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totallyseiso · 4 years

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The For Honor team have announced their plans for next year, so to save people from having to search for their statement, I'm going to put it here so you can see what they're planning:

Hey Warriors,

We know that you have been waiting patiently to know what’s going on for next year in For Honor. We are excited to announce, today, what we have planned for Year 4: The Year of Reckoning.

From launch three years ago to For Honor today, we are incredibly proud in the progress the game has made, none of which would have been possible without the unique relationship that we’ve built together with you, our players.

Year 4 is about learning and building upon what we have experienced together in these past 3 years. Let’s keep the party going!

We’ll be able to share more details in January 2020 but here is an overview of what’s in store.

Year 4 – The Year of Reckoning

The Year of Reckoning is a turning point in For Honor’s history. The great war that has been raging over the past years takes an unexpected turn. The earth has quietened down, but new leaders arise and warriors across all factions need to decide what they are really fighting for.

Four Unique Seasons and Two New Heroes Joining the Fight

Like Year 3, Year 4 will have four new Seasons, each with its own theme, rewards, and activities.

Two new faces will arise during the Year of Reckoning. One Hero will be released during Year4, Season 2, and the other during Year 4, Season 4. Their arrival will coincide with the storyline, as well as the events of the Year and its seasons. We can’t wait to find out which side you choose!

You will be able to purchase them upon release or unlock the new Heroes with steel as usual.

Seasonal Progression Update: Battle Pass in, Year Pass out

Starting with Year 4, Season 1, we will be introducing a new reward system with the For Honor Battle Pass.

In the past, rewards relied solely upon random drops after matches and scavenger crates, which gave little visibility on the items you were able to unlock.

Now you will have clear objectives throughout the 100 tiers within the Battle Pass where you will be able to unlock items through gameplay. The battle pass will be limited to character customization items and consumables meaning that you do not need to purchase it to have access to the two new heroes coming during the year.

The For Honor Battle Pass will consist on a Free pass and a Premium pass, with a shared progression across the different tiers and resetting with each new Season.

Everyone will have access to the Free pass and its rewards. In the Free pass, you can unlock items such as ornaments, steel, color swatches, champion status, embossings, and more.

Owners of the Premium passes will have access to unique customization rewards such as new signatures, new weapons, new executions, new effects, and more.

Both free and premium passes will have rewards for all heroes.

It was also important for us to make the Premium pass an addition to, and not a substitute for, the existing means of getting content in the game. Thus, we will be keeping original options for players with new content of the week, sales, and scavenger crates /drops at the end of the matches to get customizations items.

We will have more details to share on the Y4S1 Battle Pass and the season itself in January 2020.

Fight - Core Experience

With 26 characters in the current roster and two new faces joining the fight in Year 4, balancing remains a top priority for us. This includes hero balancing, of course, but also game mode balancing.

A major step toward strengthening our process of balancing has been the introduction of Testing Grounds.

For Year 4, you can expect this tool to have a big role in how the dev team continues to bring changes to the game. The focus of the year remains on increasing character viability, allowing for a wider range in team composition at a higher level of play, and continue to improve offense to enhance the core gameplay of For Honor on a more general level.

Competitive

The competitive nature of For Honor has been part of the experience since the get-go. One of the main reasons why the competitive scene has continued to grow over the years is thanks to you guys who have supported it at a grass roots level. Year 3 was the first step in better supporting the tournament/competitive scene of For Honor, with more visibility on community tournaments, in-game prizing, but most importantly the introduction of the spectator mode.

The competitive scene is extremely important to us as it is to you. It helps us grow the community and is ultimately a compass in shaping the experience of the game. The competitive scene is a pillar which we intend to expand on in Year 4 with a new all-access competitive program set to launch.

More details will be shared soon.

More to Come

We will expand on all of these elements in January as we get closer to launch of the Year of Reckoning, we are really excited for what this year has to offer!

Lastly, we want to thank you for all the creativity that you guys have shown us over the past 3 years. Whether it be cosplays, fan-fiction, memes, videos, and fan art; we felt inspired for Year 4.

That is why we will be working with renowned artists for each season’s iconic image, starting with the Year 4 image below, made by the American illustrator AJ Frena. Representing the Year of Reckoning, we are proud to be able to share her piece of art with you all today and cannot wait to share more details later in January for what’s to come in For Honor.

Oh! And one last thing… new armors are coming this year.

Happy Holidays Warriors,

For Honor Dev Team

#for honor #year of reckoning

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thesevenseraphs · 6 years

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Bungie Weekly Update - 7/17/18

This week at Bungie, we released a prestigious update to Destiny 2.

It’s been another busy week. We deployed Update 1.2.3, kicked off a World First raid race, and started up the last Faction Rallies of Season 3. All on the same day!

You can read the full patch notes to get all of the details on what has changed. We also whipped up another Dev Insight video that dives into what’s new and what else is coming with the Solstice of Heroes event this summer.

Along with the news and commentary about the update, we also showed off what you’ll earn in the Solstice of Heroes. The event starts on July 31 and is available to all players of Destiny 2.

World First

We had a double serving of World First runs this week. Tuesday featured Prestige Eater of Worlds, and Wednesday followed up with Prestige Spire of Stars. Players already knew the mechanics and were at max Power, so it was just a matter of who could execute the quickest with the loadouts and modifier we threw at you. Here are the results…

Prestige Eater of Worlds

Eon

Tehkidmarc

GooeyGravy

Phammy

Chevy

Gigz

Prestige Spire of Stars

Incerae

Sotosolice

Noviq

EtherPanda

Balla

Alex

Congratulations to these elite fireteams who rose above the rest. These races were close—Spire of Stars saw the top two teams finish within a minute of each other. The next World First race is coming in September. Maybe your team will be the next to be honored here.

A Final Rally

Future War Cult is still riding high from the last Faction Rallies, where they claimed their first victory ever. Dead Orbit won the first event of this season, so New Monarchy should be eager to reclaim the crown they wore many times last season. Who do you think is going to win? Go to the Tower to cast your vote.

This is the final Faction Rallies event of Season 3. Grab up any gear you haven’t collected yet. Here is a look at what you can expect through the month of July:

Hotness

We returned from Tampa earlier this week with full hearts and sweaty clothes. Our away team went down to GuardianCon to show off Gambit to a sea of players, many of whom were excited to try out the new mode. It was great to meet everyone who attended and to hear stories of clans meeting in person for the first time and the impact Destiny has had on some players. All together, the event raised $2.7 million for St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital. It was an astonishing outpouring of generosity. Thank you to everyone who donated.

While we were there, we put Gambit on the mainstage in a friendly competition to see who could take home the really tall trophy we made. Everyone played well, but team Gambiteers won in an exciting final match, in which one of the rounds left True Vanguard shocked and speechless. You can watch a replay of the event on the GuardianCon channel.

Player Support Report

You may have noticed we have a fancy new GIF. We are rebranding this section. Player Support Specialist Chris Alejo has the details.

Player Support Specialist Chris Alejo has the details.

Chris: Some of you may remember, in a bygone era, Bungie’s weekly blog was titled the “Bungie Weekly What’s Update.” In the age of Destiny, in partnership with our Destiny Operations Center, we took this name and began publishing a segment called “What’s Up, DOC?” The purpose of this segment was to inform Destiny players of known and emerging issues, as well as make official statements on the state of the Destiny service. This segment has long since been authored by the Destiny Player Support team, but now we’re officially making it our own. Players can expect the same content and coverage that they’ve come to know in “What’s Up, DOC?”, but with a fresh coat of paint and a new identity. Our prime directive continues to be serving Destiny players.

Today, I’m proud to announce that this segment is donning a new name: the Player Support Report.

Destiny 2 Update 1.2.3

This week, we deployed Destiny 2 Update 1.2.3 to players. This update brought changes to the game experience, including Prestige raid lairs, new Exotic Masterworks, and Crucible playlist updates.

Since this update has gone live, two important issues have emerged that we’d like to bring to the attention of players:

Armor earned from the “Leviathan, Eater of Worlds” raid lair is not displaying its Prestige raid lair ornament or ornament requirements. These ornaments may still be unlocked by completing the actions listed below. This information is also available in this help article.

Head Armor Ornament: Complete Prestige “Leviathan, Eater of Worlds” and the Throne Challenge

Arms Armor Ornament: Complete Prestige “Leviathan, Eater of Worlds” and the Gardens Challenge

Chest Armor Ornament: Complete Prestige “Leviathan, Eater of Worlds” and the Pools Challenge

Leg Armor Ornament: Complete Prestige “Leviathan, Eater of Worlds” and the Gauntlet Challenge

Class Item Ornament: Complete Prestige “Leviathan, Eater of Worlds”Weapons earned in Prestige raid lairs cannot be infused directly into other Legendary weapons. They may be infused into Exotic weapons, and those Exotic weapons may then be infused into non-raid Legendary weapons, but players should exercise caution when doing so because non-Prestige raid lair Legendary weapons will be capped at 385 Power when infused. This information is also available in this help article.

[Editor’s Note: Weapons from Prestige raid lairs and armor from Solstice of Heroes were not intended to be infusion fodder for two reasons:

These items are intended to be trophies, for players to show their accomplishments leading up to Forsaken.

If players who own Curse of Osiris but do not own Warmind use these items for infusion, any gear infused above 335 Power will no longer be available for use.

Players who have already done this can claim a duplicate of their weapon from their Weapon Collections, which will become available to all players when Forsaken launches on September 4, 2018.]

Players who have not yet done so should see the Destiny 2 Update 1.2.3 Patch Notes with full details on this update. For information on future updates, players should follow @BungieHelp on Twitter and monitor our support feed on help.Bungie.net.

Faction Rallies

Right now, Destiny 2 players are invited to participate in the final Faction Rallies event of Season 3. Players can pledge to Dead Orbit, Future War Cult, or New Monarchy for glory and rewards, but they should be reminded that all pledges are account-wide.

Players in search of more information on Faction Rallies should see our Faction Rallies Guide. Players who encounter game issues should report them to the #Help forum.

Bungie.net Emblem Codes

Over the past months, players have had the opportunity to earn exclusive Destiny 2 emblem codes by participating in special offers in the Bungie Store, as well as by playing Gambit at E3 and GuardianCon.

Players who have received these codes should visit our Code Redemption Guidefor information on how they can redeem the codes. When redeeming Bungie.net codes, players should pay close attention to which account they are logged in with. Codes redeemed on unintended Bungie.net accounts will not be restored or returned.

#Destiny #Destiny the game #Destiny 2 #bungie weekly update

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foxgraphics325 · 3 years

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Alpine Windows Media Player Skins

Steps to Change Skins on Windows Media Player Step 1: Of course, you will need to start the Windows Media Player. Click on Start and type Windows Media Player to bring it up. Windows Media Player Skins Portfolio. Windows Media Player Skin. Client: Warner Bros. Entertainment + C- 2 Pictures. Net Media Module Windows Media Player skins is one of The Skins Factory's most comprehensive WMP skins to date.

Windows Media Player Skins In Windows 10

Windows Media Player Skins 12

When I first started using a computer I used to play all my music on Winamp Player. And as a kid, I was obsessed with all the interesting skins that came along. They were all the rage those days. I used to change them frequently and enjoy the new look and feel. I am sure many of you can relate to this.

However, most of us have moved on leaving that child in us behind. Though we still like beautifying our desktops with widgets and themes, I don’t see new content on the internet these days on media player skins. Today, just to refresh my memories, I tried applying skins on Windows Media Player and my joy found no limits.

So, I thought I should put down the process and you could take a dive into your memories as well. All skins support the basic functionalities and some of them have additional features too, to my surprise.

Steps to Change Skins on Windows Media Player

Step 1: Of course, you will need to start the Windows Media Player. Click on Start and type Windows Media Player to bring it up.

