What Would Chris Do? (Some thoughts on the suggestion board)

[Max_Caine]

The forumites on this board are a creative and inventive lot. The suggestions forum alone has 25 pages of suggestions, quite a bit of which loops, but all the same people are always thinking new ways which the game experience for them might be improved. However, many ideas are left at the side of the road, for one reason or another.

I think when coming up with ideas, we need to put ourselves in the headspace of the lead developer and come up with some What Would Chris Do? rules to help shape the creative process. Having observed his behaviour on the boards, I have come up with some simple rules.

1) Will it cost money? The more artwork, the more props, the more coding that has to go into a suggestion, the more it will cost, and the less likely it will be put in.

2) Will it be a bugger to balance? A lot of ideas look great on the surface, but if there are ways to exploit the idea that will imbalance the game without a lot of hard work fixing it, then it isn’t so attractive.

3) Was it in the original X-Com? Xenonauts is billed as a “spiritual successor” to X-Com. When the harpies descend on Xenonauts at release, they will pick over every bone and squawk when something that was in X-Com doesn’t appear in Xenonauts.

4) Will it take a long time to implement? This game has been Chris’ life for a long time now. If a suggestion will take forever to implement, then it’d have to be pretty spectacular to do!

5) Will it detract from existing game elements? A good example of this is the idea for long-range SAM batteries. If SAM batteries were implemented, it reduces the need for interceptors, which are an integral part of the game.

[Oktober]

Stop making sense with your words!

[thothkins]

That being said, I'd hate for people not to post their ideas, just because they feel that they don't pass any of the criteria above. I look at the suggestions as brainstorming. You just never know know what one idea will spark off.

[Max_Caine]

You are right, thothkins, my thoughts and extrapolations are mostly negative in aspect, and they are a brake on the wheel of creativity. In my defence, I would say that the very incomplete framework I present guides rather than hampers. Grand ideas can spark off the most incredible things, but small ideas link up with other ideas to form a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts.

[windex]

Honestly, I don't think anyone needs any of these rules. It's going fine the way it is. He can tell us what he can and wants to do and we will just make suggestions or requests and he can knowing enough about the game and being the one who is developing it be the one to ultimately decided whether or not it will work or if he even wants it there in the first place.

And the way you word all this- what I'd expect from you- as if asking us to answer to all these questions:

" No, don't do any of this, the game is just fine as it is but maybe we should give him more money anyways and tell him he's done a great job and worked too hard already and to just go on a long vacation right now, which we will pay for." So after reading all this I am admittedly a little nauseated.

Edited June 30, 2012 by windex

[Oktober]

Well I don't think the OP needs to be taken in the wrong way. Max is right: the game is designed to be something specific, and it's attracted us all for what it's intended to be. So certainly making outlandish proposals (like my own request for a "play as the aliens" variation on the main game) or not really something that need to be talked about right now.

(On the other hand I don't think long-range SAM would be a bad thing. Sometimes you can't field enough fighters and it would be nice to have the option to just shoot some UFOs down instead of letting them destroy the countryside at will!)

What Max is proposing is that we make refinement suggestions as opposed to just vomiting everything we want for some game, at some time. We're all beautiful, creative beings. We have great ideas which would be super-fun, somewhere. In this context, that's not necessarily helpful.

[Max_Caine]

If you want to throw mud at a wall all your life windex, and hope that something sticks then by all means, go ahead! No-one (least of all I) is preventing your sovereign right to present your ideas in whatever format you please.

I, on the other hand would prefer that people examine the wall, look at the spots where mud is most likely to stick and focus most of their efforts there, reserving some for the ideas that we know are pure diamond. But hey, windex knows best, right? You've certainly presented your arguments in an authoritative and informative manner. I'm especially impressed at the straw man you threw into the second paragraph, having run out of actual arguments at “it works fine”.

Edited June 30, 2012 by Max_Caine

[GoodGuyEddy]

He'd make a badass game , make it fine in well.

