98 replies to this topic

[DingdongJR]

Oh, and that too.
I said advertising because of how barren the player base is - I think one of the reasons this game is often so empty is because not many people really hear about it these days.

 

I don't care how barren it is right now. In the current state, it is not fit to even handle more players, let alone hold them long enough. I would rather let this game simmer for a few years while fixing the mountain of issues it has than launching an advertising campaign anytime soon. Why they released it to the public in this state to begin with is beyond me. 

 

Just have a look at their social media, facebook responses, it would be funny if it wasn't so sad. If they continue this denial that there are some serious issues here simply for "Public Image" then they are deluded. 

[System64]

I don't care how barren it is right now. In the current state, it is not fit to even handle more players, let alone hold them long enough. I would rather let this game simmer for a few years while fixing the mountain of issues it has than launching an advertising campaign anytime soon. Why they released it to the public in this state to begin with is beyond me. 

 

Just have a look at their social media, facebook responses, it would be funny if it wasn't so sad. If they continue this denial that there are some serious issues here simply for "Public Image" then they are deluded. 

I stand corrected.

[lafinjokinnumnut]

ive tryed everything..EVERYTHING..its still a broken down pile of shart...its cool..i have titanfall2 

[Compliance]

I find it hard to believe anyone is still trying to play this stupid piece of crap...

 

Meanwhile...I've moved on and am enjoying playing the new free Unreal Tournament Pre-Alpha. Plays like a polished game...dependable, beautiful...smooth as silk...no stupid-ass bugs like this dumper. All kinds of servers up. Hope to see you all there while we wait for something to be done on this purposely torpedoed franchise...

[WmMoneyFrmMissouri]

I find it hard to believe anyone is still trying to play this stupid piece of crap...

Meanwhile...I've moved on and am enjoying playing the new free Unreal Tournament Pre-Alpha. Plays like a polished game...dependable, beautiful...smooth as silk...no stupid-ass bugs like this dumper. All kinds of servers up. Hope to see you all there while we wait for something to be done on this purposely torpedoed franchise...

Take your hateraide back to unreal. I and the GRR will miss you, you know this. People still playing this game though. We all wanted an update, we got one. Be careful what you wish for could be the lesson learned here. I am having fun though so there is that. Only way to go is up !

[Gueber]

We tried.

[HYDRA_CXX]

Guys how do I log off my acc on Hawken in steam? Went back from a 2 year break and used my 2nd acc but I want to open my 1st account yet I cant find  the log out button anywhere.

[Compliance]

Take your hateraide back to unreal. I and the GRR will miss you, you know this. People still playing this game though. We all wanted an update, we got one. Be careful what you wish for could be the lesson learned here. I am having fun though so there is that. Only way to go is up !

No hate here. I was one of the biggest proponents of this game early on.

 

Nobody wanted an update. I didn't "wish" for any update. What we wanted was to keep the version that worked, and the servers that used to be present. This latest Frankenstein was supposed to be some kind of "fix" for the previous failed "fix", which in turn was a failed "fix" for an earlier version...two stages back...which worked just fine. So what we ended up with is a version that's worse than the two before it...unplayable for many people. It's the most absurd business plan I've ever seen. So, you have "fun" where you are...and I'll have fun where I am.

[claisolais]

Take your hateraide back to unreal. I and the GRR will miss you, you know this. People still playing this game though. We all wanted an update, we got one. Be careful what you wish for could be the lesson learned here. I am having fun though so there is that. Only way to go is up !

I wanted more customization, all they need is to release old chassis parts, and I'll throw money at them.

Maybe new map new game mode, as well.

 

I was careful

 

Look what they did.

 

They've found another way.

[teeth_03]

It's already been simmering for years. It's about to spoil if it sits on the stove much longer.

[CZeroFive]

I have been out for the better part of a week or so. Let's get some stuff cleared up:

 

There's going to be some rough patches while we address issues in this update. Nothing is *ever* final, especially with a game like Hawken and you guys should know that too. We're a small team, and we're working incredibly hard daily on bugfixes and polish items.

 

Let's also keep in mind that if we had kept the game running in its previous state, it would have died out for a multitude of reasons. It just simply wasn't sustainable. Change is needed for Hawken to survive, and I feel like the general consensus of the community is that we need to address the issues in question. We are addressing them. The hitboxes, for example, have a pending change that we are going to implement in the next update. There are crash fixes for those who have not been able to launch the game, among other features, balance changes and new content.

