How relations with the community could improve

3.5k · December 17, 2018

First of all, I would like to say that I have no reason to bring up any specifics. Only that I (and others) have noticed a pattern in how community relations are with BSG. Without doubt there are some things that could be adjusted. This thread is certainly not aimed to further fuel on a bandwagon that is currently on-going, but instead list a few suggestions that could help change and furthermore prevent future incidents.

The first and primary cause for any ongoing drama is primarily connected to how Battlestate publically responds to internal or external conflict. Conflict WILL happen, it is inevitable. But how a company deals with it is paramount to what their employees will think of them, and more importantly what their customers will think of them. Damage control needs to happen, but it has to be wholehearted and show an interest in the views of the community. This has partially occured in the past, so lets name a few examples:

* Active developers on the forums that listen to feedback and respond with information that the community wants

* Transparency in terms of the obstacles and strides forward in development - information about why there are delays

* Talkshows with a sense of humor where the community can interact live with streamers and representatives from the company (TTv, and Talking Tarkov)

* Reposting memes, a general sense of tongue-in-cheekiness

However, some things have been strange, and keep being unaddressed and cause irritation:

* Handling of deadlines and release dates of patches - the shortsightedness of saying a deadline without foundation in reality

* The lack of interaction previously on the English-speaking forums, but instead showing preference to reddit

* Publically disowning profiles that express criticism toward the company - this legitimizes the criticism and makes so a part of the public believes "where there is smoke, there's also fire"

* Sloppy methods of handling representatives of the community (In my times two popular community representatives have been fired under 'strange' circumstances)

There are more in each category here - but the fact that we keep seeing this "mixed" result leads to a tarnished company image, something I'm sure a "cool businessman" could care less about, but it is certainly for any new game company something to think about. My suggestions are:

* Do not handle ANYTHING arbitrarily or spontaneously - always have a doctrine, preferrably one that has been carefully analyzed prior to implementation.

For example, it is better to have a delayed reaction to see how the community reacts to something occuring than making a rash decision and having to do damage control. While it can seem indecisive - it is usually good to get a feel for what the community reaction is. If the community is acting on lack of information, transparency is nearly always a preferable option. If you make mistakes, then own up to them. Nikitas wholehearted messages about the difficulties of development usually get positive feedback.

* Nobody, not even the boss should address the public on a scandalous subject without having their viewpoint properly criticised by someone who is NOT a yes-man.

Essentially you need people working for the company who are able to AT THE VERY LEAST play "devil's advocate" and YOU NEED TO LISTEN TO THEM. Seriously, a LOT of the negatives could have been prevented if you weren't so sensitive to internal criticism.

* All public actions that have legal ramifications should be scrutinized by the company legal team/representative

Including termination of employment, DMCA-filings, copyright claims, et cetera. Also, what might be legally right - might have moral implications that can cause an outrage in the community. When in doubt; choose the path that strengthens the company image, always.

From a former Emissary that in spite of everything still wants BSG to succeed.

December 17, 2018

Shifting from Reddit to here - an official forum if I'm not mistaken - would defuse half the tension. That's no.1 priority and from there we could work on mutual communication. People need to understand, that this project is massive and in many ways pioneering and all that burden lays on top of a relatively young and small company. Laid back attitude on our, the players part, coupled with the approach like "enjoy what you have already and calmly report what doesn't tick yet" would go miles towards communication.

Imagine you're a developer on an already stretched deadline, working with community takes precious time that could be used on the game instead or just for resting and clearing your mind between stints in front of the screen and on top of that when dealing with such community, 80% of the time you have to deal with stupid drama and demands. You'd have to either shoot yourself or cease all communication and try to work in detachment with the outside world, which is, I believe, precisely what we're seeing now.

Streamers need to be toned down, not only in EFT, but in general. The amount of the following and praise they receive from their blind followers seems to cloud the truth, that they are just ordinary players and nothing more. Sharing your exploits with others doesn't automatically make you a developer or gives you right to anything. Call me old-school, but I'd rather side with the guys who do the actual job, rather than with the ones living off their work without contributing anything meaningful or even worse - causing damage. I'd rather read comments from BSG regarding the development, than word about certain situation - no difference in time to write either of them.

December 18, 2018

Very well said. I agree with all of this. I think the community largely doesn't understand the trials and tribulations along with insane amount of work that goes into producing this kind of game, as well. However, BSG could surely handle the public relations of this game far better. Setting reasonable and tangible deadlines for all future patch date(s) that include a breakdown of the update and content would be a great start. Additionally, committing to a date and giving us a heads up if that isn't going to be met - which is expected, and the community should expect that, too. If not, these players shouldn't be participating in a "closed beta" phase of any game.

First off, I think Reddit is absolutely toxic and a complete waste of time altogether. The community on the subreddit isn't the forum in which we should be pleasing. It's largely a lot of individuals that enjoy nothing but drama and negativity surrounding this game. It's a bad idea for any BSG associated individual to pay a grain of attention to it, unless they're the moderators of the subreddit.

Right now, people need to understand that BSG's efforts should largely be on committing to promised content with fixes and optimizations that "polish" the game saved for later, unless they're game breaking towards beta testing. There's no point in polishing when you're going to bake code on top of the game as you'll be iterating to finish up the content of the game. In many cases, they'll just end up fixing the same thing multiple times. And that gets me back to my first point, responding on Reddit or to memes about how poorly optimized the game is = huge time sink. The people griping about these issues don't simply understand the polish phase to any product in a "closed beta" development cycle generally comes at the end of development during "open beta" or before pre-release/release.

Just my two cents. Keep focused on the 0.11 update, BSG. There's a massive supporter base that still is hyped for it, and this, too, shall pass.