If you are in Now Playing mode, you should switch to the Library mode by clicking on Switch to Library.

Step 2: Navigate to Organize -> Layout and ensure that Show menu bar is ticked. If not, do it right away.

Step 3: On the menu bar, click on View and then on Skin Chooser. This would bring up the interface where you could select different skins, view/apply them, remove or even download new ones.

Step 4: Select a skin from the left pane (preview is available on the right) and click on Apply Skin if you like it.

You can download (must be logged on as the administrator) more exciting ones by clicking on + More Skins and following the instructions on the website that follows. Here’s the official page for Windows media player skins.

Note: To return to the player Library at any moment, right-click anywhere on the skin and select Switch to Library.

Conclusion

As you have seen, it is really easy to change skins on Windows Media Player and take a break from the bland and regular interface. Do not forget to tell us about your favorite skin and the additional features (if any) that it had.

The above article may contain affiliate links which help support Guiding Tech. However, it does not affect our editorial integrity. The content remains unbiased and authentic.

Windows Media Player Skins In Windows 10

Also See#windows media player #How-to/Guides

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With skins, you can change the look of Windows Media Player in a couple of clicks, as often as you like. Some skins just change the appearance of the Player with graphics and animations, while some also add new features. Skins are easy to download and install—and you can freely switch between different skins in the Player using the Skin chooser feature.

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Windows Media Player Skin Importer

Windows Media Player Skin Importer makes Windows Media Player skins from WinAMP skins.This utility is easy to install, and you have to follow these steps to convert the skins:- select the source directory for the WinAMP skins to be imported- choose Convert Skins.The original WinAMP skins will not be modified.

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WinCustomize Browser

Everybody likes his Windows should look unique and appealing, without wasting so much time in customizing every element there. WinCustomize Browser as name states is powerful software to customize virtually every component of Windows. It is powered by instant access to unmatchable library on web containing huge stock of themes, skins, icons, wallpapers for your Windows only.

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The KMPlayer

Developed by KMP Media, KMPlayer is a well-known media player in this branch by most of the users because it shares notoriety with other applications of this kind like BS Player, VLC media player or Gom Player.A clever media-player solution to take into consideration for any type of user.

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Fusion Media Player is the smallest fully-featured media player available!It is based on DirectShow© and features all the latest audio and video formats, if the appropriate codecs have been installed. fusion is free and doesn't contain any spyware or spam.

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VLC is a free and open source cross-platform multimedia player and framework that plays most multimedia files as well as DVDs, Audio CDs, VCDs, and various streaming protocols. Plays everything - files, discs, webcams, devices, and streams. Plays most codecs with no codec packs needed - MPEG-2, MPEG-4, H.264, MKV, WebM, WMV, MP3...

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Windows Media Player Skins 12

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exilesofembermark · 7 years

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Game Dev Update | 4.28.17

“You ate the last Twinkie...” - Master Dwarf Thisguy ^

We’ve waited to show more than a glimpse of the dwarven race on Embermark until our own hammers were pounding out the mass of loot we’ve promised in Dev Updates past. Now that the promised loot train is rolling, it’s time to really take a look at our stout, grumpy friends.

Last update, we covered the beginning of our game mode experimentation, world map navigation, a Legendary sword and the ability to view your Battle History. This time, its about content and gameplay. Read on to check out our new icon system, new battle environments, new loot, an upcoming AMA, your chance to help design an item that ends up in the game and what we’re learning about battle mechanics.

Oh, and dwarves.

DWARVES

Whether they’re holed up in the caverns and carved-out tunnels of Siege or feverishly rebuilding the once-great Anglon, dwarves in Embermark are a force to be reckoned with. Here’s an Elite version of our angry fellow from above:

We started the dwarf-creation process exploring what we wanted the basic proportions, faces and gear types to be, as well as where they reside in Embermark and what their background is. As you can see below, Beardbo Grumperson IV there on the far right is a look we’ve stuck with through the representation of our Elite fellow above.

There are a few geographic locations where the dwarves in Embermark tend to be found (though they travel and team up a bit more than dwarves in many other settings), and as mentioned before, the region of Siege is one of them. They’ve gone underground for the past several hundred years as Embermark was overrun and a terrible place to live, but a few ancient entrances to their underground lairs are still visible on the world map:

3D design proceeded much as all the humanoid races we’re developing have-- from the base player model, with some changes that led into a distinctly dwarven look:

And unless the dwarf in question has been beaten in battle to a humiliating degree lately, he/she usually has some manner of facial style going on:

We couldn’t resist this one:

And this one, with a better look at some of the tattoo designs we’re playing with:

I’ve mentioned the history and background of the wolves in Embermark before (despite my bold-face lie about there being no rats, bats, wolves or skeletons in this game). They’re a mean and cunning lot, with far more organization to a “pack” than typical.

Well, this gives you a clue about how dwarves on the continent feel about them:

Depending on the proportions of our humanoid NPCs, we’re making versions of all their gear to also fit the player, for extra tasty drops.

ICONS

When you have a lot of lootses in a RPG, someone has to make the icons. And usually, artists hate doing it cuz there’s so many and it takes so long and it’s not sexy.

WRONG.

With Exiles, it is sexy (and so are you). We’ve had the same placeholder sword/boot/pants icons in just about every screenshot you’ve seen up till now (like here and here). No more!

Because we aren’t satisfied with that (and hate sleep), we created a new icon creation pipeline that takes EACH design for a piece of loot and creates an icon for it. So for every item you get, you’ll see a Tier 3 (that’s the highest) image of that item over a rarity color (either nothing, blue, purple, gold, or green) to give your loadout that extra oomph you’ve been looking for.

GAME MODE EXPERIMENTS

As fast as the content train is moving, the mechanics train is hurtling along just as fast. Now that we have most of the Abilities, Stats and Talents working for the Warrior and Mage classes, we’re diving into what will make the moment-to-moment gameplay the most strategic, satisfying... and visceral! To that end, we have our 4-Ability loadout that we’ve talked a lot about, but last week, we got a second mode of combat going-- The Deck.

With The Deck, the rules of the game are still the same:

WEGO-style turn-based with initiative determining order of ability execution

Abilities combine with Gear & Talents to create effects on either character

First character to die (there’s no fainting in Exiles) loses

However, instead of a 4-Ability Set, you now choose 8. 4 are chosen for you randomly at the beginning of a Battle and the others are in queue. As you use Abilities, they cycle back into the deck and the next Ability in the deck becomes available (see the smaller “coming” Ability represented below-- that is WIP as is everything in these Updates, and it will get a proper UI representation if it ends up being something we support).

Initial testing has proven fun and maddening-- my main Mage “MoarMagicks”still can’t consistently beat SingmeAsong’s main Warrior “Jackal,” despite my clearly superior strategies and build-- and we have some work to do on what the mode does to overall balance. But it’s promising, and we’re excited to show it to you if it ends up passing muster.

AMA

We’re getting ready to do another AMA! If you’ve got burning questions about Exiles, from features to rules to lore to whatever, join the crew and the community for an evening of anything goes-- even making fun of the devs-- we can take it. Submit questions/discussions now on the Reddit thread, and we’ll have some answers ready. And you can win stuff! We’ll be doing some good old-fashioned rolling (of virtual dice) for in-game prizes (loot table is forthcoming, and will be published on the AMA thread in the forums).

So head over to the Discord channel on MAY 9 at 5:30 PM Central Time and get the inside scoop on all things Exiles.

WE HAVE AN ANDROID BUILD

“WHAT?!”

Yes. MANY of our early testing sign-ups have Android devices, and I have some good news for them-- we have an early Android build! Now, before any shenanigans break out, you should know that it’s rough, new and not as far along as the iOS build. But it lives, and you Android users will be kicking arses before too long right beside your iOS brethren.

VANISIR

Along the southwest of Embermark is a region called Vanisir, a mostly arid-- but critical-- piece of land, given its major port, resources and the presence of a manageable Breach. We’re rolling out Battle environments for each of our starting world zones, and Vanisir’s first can be seen here, with an unfortunate player sizing up the enemy that I can’t stop showing to you-- the overly intelligent and vicious WOLF.

“Hey, didn’t I just see you atop some dwarven shoulder armor?”

THE PLAYER CREATED GEAR CONTEST (PCGC)

Players have been guiding us every step of the way toward Embermark and it’s time for them to get a piece of loot or two (or more) in the game. All of the rules surrounding battle and loot haven’t been revealed, but those of you following the development of the game probably have an idea or two rolling around in your heads about a piece of equipment that would do X, Y, or Z.

So the 1st Exiles Player Created Gear Contest (PCGC) is on! Check this thread in the forums for all the details and how to submit your idea. One lucky (and clever, and creative) winner will get their piece of loot in the game (and get a copy of it themselves) and many will win prizes based on the criteria you see in the official thread!

LOOT UPDATE

The loot train continues, and our artists are feverishly designing, modeling texturing and lootzing armor weapons and even rings now (rings are just icons, so they won’t show up on your person, but whatevs).

Armor for the Warrior is getting the color-tell treatment, as we showed for the Mage armor earlier. You’ll see it throughout the system as you start to play, and it’s turning out to be both useful and sometimes hilarious, depending on the how close your gear build preferences are to your color preferences (did someone say transmog? *whistles as he walks away).

Behold the Axe of Cleaving (your head from your body)!

You will see this spear put to good use by our draconian friend below.

I’m not even sure what to say here other than I wouldn’t want it connecting with any part of me...

We continue to design various silhouettes for shields, for those sword-and-board enthusiasts out there...

And here’s one more! (this one’s a stock broadsword, but I still lurve it)

MILITARY

Last couple of Updates, we’ve been showing off a race of baddies that will hound and hinder you throughout your journey to be among the Marked. Their political and military machinations threaten to overrun the entirety of Embermark.

They also look like dragons, have wings and are awesome. Now we’ve got them animating in the engine and will be playable in short order. Like the dwarf above, we created their gear with an eye towards dropping it for you to use in your own loadouts.

(Alas, I had to fool with this one quite a bit to get it under Tumblr’s 2 MB GIF limit, so if you want a higher quality look at this attack, it’s here)

REMEMBER

We’ll keep sharing details as we head into testing (remember to PM TheWizard on the Exiles forums if you want in on closed testing & beta later), and you can count on early impressions from the testers throughout our various channels.

If you haven’t already, follow along with the Exiles development on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. And if you haven’t, I’ll find you. And SMITE you.

GET IN ON THE CHATTER

If you want to hear about the game, ask questions or connect with others who are helping the development team think about features, design and narrative, hop into the Discord Channel for live chat and say hi– it’s a friendly lot with plenty of daily shenanigans (there’s even a Shenaniganizer).

THE BONUS

I leave this here without comment.

#gamedev #rpg #mmorpg #mobile games #fantasy #games #video games #eoe

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entergamingxp · 4 years

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Riot on developing the next big competitive FPS • Eurogamer.net

Riot Games’ five-on-five tactical shooter Valorant recently launched on PC, where it seems set for inevitable success after a recording daily player counts of three million during its much-hyped closed beta period. Now that the game’s out in the wild, I took the opportunity to speak to several members of the Valorant development team at Riot Games, including the title’s game director Joe Ziegler and tech director Dave Herionymous.

The interview below touches on a wide range of tech topics, including the game’s custom forward renderer, the challenge of meeting their 128-tick processing target and which hardware plays the game best. Some game design questions snuck in too, including those passed on by Redditors in this thread – like tweaking the strength of the game’s tagging mechanic, designing new characters and implementing fan-requested features like left-handed view models and retake servers.

