You uber devs might have ruined dev-community communication for all developers.

[semi-drunk rant incoming]

I'm involved in a couple of games in early development in different stages. One thing I've noticed that in general we (PA) seem to get the raw unprocessed unedited thoughts of the project leads of PA. This is something that usually doesn't happen in any team productions. You might get it in 1 or 2 developer indy titles but definitely not in producer-publisher titles.

This is a thing that has positively upped the bar for user-producer relationships for me. I personally liked to be involved in the games that I truly care about. That's why I kickstarted for a certain amount on this project. I know it's not for everyone, I certainly don't expect them to care. But I care about the game development of games that appeal to me greatly. Like PA, which I'd like to see grow in to a team orientated tank spamfest. Combining both my love for time coordination and tank spamming. Which is obviously a personal preference, would you kindly not flame me on that.

The basic premise of this thread is for people to compare there dev-community relationship in other games with the one they have with Uber. Please keep the Uber community rules in mind. Don't flame on this one guys, let's keep it civil.

I'd imagine that often the developers must think it isnt worth the hassle or does more harm than good. It is a bit of a double edged sword when you demonstrate work in an unfinished state, but I think it is definitely the way to go when funded directly by the community (ie kickstarter).

It kind of mirrors the open nature of the platform they're developing, it all seems to be very tailored with the community in mind.

I follow a few other indie games, and few of them have this much community interaction. I have never seen an indie(or AAA) developer do so many livestreams or post so much in the forums; it's quite fantastic.

The few examples of other developers I can think of are Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead (which is a post apocalyptic roguelike) and Starsector ( Mount and Blade in SPAAAAAACE!)

Anyways, keep it up Uber!

When I saw the title, I was expecting another one of these troll threads to be locked. Then I saw that the author was thekiller – and I didn't know what to expect.

I agree. The developer communication and community involvement on PA has been... intense. I am greatly enjoying the amount of communication we can have with the devs and the influence we have on the game.

My hat is off to you Uber.

This has been one incredible ride.

I've been saying this from the beginning. These guys have set the bar way too high.

Poor *insert other dev here*

But especially SOE. Seriously. Screw them.

I'm personally backed number of projects on Kickstarter, but unfortunately wasn't able to participate PA campaign due some real life problems. I really like work done by Double Fine (Broken Age) and Obsidian (Project Eternity) because they share lot of information with backers, but they're big studios.

Unfortunately there is number of other companies that talked about open development on Kickstarter, but did all development behind closed doors and it's make me upset a bit.

I also like how War For The Overworld going and developers are pretty open too.

I agree that Uber have most most open development process I ever seen and this why I'm here.
So there is number of other developers who handle communication with community, but Uber is the best.

Maybe reword the title
It's a bit click-bait-y

With that said I agree that Uber's done a fantastic job communicating with the community for the most part. The biggest things for me are when they make forum-blog-hybrid posts about technical things or their plans, and the dev build livestreams.

I've been constantly amazed at how the devs at Uber take the time to come and talk with us like we are actually part of the company. It's just great to be able to read tech explanations or any of the other great things they post. I'm also amazed at how patient they are when explaining a decision to an unhappy forum member.

So anyway, GO UBER, and I hope other devs follow in your footsteps.

With any other game I would just stop caring and not play it after 3ish months. With PA I keep playing for 3 main reasons.

1. Super awesome devs who are very interactive
2. Mods!
3. Game being super mother ******* badass

I think part of the recent problems have been caused by people losing perspective a little and forgetting that we aren't actually part of the company. With such great interaction from the devs, it's an easty mistake to make. We are part of the game's development but not part of the company, and that is a hard distinction to remember all the time.

Uber understands that distinction very well, but I can see where a dev trying to mirror this development model might have trouble pulling it off. And don't forget that it also takes a dedicated community that shares the same vision and understands that development model, too.

Drunken compliments are the best compliments.

Is it a bar-raise? Or is it the start of an industry changing trend?
What are you looking at me like that for?
Please stop it.
Let me dream...

And definitely, the most honest.

I think the level of inclusion given by the people at Uber has been great, and I think they have been on the forefront of a trend of developers doing similar of late, it seems particularly suited to the new wave of crowdfunded games where backers feel like they have a bit more invested than simply just buying a game to play, and with the explosion of services like Twitch it seems a natural way to go.

A couple other groups of developers for games I have backed also seem to put a lot of emphasis on interaction with their backers and community, those being Starbound and Star Citizen. I'm sure I remember early on in Star Citizen, them referring to how impressed they were with how Uber handled their Kickstarter campaign and live streams, and they have very regular streams and plenty of interaction on their forums as they continue to develop the game. One of the Starbound devs regularly streams himself coding the game, and most of their team are regularly on IRC.

Its different when you are self employed, and totally different when you have boss/publisher that may make decision just because and you need to follow it. And if you look at bottom line We all are employers of Uber. They have much more freedom than any other game dev studio.

Chapeau thekiller666!

Truth be told, I'd rather closed doors that generate good doors than open doors that generate bad ones.

Uber is doing well at PA, but I'd be willing to bet that it's more due to their experience than anything else.

I've seen games die because of community involvement. "We want x." "OK, here's X." "OMG Y U AD TAT BAD GAME I OUT."

I don't feel any communication. Just see media links set up by people. Its a very one way street, pretty much identical to everything I have come across. Not once have I seen anything in the forums asking for an opinion from people. Even if ubers dev's are supposedly better at communicating its still pretty poor. Its the same as watching t.v purely one way.

That's my opinion about it. I guess my expectations were a lot higher.

I'm with @moonsilver it's very much a one-way street as communication goes. As in not even things like questions get to go the other way that easily. Not complaining mind you, just that I've seen "better."

Star Citizen does official magazine (as in "the devs" or as close-to make it).

Star Citizen also does several shows per week, one of which is almost entirely community driven outside of a large portion of the judging and involves getting a ship into the game; and another that's weekly status reports and recognition on community involvement.

Skullgirls, among others, does weekly status/tournament/meetups with the devs. Many games actually have plenty of opportunities to easily talk to the devs (hint: its never the forums! =P since forums are detrimental to getting things done). The whole idea of "devs never talk with fans" is mostly a thing with people that are: "I'm too lazy to find where the devs like to be contacted with, why haven't they responded to my obscure message while I've been sitting on my *** for two days here?"

A ton of games do development streams, as in as-they-work, usually art stuff. If its concept work I've seen the dev in question just ask for opinions live on some occasions. I've seen pure programming streams too. Usually its a indie thing though.

If we're talking status reports there are examples in the dozens, like really fast patching (usually in a cutting edge separate release), to more extreme cases such as literal daily status reports/brainstorming as is the case of Limit Theory: http://forums.ltheory.com/viewforum.php?f=12

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Of course I don't mean to say PA is somehow doing anything wrong with the monthly updates, internal testing streams and such, just that if we're talking "most livestreames, updates, quality time with players etc" there are plenty of better examples in this day and age.

Don't forgot Star Citizen has the bestest concept art ever. Although the website doesn't have an art section :'(






But this is the real reason it's awesome: