I Hope SE Learned Their Lesson From Eureka And Bozja

[TaleraRistain]

Yeah, they weren't very clear. Communication hasn't always been their strong suit though, at least outside of Japan. There are also times when the player base is pretty vocal about wanting something, then when Yoshi P is asked about it he seems genuinely surprised. I think a lot of feedback and requests just don't reach him.

Packetdancer made an excellent point in another thread that the wording they used made the story in Bozja seem like an optional side-quest to unlock upgrading the resistance weapons there. Not that the resistance weapon itself required the story. And that those who didn't do the story wouldn't realize that because it's the story that makes that clear, not the way it was communicated.

I think you're right on the idea that things don't reach Yoshi-P but there should be folks before him who do get feedback and requests and if they're not doing their part, maybe someone higher up needs to look into that.

[TurtlesAWD]

The thing here is that the quest for the initial weapon took place outside of the exploratory zone with a trial you had to do, also outside of the zone. So it's fair to assume that, like the Heavensward weapon, the story would be tied to the strengthening of the weapon, but not required to advance the story on the frontlines.

As was stated, it just wasn't well communicated. Yes I'll give you your logic of having to do it, but you also have to see that if you're going off what you were told that you do and don't have to do, then you could have thought it was okay to take a pass on the content. This is especially true for those of us who didn't enjoy the exploratory zone content. You see the announcement you don't have to do it to strengthen your weapon, and so you skip it, only then to be blindsided when you find out this optional content is actually required. (Think Tetra Master in Final Fantasy IX. It was optional the entire game, never telegraphed to be required, then out of no where you have to win first place in the card tournament in Treno to advance the story. This wasn't a problem if you chose to play the card game leading up to that point, but was a major stumbling block for players who did not.)

Yeah I guess maybe the difference in how I approached/framed it for why it didn't feel surprising in this case is that I came at it as like, "the weapon is the path for the story" rather than "the story is the path to the weapon" and I can see why people would view it as the latter. I would advocate for seeing it as the former, but I get why people see it as the latter.

[wereotter]

I think you're right on the idea that things don't reach Yoshi-P but there should be a folks before him who do get feedback and requests and if they're not doing their part, maybe someone higher up needs to look into that.

There's a lot of reasons to believe that feedback from western markets does not make it to him. While not all feedback can realistically go directly to him, I do think that there's the potential that either too many are focused on the JP market, they don't fully understand the western market (looking at it more through a stereotype than actual market research), or there are mistranslations going both ways that make it so what we're trying to say doesn't get accurately conveyed to him... though most likely a little bit of all three of these things.

We've seen make times where it's not until Yoshida is interacting directly with western players that he learned what we're thinking, what we do and don't like, and what successes and failures exist here. I think a really good example was the launch of the new races. They anticipated there would be disappointment with them being gender locked, but didn't anticipate just how much of an issue this was with western players compared to Japanese ones. So this could easily be an example of all three: rabbit men and big strong beastial females wouldn't be popular in Japan, stereotyping of western players says we want pinnup model women and power fantasy men, and feedback came that people would be upset with no opposite gender counterparts, but could have been downplayed by mistranslating the terms used.