In total, eight (!) members of the Valorant dev team took time to answer questions, so let’s break down the full squad participating today. In alphabetical order, they are:

Paul Chamberlain, anti-cheat lead

Dave Heironymous, tech director

Brent Randall, staff engineer

Marcus Reid, principal engineer

Felipe Romero, principal engineer

David Straily, game tech lead

Chase Swanson, senior QA manager

Joe Ziegler, game director

There’s plenty of fascinating stuff here, so enjoy!

What are the major differences between how Valorant is architected compared to other Unreal Engine games? Did you need to take any novel approaches to attain your high performance targets?

Marcus Reid: Wherever possible we try to follow Unreal Engine best practices and minimise deviation from the stock engine as every customisation incurs an ongoing maintenance cost. With that framing, we have made substantial modifications to parts of the engine to hit our performance goals.

For example, we built a custom forward renderer (originally based on Unreal’s mobile rendering path) with our own render passes and highly optimised shaders that only support the minimal set of features required by Valorant’s art style. It’s much faster than what we were able to achieve with the more fully featured renderer shipped with the stock engine.

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The recent Unreal Engine 5 demo was an exciting one for fans of PC tech. What did the Valorant development team think about the reveal, and is there anything of note in the demo that could make sense for Valorant?

Marcus Reid: We loved the UE5 demo and will carefully evaluate what makes sense for our game as more details become available. We regularly update to the latest version of Unreal for new engine and workflow improvements, but we also ensure that any new capability we use doesn’t degrade competitive integrity on older hardware that we still support.

Ensuring the game runs well on a wide range of PC hardware seems to have been a big focus, so what’s the lowest-end hardware that is able to hit a relatively stable 60fps? What performance targets did you have during development?

Brent Randall: It was always a goal to allow as many players to enjoy Valorant as possible. We recommend an Intel Core i3-4150 CPU paired with a NVIDIA GT 630 GPU and 8GB of dual-channel RAM for 60fps. Honestly, you might be able to get by on less if you’re willing to tweak your setup. During development we had targeted the Intel HD 3000 at 30fps as our minimum spec GPU but UE4 deprecated Shader Model 4.0 support, forcing our hand to drop support [also]. That brought us to the Intel HD 4000 which we support today; targeting the 3000 helped us out because now the 4000 can get upwards of 40fps and we’re comfortably within performance budgets.

Our devs ran a bunch of lab tests with high-skill players using a 1000fps camera to measure reaction times and peeker’s advantage.

Despite sustained interest from the CSGO community, Valve has so far declined to upgrade its matchmaking servers from 64 to 128 ticks, citing the performance impact this would have on lower-end PCs. When did the Valorant team decide on 128-tick as standard, and were there any issues with this tick-rate on low-end PCs you had to overcome?

David Straily: We decided on 128-tick servers early on in development. Our devs ran a bunch of lab tests with high-skill players using a 1000fps camera. We measured reaction times and peeker’s advantage, and looked for the best implementation cost/player value compromise.

While you can never get rid of the peeker’s advantage (the “defender’s advantage” pipedream!), you can mitigate it. The most sensitive situations are with high lethality guns (like the Operator, which in most situations, is one-shot-one-kill). With time to kill being so low, every millisecond counts. 128-tick really was the sweet spot for us.

As to the impact on low-end PCs – it is correct that if your PC’s frame-rate is <128, the benefit of 128-tick servers is reduced. However, performance impact can be mitigated (eg through move combining, & downsampling the send to clients with low frame-rate). A significant amount of our players have client frame-rates above 128, and we want to provide our premiere experience to as many players as possible.

We recently reported about Valorant being prototyped on console. With 120Hz televisions becoming more standard and next-gen consoles more likely to support higher frame-rates thanks to HDMI 2.1 and much faster CPUs, some traditional barriers that have kept PC shooters away from consoles are being eroded. What remaining challenges exist?

“Getting Valorant running at [4K] 120Hz on next-gen consoles is an achievable goal.”

Felipe Romero: The big challenge of taking Valorant to console is being able to replicate the core game experience using a gamepad controller. Valorant is a game that requires precise aiming, responsive movement, recoil control and being able to execute abilities in a limited amount of time. Is it possible to effectively execute a clutch play in Valorant using a controller? How much aiming and movement assistance can we provide without sacrificing the overall competitive environment? Valorant was designed to be played and experienced in a particular way. We want to make sure playing with a controller remains true to that core vision.

In terms of performance, we believe getting Valorant running at 120Hz on next-gen consoles is an achievable goal. This is mostly thanks to the aggressive performance targets that Valorant initially set. During development, we put emphasis hitting high frame-rates at commonly used resolutions. Being able to push a 4K resolution at 120Hz comes with its own set of challenges. Even with an optimised renderer and low instruction count pixel shaders, rendering a large amount of pixels takes a significant amount of time. Technologies like variable rate shading could help us reach these targets and we will be evaluating them for higher end hardware and next-gen consoles in the near future.

High refresh rate monitors are a natural fit for Valorant – I’ve been playing on a 240Hz model and it feels super crisp. Are there any gameplay or technical elements that require special attention when you know many players will be playing at 120Hz or higher?

Marcus Reid: 240Hz is wonderful. Pushing performance high enough to hit high frame-rates is the largest challenge. We’ve been playing on 120Hz and higher monitors for much of Valorant’s development, and the game is now fast enough that many machines can hit 120/144fps. Only very powerful machines are currently capable of hitting a solid 240fps in all gameplay scenarios. We’re still making improvements to high-end performance that will increase the range of computers that can fully utilise these screens.

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As 360Hz or 480Hz monitors become available over the next few years, will the game require any changes to take full advantage of these higher refresh rates?

Marcus Reid: To hit 360fps we need to process each frame in 2.78ms. To hit 480fps the target shrinks to just 2.08ms. That’s not much time to update the game simulation and draw the scene, even on very powerful hardware. We have more than 2ms of CPU work to do every frame, so we’ll need to increase parallelisation across available CPU cores in order to hit these numbers. We’ll also have to make sure our rendering remains blazing fast.

It’s likely we will support Vulkan or DX12 in the future.

Any plans for a version of the game client that supports Vulkan or DX12 in the future? What reasons made DX11 the best choice?

Marcus Reid: It’s likely we will support Vulkan or DX12 in the future. Early in the development cycle we targeted hardware that couldn’t run DX12 and engine support was less mature than it is today. We’ve done some initial evaluation of DX12 but need to do additional work to ship it as a supported mode. Valorant’s performance bottleneck on high end machines tends to be the game simulation rather than rendering, and we haven’t gotten big performance wins from DX12 in our early tests. If this changes as we continue to improve performance, DX12 becomes more attractive.

How much tech were you able to borrow from other Riot titles?

Dave Heironymus: In terms of core game engine tech, we didn’t borrow anything directly. A number of our engineers worked on League of Legends, and so that experience influenced some tech on Valorant. Ultimately the early decision to use Unreal, along with Valorant being a completely different genre from League, meant that the core game tech differs significantly from other Riot titles.

We do make extensive use of shared infrastructure and account tech owned by central teams. A lot of that tech evolved from League’s early years and it’s one of the key ways we benefit from the scale of Riot.

Were there any abilities that were especially troublesome to implement during development? Were any planned abilities scrapped due to technical limitations?

For every ability you see in the game, there were dozens before it that we tried and ultimately scrapped.

David Straily: Valorant by its nature is a very analogue/sandbox style of game. With there being great technical flexibility, there also needs to be a really mature development process around creating and harnessing abilities in a very sharp way.

I remember when we added Powered Ascenders (ropes) to the game – so many of our abilities broke because we hadn’t set proper constraints around the new game mechanic.

I imagine a future where we have many characters, all uniquely fantastical. To not make ourselves go insane, we’ll need to keep the bar high for how we implement game-systems – and make sure that we never get to a point where there is so much tech-debt, it’s impossible to expand the surface area of our sandbox.

(For every ability you see in the game, there were dozens before it that we tried and ultimately scrapped. I’m excited to bring some of the more zany abilities back in the future, but we first want to ship a well-defined founding cast of characters.)

At Digital Foundry, we’re always looking to add new games to our benchmark suite, but this requires consistent, repeatable scenes. Are there any plans to add in-client demo recording/playback or a built-in benchmark? What’s the best way to ensure any tests we run in Valorant are representative of real gameplay?

Marcus Reid: We don’t currently have a benchmark mode or replay support. These are features that we’re interested in, but we don’t currently have a firm plan or timeline for their delivery.

Games that run at high frame-rates tend to suffer from CPU bottlenecks, especially at low resolutions like 1080p. Presumably this is also true of Valorant? If so, what CPU characteristics provide the best performance – high core/thread count? High clock speeds/IPC? If a Valorant fan wanted the best experience in-game, what CPU would you recommend for 1080p at the highest possible frame-rates?

Marcus Reid: Yes; Valorant has low rendering requirements and is CPU-bottlenecked on machines with modern GPUs. Valorant makes heavy use of three to four cores and moderate use of remaining available cores. Over time we’re working to better utilise additional cores on machines with higher core counts. Currently, higher clock speeds/IPC will yield the largest direct performance benefits. Additionally, use of high-speed RAM can make sure you keep the CPU fed with enough data to avoid losing any CPU cycles.

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One of the most common criticisms of Valorant I’ve heard, particularly from a non-CSGO audience, is that the game looks bland – in a Eurogamer live stream, some viewers compared it to a mobile game. There are competitive reasons to ensure player characters are always visually distinct from their environment, but it does seem to turn some people off from the game. How did you balance these two concerns during development, and do you think that you’ve come close to maximising the game’s visual appeal without sacrificing competitive play?

David Straily, Game Tech Lead on Valorant: We are an unapologetically competitive game – and in order to maintain that focus, we have to make compromises on in-game visual fidelity.

We as Rioters often talk about our “black liquorice” culture. We target a certain type of game experience, for a certain type of player – we never intend to be a jack-of-all-trades experience; we know the game doesn’t appeal to everyone, and that’s OK. We deliver where it counts.

That being said, if we can hit our readability and performance targets – yet still level up the visual fidelity, we will do so. You’ve seen some of this on the transition from closed beta to worldwide launch (3D character select, spawn barrier VFX, orb VFX, etc). Expect continual improvements over time, we are a live service and always want to make the experience better.

Will players be able to restrict their matchmaking games to certain servers or set a maximum ping? Could matchmaking take player language into account, eg preferring to create teams who speak a common language? Players in the European and OCE regions seem particularly interested in these issues.

Joe Ziegler: We’re definitely looking into options that provide players, especially in custom games to specify what server would be best suited to handle their game, especially for teams where players are coming from mixed locations. In regards to general matchmaking, we are always investigating options that would allow players to control more options around their matchmaking, while still maintaining the quality of the matchmaking quality and speed to match of games. Every option we add has the potential to increase queue times for all players and make matches even more volatile, so we will be judicious with things that we do add, to ensure we still have a smooth matchmaking process.

One of the famous game design “wins” from Team Fortress 2 was the fact that each character had a unique silhouette, making them easy to identify at a glance. As Valorant’s roster grows, how do you keep different heroes visually (and otherwise) distinct?

Joe Ziegler: A lot of the work that we do in driving characters’ visuals is in creating distinct shapes, colour palettes, and colour zones that allow for better identification of characters from a glance. Additionally when planning their abilities we also utilise unique sounds and VO cues to ensure that when a character is doing a high impact ability, let’s say from behind a wall, you’ll be able to identify that character before you may even see them in your view. With these methods and philosophies in play, we feel we can continue to create future characters with the same identifiable clarity we have delivered upon so far.

One of the most noticeable changes moving from CSGO to Valorant is how much you slow down when you start to take damage (“tagging”). This effect seems much stronger in Valorant, making peeking in and out of cover more risky. Are you happy with tagging in its current state?

