Every once in a while I really need to hear this :)
CIG wants $20 for the Citizencon livestream
- Thread starter Montoya
- Start date
I to cannot wait for the Carrack to come out but at the same time seeing the detail and artistic growth of the ships I am more then glad to wait.
No no, I always have the last round. As in, no man, I ain't getting this round, I got the last one. Ha.
Jokes on you, I sold mine LAST weekend. I don't need no damn lynch-mob mentality to have an excuse, haha
Yeah man, I hear ya.
This was my thoughts exactly i might just bump my subscriber status up to imperator that month just to get those digital goodies. But yeah it's strange they decided to charge to stream it's definately not good for public eye.
This was absolute genious i didn't see this comming.Perhaps here?
Best grab a couple before @Blind Owl ventures over here.
;) Yeah man. Now, you getting this round or what?
*slowly removes hand from case of beer* Say what now? Dunno what'cher talking about.
https://robertsspaceindustries.com/pledge/Add-Ons/CitizenCon-Digital-Goodies-Pack
There you go, my good man. Fill your boots!
Shadow Reaper
Space Marshal
I think you're presuming an awful lot here. In his place, I would never have divined that the millennial masses would so erupt in tawdry, adolescent whining. Since this took CR by surprise, he did just what any good leader should do: took responsibility for this himself, and applied what seems to me an excellent fix. He explained the entire thinking process behind the original decision, and that explanation was above and beyond the call of duty. Most leaders would have given a much less detailed explanation, and the whiny children really ought to take this into consideration.
Lemme ask, those here who think CR does such a terrible job, what is your practical experience in leadership? Have you ever run a multi-hundred million dollar project with hundreds of employees, linked to a community that is ever-ready to complain? You really know what it's like, do you?
Concur. Damn, just running a few million dollars worth of equipment and a crew of 4-6 is interesting enough.
The fact that he communicates at all, and takes the time to listen, is freaking amazing. Kudos to him for that.
Now, if we could just get CIG to let us know these things ahead of time, then we'd probably have a lot less fires, haha.
I think a lot Backer Beef about this was that it appeared to push back on two of the original founding principles of this project - A) Be as transparent as possible and ii) No Publisher = no Publisher Dick Moves.
I don't think putting up free to view youtube videos "eventually" was seen as massively transparent, and almost evryone has compared charging for the Live Stream to Blizzcon, which is, as you can guess, choc full of Publisher style moves because it is put on by a publisher. No comment on blizzard, by the way.
I agree entirely communication before hand would have really helped - Concierge didn't know they were getting a free pass until after the tickets went on sale, I know a few did buy not knowing, and the announcement that the keynote speech would be open to all also came in after the announcement that digital tickets were on sale.
Personally, I think Backer Interest should dictate the scale of the Live Stream with a Crowd Funder:
- Goal 1 $25k, One stage streamed.
- Goal 2 $50k, both stages streamed AND the top five Dev Q&A's.
- Goal 3 $75k, both stages streamed and ALL Dev Q&A's and top five meet and greets.
- Goal 4 $100k, both stages, all Dev Q&A's, all meet and greets, and a roaming event camera with presenter.
- Goal 5 $150k all of the above, plus "Chris Cam" where Chris Roberts has a GoPro strapped directly to his head streaming for the duration of the entire event. The additional $50k is the bribe to Chris to get him to wear it.
Considering CIG has set up the most successful crowd funder in the whole of history, I can't for the life of me see why they don't seem keen on letting the mechanics of the Crowd Fund market dictate the scale of things like this that are otherwise unnecessary.
Frad in'Ryth
Vice Admiral
I'm an independent business owner/operator.
Leadership experience?
I've had to manage and be responsible for teams from a dozen to just over 100 over my career.
Multi-hundred million dollar projects?
No, but projects that are usually around 800k-1.5million yes.
Linked to a community?
No, but directly reporting to C Suite executives and board members every damn time (want to see people who like to complain? Talk to people who have concerns that if the project goes badly their industry presence will be hurt and their share price will take a hit.)
I could care less about the whining from some arm-chair developers to be frank.
=====
Do I think CR is doing a terrible job? No I think the project as a whole is fine. I was specifically referring to CIG's ability to communicate with the community. So, lets look at some of the highlight reel of how this project as communicates with the backers.
- Weeks not Month... It took them a year to inform us that Ilfonic fucked up Star Marine and built the whole thing to the wrong scale. That was a year the entire gaming industry assumed CIG had fucked up royally and couldn't progress the project. Not wanting to ruin Ilfonic's reputation for how badly it went by hurting your own reputation instead isn't noble it's bad business.
