Market Wards, enough is enough

[Shai]

HAHAH sorry mate!

I never read the full thread as it makes my eyes glaze over like a crack whore. Love to just jump in at the end instead.

God knows what the last 17 pages have been about. I'm guessing - no money for AH, we're keeping market wards. Battle is no.1 priority, go away.

Heh, you don't have to be sorry and I advise you to skip the last 70% of the thread if you feel curious.

If only it were as informative as you assume it might have been. ^^

[Amineri]

LOL, Shai

In all seriousness, there is almost certainly some cross-over between teams. Most teams have a few "super-awesome-people" that can do most anything, and get thrown at the whatever the current priority is. Then there are the "worker bees" that plug along on a particular team, and churn out the majority of the work, dotting i's and crossing t's.

So, the fact that the battle system IS a priority does have an impact on other parts of the game. These teams don't work in complete stove-pipes (or if they do / did, it explains the current situation a bit). Yoshi-P has finite resources (in terms of people), each with their own skills, so working on one thing will definitely mean not working on something else.

At this point in the game, I'm back on the fence as to whether it's really been worth it waiting these extra months while the battle system has been revamped, and content has been delayed. Back in November, Tanaka-san told us that the first patch of 2011 would have : player run companies, company-owned ships, company-owned buildings, addition of a delivery service to the markets, hamlet defense battles, among others. All of this has been delayed. I'd rather not see further delays in order to rebuild the economy by replacing the current markets with an auction house.

CONTENT!

And, just for reference, my "credentials" for saying this : I have a Master's in Mathematics, and am an algorithm developer and system analyst for a team of ~30 people that work on a software product. Granted, it's not game development, and I acknowledge the likely differences, but corporate cultures generally seem to be the same ~_~

[kurokawa]

LOL, Shai

In all seriousness, there is almost certainly some cross-over between teams. Most teams have a few "super-awesome-people" that can do most anything, and get thrown at the whatever the current priority is. Then there are the "worker bees" that plug along on a particular team, and churn out the majority of the work, dotting i's and crossing t's.

So, the fact that the battle system IS a priority does have an impact on other parts of the game. These teams don't work in complete stove-pipes (or if they do / did, it explains the current situation a bit). Yoshi-P has finite resources (in terms of people), each with their own skills, so working on one thing will definitely mean not working on something else.

At this point in the game, I'm back on the fence as to whether it's really been worth it waiting these extra months while the battle system has been revamped, and content has been delayed. Back in November, Tanaka-san told us that the first patch of 2011 would have : player run companies, company-owned ships, company-owned buildings, addition of a delivery service to the markets, hamlet defense battles, among others. All of this has been delayed. I'd rather not see further delays in order to rebuild the economy by replacing the current markets with an auction house.

CONTENT!

And, just for reference, my "credentials" for saying this : I have a Master's in Mathematics, and am an algorithm developer and system analyst for a team of ~30 people that work on a software product. Granted, it's not game development, and I acknowledge the likely differences, but corporate cultures generally seem to be the same ~_~

Stop showing off, lol.

[Kareiya]

you guys really need to look at the moral implications of this, First you said you'd look at the AH system, also telling us you'd actually try to do something about it after the poll we had. Then disregard all of that.

basically lying to us, I can see a lot of people quiting.

[TheVedis]

you guys really need to look at the moral implications of this, First you said you'd look at the AH system, also telling us you'd actually try to do something about it after the poll we had. Then disregard all of that.

basically lying to us, I can see a lot of people quiting.

they said theyd look at it

they did look at it

no lie was ever given


please note that just cuz the outcome wasnt what you wanted, doesnt mean it wasnt looked at

[Amineri]

Yeah that's exactly what I'm getting at.

They no doubt can't afford to implement two teams to work on the economy. It's easier and more cost effective to tweak the wards until the game starts to break even. Then they'll think about the AH or something more innovative when they're profitable.

They should just say that though. "Sorry guys, no AH now, we just don't have the resources to burn. Agree we could have both but we're working on partying and battles as they suck right now."

I don't think it's ONLY that they can't afford to have two teams working on it. Having two teams trying to work on the same task just doesn't work. And both the market wards and a notional auction house are part of the same task : the economy.

As the team updating the market wards, and adding whatever in order to try and curb inflation goes along, they'd have to be constantly updating the auction house team, or that team with end up with something completely inappropriate and unusable at the end. That leads to sitting in meetings constantly, explaining what is going on, rather than actually sitting down and doing the work.

[Shai]

you guys really need to look at the moral implications of this, First you said you'd look at the AH system, also telling us you'd actually try to do something about it after the poll we had. Then disregard all of that.

basically lying to us, I can see a lot of people quiting.

Looking at something and deciding it's a low priority is exactly what looking at something is.

Again with reading comprehension and making up your own agendas.

They said they would look into it. Guess what - They are still looking into it.
Nothing has changed.
Oh, but the game might be better while they continue to "look at AH" and "work on real shit."

Sorry to be the bearer of reality for you, but I assumed this since January.
I'm glad to see my interpretation of vague phrases is a finely tuned instrument.

[Elexia]

you guys really need to look at the moral implications of this, First you said you'd look at the AH system, also telling us you'd actually try to do something about it after the poll we had. Then disregard all of that.

basically lying to us, I can see a lot of people quiting.

They never said an AH system was coming, much like jumping it's something that was being looked at, not promised.

[Amineri]

you guys really need to look at the moral implications of this, First you said you'd look at the AH system, also telling us you'd actually try to do something about it after the poll we had. Then disregard all of that.

basically lying to us, I can see a lot of people quiting.

From Letter X

Planned: Examination of an auction house system
Current Task: Final examination of retainer and auction house systems
Future Task: Initial planning following final decision

This says they are still studying the situation. It's not their #1 or even #2 issue right now. But, it is still being looked at.

I would say that all of the following are more important than an AH:
(a) Battle system (b) Dungeons (c) New synthesis recipes (d) Gil and Item inflation issues (e) Materia System (f) Chocobos / mounts (g) Grand Companies (h) Ifrit battle (i) New quest content (j) New NMs (k) Job System

So, they patch up the Market Wards, add other content, but continue to study the auction house and how it fits in THIS game.

Edit: by the way, the above is ELEVEN different tasks. Then consider that there are SIX different dungeons planned (r30 and r50 for three areas). Also add targetting (a big deal for some), patcher issues, special events, the need to create new animations. Suddenly that 100 person team is looking spread a little thin.

So, which of the above should be dropped in order to implement an auction house?

[Gracious]

I may quit over this. I really feel mislead and disappointed.