There are reasons why PR is an actual devoted career, and few larger outfits put the developers directly in the firing line of their audience. Because it absolutely is an expenditure of energy and time engaging with that, parsing that, and sorting that. Even in the absence of offense, the sheer dispassionate reality is… do you 𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙡𝙡𝙮 have the time an energy to sort through hundreds of reviews and God knows how many forum posts?
Even when most of them are good (and looking at Steam they are), that’s just too much to ask a guy who also has to do… I’m going to guess not 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘺𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 at Spiderweb, but definitely far more than just what anyone who simply calls themselves a “developer” or “software engineer” has to on a regular basis.
But… dealing with the sum total of all public feedback just isn’t realistic. Not in scope. You’d need a PR department for that. And in practice it’s healthy for there to be layers of impersonal distance between the feedback and the creator. Someone criticizing a product “your company made” is a lot easier to not take personally than a thing that 𝙮𝙤𝙪 personally made. That distance helps filtering out the nonsense a lot easier and less emotionally taxing.
But you don’t have a PR department separate from the development department. You probably don’t even have a custodial department separate from development department. You got you. And you’re great. But there’s only a limited amount of you to go around. There are simply better uses of your limited you than trying to pick through the mountains of faceless feedback looking for treasure.
I'm glad you added point 4 to the list. I used to have a boss. When I walked into the office, she'd say "Hello equal.iron, don't bring me problems, bring me solutions".
That was a joke, because the boss' job is to deal with stuff above your pay grade. But there was a kernel of truth. If you see a problem and you're motivated to fix it, you might also have an idea to make it right.
So what motivates your testers? From the loathsome dreaded self-help aisle of the bookstore, Daniel Pink's "Drive" says that people are motivated by 3 things, and specifically not motivated by one. People are motivated when they are offered autonomy, mastery and purpose. (What doesn't motivate people: money -- as long as they're not in abject poverty or something.)
Purpose, you offer your testers. As described above.
Autonomy, you offer your testers. Here's the installer file. The goal is to give useful feedback. Doesn't matter how you get it. Go forth and operate the best way you know.
Mastery, you offer your testers. You need to get good at this game. You need to break it like nobody ever did. You need to spot issues that nobody else could. Prove yourself. (and have fun!)
There's a lot of wisdom in this post. I've released/contributed to several titles, but my skin is not so thick. To this day, I still get retroactively pissed off at an idiot who made a campaign of trashing a game I worked 4 years on in Steam comments. It was like it was his mission to get early negative feedback on the public record. His feedback was low-quality, smug, and damaging.
And there's an audience capture effect to game design I don't care for that comes from people who are very familiar with the genre you release a game inside of. And if you try to depart from the current conventions to try something new, you will get howled at. In my case, I very intentionally excluded an "undo" key from a puzzle-solving game and designed the entire game to promote a less cagey, controlled style of play. But certain genre-defender types, self-imagined pillars of their communities, would just kneejerk criticize the choice. The trouble is you're both kinda right - these are your customers to satisfy, and yet you might have a vision worth preserving that goes against what they want. So it's a dilemma or balancing act.
I think Queen's Wish is an example of the vision asserting itself strongly. I appreciated the "no easy feel-good decisions available" aspect of the storytelling. If that game hadn't stuck to the vision, I wouldn't remember it so well. It was an emotionally challenging game.
Thanks. This was a nice article. While it's common sense (and courtesy), it got me thinking about the fever dream that is how to best channel and obtain the most useful feedback (and possibly make friends along the way).
However, then there's the human brain and societal behavior. Troublemakers. "Unlearning" seems more challenging than picking up bad habits.
This is certainly a nice topic and worthy of consideration. Hopefully, not too many "life lessons" were experienced in the production of this message. All the best.
Somewhere in the area of 20 years ago I sent an e-mail asking if Spiderweb would ever consider making MMOs (I thought Avernum would make a super cool setting for an online world). Even though the reply was that you had no interest in making multiplayer games, I was pretty excited to have received a real written response from you! I still remember it to this day :)
I agree with the poster about people being able to appreciate things that aren't 'their thing'. Visual art and paintings make no sense to me, but I wouldn't go around saying Rembrandt sucked just because I don't get it.
I really can see a purpose for Steam Early Access, especially for games with LOTS of different play options. I could never handle it myself, and Blow's puzzle games (which I love) don't need that big a user sample.
I think society in general would be a lot better if more people could appreciate that something is not their thing, there are other people those things it is, I am happy for them and leave any discussion beyond this to them.
I think it's great for people to advocate for the stuff they love. If someone goes into the Steam forums for my games and complains that it's not multiplayer or is turn-based, that's not useless. It provides bread crumbs for other creators to see what there is a demand for.
It's simply that that particular sort of feedback throws me off my game, so I filter it.
There are reasons why PR is an actual devoted career, and few larger outfits put the developers directly in the firing line of their audience. Because it absolutely is an expenditure of energy and time engaging with that, parsing that, and sorting that. Even in the absence of offense, the sheer dispassionate reality is… do you 𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙡𝙡𝙮 have the time an energy to sort through hundreds of reviews and God knows how many forum posts?