- How many times do they make changes and only inform the community after the fact. One of the few times they ever got ahead of a change was the Cutlass price increase. Which they've yet a year later to actually do. LTI, Warbond discount for new cash, No LTI for new concepts, etc they communicated after the fact that they were changing something. The last time I can remember them actually talking about a change before it happened and executing it was when they split Sq 42 and SC packages.
- Sold the Vanguard as a long range multi-role combat ship with a price point that reflected that ($250 vs $160 for say the Super Hornet). They then took that concept and divided it into three ships none of which reflect the cost. Used a new concept FUKs... sorry BUKs to sell why the change wasn't a big deal. Have now rolled back BUKs and aren't going to use that concept for anything other than the Vanguard series.
- Sold the Khartu-al as a two person scout ship, with components and abilities it would not have, only days before it went Hangar ready. If you think they didn't know it was going to be scaled back heavily days before they released it that speaks to how badly the project was going at the time.
Thanks for your experience, sounds like that pretty much sums it up.
There are very few invested backers who are following this without the awareness that things can and will change. It's just when they change, they seems to be almost never fore-warned and managed...
I appreciate that Chris wanted to let every backer see every angle of CitCon and that he wants to show this marvellous event off. What I can't fathom is why, when 800 hours of footage saying "this is the plan right now but you do of course understand its Alpha and subject to change" isn't going to be far different to 48 hours of the two stages where people say "this is the plan right now but you do of course understand its Alpha and subject to change".
Perhaps it was just a little too big a little too soon. I hope he's keeping a journal his Memoirs of SC development would be fascinating to read once the game is made.
I really do think this is the case. I understand wanting to celebrate the game and have grandiose conventions, but it's not out yet. It has yet to be a success or failure. It's still in development. So unless the goal is getting new backers involved, or use the convention as a source of revenue, it has no business taking place.
We backed the game to see it made, not to fund a convention. So to hear Chris talking about running the convention at a possible loss was disturbing. Our money was supposed to be used to develop the game, not celebrate it before it's even out. Now obviously I know nothing about their revenue streams and budgets. The only thing I know are their published numbers. That leaves a ton of room for a sponsor or other forms of donation to be funding this thing. At the surface though, it doesn't look too good.
If they had a product out, I would be fine with it. If they had fulfilled their obligations, I would love the idea of larger than life conventions. Hell, even if the goal was advertisement or pulling a profit, I wouldn't mind. However, they haven't fulfilled anything yet and they're talking about running the convention at a loss. At the moment, it's like a home builder using the money the home buyer paid to send their company on a vacation before finishing the house. That's not what the money is for.
So if they need to sell e-tickets to mitigate some of the loss, they need to re-evaluate the scale of the convention itself. The answer is not to charge the backers even more, but to budget the event practically. They are acting like they NEED to have a huge event. That's not the case. They need to spend our money in a practical manner and not act like they have already crossed the finish line.
Subscribers used to get a special subscriber trophy and sometimes other stuff for Gamescom and Citizencon JUST FOR BEING A SUBSCRIBER. Last year, no Gamescom trophy, "We were so busy we never got around to it." What? You couldn't have one person pull up last year's trophy and change the 2946 to a 2947? Seriously? Ok, WTF ever. Then Citizencon happens and the attendees get special guns with skins and a trophy, etc. I have to pay $5 for the gun and $5 for the trophy. $10 total and I didn't get a subscriber trophy, which is just the regular trophy in a different color and we didn't even get the option to purchase the other guns.
This week, CIG says that I can get three items of flair given to attendees and the option to buy more stuff for $20. Oh and you get access to the live streaming, which happens while I'm at work. BOOM!!! The internet blows up with people screaming and crying over the unfairness of the world and HOW DARE THEY ask us for money???!!!111??!!
My response to all this is: Yeah, ok, WTF ever. At least this year, I'm not getting jipped out of the option to get the special release guns/skins.
This week, CIG says that I can get three items of flair given to attendees and the option to buy more stuff for $20. Oh and you get access to the live streaming, which happens while I'm at work. BOOM!!! The internet blows up with people screaming and crying over the unfairness of the world and HOW DARE THEY ask us for money???!!!111??!!
My response to all this is: Yeah, ok, WTF ever. At least this year, I'm not getting jipped out of the option to get the special release guns/skins.
Frad in'Ryth
Vice Admiral
I'd find that a very interesting read.