Joe Ziegler: We’re currently happy with the effect it creates, which is to push engagement and prevent combat from becoming “too slippery” in the sense that players default to pulling away instead of engaging. Additionally we’re also happy with the level of consequence it pushes for players advancing into an open area without using abilities to mask their advance or push back their enemies. We’ll always be looking into individual cases and tuning and tweaking based on what we see, but for now we feel like the interactions the tagging system is creating are strongly aligned with our gameplay values.

Incidentally, tagging was made less severe in patch 1.02, after these questions were sent in.

So far, we have several characters that can essentially throw flashbangs of various types, several that throw smokes, several that can self-heal. In terms of designing agent abilities, how will you ensure each role’s kit offers tactical diversity?

With our upcoming agents we’re looking to allow for the creation of new strategies, new types of plays.

Joe Ziegler: Our framework for the starting eleven agents in our roster was to cover the basics of the functions of the known tactical space in creative and interesting ways while also adding a few new elements here and there to challenge the notion of what is possible in the space. A lot of these basics are what you’ve described here, vision blocking, breaching, flushing and distracting, so a lot of our tools for our initial characters focused on filling those purposes. With our upcoming agents we’re looking to broaden a bit on that and challenge some new areas of the tactical space and allow for the creation of new strategies, new types of plays. I won’t give any spoilers here, but I look forward to seeing how the gameplay evolves with these additions.

The recent improvements to Vanguard – most notably, the tray icon that allows you to disable Vanguard until your next reboot – make a lot of sense. Is Vanguard now in a state where you’re happy with it, or are there any other community-requested changes you’re considering?

Paul Chamberlain: We’re always going to be looking for improvements that we can make to Vanguard and our anti-cheat efforts in general. One requested feature we have coming soon is that we will start giving feedback to players when a person they report gets banned for cheating. As we hear more requests for features from players we’ll try and see if we can bring them into Vanguard, since at the end of the day the anti-cheat system is here to serve the player community.

How large is the Valorant development team compared to that of League of Legends?

Joe Ziegler: Valorant’s dev team is about 150 people, which is smaller than League’s team.

Can Valorant support left-handed view models (“cl_righthand 0” in CSGO)?

We definitely hear the community on [left-handed view models]… expect to hear more on this in the future.

Dave Heironymus: We definitely hear the community on this one, and we’ve done some light investigation internally to understand how much work is involved. No committed timeline yet, but expect to hear more on this in the future.

Certain maps seem to appear a lot more frequently than others when playing ranked or unranked matches online. For example, I was in a game last night where another player said that they had never played on Split after seventy hours in-game. Is this a bug, or are the chances each map appears adjusted by the development team, eg in order to get feedback on new maps?

Dave Heironymus: We did actually reduce Split’s selection rate at launch because it’s a little less beginner friendly, but now all maps are equally weighted. We don’t do anything special to force map variety based on recent games, so with four maps and a 75 per cent chance to not get a particular map (eg Split). I can believe there are players out there who are unlucky (or lucky?) enough to not play on Split for long periods of time.

Recently a clip was posted on Reddit that seems to show that any wall can be penetrated – but only if you hit the enemy player in the hand. What were the most unusual bugs or issues reported by Riot playtesters in alpha or earlier?

Chase Swanson: Our test strategy for Valorant has involved Rioters from every discipline, inside and outside of our development team testing with purpose from even the very early stages of development. As you increase the variety of your gameplay (through features, characters, abilities, maps etc) you subsequently increase the amount of permutations where these features interact and potentially behave in unexpected ways. As this risk grows, our testing coverage must grow along with it. An example of this is a critical server crash we discovered when using Sage and Omen ultimates on the same frame in a match.

The hardest system to test for was probably Fog of War, as the intent of the feature is to explicitly obfuscate information from the client’s perspective. Bugs in this feature could result in the client seeing things that are not actually there, like ghost players taking sniper shots, or fake bombs on the minimap. Our QA Engineer on the game systems team had to build a unique test methodology to identify, isolate and reproduce these rare bugs. We’ve also had our fair share of fun ones, like players being able to ride character abilities like Gary the robot, or flying through the air on Sova’s dart.

However, our favourite bug of all time has to be the one where Cypher’s camera can equip a gun. I don’t think we would have found this issue even if we took another year to develop. Thank you to our players for finding and reporting this. You have taught us a lot about how to better prioritise what we can and should test before release.

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Desynchronisation issues are some of the most challenging to solve, as the effects are subtle and objective testing is problematic. How have you tackled this issue, and are any desync bugs still known to exist?

David Straily: We place big priority on creating “knowable systems.” Debug tooling, automation, telemetry, are all used to great effect to ensure we are creating stable systems.

One internal cheat we have is an overlay to detect “dropped shots” – every time you land a shot on your client, but the server registers it as a miss – we print out the (client and server) hitbox outlines and full debug data. QA and playtesters video record, we capture footage of the instance, and then fixes are prioritised as necessary on the dev team.

Competitive integrity is a core pillar for our game. When we discover desyncs, we fix them ASAP (above other features). A big benefit of us operating as a live service is that you can have confidence as a player that Valorant fixes are fast and frequent.

Spike Rush is an interesting new mode, and one that’s sparked interest amongst the community as to what other modes could exist in the future. Normally, game modding and scripting are key to seeing a wide range of new modes appear, but Blizzard has shown with Overwatch that building these tools into the game while retaining control of game files can also work well. Is this something that the Valorant team is interested in exploring in the future?

Joe Ziegler: We’ve definitely considered it, but I think ultimately we find it difficult to focus our efforts on delivering a streamlined experience while also supporting and helping to curate community created content. This may change in the future, but for the time being, given how much we are focused on bringing the gameplay forward, filling out our content, and pushing improvements to our out of game experiences, our developers already have a full plate.

Could Valorant technically support, for example, tens or hundreds of players in a single match, or a game mode with a much larger map?

David Straily: Not without some compromise on our 128-tick servers and client performance targets. If we ever were to do something at this scale, we would run a thorough investigation to find the best solve which maximises player value. In the ideal we would do something with dynamic tick rates, where you keep a high frame rate when it matters most in gameplay, and then scale it down in situations where competitive integrity is a less critical need.

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Retake servers are popular amongst CSGO enthusiasts, as they allow teams and individuals to practice the most crucial part of a round – retaking or defending a bombsite – with realistic positions, smokes and other abilities already in play. Could Valorant support this in future?

Joe Ziegler: Definitely a thought we’ve had in the past, especially as an alternate mode. It’s possible we may introduce something similar to this concept as part of our efforts to add more practice modes, or alternate modes in the future as we evolve the game.

How are match servers allocated when pre-made teams are split across multiple geographical regions? Are there any regions where the development team is looking to increase the number of available servers?

Dave Heironymus: Geographically dispersed pre-made [teams] are a tough problem, particularly in a game that prioritises minimising latency. The key metric for determining where to put a pre-made is “ping delta from best game server” and we try to minimise this value at all times. Right now we’re looking to fill out a few locations in North America and Europe, but we’re always looking at latency values across the world to understand where we need to invest more.

There was a point where frame-time on the server was ~32ms. We knew we had to eventually land on <3ms to be ship-ready.

What were the biggest technical challenges during development?

David Straily: 128-tick servers at scale. There was a low point in development where frame-time on the server was ~32 milliseconds. We knew we had to eventually land on <3 milliseconds to be ship-ready.

It is quite a daunting thought to know we’d have to achieve more than ten times the performance in just one to two years’ time. But somehow, we did it. I’m very proud of our engineering team and what we accomplished.

What advice would you give to an indie studio looking to create a game with a similar competitive focus?

Dave Heironymus: Deeply understanding the intended audience was critical to knowing what to prioritise for Valorant. We knew that players who love tactical shooters really wanted crisp gunplay, high fps and solid anti-cheat. Keeping those as our pillars helped us determine the right constraints for our art, design and tech teams to work within. Similarly, I think an indie studio would really need to hone in on what audience they want to serve and then really nail that audience’s core needs while keeping overall scope under control.

Thanks to the Riot Games team for their time spent answering these questions, and to the Redditors who contributed topics they’d like to see answered – including Nhirak, Raiid_CS, DoctorWho2015, TheWinterLord, BmpBlast, LittleLunia, Arkiece and LuxSolisPax who suggested particularly interesting questions.

from EnterGamingXP https://entergamingxp.com/2020/06/riot-on-developing-the-next-big-competitive-fps-%e2%80%a2-eurogamer-net/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=riot-on-developing-the-next-big-competitive-fps-%25e2%2580%25a2-eurogamer-net

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ladystylestores · 4 years

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How the pandemic has transformed work in the game industry

The pandemic has impacted all of us, including the game industry. Sure, many publishers are reporting record engagement and increased revenues as players flock to games for entertainment and distraction. But what about the people who make these games?

Over the past couple of months, I’ve talked to some of the studios, creators, and software makers about how COVID-19 has changed they way they work. Of course, this has meant adjusting to a new normal of people working remotely. Companies used to offices and immediate access to colleagues are now getting used to video conferences and turning personal spaces into working ones.

This changes the way games are made, and it can make the process more difficult.

Development never ends

Chris Wilson is the studio head for Grinding Gear Games, the developer behind the hit free-to-play action role-playing game Path of Exile. It’s a long-lived title that has become popular thanks to a steady stream of constant updates. It keeps offering new content, so its players are rarely bored.

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“One of the big attributes of Path of Exile that’s been successful is that there’s a reliable release schedule,” Wilson told GamesBeat. “We release every 13 weeks. One of the reasons why we get a lot of players at those releases is because the community just knows when — there’s a cadence to it. They know when to come back. They’re excited about it. It’s easy to drop back in. We want to keep that cadence. We don’t want to say, no, we’re delaying stuff for months.”

But not only is Grinding Gear always working on new stuff for Path of Exile, but the studio is also developing Path of Exile 2. It’s plate isn’t just full, it’s spilling over. And now it has to work on these projects with a new reality: people working from home.

“The concept of people working from home was something we really didn’t want to have to accept, but for health reasons of course, we have to put our staff’s health first, so we started to get things set up so that people could,” Wilson told GamesBeat. “And that setup time was important, because rather rapidly, as soon as New Zealand got its first case of community transmission in March, the government announced, you have two days to be working from home and everyone is in total lockdown.”

Above: Path of Exile 2 is Grinding Gear’s next game.

Image Credit: Grinding Gear Games

This is a tough situation for a studio used to close collaboration and outputting new content on a regular basis. Working from home can be good or bad, but it always different. And that uncertainty can be stressful.

“An artist working on Path of Exile 2 assets is going to work at his desk making assets all day just like he was before, which is great,” Wilson continued. “But all of the upper management is scrambling to keep people working efficiently from home, with our existing release schedule of updates. We have a management deficit for the sequel at the moment, which won’t affect its quality of course, because we’ll make sure to do the management as we can. It’s just going to affect its release time. We’re going to be in a situation where assets are ready earlier than we need them, because we’re behind on getting them integrated into the game and functioning correctly and so on. I do expect that the pandemic will probably have a bit of an impact on our release schedule for the sequel, but honestly it was up in the air anyway. It’s an ambitious project. We’ve said we’ll release it when it’s ready.”

Warframe developer Digital Extremes is in a similar situation. Warframe is another free-to-play game that receives constant updates. Rebecca Ford is its live ops director and one of the most visible members of the staff to the game’s community. She’s also the voice of the Lotus, who serves as an in-game guide for players. She does a ton of work for Warframe, and the pandemic has now changed the way she does that work, both in big and small ways.

“I miss having coffee on the go,” Ford told GamesBeat. “I miss having instant access to food I don’t have to buy. I miss our catered lunches. I miss just walking in and being fed. Woe is me! I said, unironically. I have to make my own lunch. This is insane. I have not had to make my own lunch in nine years, just for the record.”