As if dragged it straight from hell, ringing in the awesome bell.

He'd kick some ass, and drink some brew,

That's what would Chris England do!

He'd beat Firaxis and pwn some noobs.

Be covered in the latest news.

Read a post one or two.

That's what would Chris England do!

[Gorlom]

He'd make a badass game , make it fine in well.

As if dragged it straight from hell, ringing in the awesome bell.

He'd kick some ass, and drink some brew,

That's what would Chris England do!

He'd beat Firaxis and pwn some noobs.

Be covered in the latest news.

Read a post one or two.

That's what would Chris England do!

Why am I getting a southpark vibe from this?

[Max_Caine]

We all have great ideas. And the threads on this board (like the 2 suppression threads - I read all of both of them) show that, big time. But I feel that people will make more headway with their ideas if they reign them in to more align with the vision and direction that Chris wants to take Xenonauts. Oktober hits it right on the head when he says I suggest ideas of refinement instead of alloftheideas. Does that make me a cheerleader? That I would like more peoples ideas to succeede, like dorphin's did? Then pass me my pom-poms and multicoloured chainsaw.

[windex]

"Then pass me my pom-poms and multicoloured chainsaw." Lolly pop chainsaw! Augh! After that cheaply made, generic, piece of goo gob garbage, appeal to the masses catch cliche, I'd like to see a let's kill ditzy, shallow stereotypical cheerleaders with jack the ripper back to life playing the role of a modern day chainsaw wielding zombie.

Edited June 30, 2012 by windex

[Gorlom]

"Then pass me my pom-poms and multicoloured chainsaw." Lolly pop chainsaw! Augh! After that cheaply made, generic, piece of goo gob garbage, appeal to the masses catch cliche, I'd like to see a let's kill ditzy, shallow stereotypical cheerleaders with jack the ripper back to life playing the role of a modern day chainsaw wielding zombie.

Windex the first post you made I thought was a little bit unfair and possibly a bit hard to follow. but this one is just making me go: "Huh? what is he on about? o.0" I really can't follow your train of thought or decipher what you mean at all.

I think you need to take a step back, read everything over again and possibly consider what made Max post the thread in the first place. You probably should consider that in the last thread that suggested some major changes Max did not particularly agree with he still encouraged the poster to keep making suggestions.

[Max_Caine]

Gorlom, when a person lives a life among murderers, that person expects everyone he meets to carry a knife. windex doesn't like what I've written and I believe windex feels my preceeding post is a cheap appeal to emotion, rather than a sincere statement of what I feel. It is true that because you can't see the face of a person who writes something, the facial cues that confirm the person is sincere are abscent. Thus you take sincerity based upon how much you trust the person to be sincere. Through windex's first post where he felt "nauseated" after reading what I wrote, I conclude that windex trusts me as far as he can throw me. Hence, my post is a cheap appeal to emotion.

windex, please cease these little displays that present you in a less than favourable light. Show me through reasoned argument and supplied proof that me suggesting that there is another way to approach making suggestions is wrong. thothkins did so, without resorting to ad hominem attacks and pointless straw men, and I responded to him, conceding the points he made. And please do so with more than "the current way is just fine". Why is the current way "just fine"? I suggest a refined approach to making suggestions to Xenonauts. You don't accept either the premise or the suggestions. Show why, without (and this is important) all the attendant emotion that marbles your posts. If you can't do any of that then butt out, and let someone else write a response who can.

[Gorzahg]

He'd make a badass game , make it fine in well.

As if dragged it straight from hell, ringing in the awesome bell.

He'd kick some ass, and drink some brew,

That's what would Chris England do!

He'd beat Firaxis and pwn some noobs.

Be covered in the latest news.

Read a post one or two.

That's what would Chris England do!

One hundred of the finest internets to you good sir.