 

We have also ramped up the customer support team and they are working as hard as they can to get you guys in and playing the game. It's completely unacceptable to us that you guys are having issues, and we're looking into more permanent solutions for those who can't play to automatically fix those players that have corrupted client files and cannot log in.

 

I will have our team put together full patch notes for the next update when it is available. We're not leaving you guys in the dark and we want to make sure Hawken is enjoyable for all players.

[WmMoneyFrmMissouri]

Thank you for your hard work. We're a "passionate" bunch is all. ;)

[DieselCat]

Still waiting to hear back from the support tickets I submitted concerning not being able to login to my 2 Legacy accounts that have lots of hours and content. Aside from the other issues, this is my problem I'm most concerned with. I understand you folks are swamped with may things on your plate atm...but I'm worried that I may lose everything here.

 

Hope to hear back from someone about something soon.

 

Only reply(s) given were....

 

5/29/17

Your request (5625) has been received and is being reviewed by our support staff.

To add additional comments, reply to this email.

 

and

 

6/4/17

Capnjosh (Hawken Entertainment, Inc.)

Jun 3, 10:16 PM PDT

I've kicked off a password reset. Try something different and let me know what happens.

We hit some database problem with a service provider last year, and your account may have been affected in a "special snowflake" sort of way. We've since rebuilt the entire database system, so we're in good shape for the future. However, this issue is certainly not one we had seen until now. We'll get it fixed up though.

[CZeroFive]

Still waiting to hear back from the support tickets I submitted concerning not being able to login to my 2 Legacy accounts that have lots of hours and content. Aside from the other issues, this is my problem I'm most concerned with. I understand you folks are swamped with may things on your plate atm...but I'm worried that I may lose everything here.

 

Hope to hear back from someone about something soon.

 

Only reply(s) given were....

 

5/29/17

Your request (5625) has been received and is being reviewed by our support staff.

 

To add additional comments, reply to this email.

 

 

 

and

 

6/4/17

Capnjosh (Hawken Entertainment, Inc.)

Jun 3, 10:16 PM PDT

I've kicked off a password reset. Try something different and let me know what happens.

We hit some database problem with a service provider last year, and your account may have been affected in a "special snowflake" sort of way. We've since rebuilt the entire database system, so we're in good shape for the future. However, this issue is certainly not one we had seen until now. We'll get it fixed up though.

 

Please contact 505's support. They will get the info forwarded to the right location. We're in the midst of moving support over to them.

 

https://support.505games.com/

[DieselCat]

TY...

[William_Adama]

o yay bigger hit boxes scout becomes a tier 0 mech thanks.  please can you fix the MMR or use something else it's a cluster fuzzy bunny.

 

Edited by William_Adama, 26 June 2017 - 06:18 PM.

[CZeroFive]

o yay bigger hit boxes scout becomes a tier 0 mech thanks.  please can you fix the MMR or use something else it's a cluster fuzzy bunny.

 

 

As we posted in other threads, we are evaluating options regarding matchmaking. We will inform the forums when we have reached a conclusion.

[William_Adama]

match making is one thing but I was referring to ranking system it's self I heard people are losing a lot and you got people not tilting in any way shape or form.

[CZeroFive]

match making is one thing but I was referring to ranking system it's self I heard people are losing a lot and you got people not tilting in any way shape or form.

We're looking into the issues with people randomly losing and gaining random amounts of MMR as well. Some of you may have noticed that our leaderboards are no longer showing some high MMR players at the top. They were affected by the bug and we'll continue to monitor the situation.

[William_Adama]

ah, thanks for the info on it. I thought I was going crazy from the heat that is outside were I live

Edited by William_Adama, 26 June 2017 - 09:37 PM.

[fez]

Thanks for the updates, C05.

[Morquedeas]

I have been out for the better part of a week or so. Let's get some stuff cleared up:

 

There's going to be some rough patches while we address issues in this update. Nothing is *ever* final, especially with a game like Hawken and you guys should know that too. We're a small team, and we're working incredibly hard daily on bugfixes and polish items.

 

Let's also keep in mind that if we had kept the game running in its previous state, it would have died out for a multitude of reasons. It just simply wasn't sustainable. Change is needed for Hawken to survive, and I feel like the general consensus of the community is that we need to address the issues in question. We are addressing them. The hitboxes, for example, have a pending change that we are going to implement in the next update. There are crash fixes for those who have not been able to launch the game, among other features, balance changes and new content.

 

We have also ramped up the customer support team and they are working as hard as they can to get you guys in and playing the game. It's completely unacceptable to us that you guys are having issues, and we're looking into more permanent solutions for those who can't play to automatically fix those players that have corrupted client files and cannot log in.

