So I saw a restoration thing.

Basically they'd come in to crappy run down eating areas and fix them up along with getting the owner to realize what went wrong.

What does this have to do with PA? Well...

There was a bar, right? Well there was a group who visited all the time.. They were called regulars. These regulars were a bit more content with the bar- yet still got mad at the owner every time she tried to change it in hopes of fixing it. The place was a mess of mismatched tile and decor. So eventually the bar owner had to make a choice... Stick to the regulars, or try and improve the place for the better. Obviously she chose the latter- they fixed the place up and gave it a whole new look, and even kept the plaque for the regulars.

My question is.. Are we the regulars? Maybe the best course of action for this game isn't to try and do what we here want.. But what everyone on Steam wants. Maybe we all like the slow game... But the majority of players DONT. Are we hampering this games development by trying to make it what we want?

Another analogy: Are we telling the poet what their poem means?

Well, let me make this very clear:

PA is not a mainstream title.
And it won't be until the sub-genre becomes super popular and a household name like Starcraft is. I don't mean the houses of gamers - I mean everyone. Seriously, most people who dont game have heard of the common games: CoD, Battlefield, Starcraft, Skyrim, etc.

The majority of players like the fast paced gameplay because they were probably introduced to the RTS genre through Starcraft and C&C, both of which have super fast gameplay in comparison to the Annihilation series.

That said, go play SupCom - the gameplay is actually VERY fast paced, especially in a 1v1. Saying PA's gameplay is now slow and dull is laughable. Any who say so should check their premises. The difference between PA and Starcraft is the Tech speed - the Annihilation series is known for making teching a strategical move instead of something that just happens in the course of the game.

You can't get strategically deep gameplay by copying the fast speed of other games into a genre where it clearly doesn't belong.

----------------
Here's a bit of philosophy for you:

The developers should make their decisions through reason, logic, and the facts in front of them. It shouldn't rest on the shoulders of *public opinion*, no matter what forum we are speaking of (the casual AI-stompers, the Steam community, or the Uber forums). That's a sure way to make everyone unhappy.

I never said PA was slow, just that we Supcom players may enjoy this build up, but that the majority of players do not.

And I'm not sure I agree that PA isn't "mainstream", maybe not at the moment- But I know a lot of people that had heard of the game or had seen it than I thought I would.

46 of my friends own PA. I have 200 friends I think.

You realize a person on the friendlist of a person playing a specific game is much more likely to also have the game?
My friendlist in Steam is mainly people I added because of SupCom2, 46 from ~90 have PA in it.

In my experience, you have to tell poets what their poems mean because they wrote it when they were drunk and/or stoned

much like the average gamer really.

True, but all those people who have it had it after I had added them, much after. Of course some are from here, but the majority are just friends that eventually bought the game.

Here want an example of how it feels pretty well known? I was at a Wal-Mart and talked to some random cashier person who happened to have heard of PA. She didn't own it- But she'd heard of it and we had a little talk about it during my checkout.

CNC was fast?

Like, mabey CNC 3, and only the online part of the cnc games.

But other then that the SP of CNC has been kinda laid back into the whole, annihilate the enemy fortress with the unit you unlocked and spooky terraforming from tiberium.

The atmosphere of Tiberiun Sun makes it my favourite game.

Oh PA is definitely 'mainstream'. Just that it has a bad 'mainstream' reputation.

The fine line between famous and infamous.

Make a list of all the changes to the game that the community caused or encouraged.

Spoiler

I'm expecting it will be short.

Then you'd be surprised... @cola_colin didn't you have a list at some point, or was it someone else?

Somewhere sometime

In Neverland?

in this forums

i can savely say that i never wanted PA to be slow ... prime reason i don't like rcbm (no offence to the team) ...
i am a person that promotes both flexibility and fluidity ...

i do think however we shouldn't stereotype ourselfes to regulars/casuals or coregamers ... just because we are on the uberforum primarily than steam doesn't make us any less part of the general community of this game ...

Sorry I didn't mean it as a rude thing, was just playing around. xP

I didn't take it as a rude thing.

This community has had a huge impact on the development of PA. There are too many balance changes to list that were reactions to community opinion one way or another. And yes, in the end I agree with Squishy to some degree. I think the Devs oscillated between taking on too much public opinion at times and at others totally ignoring it. The end result is a product that doesn't feel like it has a very cohesive central vision other than 'lots of stuff happening on spheres'. I don't play anymore but I gradually came to feel more and more the game may have ended up slightly too tailored to it's audience. I don't think good game design is to collect a survey of opinions; the best design is when devs come up with gameplay you never even envisioned, and it's fun. Oh well, I had fun along the way.

this is were i think modding is most important because that way we can propperly estimate what kind of changes we realy want to see and don't nessesarily change gameplay too drasticaly ...

I'm actually thinking of direction changes, rather than little balance changes: Instances where the community was in direct contradiction with the devs and the community 'won'. The only big about-face change I can recall because of the community was the T2 economy.

Then again, one could think of subtler ways this works: E.g. the enthusiasm towards planet smashing may have distracted attention from features that weren't about planet smashing.