Edited June 30, 2012 by Gorzahg

[raziel1981]

I think that your general guidelines are correct Max, however, I'm certain that Chris is capable of making his own mind on what and if any of the ideas we post here are relevant to the game. As a person who takes interest in Xenonauts I don't expect any of my suggestions to be necessarily implemented. Sure, it would be fun if they did, but I realize as an adult in a global economy, that creating a computer game eventually is a process that is driven to create a commercial product that makes profit for its developers. Brainstorming ideas is first and foremost simply fun. I'm sure that if the dev. team would see fit, they could simply post that the project is complete and no more suggestions of any kind will be implemented into the game.

Eventually, they are not obligated to take anything posted here seriously, just as much as any person here doesn't have to post any suggestion they got. Your suggested rules might be a welcomed filter for the developers, but I don't see why they might need such a screening process in the first place.

[windex]

3) Was it in the original X-Com? Xenonauts is billed as a “spiritual successor” to X-Com. When the harpies descend on Xenonauts at release, they will pick over every bone and squawk when something that was in X-Com doesn’t appear in Xenonauts.

I'll answer this one. Yes players and self acclaimed veterans will pick it apart no matter what. But since it is intended to be the "spiritual successor" of X-com I think it should for the most part contain the same elements of game play as the original with some refinements but -and I don't need to say this judging how the game is currently going along with the developers intentions- but without streamlining or leaving out parts that may make the game at first difficult though interesting in the long run.

Gorlom! what did you not understand about my post! Its quite clear. It is a reference to a current console game called Lollypop chainsaw which turned out to be a disappointing flop for many who wanted this kind of crap- get with it Gorlom! are you not a gamer! Google it. I don't always explain things I expect certain people to know.

By the way what did you think of Max payne 3, Caine?

Ok, and after this I'm out of this thread. I really don't think it is necessary and I've already stated why- reread it if you didn't understand me the first time, it is quite explicit. And, no I don't think it should be left the way it is. I was being sarcastic.

If you want to follow Max_Caine's "refined Guidelines and rules for Chris then go ahead. Maybe Chris will want him to do this for him and everybody . But I'd think he'd want to handle things himself since it is his project and he is the lead developer and knows exactly what needs to be done. That's not my business regardless I want to make some requests and if Chris can't or doesn't want to do them for whatever reason so be it.

So, you think you can make it easier on Chris, Max_Cain, by refining and articulating guidelines for everyone I think that will put limitations on Chris and everyone involve in the developing creative

process of this game including those who will be playing it after. Is this Max Cain's game? or all those who are playing the beta and preordered it and for a reason I might add.

Edited June 30, 2012 by windex

[erutan]

I thought OP was reasonable - I put up a thread making a big fuss about adding stances (ideally we'd have JA2 level of 4 moving and 3 still), but acknowledged sprite rendering issues and added in a "well at least add a moving crouch, with a still prone if you really want suppression w/ a reduced AP cost to balance suppression w/ no cover".

Asking for something like being able to go to the alien homeworld after working our way through bases scattered throughout our solar system sounds pretty awesome, but is highly unlikely to make it in game. Xeno obviously has features not in XCOM, but they are features that would not feel garishly out of place in XCOM (e.g. in game DLC for custom outfits for your troopers ala Magicka).

[Gorlom]

Gorlom! what did you not understand about my post! Its quite clear. It is a reference to a current console game called Lollypop chainsaw which turned out to be a disappointing flop for many who wanted this kind of crap- get with it Gorlom! are you not a gamer! Google it. I don't always explain things I expect certain people to know.

Meh I'm a PC gamer. I don't really check out console games. But even if I would nothing about this game interests me enough to take a second glance at it. As such it was rather hard to deduce that "lollipop chainsaw" was an actual title from your post... I thought you were ranting about Max_caines post.

[erutan]

That was basically what I took away from your post - I don't think it's literally good for us to think like Chris, because then by definition there would be no new ideas.

I personally read it as "if you were the lead developer, would this go in?", while recognizing you are not actually the lead developer. You're fine, nothing you said was offensive, it's the internet and everyone could have worded things slightly more accurately at one point or another.

