[Feedback] Dev Diary Summer Event 2019

[JoBeth]

During the summer, people are away on vacation, children are home from school, and people, in general, don't have enough time to spend hours on the game. I have one guildmate that went up 5 levels due to the increased xp, others that weren't able to complete the 25 minis. I used to have the resources to buy a lot of gems, shoot, I'm still on premium time I bought 3 years ago, but now the economy has turned and I can't afford to buy any. It would be great to have an event where nothing was available for gems.

[SirPool]

Agree with ghannima, and other post sentiments.

The triple XP was a good idea, also including ventures in the event adventures list was a welcome addition.

BUT, BB still hasn't fixed observatory, from ... how long ago was that now? The Prem Friend Buff was sort of good, but so unclear with what would or wouldn't work. It messed up the PH and RPH times so much also, that made it hard to run anything like Storm recovery or anything that requires the use of a PH.

Prices of event items are extortionate. The game has sadly changed to a pay-to-play model which takes a lot of the excitement from the game. While I have been here for a number of years and explorers did a lot of the work for me, I would hate to think of what the experience is like for a newer player.

I did not get many of the things that I would have normally aimed to get, the perceived effort involved made the goal too far off. Instead of the events being an opportunity to gain special buildings etc, the only thing I did really was enjoyed some of the extra XP, but didn't really even push with that too much.

Feeling burned out from the effort that this game wants to demand now, started to look around for something fun to replace TSO.

I wish events were fun like they used to be instead of a grind like now.

[SG73]

I agree with others. There needs to be more events where adventuring isn't the focus. Events like this one I can only imagine how new/newer players felt. Chances are they only had a few explorers. And very few gens. And the high cost of most stuff in the event merchant would make it very discouraging for new players.

Over the years in our guild, many who had been playing a long time would have been able to get what they really wanted & then we'd pitch into the "guild bank" to make a pool of event currency to help the new players get the important items like gens/geos/expos & stuff like coal recyclers, RPH etc. The past few events have seen it where we are lucky if there is much to spread around to help the new players. Seems the game has gone to where you either have to "grind, grind, grind" or you have to pay. And sadly if events keep going the way they are, TSO is going to start loosing a lot of players.

I know it's becoming pay to win when I used to see one, maybe two % sales during an event. This time there was three to four during the event with two in less then a week. Instead of pushing several 100% sales in our face. Why not offer a 200% sale for a change? You all had done it a few times before on Anno Online. No reason you can't do that here. Might entice more people to drop some $$ on the game. Those 125% ones are nice. But very limited (can only buy one of each & only 2 of the tiers available for those)

[Gargormess]

loved the 3x XP but ball drops horriable

[kzar]

It is true that even without gems, one could get a lot of balls through trade. However, this means that many players gave up on getting the high-end rewards or they bought gems. Both situations are bad in the long run:

1) In TSO, rewards earned from past events are essential if one wants to be able to do well in future events. If newer players can't enjoy their first events, they will quickly become frustrated and quit because their only option is to sell their event resources to 'rich' players.

2) I would believe that most of the revenues are generated by a minority of compulsive consumers. This model can work very well in a market where the competition is high and a social status is attributed. However, there is no champion of TSO, no competition outcome (RIP PvP). While some players can spend thousands on their island, the 'poor' players simply have no extra motivation to keep playing. In other games, new and free players will grind all day, because even the underdog can win it all.

Finally, this summer was the Women's World Cup. BB made absolutely zero effort to adapt the content of the event (specialists, flags, missions, quests, etc.). Soccer is possibly 8th or 9th sport in the US, behind college leagues, golf, Nascar, and maybe even pro Wrestling. That's almost as good as Valentine's day in March.

[LordMadmax]

I earned Balls so I could give them away to others, so they could get something they wanted to buy with them.
I think the event went well BB_Odhran.

[Frogtalk]

Now that the summer event is over, a few things I want to comment on. The triple EXP and chance of double loot on all advs was nice, but with the pricing in footballs of a lot of event items, it should have been ALL double loot. I liked the mini missions achievement, it was a nice switch from having to do the same 1 or 2 adventures ad nauseum. the prices of the event merch were by far way too unreasonable. BB hit it perfectly a few years ago, when those who aren't able to be everyday players, but could do adventuring and trading, get about half of the event items, if they did some adventuring and trading. Now, it seems you must adventure 16 hours a day, every day, on top of being very aggressive trading to getting about 3/4 (maybe more, depending on how dedicated you are) to getting the very over priced items. I lost about half the event due to unforeseen loss of the internet, and had to do a lot of adventuring and super heavy trading to get some of the items at the top of my list. I realize that the goal is to make people buy gems for the event currency, but to be honest, by making things so overpriced, and NOT increasing the treasure loot or adventure loot, is simply turning a lot of people off the game. I think that this was one of the least played events of my guild, and my personal belief is that it's because events are happening so often, and are so out of reach for a lot of my guildies. Just my observation, if you made events to where with some trading and adventuring, you could get half of the event items, then with gems/heavy adventuring and trading, you could get all of them, BB might see an increase in players.

[pittyness]

the event was not all that bad.Like the x3 xp and the x2 loot. One major issue was adventures they did not drop enough balls for the work. 2nd major issue with summer resident house you needed balls 1k to do a lvl and thats not fair. these items should never use event items to upgrade

I ended up spending gems to get things sure bb likes that and it was alright lots of good item to get this event. so work on better drops on those adventures next event and thanks for fixing loading problem that ran 6 days into event

Pittness

[Gwalben]

Sadly, those soccer ball numbers were double loot. Didn't seem like it. I liked the beans, though.

[KirkMac]

I give it four balls out of ten.

Things are overpriced and poorly implemented. Language/translation issues to some degree, but there is just no excuse for some of the bugs that plague the game for years n' years. Not to mention the lag and the game going down for hours at a time. Just... frustrating. The game going down like that cost me the weekly log-in bonus (fine, whatever, it happens) but it also put me behind the curve for event collectibles, so I failed to get the last achievement by 12. Frustrating.

Another gripe was all the explorers sent out before the event ended who turned up with no soccer balls. And how about all the stupid bits and buffs cluttering up the menu from events past? Red cards, Cuddle bears, Pony rides, Truce offers and Golem waters/Marbles, etc. When you deactivate an event, hide the junk. Or have a filter toggle to "Show inactive items". Don't have highly variable buffs show up as the first item on the buff menu. When another free Premium day showed up, I didn't notice and dropped an oodle of Fish Steaks instead of Sammies because they had been bumped over one space and the picture only peeks out on the default menu.

However the Flashplayer issues, hotkey inconsistencies, lag, etc... It's these things, these "quality of life" issues that have not been remedied since the server launched. These are the reasons I stopped buying gems. You've jacked up the prices, given terrible and misleading descriptions on purchase items, and are requiring insane amounts of real world time. Who the heck ENJOYS endless, mindless grinding? That's not how you change my mind and win me back.