 

I will have our team put together full patch notes for the next update when it is available. We're not leaving you guys in the dark and we want to make sure Hawken is enjoyable for all players.

 

Balance changes you say?  Maybe run those changes past us before including them in the update, if you please.

 

Nothing personal, but I am a bit skeptical of the dev's abilities to properly balance the game right now, and it would be pretty easy for us to let you know if it's a good or bad idea.  This would be preferable to finding some preposterous change on the day of the update that makes me not want to play.

[CZeroFive]

Balance changes you say?  Maybe run those changes past us before including them in the update, if you please.

 

Nothing personal, but I am a bit skeptical of the dev's abilities to properly balance the game right now, and it would be pretty easy for us to let you know if it's a good or bad idea.  This would be preferable to finding some preposterous change on the day of the update that makes me not want to play.

 

We'll be announcing them when they are upcoming, but we do not bend to the every whim of the community because they think it's a good idea - especially a singular or small subset of our players instead of the community at large. There's a lot of... undocumented players that keep to themselves. The forums and discord represent a very small portion of the people who play this game.

 

That being said, a lot of players do not even get to experience an informed opinion of balance because of the average lifespan that a new player sticks around. If anything, we will be researching based on data and general consensus.

 

All I ask of you is to have faith in our decisions. We've pretty much admitted that there are some things wrong, and we need to find solution to those things.

[DeltaBravo]

We'll be announcing them when they are upcoming, but we do not bend to the every whim of the community because they think it's a good idea - especially a singular or small subset of our players instead of the community at large. There's a lot of... undocumented players that keep to themselves. The forums and discord represent a very small portion of the people who play this game.

 

That being said, a lot of players do not even get to experience an informed opinion of balance because of the average lifespan that a new player sticks around. If anything, we will be researching based on data and general consensus.

 

All I ask of you is to have faith in our decisions. We've pretty much admitted that there are some things wrong, and we need to find solution to those things.

Keep doing what you're doing.  Too many people fail to realize that changes are much more than "a few lines of code".  While I have been vocal about the latest update, I also know that I am not the only player out there and that development is not always as glorious as you want it to be.  I have seen that you are aware of the complaints throughout the community and I will continue to keep faith that there will be positive progress once all of the kinks are ironed out.

 

I began playing the game a short time ago and was made to feel welcome, which kept me around.  Plus, the game ain't half bad (I'm kidding, it was pretty good prior to the update).  I've spent the money on the pretty and don't mind doing so, as I see it as my contribution toward the game's progress.  There's no doubt that things are in disarray at the moment and I won't even try to pretend have an inkling of what's going on behind the scenes, but I do like to see regular communication from "those in the know".  If we can nurture the new players and retain them, that would be a a win for the home team.  Word of mouth can make or break you, so if a friend tells a friend, who in turn tells a friend, there can be a chance at rebuilding the player base.  

 

 

 

 

TL;DR  Game development ain't easy.  Be patient.  Be nice to other players.

[Morquedeas]

We'll be announcing them when they are upcoming, but we do not bend to the every whim of the community because they think it's a good idea - especially a singular or small subset of our players instead of the community at large. There's a lot of... undocumented players that keep to themselves. The forums and discord represent a very small portion of the people who play this game.

 

That being said, a lot of players do not even get to experience an informed opinion of balance because of the average lifespan that a new player sticks around. If anything, we will be researching based on data and general consensus.

 

All I ask of you is to have faith in our decisions. We've pretty much admitted that there are some things wrong, and we need to find solution to those things.

 

Bending to the whim of the community would definitely be a bad idea, but that doesn't mean we should be excluded from balancing entirely.  There are plenty of people on the forums that offer suggestions backed with evidence or rational.  While the vocal community is a small portion of the whole, we could still help avoid some of the more disastrous that are almost universally opposed (the shock coil changes and reverting Gren's ability for examples).

 

Ages ago in games long past I advocated the "every players opinion is equal" approach to balancing, but not anymore.  Balance for the top level, provide comfort and quality of life changes to lower levels to prevent sour experiences like getting pubstomped by scout and such (without necessarily rebalancing the scout).

 

This is going to sound harsh, but I don't see the dev's are being as qualified for raw balancing of the game as the veteran community given less experience, less skill, and less understanding of mechanics/techniques.  Data and metrics are probably a bad way to analyze balance considering how small Hawken is, and how colossally exaggerated the skill spread is.

 

In my opinion, the majority of the balance changes to Hawken in the softlaunch were steps backwards, so I have no faith, only hope.