[Max_Caine]

EDIT: Sorry erutan, I was trying to get this to repost correctly and I messed up.

First, let's clear the chaff away.

windex, I enjoyed Max Payne 3 very much on my PC. I was annoyed that I had to wait several weeks after it had been released on console, but what can you do?

Okay, that's done. There are two points which have been touched on several times in this thread. I'd like to talk about them. And after having spent a long while with both of them, I'm only going to really write about one of them in this post, because it's a damn wall of text. If you TL; DR this, then I don't blame you.

People should have the freedom to express themselves creatively any way they like without restriction.

I am not in any way associated with Goldhawk Interactive. I am not a shill, paid or otherwise. I am a forumite. My words are as strong as a puff of wind. I doubt that after this thread hits the second page that anyone will pay attention to it. I, as a person, can not and do not restrict anyone beyond the restrictions that they place upon themselves. But what I wrote has drawn some very strong reactions on the importance of creative freedom.

Should people have the creative freedom to write what they want without barrier or bar? Well, what is the consequence of creative freedom? With the freedom of expression is the freedom to be ignored. Oktober and erutan both put it succinctly that not every idea will be listened to, because Xenonauts has a direction it's going in, and there are practical considerations to be made when considering suggestions. But that is something that raziel1981 recognised, and wrote

Sure, it would be fun if they did, but I realize as an adult in a global economy, that creating a computer game eventually is a process that is driven to create a commercial product that makes profit for its developers.

But practical considerations don't excuse stunting creative freedom. It's clearly something that Goldhawk recognises, as raziel1981 then goes on to write in the same post

Brainstorming ideas is first and foremost simply fun. I'm sure that if the dev. team would see fit, they could simply post that the project is complete and no more suggestions of any kind will be implemented into the game.

And thothkins reinforces this, when he wrote earlier in the thread:

That being said, I'd hate for people not to post their ideas, just because they feel that they don't pass any of the criteria above. I look at the suggestions as brainstorming. You just never know know what one idea will spark off.

If creative freedom is stunted through rules, no matter how lightly or selectively applied, ideas that may otherwise be diamonds would be missed. This is a real problem with AAA development. With so much money at risk, the creative freedom of developers seems to be restricted to what the focus group said was cool. (It doesn't help that big publishers make money hand over fist by being heavy handed about what goes in, and what stays out).

In addition, while there isn't a formalised Internet Bill of Rights (although if you google “Internet Bill of Rights” it comes up with SOPA of all things!) to say “you shouldn't write like that, you should write like this” certainly draws considerable ire. windex wrote on that matter:

And the way you word all this- what I'd expect from you- as if asking us to answer to all these questions: "No, don't do any of this, the game is just fine as it is but maybe we should give him more money anyways and tell him he's done a great job and worked too hard already and to just go on a long vacation right now, which we will pay for." So after reading all this I am admittedly a little nauseated.

And windex has a right to feel nauseated, as I believe windex feels I want to dictate to him how he should write and what he should write, which is something windex will rebel against.

But let me ask a question. What is the goal of making a suggestion to the developers? I put it to the reader that when people have an idea for Xenonauts, they want to see that idea in the game. Perhaps not in the form they originally envisage it. Other forumites may have suggestions, critiques, modifications. An idea can go through multiple iterations with different parties arguing over points, but the end goal is “hi, I think my idea is neat, what do you think about it being in the game?”. Forumites, on the whole, don't write things in the suggestion board just for the hell of it. They may discuss and brainstorm within the phase space of any particular idea, ideas might get linked up and fuse to evolve into brand new Digimon, but there's an aim, an end goal.

My proof for that is the language which goes into writing a suggestion. There are fairly often phrases like “it would be really simple” or “it would be easy” or “it would extend the game” or “game X which is really cool can do Y, Xenonauts could do Y if we did...”. These positive phrases are designed to make the idea palatable. Then there are negative phrases. People might write instead something along the lines of “this is really boring” or “this is repetitive” or “I don't like the layout, this is why”. These draw the attention of the developer that a paying customer doesn't like how things are panning out with subject X, plz fix. The more artistic among us produce screenshots with mockups of how their ideas would look. I would argue that these ideas are not simply being bandied about, they are actively being pitched.