Now that Warframe’s staff is working from home, employees are more dependent on communication tools like Slack to be efficient.

“We’ve been integrated in Slack so heavily for the past five years, I’d say, that it’s not too big of a change in communicating on Slack with my team,” Ford continued. “It’s just I don’t have any other option. I kind of regret how much I relied on Slack before when I could have just talked to people side by side, but now it’s like, you have no choice, it’s only Slack.”

Different platforms, different problems

And depending on what platform you’re developing for, you can discover some unique problems. Patrick O’Luanaigh is the CEO of nDreams, the studio behind the upcoming Oculus exclusive Phantom: Covert Ops, a stealth-based game that has you piloting a kayak.

“We’re a VR developer, so everyone had to take all of our equipment home,” O’Luanaigh told GamesBeat. “You can’t log into a VR headset remotely at the office, because you can’t put it on. You have to have your powerful PC to do your development and test on a VR headset at home. We had to get everyone’s headsets and hardware and PCs and monitors home with them, which isn’t quite the same in terms of more traditional development. But things like dev kits have had to go back to people’s houses. We had to get permission from the hardware manufacturers to take headsets home and all sorts of stuff. That was a bit of a pain initially.”

Phantom: Covert Ops releases on June 25. O’Luanaigh notes that it can be easier working on the post-production part of game when everyone is at home.

“We’ve found that for a game in the later stages, everyone knows what you need to do. You have your bugs to fix. Everyone’s got their task.”

Above: Phantom: Covert Ops is launching during a pandemic.

Image Credit: nDreams/Oculus

Pre-production, however, can be more fluid. People are creating concepts and building the foundations of a game. That can take more iteration and collaboration, which can be difficult when your staff is all working apart from each other.

Joel Burgess is the studio director at Capy, the developer behind the mobile hit Grindstone, a puzzle game that debuted alongside the Apple Arcade subscription service. Capy is based in Ontario, Canada, and Burgess has been helping the government there support gaming studios during the pandemic.

“I got thrown in very quickly when the pandemic started, into this committee for the minister of tourism, heritage, and culture for Ontario,” Burgess told GamesBeat. “We’re doing a whole bunch of meetings and subcommittees and all this stuff every week to make recommendations on how the government can support companies through COVID. I would say 90 percent of these meetings and subcommittee stuff is making sure that there’s financial health for studios.

The committee is especially important for indie developers.

“A lot of those smaller studios, having somebody who started the game pull out and now they’re not going to get a milestone payment, that can bankrupt them,” said Burgess . “The damage to the Toronto indie scene could be catastrophic, if suddenly a bunch of people who had been able to make it because of government assistance, if they can’t because those programs are bogged down in red tape or something.”

As for Capy itself, Burgess is glad that Grindstone became a known quantity before the pandemic hit.

“I wouldn’t say that the pandemic has been good for us. I think it’s more a matter of, from a damage mitigation perspective, I’m happy that we have a product on a platform like Apple Arcade that’s doing well,” Burgess notes. “Grindstone is out. We know what it is. We know what we like about it. We read what critics and fans say about the game and can respond to that. Which means the team has something to work on that’s really clear.”

But as O’Luanaigh from nDreams talked about earlier, stay-at-home work becomes more difficult for games early in the development process.

“We had other stuff going on in the studio that I can’t talk about, because it’s newer and earlier and still secret,” said Burgess. ” That stuff has been much more of a challenge, because those early stage projects have uncertainty in them already, and when we’re in this situation where people have anxiety about their lives and the world, and then you mix that with project anxiety, because everyone has a different version of this game in their head, that compounds.”

Capy is a small studio with just 25 people. This presents Burgess with an additional challenge: protecting his employees’ mental health.

“If I were still at Ubisoft, for example, there’s an apparatus there with HR and management relationships and all of that, to check in on people. When you’re in a small indie studio, you rely a lot more on organic personal connections to check on people, because you’re friends,” Burgess explained. “I’m concerned about it. People on the team with whom I’m close, I can get a sense that, say, this is a rough week for them. But we’re just small enough that we don’t have more formal systems for checking in on people, and we’re just big enough that you can’t rely on it being five people who know each other super well.”

Staying connected while stuck at home

Apps like Slack and Zoom have become a regular part of many gaming companies’ lives. Some are even using programs designed for less practical reasons to help make work more efficient. Benjy Boxer is the co-founder of Parsec, software that makes it possible for people to use cloud gaming to play and stream with each other. But Parsec also has tools for screen-sharing and accessing other computers remotely.

“You can use it as an indie game developer to log into your workstation at the office,” Boxer told GamesBeat. “But there are larger companies that are saying, hey, we really need this so that our game developers can connect to their workstations from outside the office.”

But people are still using Parsec for its main intention, which helps people play games together.

“That hasn’t really changed,” Boxer continued. We’re seeing a very significant increase in that usage, to be frank, but the way that people use Parsec is to play games with their friends. They invite their friends to join their PC and they play together. I believe what is happening is — from the consumer side of things, if you’re interested in that, people need a social connection. They’re using Parsec and games for that social connection, because we’re all isolated and feeling lonely. At least I am. Parsec is a great product to continue to connect to those who you want to be connected to. That’s what’s driving a lot of the consumer usage right now. People need that social connection, and then they want an escape through games.”

Above: Xbox Series X could be coming out during a pandemic.

Image Credit: Microsoft

Matias Rodriguez if the vice president of Technology Gaming Studio at Globant, an IT and software development company. I asked him about a logistical problem facing developers. Many of them have dev kits for the next-gen systems, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X. You need those to do a lot of work on games for those upcoming systems, but you can’t exactly move them around to different people’s homes. Is this going to have a big impact on the creation of PlayStation 5 and Series X titles?

“No, there is actually a workaround,” Rodriguez told GamesBeat. “We’re working remotely with them, so there is a workaround. The problem is that for some of the work, like optimization work, even with the best remote solution, it’s not possible. At some point — it doesn’t affect some things, because you can buffer them, but at some point it will require having those devices. I wouldn’t be surprised if Microsoft and Sony are having discussions about that. Now, next-gen, as you can imagine, you also have the complexity of manufacturing. There’s not a lot of stock. Logistics are more complicated. That makes things more sticky. It’s not necessarily a full hold on production, but it’s definitely something — it doesn’t have the velocity or productivity of Steam, something like that.”

Future impact

So far, Microsoft and Sony are still committed to releasing their new consoles later this year. But we don’t know exactly what impact the pandemic will have on the games coming to these systems. Considering the long development period for many games, we could be seeing the fallout of this situation for years to come.

But it isn’t all bad news.

“A positive is that a lot of companies are now seeing that they can have more time to develop,” Rodriguez continued. “That could translate into teams having less crunch time and other things that, toward the end of the game, could be more problematic. Now, if because of the pandemic, you earn four or five months of delays because it doesn’t make sense to release a huge title under these conditions, then you end up with more buffer, more time. Again, that’s on the production side. On the consumption side, for a lot of people, they’re discovering games. There’s something very interesting we saw the other day.”

And once the pandemic is over, can we expect companies adopt more lenient work-from-home policies?

“The honest answer is we have to talk to all the employees,” nDream’s O’Luanaigh told GamesBeat. “We have to see how they feel. People don’t really feel safe yet coming back to the office, and we certainly wouldn’t force anybody back until they felt comfortable. We’re going to wait and see how it pans out. But I’ll be very surprised if we don’t have more flexibility than we did before. I suspect that there will be more working from home.”

Right now, many parts of America are attempting to reopen. This could result in another wave of COVID-19 cases. And even if it doesn’t, the pandemic will have a lasting impact on how the gaming industry operates. Working from home may become more common for companies that once depended on the office environment.

Like most of the country, gaming wasn’t ready for the pandemic. But developers have done what they can to adapt, working hard to offer entertainment to millions of people looking for fun during a dark time.

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ciathyzareposts · 5 years

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Rule the Waves 2 Review : Does it Still Rule?

It’s June, 1944. A line of French battleships screens a motley collection of carriers, escort carriers, and destroyers. The sun is about to rise as flight crews prepare to attack a target in Sardinia. Our fighters are inferior to the Monarchist Italians, but our bombers are glorious. The signal is sent, and waves launch…

Rule the Waves 2 is a early-mid 20th century naval combat simulator/ship designer/bureaucrat game. Have you ever wanted to play as Jackie Fisher? Designing new fleets, tactics, all the while fighting off political demands? Balancing a budget, starting wars to get more money, torpedo’ing civil reforms? Then this is your game.

The first Rule the Waves was a surprise hit. It built upon a basic simulation layer (the lackluster Steam and Iron) with an entirely unique strategic layer. RtW1 broke ground into an entirely new area unlike anything else out there. From 1900 to about 1925 you got to control the great worlds navies and steer them through a changing era.

It’s like a cake. A base layer of chocolate cake is good. But add frosting and man, you’ve got a tasty creation. A subtle layering of flavors can make a basic dessert into a masterpiece. But get too wild or stray too far and you no longer have a tasty condiment but a mess of flavors.

The TLDR

Let’s cut to the belt armor here. RTW2 is a fun game. But it’s also a mess. It’s plagued by errors, crashes, bad design, complete lack of UI beyond Microsoft Excel, but through it all somehow maintains a quaint charm. The devs and publishers have screwed up PR in so many ways they make the Battlefront guys look civil and professional.

First let’s look at what it gets right. It gets a lot of things right. The ship designer, an afterthought of common derision in 4X games, is fun here. Not only fun but a place where a choice in the early game can have a long life into the 50’s.

As your technology progresses you’ll unlock better turrets, weight savings, speed, so a ship from 1945 is much more powerful than the same tonnage from 1915. You always walk the cutting edge between budgetary needs and military desires.

That is the core of the beauty here. Tradeoffs. Do you act belligerently for more funding, and tension, or play civil and stretch out a few more months till war? You always need more money. Tension is about the only way to get more.

The major change to RTW2 is aircraft. This is a game for the carrier age. While the Dreadnaught was king in 1918, the aircraft carrier reins supreme in 1940 on. Force projection really becomes amazing. You send your carriers to the extent of the range and strike, hoping that the enemy hasn’t done the same to you.

When it works right, it works exceptionally well. The horror of seeing 20 torpedo bombers appearing on your fleet is priceless. You definitely feel like a Nimitz or a Yamamato.

As each turn progresses you may get a political choice, you may see research progress, or even see a ship or sub completed. Depending on the budget you can design, build, train, allocate, shift about, or just click next turn.

Once you enter a war you’ll get missions. You may accept or decline them (as may the opponent). These range from convoy defense to bombardment to fleet engagements. Declining them costs victory points. The battles themselves are real time with acceleration.

The battles, for the most part, feel pretty good. The control setup is rather obscure and can be a pain for large fleets. One must be careful to not accept a mission with your forces deep inside hostile waters, and this can be a real pain depending on the theater.

Aircraft, the core of this release, are almost an abstraction. Yes, kind of visible in a weirdly obscure way, but they are functional. Little red dots signify air groups, slightly larger ones airships.

The AI is competent. It behaves like you’d expect and can surprise you with a destroyer rush. Sometimes missions end with no contact, but that’s OK, usually someone is going to Davy Jones’s Locker. Or wherever airplanes go when they crash into the water.

The process to launch them though is a pain. Unlike gunships that open fire on their own, you must give strike orders to your strike aircraft. Then the little icons fly off and eventually you get a pop up announcing a strike. You may get a few hits and they recover.

It is very satisfying to see things like airships and parasite fighters moving about of their own volition. Seeing AI strikes come and go is really exciting, even if you usually have zero control over the units. This is both historical, and in some cases absolutely not.