[William_Adama]

no big nerfs are really needed, the ranking system needs to do it's part no matter how much you nerf a mech you cant nerf skillz.

[CZeroFive]

Bending to the whim of the community would definitely be a bad idea, but that doesn't mean we should be excluded from balancing entirely.  There are plenty of people on the forums that offer suggestions backed with evidence or rational.  While the vocal community is a small portion of the whole, we could still help avoid some of the more disastrous that are almost universally opposed (the shock coil changes and reverting Gren's ability for examples).

 

Ages ago in games long past I advocated the "every players opinion is equal" approach to balancing, but not anymore.  Balance for the top level, provide comfort and quality of life changes to lower levels to prevent sour experiences like getting pubstomped by scout and such (without necessarily rebalancing the scout).

 

This is going to sound harsh, but I don't see the dev's are being as qualified for raw balancing of the game as the veteran community given less experience, less skill, and less understanding of mechanics/techniques.  Data and metrics are probably a bad way to analyze balance considering how small Hawken is, and how colossally exaggerated the skill spread is.

 

In my opinion, the majority of the balance changes to Hawken in the softlaunch were steps backwards, so I have no faith, only hope.

 

You have to remember that a lot of the changes we've made are constantly being evaluated and tweaked based on data and opinions of players plus ourselves playing the game.

 

We look at what players are using, what their KvDs are in each match, MMR values of each player in the match relative to their performance, etc. It's a long and complicated process to actually balance the game, and not just easy as '5% of the community that posts on the forums says the general consensus is x is unfun'.

 

To be completely honest a lot of players don't even know shock coil exists, and a very small percentage even have the grenadier in the first place. If you saw the numbers, you'd be shocked at the percentage of players that only own 5 mechs or even realize internals exist. We can get to the balance stuff when the game is fundamentally enjoyable.

Edited by CZeroFive, 27 June 2017 - 08:52 PM.

[William_Adama]

c05, who would want to use grenadier now anyways turret mode is dreadful for any mech to have and if the % was low why would you go out of the way to change the grenadier so much ? I haven't done the new tutorial for this game but you should add a tutorial for internals and how to get new players to use them if the numbers are that low  also your skynet dosnt help.

[lafinjokinnumnut]

personaly i dont get why the game crashing small patch was not released already..just a small patch to keep it from locking up...only reason i can think of is you want to chase the old players off..

[Morquedeas]

You have to remember that a lot of the changes we've made are constantly being evaluated and tweaked based on data and opinions of players plus ourselves playing the game.

 

We look at what players are using, what their KvDs are in each match, MMR values of each player in the match relative to their performance, etc. It's a long and complicated process to actually balance the game, and not just easy as '5% of the community that posts on the forums says the general consensus is x is unfun'.

 

To be completely honest a lot of players don't even know shock coil exists, and a very small percentage even have the grenadier in the first place. If you saw the numbers, you'd be shocked at the percentage of players that only own 5 mechs or even realize internals exist. We can get to the balance stuff when the game is fundamentally enjoyable.

 

There may be a logical and appropriate approach to balancing, but some of the changes are so baffling to me that I have trouble believing they could be the result of a sound developmental process (I won't go into detail here).  I think this is mostly limited to the changes that were made in the original port to consoles, and I can only compare between the original PC version and the current PC version.

 

I wholeheartedly agree that making the game enjoyable and accessible to new players should take precedent over balance right now.  But it still irks me that we are now stuck with balance in it's current state while other things are worked on, when balance would have probably been better left alone entirely.

 

I'll be waiting for the hitbox update, and I'll be sure offer my 2c on whatever balance changes come if they warrant it.  I think balance will be "in the negative" relative to the old PC version, for a long time though.  I also feel that this discussion may be coming to it's end...

[claisolais]

personaly i dont get why the game crashing small patch was not released already..just a small patch to keep it from locking up...only reason i can think of is you want to chase the old players off..

Or probably assume: Since you've been here through the great silences, you probably are going to stay anyway.

Every time I log in, I want play it less...now I just need a trigger...another game, and I AM chased OFF.

 

Another evidence: Someone up there being super patient havent even fully leveled every old mechs. 

Edited by claisolais, 28 June 2017 - 01:22 PM.

[teeth_03]

I logged in yesterday for the first time since the update. I had no issues linking my legacy account. However, I am baffled by the decision to add so many more Mechs as if that's not going to be daunting to new players. If anything was going to save this game, shotgunning Mechs at us is not it. I would prefer to see more customization options versus more prebuilt mechs.