If there is a goal to writing a suggestion beyond “I think my suggestion is really cool and I'm going to write it down”, then what suggestions make the cut? Why does one suggestion go in, but why is your idea, which is clearly awesome, ignored, or worse yet, turned down. The answer is quite simple. An idea is more likely to be looked on favourably if it is one that aligns itself with the vison and direction that the developers want to take Xenonauts in, but either brings out a point that was previously missed, or refines and extends existing game concepts. My observations on “vision and direction” are limited to what I observe, and I wrote those observations down (clumsily) in the form of rules. If an idea looked like it was going to take a lot of work, it was less likely to be considered. If an idea ws something that was in X-com, it was more likely to be considered. The interface between creative freedom and game direction constricts and strangles, because it has to. Consider Oktober's comments on this.

What Max is proposing is that we make refinement suggestions as opposed to just vomiting everything we want for some game, at some time. We're all beautiful, creative beings. We have great ideas which would be super-fun, somewhere. In this context, that's not necessarily helpful.

All these ideas we keep pumping out are great, but like Oktober says, they are for some game at some time. Xenonauts 2 perhaps, but not, ultimately, Xenonauts. Creative freedom is won at the expense of communicating ideas that are more likely to be considered by the developers. What I would like to see are more ideas that take flight. For people to not only say “hey, this is a cool idea, could it be in the game?”, but for the developer to say “it is a cool idea. Tell me more.”, which is better than “uh, maybe?”.

But I admit, I was wrong. Wrong to say "what would Chris do?". To presume to try and get inside the head of someone most of us only know through this forum, several interviews and the AMA is both presumptious and arrogant. The better question to ask, and to ask honestly is "if you were the lead developer, would this go in?". That, I think, is the only question, the only rule, that we should follow. And I honestly think we would be better for it.

Thank you for your time. The peanut gallery is still open. Rotten tomatoes are to your left.

[raziel1981]

I think that that specific rephrasing of your words brings a world of difference to their meaning from the reader's point of view. A certain degree of pragmatism with suggestions wouldn't kill anyone here (including myself).

However, while its clear to me that a great deal of the ideas we see rolling around on the forum at this point, are far more fitting for Xenonauts 2, it does seem pointless to title a thread with "suggestions for Xenonauts 2"

[windex]

Lets start with: what is in the original X-com enemy unknown that is not in beta v12-including place markers?

My main concern is not so much with extras as it is with good enemy AI in ground combat which understandably it doesn't have much of at this point. Also, I'd like to see more work done on the map generator.

Soldier types, enemy types, what do you think should there be more? That is something else to think about.

I think there is still a lot of work to be done fleshing it out and there is plenty to do there, so adding

more content to what we already have may not be all that feasible.

I know a lot of people don't like this but the extras can come later in an expansion or DLC.

I think there is a lot in the game to make work and refine already and I will add in spite of what isn't refined and working it is

a very fun and interesting game to play-or will be again once v12 is patched to prevent all the crashes and save problems.

I played Max Payne 3 on the xbox 360 figuring it wasn't going to be much better on the PC also I didn't want to wait while everyone

was playing it. I thought it was decent, decent enough for me to finish, though the First one for PC was superior in every way, in my opinion. The first one I installed and played more than once and even years latter, while MP3 I traded it in the following week.

Even the graphics for the first one -PC version of course- looked a lot better than Max Payne 3 on xbox 360.

Also, they over did all the slide show and blur effects not to mention the excess of Maxes painkiller and alcohol addiction- if he was doing all that he'd have been dead long before his story started in Brazil, let alone being a one man army. Narcotics and alcohol do no mix well. To have a daily habit like that is not at all believable.

Edited July 2, 2012 by windex