Current Events > Blizzard INCAPABLE of change don't buy a bliz game if you have been disappointed

(+) Yeah! (+)

If you purchased before something like D4 and were disappointed, note THEY WILL NOT and they CANNOT change. Don't buy from them ever again.
I am not telling you what to do I am relaying information. If you liked Diablo 4 then buy away. But read on how deluded they are:

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/players-have-no-patience-says-blizzard-ceo-they-want-new-stuff-every-day-every-hour

"Players have no patience", says Blizzard president - "they want new stuff every day, every hour"

People who play videogames want "new content literally almost every single day", according to Blizzard president Mike Ybarra - indeed, "they want new stuff every day, every hour". I do not want new stuff every day, every hour, Mike. Frankly, the idea makes me want to burn my possessions and go spend the rest of my life under a pine tree.
Ybarra's pseudo-apocalyptic observations came during a chat with the Verge about all things Blizzy under new owner Microsoft. Asked about Blizzard's current approach to live service gaming, Ybarra noted that "players have no patience. They want new stuff every day, every hour. We're trying to react that way while holding the Blizzard quality bar high."

One obvious question is how to keep up that avalanche of New Stuff without making Bad New Stuff. Ybarra's answer, as may be deduced from Blizzard's current operations: set up vast teams increasingly fuelled by the power of in-game monetisation, with a lot of effort dedicated to ensuring that buying things in a Blizzard game feels enjoyable.
"We know players want new content literally almost every single day," Ybarra went on. "At the same time, it takes large teams to be able to deliver that. So you have to monetize it in the right ways. At the same time, I always tell the teams, 'When someone spends one dollar or a penny with Blizzard, I want them to feel good after they do that. How do we get to a world where we know that's always going to be the basis of what we're doing?'
"We want to serve players with more content in our universes," he added. "At the same time, we want to make sure we're responsible and meet their expectations. I think we're still fine-tuning a lot of those things as we go forward. But it's something top of mind for me as we go forward."
Blizzard's execs do remain "open" to proposals that aren't live services, Ybarra commented, be it "a four-hour experience or a 400-hour experience". Nor are they "afraid to create new IPs" or "turn models upside down." Still, the publisher's current portfolio suggests that the majority of chips are on service gaming for the moment.

It's interesting/harrowing to think about how live service games both react to and actively cultivate player behaviour. Ybarra doesn't discuss the role publishers and developers have played in teaching players to expect and demand New Stuff every day, via such habit-forming mechanisms as sign-in XP and events with exclusive rewards on top of compulsive design loops and feedback such as the jingly noises you get when you open a lootbox. A lot of this kind of thinking comes from the world of mobile gaming, which Ybarra described elsewhere in the chat as "a hyper growth area for us". Ybarra also doesn't talk about the sustainability implications of this expectation of constant New Stuff - for instance, the risk of mass layoffs when those big-team service games don't perform as well as shareholders wish.
I know, I sound like a scold. But looking at it from a more dispassionate armchair-designer point of view I'd love to hear more about live service projects that try to limit the player expectation of novelty and discourage daily engagement, with a view to creating something that isn't the equivalent of an artificial black hole remorselessly devouring the energies of all concerned. One of the most enjoyable live service games I've played lately is Might & Delight's Book of Travels, a "tiny MMO" with a far-from-Diablo-esque update cadence, in which you spend lots of time ambling from teahouse to teahouse. I sign into the game regularly just to have a nice stroll through the game's painterly countryside. Perhaps there's a tree I can live under there.

The irony of this is D4 complaints was not "give us something new!" it was the endgame was not there and everything that existed in the game was designed to slow you down so you don't get there and realize that.
Infact they patched it such that they increased stuff like how long it took to teleport out of dungeons and couldn't explain why they did it.
They were stalling.

Hyperbole to brush away their incompetence

The quote is correct but it is a dangerous mindset.

"We can't satisfy them so I guess we shouldn't even try."

Gamers individually should also look at themselves and how they consume content. Most people just want to blaze through everything as fast as possible then complain that there is nothing to do.

Dakimakura posted...

The quote is correct but it is a dangerous mindset.

You are wrong.
And even if it were not, who decided to make Diablo 4 an online only live service game with an in game shop?

WingsOfGood posted...

You are wrong.
And even if it were not, who decided to make Diablo 4 an online only live service game with an in game shop?

What does the quote have to do with Diablo 4?

The quote in itself is impossible to be wrong which is why they said it as an excuse for their game. Who wouldn't want more content if they are consuming more than is being produced?

The only Blizzard game I've ever purchased was Overwatch and I haven't played that since 2021.

don't buy a bliz game if you have been disappointed

I'm already doing that indirectly since both of the games I would gladly buy from Blizzard/Activision are online-only and the other is way too big to download feasibly (Call of Duty).

I'm not sure, but even if it is, that's the reason why a game like League of Legends is basically the most played in the world. For better or worse, they pop out content routinely.

Dakimakura posted...

What does the quote have to do with Diablo 4?

quite alot

Aren't they selling a $65 mount in D4 now?

CyborgSage00x0 posted...

I'm not sure, but even if it is, that's the reason why a game like League of Legends is basically the most played in the world. For better or worse, they pop out content routinely.

It also works on potatoes

Blizzard only has themselves to blame for this. Nobody is asking for OW to have eventybillion characters that all require constant maintenance, just provide the shit you promised us and stop using new characters as a distraction from your issues.

How can Blizzard be so out of touch with such a vocal fanbase? The complaints have always been to fix their damn games. Nobody asked for a yearly expansion. That's their greedy asses.

WingsOfGood posted...

Players have no patience", says Blizzard president - "they want new stuff every day, every hour"

Fuck blizzard

I'm probably never buying diablo 4 at this rate. -_-

Sometime in the next thousand years, Blizzard will release Warcraft 4. I will literally claw my zombie ass out of the netherworld just to play it.

And then be disappointed that half of the units in the campaign are locked behind a battle pass

Maybe instead of trying to create new content every hour, every single day, and failing, they get a core concept, and refine that until it's pristine. It worked with Starcraft and Warcraft 3, except those also came with robust platforms for user created content. Oh no, can't have that anymore. Imagine having something fun that you can't monetize out the ass.