Since the initial Steam launch, I have always felt the game to be too fast paced. I guess you are trying to appeal to the younger crowd, but there is nothing here to keep those younger players here. I would like to see either the game entirely slowed back down, with slower movement and more TTK, or specific game modes you can play that has this.

This game I think needs to appeal to players who are used to more traditional mech games, and I think it's just too fast for that. It doesn't need to be as slow as MechWarrior, but the pre-steam Hawken always seemed like the best Hawken for me.

Also, if anything, games need to be longer. TDM games are just too short, they end by the time they get started.

[Morquedeas]

I logged in yesterday for the first time since the update. I had no issues linking my legacy account. However, I am baffled by the decision to add so many more Mechs as if that's not going to be daunting to new players. If anything was going to save this game, shotgunning Mechs at us is not it. I would prefer to see more customization options versus more prebuilt mechs.

Since the initial Steam launch, I have always felt the game to be too fast paced. I guess you are trying to appeal to the younger crowd, but there is nothing here to keep those younger players here. I would like to see either the game entirely slowed back down, with slower movement and more TTK, or specific game modes you can play that has this.

This game I think needs to appeal to players who are used to more traditional mech games, and I think it's just too fast for that. It doesn't need to be as slow as MechWarrior, but the pre-steam Hawken always seemed like the best Hawken for me.

Also, if anything, games need to be longer. TDM games are just too short, they end by the time they get started.

 

This game already has a pretty long TTK compared to most shooters out right now, and remember, this is NOT a mech sim, its more of an arcade style shooter.  Appealing to the "younger crowd" is probably the best way to do it since there is no "crowd" that wants to play a slow mech game nowadays, that's just too niche.

[lafinjokinnumnut]

ok sell me the patch to fix the crashing..how much

[TangledMantis]

When the 'soft launch' happened, Devs seemed to be very active on forums and even asking us for feedback by name. I almost felt like they were in the process of actively fixing things and refining the game. Shortly after, they just left us again. We're back to mods locking threads and giving out murky answers. 'Near coming update' was the last statement I read. Course, we were expecting an update 'soon' 3 months after RLD acquired Hawken, so this next update could take 5 years for all we know. 

  

Course, they're welcome to give us a straight story, but dont. I think organization is a real problem in their offices.  

 

That or they think if they ignore us for long enough and leave us to use a broken console port, they wont have a PC client to worry about maintaining anymore.

[Silverfire]

When the 'soft launch' happened, Devs seemed to be very active on forums and even asking us for feedback by name. I almost felt like they were in the process of actively fixing things and refining the game. Shortly after, they just left us again. We're back to mods locking threads and giving out murky answers. 'Near coming update' was the last statement I read. Course, we were expecting an update 'soon' 3 months after RLD acquired Hawken, so this next update could take 5 years for all we know. 

  

Course, they're welcome to give us a straight story, but dont. I think organization is a real problem in their offices.  

 

That or they think if they ignore us for long enough and leave us to use a broken console port, they wont have a PC client to worry about maintaining anymore.

 

Soon could be today. Soon is sooner than you think.

 

 

 

Do you want them working on the game or drafting up a few dozen forum responses?

Edited by Silverfire, 05 July 2017 - 11:31 AM.

[Call_Me_Ishmael]

Soon could be today. Soon is sooner than you think.

 

 

 

Do you want them working on the game or drafting up a few dozen forum responses?

 

Please view this thread for more information: <link>

 

:D

[EMEUTIER]

Let's also keep in mind that if we had kept the game running in its previous state, it would have died out for a multitude of reasons. It just simply wasn't sustainable.

 

I still love this bit.

I read it as "we needed more 'pay to win' because we cant think or any other way to get money so we ruined a great game"

[CZeroFive]

I still love this bit.

I read it as "we needed more 'pay to win' because we cant think or any other way to get money so we ruined a great game"

It's not about getting 'more money', Hawken has never been able to sustain itself. This is about keeping the game alive at this point so that the folks who want to play on all platforms still can. You read my quote the wrong way entirely.

Edited by CZeroFive, 13 August 2017 - 01:59 AM.

[claisolais]

It's not about getting 'more money', Hawken has never been able to sustain itself. This is about keeping the game alive at this point so that the folks who want to play on all platforms still can. You read my quote the wrong way entirely.

Your soft-launch doesn't support that idea. I've heard ppl against releasing at that early version. Previous version of game lasted so long and still have many more player than current state--I know people continuously leaving the game, but rush launched is killing it with a faster pace.

Let's not be rush this time. Right idea, but without communication, it still might heading deeper into the wrong direction.

At least it led player reading words wrongly.