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FirestormGamingTeam's avatar
FirestormGamingTeam

It's not a good move, period, Sony has had so many issue with account security. People should not be forced to own a PlayStation account for a game that was not released for them or brought by them through that platform.

Personally, I don't mind as in this house we have Xbox ultimate, pc ultimate and psn network accounts because of lots of children. But others do not.

Sturmer's avatar
Sturmer
FirestormGamingTeam

Yea, I've seen some Reddit users report that they are unable to register a PSN account, even if they wanted to =(

FirestormGamingTeam's avatar
FirestormGamingTeam
Sturmer

Yup, PSN is banned in multiple countires

CelestialFlea's avatar
CelestialFlea

There's also been some very poor behaviour from several community managers, one of whom saying "Because we want to ban players" or something along those lines. She's since deleted her twitter account, which is a terrible move for a CM to do whether she was forced to or didn't want to deal with the fallout of her actions.

Additionally in their official Discord another CM told a player who criticised the decision "I thought you were refunding and leaving"

And then there was this god awful take..

I think he was reigned in and scolded for his unprofessional behaviour as he's since apologised for his behaviour, saying that he acted out of frustration and significantly backpedaled. I believe he was probably threatened with his job after behaving like he did and I don't think it's going to undo the damage he did. Apologies for it not being in order.

Whilst I truly believe Arrowhead's hands were tied by Sony and they were probably blindsided to an extent, I believe they should still be held to account, let me explain why

They KNEW this was coming this whole time and could have planned for it much better, but they did nothing. There's no way they didn't know that there would be players from 120 different countries Sony and them respectively had sold the game to and would no longer be able to play after they started enforcing this. There's also the issue of incessant data breaches at Sony,. 3 that were known about last year alone. A pretty good reason not to want an account huh?

Perhaps it was made clear to players when they bought the game, but is anyone excited about buying a new game really gonna be reading a small box tucked in the bottom right corner? Nope. Gamers often don't read things right infront of them, in big writing.

I think this whole thing displays a degree of managerial incompetence from both Sony and Arrowhead, both of whom had plenty of time to prepare for this. Rather than risk angering the entirety of the PC playerbase that actually made their game a huge success they could simply have left it alone and take the W but instead they chose to be tone deaf and lacked any tact.

Such an easily avoidable fustercluck!

Boomer's avatar
BoomerMod
CelestialFlea

Hey CelestialFlea, there's no denying those comments aren't great, but let's steer the conversation away from calling out individuals. I couldn't imagine replying to a community member like that, but then again Just About is a far more friendly platform than the ones they're used to.

Can you imagine having to be the person in the community turns to during all of this? That must have been an immensely difficult position, and in hindsight I bet they wish they handled it differently. They have their employer on one side, the community on the other, and a long history of developers receiving abuse behind them. I can see how they'd be having a bad day and in all that stress and frustration make some poor choices. Let's just try not to contribute to that.

All that said, none of this is to shut down the conversation, but I wanted to share as someone in a community role.

CelestialFlea's avatar
CelestialFlea
Boomer

That's why I mentioned and included the full apology for additional clarity so people can come to their own conclusions whether they were spoken to or had a genuine change of heart, I do genuinely believe it's the later. I simply wanted to present the facts here, granted mixed with my own personal opinion. I hope that was ok, wasn't intending to call anyone in particular out but rather present additional context people may not have been aware of if they don't follow social media.

I can certainly understand things from a perspective of managing a community, I've helped to manage several large communities myself. It's not an easy task, large communities like this can be quick to turn toxic over the slightest thing. Though I'll agree there's been toxicity on both sides of the fence and misdirected anger that Arrowhead may not have deserved.

As Sturmer said they're trapped in a really awkward situation, that yes..could have been better prepared for on their end as it was absolutely known about but also isn't their decision ultimately. I believe the poor behavior from CMs can probably be attributed to inexperience in their roles as much as anything else.

Boomer's avatar
BoomerMod
CelestialFlea

No worries you're all good, and I share your belief that they likely had a change of heart 🙂

It's an unfortunate truth that tough situations like this will happen again, and when they do, I wonder how studios can better communicate with their audience?

CelestialFlea's avatar
CelestialFlea
Boomer

I believe many studios fail at clear communication because they treat negative feedback with contempt, especially when it's en-masse and they blame their players. We get fobbed off as entitled little brats (granted many review bombers are) rather than trying to understand why they're receiving negative feedback in the first place.

Granted they'll never make everyone happy but instead of even trying we often get treated with complete disdain and lack of empathy which only fosters the ill will between them and their consumers.

A great example of how a company can restore good-will is 2077, CDPR owned their mistake and apologised to us for letting us down. They put years of hard work into putting things right and at the end of it, they were rewarded with an award winning DLC and praised by so many people who hated what they got at launch and were heavily critical of CDPR. Making for one hell of a come-back story.

Yes, some people were completely unreasonable as they were screamed at to release the game, then got screamed at for releasing it too soon and some people will never touch a CDPR game again. But it proves that goodwill can be restored even after a complete disaster, with the right management and people supporting them.

Boomer's avatar
BoomerMod
CelestialFlea

I couldn't agree more! Building a community takes a long time, but invalidate their experiences and treat them with contempt and they'll (rightly) turn in an instant.

CDPR really put the time in and it paid off in a big way. I was lucky not to experience too many bugs at release, other than Jackie pulling a gun instead of the chip out of his head! 😆I hope CDPR keep in mind the things they've learned as they work on the next Cyberpunk title.

CelestialFlea's avatar
CelestialFlea
Boomer

I didn't have anything that couldn't be resolved with a reloaded save, Jackie replicating his chopsticks, shifting through walls and a quest target spawning behind a wall at the Plaza. All pretty minor things, but the difference between now and then is um...NIGHT and day.

Sturmer's avatar
Sturmer
CelestialFlea

Arrowhead is trapped between corporate cogs... this is so sad.

I just found out that PSN is not available in at least 7 European countries, including several that are part of the EU. According to Sony Terms, if you are using a VPN and provide a fake address (of a supported country) that could lead to a PSN ban and data erasing.

CelestialFlea's avatar
CelestialFlea
CelestialFlea

There was a fresh apology coming from Spitz I wanted to add to my response for extra clarity which I wasn't aware of at the time of posting. Owning your mistakes like this, takes a certain degree of courage and I believe it is genuine. So I have to give him full credit where it's due but the damage is already done. I believe this simply comes down to hiring individuals who are simply too inexperienced for such a high pressure role.

Sturmer's avatar
Sturmer

Well, they could probably mitigate the damage, by offering some unique and great looking cosmetic item(s) to players who links/creates PSN.

CelestialFlea's avatar
CelestialFlea
Sturmer

That'd probably go down as well as a $250 edition of Helldivers2 xD Maybe if they waited a little while before adding those perks it MIGHT sweeten the pot for some, else imo it'd be seen as insulting.

Kane Carnifex's avatar
Kane Carnifex

Sony got how often hacked at least twice...

MONEY MONEY MONEY MONEY... as long the rubel rolls nobody cares. You care but you have no rolling rubel!

Dave's avatar
Dave

Apparently it's been delisted on steam now from around 170 regions that aren't supported by PSN accounts. Don't know if this is steam/valves doing or the publisher.

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