Even when most of them are good (and looking at Steam they are), that’s just too much to ask a guy who also has to do… I’m going to guess not 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘺𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 at Spiderweb, but definitely far more than just what anyone who simply calls themselves a “developer” or “software engineer” has to on a regular basis.
But… dealing with the sum total of all public feedback just isn’t realistic. Not in scope. You’d need a PR department for that. And in practice it’s healthy for there to be layers of impersonal distance between the feedback and the creator. Someone criticizing a product “your company made” is a lot easier to not take personally than a thing that 𝙮𝙤𝙪 personally made. That distance helps filtering out the nonsense a lot easier and less emotionally taxing.
But you don’t have a PR department separate from the development department. You probably don’t even have a custodial department separate from development department. You got you. And you’re great. But there’s only a limited amount of you to go around. There are simply better uses of your limited you than trying to pick through the mountains of faceless feedback looking for treasure.
Uses like this blog. At least I think so.
If you didn't, I suggest look at this ...
https://bottomfeeder.substack.com/p/how-i-deal-with-harassment-abuse
I say much of what you said from a smell dev perspective.
It’s a mistake thinking you can make us believe that you were no genius 🥳
I'm glad you added point 4 to the list. I used to have a boss. When I walked into the office, she'd say "Hello equal.iron, don't bring me problems, bring me solutions".
That was a joke, because the boss' job is to deal with stuff above your pay grade. But there was a kernel of truth. If you see a problem and you're motivated to fix it, you might also have an idea to make it right.
So what motivates your testers? From the loathsome dreaded self-help aisle of the bookstore, Daniel Pink's "Drive" says that people are motivated by 3 things, and specifically not motivated by one. People are motivated when they are offered autonomy, mastery and purpose. (What doesn't motivate people: money -- as long as they're not in abject poverty or something.)
Purpose, you offer your testers. As described above.
Autonomy, you offer your testers. Here's the installer file. The goal is to give useful feedback. Doesn't matter how you get it. Go forth and operate the best way you know.
Mastery, you offer your testers. You need to get good at this game. You need to break it like nobody ever did. You need to spot issues that nobody else could. Prove yourself. (and have fun!)
Relevant to any creator. Good advice
There's a lot of wisdom in this post. I've released/contributed to several titles, but my skin is not so thick. To this day, I still get retroactively pissed off at an idiot who made a campaign of trashing a game I worked 4 years on in Steam comments. It was like it was his mission to get early negative feedback on the public record. His feedback was low-quality, smug, and damaging.
And there's an audience capture effect to game design I don't care for that comes from people who are very familiar with the genre you release a game inside of. And if you try to depart from the current conventions to try something new, you will get howled at. In my case, I very intentionally excluded an "undo" key from a puzzle-solving game and designed the entire game to promote a less cagey, controlled style of play. But certain genre-defender types, self-imagined pillars of their communities, would just kneejerk criticize the choice. The trouble is you're both kinda right - these are your customers to satisfy, and yet you might have a vision worth preserving that goes against what they want. So it's a dilemma or balancing act.
I think Queen's Wish is an example of the vision asserting itself strongly. I appreciated the "no easy feel-good decisions available" aspect of the storytelling. If that game hadn't stuck to the vision, I wouldn't remember it so well. It was an emotionally challenging game.
Thanks. This was a nice article. While it's common sense (and courtesy), it got me thinking about the fever dream that is how to best channel and obtain the most useful feedback (and possibly make friends along the way).
However, then there's the human brain and societal behavior. Troublemakers. "Unlearning" seems more challenging than picking up bad habits.
This is certainly a nice topic and worthy of consideration. Hopefully, not too many "life lessons" were experienced in the production of this message. All the best.
Somewhere in the area of 20 years ago I sent an e-mail asking if Spiderweb would ever consider making MMOs (I thought Avernum would make a super cool setting for an online world). Even though the reply was that you had no interest in making multiplayer games, I was pretty excited to have received a real written response from you! I still remember it to this day :)
I agree with the poster about people being able to appreciate things that aren't 'their thing'. Visual art and paintings make no sense to me, but I wouldn't go around saying Rembrandt sucked just because I don't get it.
I got asked that a LOT. And I agree it'd be cool. I would just have to clone 10 of myself to make it happen. :)
I find that for every insulting review I receive, I need about 4 or 5 positive reviews to feel better.
I was just thinking that I really want to see a Steam Early Access Title by You or Jon Blow.
"How are you planning on involving the Community in your development process?"
We aren't.
Honestly, I think that would be an instant purchase just for that.
I really can see a purpose for Steam Early Access, especially for games with LOTS of different play options. I could never handle it myself, and Blow's puzzle games (which I love) don't need that big a user sample.
I think society in general would be a lot better if more people could appreciate that something is not their thing, there are other people those things it is, I am happy for them and leave any discussion beyond this to them.
I think it's great for people to advocate for the stuff they love. If someone goes into the Steam forums for my games and complains that it's not multiplayer or is turn-based, that's not useless. It provides bread crumbs for other creators to see what there is a demand for.
It's simply that that particular sort of feedback throws me off my game, so I filter it.