More than once I entered a war thinking I was predator only to discover that my battlecruisers lacked punch, or my planes were out ranged. Now I was on a defensive footing attempting to draw out the hostiles. The nature of the world map made this challenging as you don’t get to choose the engagements.

The Ugly

Which brings us to the bad. I’m tempering this as this is a small team (one man?).

Aircraft, the main theme of this game, are both land and naval based. You as the player can control the naval based aircraft. Determining the details of land based aircraft, beyond a checkbox, is out of your control. Which leads to the Thunderdome.

The Thunderdome is what happens when every airbase you have launches strikes along with every airbase the enemy has. For me this has been the Mediterranean. Aircraft don’t begin in the air, no assets are pre-deployed, every single plane launches at mission start. Often with hilarious outcomes.

But the utter lack of coordination can be maddening. Planes bomb airfields, hundreds of aircraft are destroyed, all the in the span of a day. By the next mission everything seems to be fine and beyond a VP loss doesn’t seem to make much matter. On top of it the game halts every time the Thunderdome progresses so it can take an hour of just pushing next while having no control.

It’s neat to see the first time but then becomes rapidly stale. Much of this could be abstracted and simulated away and the player would be none the wiser. About the only time it could have an impact is when land based air units directly come hunting.

Among the most glaring issues is the war system. The world will only go to war against you. Multiple nations may attack you, but they will never attack each other. Now a nation may ally with you and appear in a limited fashion, but you never get to dogpile into an AI war.

Confederates? Really?

Another odd choice is including the Confederates States of America as a “what if” but not including the Ottomans, a historical figure that at least could have had an interesting navy. Countless other “minor” powers would have made for more engaging gameplay on a limited scale. Let me play a Spain or Sweden with a more limited scope.

Supposedly SAM’s and AAM’s are coming in a future update but I’m not sure it’ll add much other than a layer of abstraction rather like the bombs or torpedo’s.

The homegrown DRM is another oddity worth mentioning. You purchase the game, run it, generate a Site code and a MID string. Then you send the codes to an email address. Then you wait for an individual to respond back with your serial number. You get a 3 day grace period in case said individual is busy.

The DRM Conundrum

My concern is for the future. What if NWS ceases to exist? This software is tied to one machine and is now non-transferable. Instead of DRM free or even on Steam, I have to deal with a generic GoDaddy webstore tied into some sort of manual key generation. These are all problems that have been solved, NWS attempting to go it alone is just odd.

I’ve seen enough games where the servers go dead, the phone-home mechanic dies, or someone just screws up, and I’m stuck with a dead game. The potential for that occurring here is real. This game is viable only as long as someone with an @Yahoo.com email address continues to service it.

I’ve run into numerous bugs, crashes, errors, and general pop ups about floating point difficulties and other such gibberish. The game functions and I’m willing to wait for a patch or two for flawless execution.

Ship design can be frustrating when you try to make a ship and it just tells you it’s an illegal design without telling you exactly why it’s illegal. Same with overseas holdings, you need a certain amount of tonnage on foreign station but the mechanic doesn’t feel fun or engaging.

Even with the oddities, quirks, poor UI, and downright strange design choices, the game is fun. It’s an enjoyable romp in a whole new genre of game. NWS has laid groundwork in a particularly new and unique way that I hope others capitalize on. Rule the Tanks? Rule the Jets? Rule the Rockets?

The game could benefit from a simulator/auto-resolve in the vein of what TortugaPower made. Sometimes I don’t want to fight another cruiser battle.

It’s just waiting for a ridiculous mod of crazy tech like dual hull catamaran battleships with a carrier deck on top. Airships with guided missiles. Look at the crazy stuff you can make in Aurora 4X, but do it here. There’s so much potential, but I only see the game moving ahead in the current vein. I’m not sure NWS has the resources to create a title much beyond this one.

All in all, it’s worth the money. It lacks the quaint focus of the previous title and the expanded scope brings problems. A patch or two will hopefully subdue the nasty bugs and smooth out the gameplay. If you’re into the era definitely give it a go.

The post Rule the Waves 2 Review : Does it Still Rule? appeared first on The Strategy Gamer.

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cameronwjones · 5 years

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Event Heroes: How MozCon Creates an Active and Engaged Community

Each month we interview an events professional who is breaking the mold. This month we spoke with Danielle Launders—Community Events Manager at Moz—about building an engaged event community, setting event goals, event hacks, Spain and more.

Every year, over 1,000 marketers, SEOs, agencies, consultants and executives converge on Seattle for MozCon. This three-day event is the experiential flagship of Moz—one of the world's leading providers of search engine optimization (SEO) software.

Danielle Launders has spent over six years working on events at Moz—managing everything from sponsorships to collateral to content and all of the logistics in-between. Underlying Danielle's unique approach to events is a passion for bringing people together.

Topic discussed in this Event Heroes interview include:

Setting event goals

Delighting attendees

Incorporating a local environment into an event experience

Leveraging online and offline touch points to build an event community

Integrating event technology to measure ROI

Note: This interview has been edited and shortened for clarity.

Brandon: You’ve been at Moz for almost six years on the dot. During that time you’ve managed everything from smaller, intimate events to Moz’s huge annual customer conference. But before any of this, you worked as an environmental analyst. What led from your career in environmental science to where you are today?

Danielle: Honestly, I would say a lot of luck and chance.

I enjoyed my time in the environmental field, but after three years of driving 60 hours a week for fieldwork, I was ready for a change.

I had a discussion with someone and they told me about this exciting company named Moz who were hiring for their marketing team. This same person thought I’d be a good fit, and they knew the CMO so they made an introduction. I ended up going through the interview process and was hired.

I fell in love with the team, the product, and the community. It was just really exciting and I’m so fortunate it happened. I can't say I planned it. Sometimes life just works that way.

Brandon: Was the initial position for event marketing?

Danielle: No, actually, the initial position was for marketing administration supporting the whole marketing team. This gave me a lot of exposure to different marketing specialties and I found that events was an area I was most interested in. At the time, the event marketer was looking for extra support with sponsorships and MozCon, so I got to dive right in.

I've been helping with events and sponsorships at Moz since 2013. This year will be my seventh MozCon. Which is kind of crazy!

Brandon: Moz has a very active community of over 600,000 marketers and SEO specialists who actively contribute to the Moz blog, chat on social and, of course, attend Moz events. Could you tell us a little bit about how you tap into this community?

Danielle: Community is such a strong backbone for both Moz, and MozCon. We really try to give our community members opportunities to connect with one another.

For instance, the MozCon Facebook community has become an extremely active year-round group and our members are so supportive of one another. The group ranges from first-time attendees to MozCon veterans, with more joining every year.

It’s a great way to get acclimated before the conference each year. We often see first-time attendees reaching out for words of advice to get the best from their MozCon experience and veteran attendees jumping in to recommend their favorite not-to-miss speakers, sessions, and activities. It’s been amazing to see how community members are able to build buzz and excitement while being there for each other.

Another strong facet of the MozCon community is our community speaker program.

I feel like we're giving back and yet at the same time our community is giving us so much more.

It's an opportunity for anyone in our community to pitch to speak for 15 minutes on the MozCon stage. Each year, we get over 80 really great pitches and we select the top six to join us for the community speaker spots.

There have been a handful of community speakers over the years that we’ve invited back to be a headline speaker at MozCon or that we’ve recommended for other conferences. It’s rewarding to see our community members build their speaking careers on our stage.

Brandon: Someone once said that you are “an excellent event marketer with an eye toward customer service and realizing that details push events from good to great.” Now, we know that MozCon has great content, tasty snacks, and ample networking opportunities—but how else do you strive to provide attendees with a stellar experience? Any new approaches you’re planning on for 2019 and beyond?

Danielle: That's so nice! Yes, a core pillar of MozCon is that we want to give our attendees the best conference experience possible. We actually internally call MozCon a great big hug to the community.

For a lot of people, they only get to go to one conference, maybe two, a year. We’re honored that they choose MozCon so we want to make sure it’s an amazing experience!

MozCon 2017

From a planning perspective, we are very intentional with everything that we do. We spend a lot of time considering the content, the layout, the environmental design, the food and snacks, how our guests will interact with everything, and many other elements. We come at it from the perspective of what would I want from a conference if I were attending?

The next step is thinking about how we can enhance that experience year-over-year.

We know our attendees will be joining us from nine to five for three days straight—and some of them have never been to Seattle before. So we provide them with amenities such as ethernet cables and power strips in the sessions to make sure that they can take notes and keep in touch with their teams back home but we also look to create opportunities for them to explore our city with other attendees during our evening programming or for morning runs and other informal activities.

Knowing that some of our attendees may not have the chance to really explore Seattle, we try to bring a little piece of Seattle to the conference.

One way we do this is by featuring a special snack each day from one of our favorite Seattle food vendors. Seattle is known to be a foodie town, and this gives attendees a small taste.

Seattle is also known for its coffee, so we love to treat our attendees with really good coffee. Nobody typically talks about coffee at a conference because likely it's just drip coffee, but last year we actually had a bicycle that was in the lobby and it had nitro coffee cold brew on tap as well as a trailer serving frappuccinos.

We’re also big proponents of making sure the swag that we give attendees is something they actually want to take home.

Take for instance last year when we had a superhero theme. We created a little figurine of Roger, Moz’s mascot, wearing a cape. Today, we’re still getting pictures on Twitter and the MozCon Facebook group of Roger hanging out on different desks.

Roger picked his favorite coffee this morning at ⁦@_anchorhead⁩ #MozCon pic.twitter.com/VBqN7EAeWH

— Sam Insalaco (@SamInsalaco) July 11, 2018

Brandon: Another thing that’s very cool about MozCon is that your goal isn’t to make a profit from ticket sales. (BTW: We love the graphic you’ve created to represent this for promoting past Moz events). So what are the primary ways that you measure ROI and prove it to key stakeholders? How do you use technology and integrations to help you here?

Danielle: Of course to make MozCon sustainable, we need to break even so ticket sales is a very important metric for us. Our marketing automation software helps with email communications, but it also helps us track whether attendees are current customers or potential prospects.

We also look at where attendees are coming from, the roles they are in, and if they’ve attended MozCon in the past as they are valuable indicators for ensuring our audience and content are aligned. Our tech stack helps us track some of the supporting metrics for these goals.

Given that the attendee experience is a huge part of MozCon, tracking post-event survey information like NPS is also important.

There are many ways to measure success on financial terms (for instance tracking customer conversions, up-sells or cross-sells further down the line), however, we really do see a lot of value from MozCon in brand awareness, and building a community of brand champions. This can be a little harder to track, but we believe it’s equally as important.

Brandon: According to our Event Marketing 2019: Benchmarks and Trends report, most marketers believe that email marketing is the most effective channel for promoting your event. Which promotional channels have worked best for you?

Danielle: We definitely rely on email marketing. We have an event email list specifically dedicated to updating subscribers about MozCon. Email is especially useful because the audience is self-electing. They want to learn more.

Our biggest campaign every year is the announcement of our final agenda, which contains our confirmed headline speakers and community speakers. Sometimes people aren't able to get budget approval for making a purchase until the full agenda is available, and email is a great way to spread the word.

Another big thing for us is blog posts. Since we have a lot of readers that follow our blog it is a valuable channel. We also use social, but I would say email and blog posts are our top two converters.

Brandon: How do you work with other teams in your company to drive event success?

Danielle: Our event team is part of the Moz marketing team but to pull off MozCon, it takes cross-team, and cross-department collaboration.

Event marketing at Moz operates across the company— working with nearly every team from our dev team who builds the web page that drives registrations, our design team who brings our online and on-site experience to life, to our sales and customer service teams. It’s truly a team effort.

We coordinate across the marketing team for support from our email, newsletter, blog, social media, and paid marketing channels.

Then, when it comes to the actual event, our on-site volunteers are all Moz staff.

