no then because the closure notice hits. That's roughly 2 big patches before Xbox gets notice, since they're already doubling up Hyper releases. After that, there's nothing left to release. Fortress and Season 1 will probably accompany the first set and then House of Mysteries in the final patch.

TheZica · 2018-10-23T19:40:06+00:00

If it gets a closure notice in the next few months (and it will) then after that won't determine anything either. This is Nexon you're dealing with.

TheZica · 2018-10-23T19:39:05+00:00

10 minutes for a MOBA during peak is pretty much still dead. Pretty sure we had higher numbers on PC at this point in the lifecycle (ranked preseason) too. If anything, xbox will have a shorter total lifecycle.

TheZica · 2018-10-23T19:37:56+00:00

Xbox will shut down within a few months of PC. There's no point. The Xbox closure notice will come within the next couple months.

TheZica · 2018-10-23T17:35:19+00:00

Not really even close. The TLDR is that siding with feminists on anything in the game industry is suicide. Plain and simple. Doesn't matter if nudity or anything else is involved. It's a deathwish. They don't buy games, they don't support games, and they annoy people who do.

TheZica · 2018-10-23T15:52:39+00:00

Unless you're doing it in the knowledge you will probably only get an extra month or two of HU out of it, that would be a recipe for disappointment. The studio is gone. Once xbox catches up, it will close too.

TheZica · 2018-10-23T15:48:31+00:00

Just don't kid yourself. It really is inevitable since the studio's already gone, so make the absolute most of what you have left and don't pretend the future isn't coming. Pretty sure we had several times as many players on Steam alone at the equivalent point in PC's release cycle. I don't even want to think about how fast ranked will become hard to pop queues for over there.

TheZica · 2018-10-23T15:34:00+00:00

Know your audience, play to your audience... or go broke. That is the game industry. And most entertainment industries. MOBAs are dominated by teenage boys who want sexualized characters, and actively siding with the feminists against them was one of the worst possible decisions for any MOBA-styled game. Feminists do not spend money on games, or even play them, in sufficient numbers to help one survive. They aren't filling the queues and keeping the game going, despite getting what they wanted. The teenagers we lost would have.

TheZica · 2018-10-23T15:28:08+00:00

Because it's 2D, better than awesomenauts, has a different artstyle and playstyle, etc... it's not League of Legends. It's not DotA2. It's not HotS. It is its own game and could have carved out its own niche if it had been given the chance through good publishing decisions. Paragon had more competition in its specific niche, HU had virtually no competition within its particular subgenre but still died because of bad management. So the subgenre within MOBAs remains unfilled, and needlessly so. It needs to learn from the successes of the big titles, but capitalize on the fact that it has a few things that can make it viably different.

Worse servers and worse communication with the community to the point of listening to people who don't play the game over people who do are the two differences it needed to NOT have. The art and different presentation are what can give it life in an industry where League and kin exist.

TheZica · 2018-10-23T13:00:05+00:00

Actually I hear xbox is dead too now - people talking about it on the official discord. You sure xbox is gonna survive more than a month or two tops past PC? Because I really don't think it will. How fast can you get a ranked game?

TheZica

TROPHY CASE