For example, we have engineers working alongside our customer service team and our administration team. It’s great because they actually get to meet the people they're building the products for or marketing the products to or processing payments for while also having a deep team bonding experience.

The MozCon Staff

Our Moz staff are the ones working registration. They're the ones hosting our Birds-of-a-feather tables at lunch, networking with attendees or showcasing our products in the Moz hub. It's all hands on deck in a really exciting way.

Brandon: Could you tell us more about these Birds-of-a-feather tables?

Danielle: During lunchtime, across all three days of the conference, we have speakers, partners or Moz staff host discussions on different topics. These topics have a wide range, for example they may be email-focused or SEO-focused, or even vertical focused like agencies that work with commerce and retail. Two years ago we had one for new parents adjusting to returning to work.

Brandon: Going into 2019, what trends and new strategies are you excited about incorporating into your event strategy?

Danielle: I'm excited to see how our new white label app will provide a place for information and connection. This includes having a space for our attendees and our partners to connect, networking features for attendees, and having a searchable digital agenda.

Brandon: What's one piece of advice you'd give to someone who is just starting to run a conference like MozCon?

Danielle: Have a clear understanding of the why and make sure that all of your stakeholders are aligned on the goal. That's going to drive all your decisions down the road. From here, you’ll get a better understanding of your ideal audience, content, speakers and experiences.

Brandon: Now for the tough questions. We understand that when you’re not building a huge community around events, you like to travel the globe. Any favorite destinations?

Danielle: I’m so fortunate to have the opportunity to travel and I haven't been to a place I don't love yet. But I’ll always have a soft spot for Spain. I actually studied abroad there and I've been back three times.

Brandon: What is one of your favorite things about living in Seattle?

Danielle: Honestly, I would say the food. I'm so lucky to experience the amazing food scene here. I also love the access to the outdoors. In two hours, I could go to the beach, I could be on the ski slopes, or I could be on a hiking trail. It's amazing.

Brandon: How do you stay inspired and keep your creative instincts fresh?

Danielle: Actually, I like to create a lot. I'll make anything from jewelry to my own body care to furniture. I also consider cooking to be creating. I think it's really important—even if it doesn't look beautiful or taste good—to always be creating something.

That's all for this spotlight, but you may be interested in checking out these other Event Heroes:

Mike Butcher (TechCrunch/The Europas)

Britta Schellenberg (Brightcove)

Cathy McPhillips (Content Marketing World)

Vasil Azarov (Growth Marketing Conference)

Dayna Rothman (SaaStr)

from Cameron Jones Updates https://blog.bizzabo.com/event-heroes-danielle-launders

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byronheeutgm · 6 years

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My 10 Biggest Mistakes in 10 Years as an Entrepreneur

I guess I’m now a 4%-er. According to Inc. Magazine just 4% of new companies make it to 10 years. And guess what? We just made it here at Convince & Convert. Our 10 year anniversary is today! This is the longest I’ve ever done ANYTHING continuously (other than being a husband and a father), and I’m so proud of my team and the work they’ve done – and continue to do.

We’re so fired up; we even created a temporary new logo to commemorate the 10th anniversary of Convince & Convert.

I was an entrepreneur before I started this firm. In fact, Convince & Convert is my fifth startup endeavor, and I’m an investor in dozens of others. But this is certainly my most well-known and longest-running venture, so on this anniversary date, I decided to take some stock and think about the mistakes I’ve made along the way. I hope these confessions will help you in your own entrepreneurial journey.

There’s been a lot of successes, and I am incredibly thankful to my team, my family, and our remarkable clients, partners, collaborators, and friends for each of them. But me writing about what I may have done right isn’t particularly interesting, or illustrative, in my estimation.

Instead, here are the 10 biggest mistakes I’ve made in 10 years with Convince & Convert.

I Didn’t Delegate Early Enough

It feels like this is a classic entrepreneurial blunder. You trust yourself to do everything exactly how you want it done, and taking on more yourself is usually a pretty cost effective angle of attack as well. For the first four years of this company, I wrote every check, and spent every Saturday at my local bank branch depositing checks. Accounting is not something at which I am particularly adept.

Social Media AZ – back in 2009

Fortunately, I eventually realized that for a company to grow, the leadership of the firm needs to concentrate as much as possible on doing what they are UNIQUELY QUALIFIED TO DO. Now, I seek every year to delegate about 15% of my time to others at Convince & Convert. When you do that consistently, it concentrates your own time like a reduction sauce. Eventually, you start to use your own time more and more efficiently and effectively.

I’m not all the way there yet, and I still do some stuff I probably shouldn’t, but I keep working on it. Delegation isn’t a dereliction of duty; it’s how good companies get better. Further, it’s a symptom of great trust in your team, when you let go of things that your formerly held in a death grip of micromanagement.

I Was Late Adopting Systems

Are you a golf fan? If so, you’ll know exactly what I mean when I remind you that there are two types of golfers. The first are practice-based golfers. They have a lot of coaches, and spend a lot of time practicing. They are trying to groove their swing to make it flawlessly repeatable. The second type of golfer are feel players. They seek less coaching and practice less often, trusting their instincts and creativity to take over when they need it.

I am a feel golfer, but in business.

Thus, I’m guilty of believing that if I can’t remember something, it’s probably not worth remembering. I also abhor unnecessary meetings, structure, and process, as I believe it thwarts creative problem solving and breeds inefficient use of time.

The Convince & Convert Team – 2012

This “go with the flow” attitude serves me well in the very early days, when indeed I could actually remember all that mattered. But I waited too long to flip the switch to project management systems, time tracking systems, accounting and finance systems. Fortunately, Kelly Santina, who heads our operations, came aboard and made me see the light about this and a great many other things.

Today, we are religious users of Teamwork Projects for project management, Sococo for communication, QuickBooks for accounting, and a flotilla of other systems to manage other elements of the business, including CoSchedule to maintain our editorial calendar.

I should have systematized earlier.

I Resisted Specialization For Too Long

One of the truisms of most small companies is “everyone wears a lot of hats.” This is equal parts a financial necessity and a cultural necessity. At first, you don’t have the cash to pay someone to do just one job, and it’s also good for esprit de corps when everyone is pitching in to do everything that needs doing.

The Convince & Convert Team hiking in 2014

But you can’t play that game too long, and I did.

It’s true in a lot of areas, but most so in our business development function. For a long time, Kim Corak handled biz dev for all three divisions: speaking, consulting, and media/content. She did an amazing job. But eventually, I realized that to keep moving forward, we needed more specialized skills. Now, Kelly and I handle most media/content sales, Kim focuses almost exclusively on consulting, and the sublime Michelle Joyce handles the speaking side.

This division of labor isn’t always perfect, but it’s much more sensible than putting everything on one person, and it’s enabled us to continue to grow. I should have done this earlier, too.

I Didn’t Set Appropriate Customer Expectations

As we grew, one of our challenges was making sure customers knew/know that while I see have input on everything we create and publish, I am not personally making every slide of every strategic plan, and I’m not writing every blog post on this site (although I did for a long time).

It’s hard to set customer expectations appropriately, especially when I am the most visible member of the team and clients think I will personally manage every project.

We’re very good at this now, and I’m careful to always talk about WE and rarely about ME when discussing the company and our capabilities. But it was definitely a tough transition for a while there.

Today, we have a similar issue, but with timing. We’re often at capacity on strategy projects, and on content projects, meaning that new opportunities may have to wait 3-4 weeks before we can commence work. Being better at setting those expectations accordingly is something I’m still working through.

I Gathered Too Little Customer Feedback

Related to the prior point, when I was fully in the middle of every project, and essentially quarterbacked everything, it was easy to not worry about formalized customer feedback. I had a handle on what customers thought of us, because I was personally talking to all of them, all the time.

Now that we have grown, and the team does more customer interaction than do I, it’s critical that we have a consistent, standardized feedback system so that we all know how we’re doing, and where we stand.

About 18 months ago we moved to a Net Promoter Score survey protocol, whereby we survey consulting clients at least twice during each project. We also use NPS for speaking opportunities, and we’re going to roll it out for media/content. I am incredibly proud that our NPS is 73 right now, which is very, very high and puts us up there with the best brands in the world.

I wish I would have started this program years ago!

I Gave Disorganized Feedback to My Team

Like a lot of entrepreneurs, I can be a bit of a handful. When I have “suggestions” I tend to offer them at less than ideal times, with less than realistic expectations for execution. I used to email Kelly all the time with “ideas” on things we could/should improve. I’m SURE she loved that!

The Convince & Convert Team – 2014

And then I realized that every time I emailed her, she had to stop what she was doing and address whatever crazy idea I’d come up with in the prior 11 seconds.

Now – and this is especially key because we are 100% virtual and always have been, and we have very few meeting and calls – I send ONE email per week to our head of operations called SOMM: “stuff on my mind”. It’s a compendium of everything that I’m thinking about or upon which I request a status update. Putting all of this in one, weekly email and resisting the temptation to fire off random “but what about…?” emails, has improved operating efficiency dramatically.

I Didn’t Force Proximity EVERY Time

As mentioned, we are an all-virtual firm, with team members all over the USA, and beyond. On occasion groups of us will connect face to face at a client meeting or conference. But the full Convince & Convert team meets in person just ONE time per year, at our annual strategic planning retreat.

Convince & Convert Retreat – 2016

Of our nine retreats, the first one was in Phoenix (when I still lived there) because there were very few of us, and we had no money. Then, we started going to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico where we rent a giant house and the whole team (and their spouse/other/friend) lives together with harmony, good times, and good ideas.

We did Puerto Vallarta together in a house every year except for 2017 when we went to Santa Fe and stayed in a boutique hotel. And it was……..fine. But it was definitely not the same. In a virtual firm, in the rare cases when you do get together you have to make it count, and create as many opportunities for unstructured bonding and closeness as possible.

That one year, I didn’t. We did a hotel instead of a house. And it’s not like it killed the company or anything, but it hurt our cohesion a little, which is why we went back to a house this year.

I Pursued Ideas Without Execution

I’m an idea guy. Always have been. It’s why I love consulting. The challenge of figuring out how to improve someone else’s business is fun and exciting for me. But I’m guilty in my own businesses of letting the idea supersede the execution plan, and sometimes I pursue an opportunity without thinking it through 100%.

And it’s a fine line between a culture of trial and testing, and culture of going off half-cocked without a plan. I try really hard to land on the former, but sometimes I peek over toward the latter.

Perhaps the most egregious example is the ill-fated MarketingPodcasts.com project. This was—and maybe still is—a good idea, in my estimation. The premise back in 2013 was that podcast discovery is hard, and it was nearly impossible to find great marketing podcasts with any degree of efficiency. So, I decided to solve that problem. We worked with a dev team to build MarketingPodcasts.com, a sophisticated, algorithm-powered directory of marketing podcasts; like Google for audio programming. It worked, and people liked it.

Here’s the problem. I was so in love with the idea, and so convinced it solved a real problem, I never fully articulated how we were going to make money, or how MarketingPodcasts.com fit into our other divisions and programs at Convince & Convert. After a year or so (maybe less, I’ve blocked out the details!) we shut it down.

Lesson learned (I hope).

I Gave Up First Mover Advantage

A few years ago, I launched one of the first daily video programs in the marketing space, called Jay Today. It was before the Gary Vee show, and long before a lot of other programs of similar type and intent, of which there are now hundreds.

Partially because I was first (or nearly so), and partially because the content was at least decent, Jay Today got pretty good traction. Not Gary Vaynerchuk traction, but good by my mortal standards.

I did the Jay Today show three times each week for about 14 months. And then, I quit. I simply got tired of doing it, which is rare for me (my Social Pros podcast is 8+ years old). I think I just felt like I didn’t have anything else to say in that format at the time, and I sunsetted the show.

Afterwards came the big explosion in daily video programs and video podcasts. About 18 months after the end of Jay Today version 1.0, I returned with Jay Today version 2.0. And it was fine, but I’d lost my first mover advantage.

I let fatigue convince me to give away an edge I’d developed. That was a mistake.

I Picked the Wrong Competitors

In the early years, Convince & Convert was really just Jay’s blog, and operated as such. Then, as we grew it became a multi-author home of intermediate to advanced social media and content marketing advice and counsel.

Over time, we saw ourselves competing against Content Marketing Institute, Social Media Examiner, MarketingProfs, TopRank and other terrific online resources that publish daily articles with excellent, tactical, how-to guides to all things digital marketing.

We tried to fight that fire with our own fire, and our editorial approach here began to embrace volume and practical advice as key components.

I realize now that was a mistake. We’re not going to out how-to those great sites, and we never should have tried. We’re a thoughtful, strategic, consulting firm that works with many of the world’s most interesting brands to solve large and thorny marketing and customer experience challenges. We’re not in the how-to business, we’re in the “now what” business.

For a while there, our audience for our content was one persona, and our audience for our consulting services was a different persona. We’ve fixed that now, which is why we publish less frequently here than we used to, our content is purposefully longer-form and more detailed, and a lot of our stuff now is based on first or second party research.

We regained the right focus and are trying to serve the same, smart audience with both content and consulting.

I hope you agree. If you like what we’re doing here, you may want to visit this page to sign up for our feed, where we’ll send you a quick email each time we publish something new.

Thanks again for the opportunity to serve. Whether our relationship began today, 10 years ago, or anywhere in between, I very much appreciate your time and your trust.

And congratulations to all at Convince & Convert for being extraordinary every day, and for getting us to TEN YEARS! I don’t say it enough, but I love each and every one of you.

https://ift.tt/2Kq7zA8

#My 10 Biggest Mistakes in 10 Years as an Entrepreneur

0 notes

fairchildlingpo1 · 6 years

Text

My 10 Biggest Mistakes in 10 Years as an Entrepreneur

We’re so fired up; we even created a temporary new logo to commemorate the 10th anniversary of Convince & Convert.

Instead, here are the 10 biggest mistakes I’ve made in 10 years with Convince & Convert.

I Didn’t Delegate Early Enough

Social Media AZ – back in 2009

I Was Late Adopting Systems

I am a feel golfer, but in business.

The Convince & Convert Team – 2012

I should have systematized earlier.

I Resisted Specialization For Too Long

The Convince & Convert Team hiking in 2014

But you can’t play that game too long, and I did.

This division of labor isn’t always perfect, but it’s much more sensible than putting everything on one person, and it’s enabled us to continue to grow. I should have done this earlier, too.

I Didn’t Set Appropriate Customer Expectations

It’s hard to set customer expectations appropriately, especially when I am the most visible member of the team and clients think I will personally manage every project.

I Gathered Too Little Customer Feedback

I wish I would have started this program years ago!

I Gave Disorganized Feedback to My Team

The Convince & Convert Team – 2014

And then I realized that every time I emailed her, she had to stop what she was doing and address whatever crazy idea I’d come up with in the prior 11 seconds.

I Didn’t Force Proximity EVERY Time

Convince & Convert Retreat – 2016

That one year, I didn’t. We did a hotel instead of a house. And it’s not like it killed the company or anything, but it hurt our cohesion a little, which is why we went back to a house this year.

I Pursued Ideas Without Execution

Lesson learned (I hope).

I Gave Up First Mover Advantage

Partially because I was first (or nearly so), and partially because the content was at least decent, Jay Today got pretty good traction. Not Gary Vaynerchuk traction, but good by my mortal standards.

I let fatigue convince me to give away an edge I’d developed. That was a mistake.

I Picked the Wrong Competitors

We tried to fight that fire with our own fire, and our editorial approach here began to embrace volume and practical advice as key components.

We regained the right focus and are trying to serve the same, smart audience with both content and consulting.

I hope you agree. If you like what we’re doing here, you may want to visit this page to sign up for our feed, where we’ll send you a quick email each time we publish something new.

Thanks again for the opportunity to serve. Whether our relationship began today, 10 years ago, or anywhere in between, I very much appreciate your time and your trust.

And congratulations to all at Convince & Convert for being extraordinary every day, and for getting us to TEN YEARS! I don’t say it enough, but I love each and every one of you.

https://ift.tt/2Kq7zA8

#My 10 Biggest Mistakes in 10 Years as an Entrepreneur

0 notes

christinesumpmg · 6 years

Text

My 10 Biggest Mistakes in 10 Years as an Entrepreneur

We’re so fired up; we even created a temporary new logo to commemorate the 10th anniversary of Convince & Convert.

Instead, here are the 10 biggest mistakes I’ve made in 10 years with Convince & Convert.

I Didn’t Delegate Early Enough

Social Media AZ – back in 2009

I Was Late Adopting Systems

I am a feel golfer, but in business.

The Convince & Convert Team – 2012

I should have systematized earlier.

I Resisted Specialization For Too Long

The Convince & Convert Team hiking in 2014

But you can’t play that game too long, and I did.

This division of labor isn’t always perfect, but it’s much more sensible than putting everything on one person, and it’s enabled us to continue to grow. I should have done this earlier, too.

I Didn’t Set Appropriate Customer Expectations

It’s hard to set customer expectations appropriately, especially when I am the most visible member of the team and clients think I will personally manage every project.

I Gathered Too Little Customer Feedback

I wish I would have started this program years ago!

I Gave Disorganized Feedback to My Team

The Convince & Convert Team – 2014

And then I realized that every time I emailed her, she had to stop what she was doing and address whatever crazy idea I’d come up with in the prior 11 seconds.

I Didn’t Force Proximity EVERY Time

Convince & Convert Retreat – 2016

That one year, I didn’t. We did a hotel instead of a house. And it’s not like it killed the company or anything, but it hurt our cohesion a little, which is why we went back to a house this year.

I Pursued Ideas Without Execution

Lesson learned (I hope).

I Gave Up First Mover Advantage

Partially because I was first (or nearly so), and partially because the content was at least decent, Jay Today got pretty good traction. Not Gary Vaynerchuk traction, but good by my mortal standards.

I let fatigue convince me to give away an edge I’d developed. That was a mistake.

I Picked the Wrong Competitors

We tried to fight that fire with our own fire, and our editorial approach here began to embrace volume and practical advice as key components.

We regained the right focus and are trying to serve the same, smart audience with both content and consulting.

I hope you agree. If you like what we’re doing here, you may want to visit this page to sign up for our feed, where we’ll send you a quick email each time we publish something new.

Thanks again for the opportunity to serve. Whether our relationship began today, 10 years ago, or anywhere in between, I very much appreciate your time and your trust.

And congratulations to all at Convince & Convert for being extraordinary every day, and for getting us to TEN YEARS! I don’t say it enough, but I love each and every one of you.

https://ift.tt/2Kq7zA8

#My 10 Biggest Mistakes in 10 Years as an Entrepreneur

0 notes

mercedessharonwo1 · 6 years

Text

My 10 Biggest Mistakes in 10 Years as an Entrepreneur

We’re so fired up; we even created a temporary new logo to commemorate the 10th anniversary of Convince & Convert.

Instead, here are the 10 biggest mistakes I’ve made in 10 years with Convince & Convert.

I Didn’t Delegate Early Enough

Social Media AZ – back in 2009

I Was Late Adopting Systems

I am a feel golfer, but in business.

The Convince & Convert Team – 2012

I should have systematized earlier.

I Resisted Specialization For Too Long

The Convince & Convert Team hiking in 2014

But you can’t play that game too long, and I did.

This division of labor isn’t always perfect, but it’s much more sensible than putting everything on one person, and it’s enabled us to continue to grow. I should have done this earlier, too.

I Didn’t Set Appropriate Customer Expectations

It’s hard to set customer expectations appropriately, especially when I am the most visible member of the team and clients think I will personally manage every project.

I Gathered Too Little Customer Feedback

I wish I would have started this program years ago!

I Gave Disorganized Feedback to My Team

The Convince & Convert Team – 2014

And then I realized that every time I emailed her, she had to stop what she was doing and address whatever crazy idea I’d come up with in the prior 11 seconds.

I Didn’t Force Proximity EVERY Time

Convince & Convert Retreat – 2016

That one year, I didn’t. We did a hotel instead of a house. And it’s not like it killed the company or anything, but it hurt our cohesion a little, which is why we went back to a house this year.

I Pursued Ideas Without Execution

Lesson learned (I hope).

I Gave Up First Mover Advantage

Partially because I was first (or nearly so), and partially because the content was at least decent, Jay Today got pretty good traction. Not Gary Vaynerchuk traction, but good by my mortal standards.

I let fatigue convince me to give away an edge I’d developed. That was a mistake.

I Picked the Wrong Competitors

We tried to fight that fire with our own fire, and our editorial approach here began to embrace volume and practical advice as key components.

We regained the right focus and are trying to serve the same, smart audience with both content and consulting.

I hope you agree. If you like what we’re doing here, you may want to visit this page to sign up for our feed, where we’ll send you a quick email each time we publish something new.

Thanks again for the opportunity to serve. Whether our relationship began today, 10 years ago, or anywhere in between, I very much appreciate your time and your trust.

And congratulations to all at Convince & Convert for being extraordinary every day, and for getting us to TEN YEARS! I don’t say it enough, but I love each and every one of you.

https://ift.tt/2Kq7zA8

#My 10 Biggest Mistakes in 10 Years as an Entrepreneur

0 notes

kraussoutene · 6 years

Text

My 10 Biggest Mistakes in 10 Years as an Entrepreneur

We’re so fired up; we even created a temporary new logo to commemorate the 10th anniversary of Convince & Convert.

Instead, here are the 10 biggest mistakes I’ve made in 10 years with Convince & Convert.

I Didn’t Delegate Early Enough

Social Media AZ – back in 2009

I Was Late Adopting Systems

I am a feel golfer, but in business.

The Convince & Convert Team – 2012

I should have systematized earlier.

I Resisted Specialization For Too Long

The Convince & Convert Team hiking in 2014

But you can’t play that game too long, and I did.

This division of labor isn’t always perfect, but it’s much more sensible than putting everything on one person, and it’s enabled us to continue to grow. I should have done this earlier, too.

I Didn’t Set Appropriate Customer Expectations

It’s hard to set customer expectations appropriately, especially when I am the most visible member of the team and clients think I will personally manage every project.

I Gathered Too Little Customer Feedback

I wish I would have started this program years ago!

I Gave Disorganized Feedback to My Team

The Convince & Convert Team – 2014

And then I realized that every time I emailed her, she had to stop what she was doing and address whatever crazy idea I’d come up with in the prior 11 seconds.

I Didn’t Force Proximity EVERY Time

Convince & Convert Retreat – 2016

That one year, I didn’t. We did a hotel instead of a house. And it’s not like it killed the company or anything, but it hurt our cohesion a little, which is why we went back to a house this year.

I Pursued Ideas Without Execution

Lesson learned (I hope).

I Gave Up First Mover Advantage

Partially because I was first (or nearly so), and partially because the content was at least decent, Jay Today got pretty good traction. Not Gary Vaynerchuk traction, but good by my mortal standards.

I let fatigue convince me to give away an edge I’d developed. That was a mistake.

I Picked the Wrong Competitors

We tried to fight that fire with our own fire, and our editorial approach here began to embrace volume and practical advice as key components.

We regained the right focus and are trying to serve the same, smart audience with both content and consulting.

I hope you agree. If you like what we’re doing here, you may want to visit this page to sign up for our feed, where we’ll send you a quick email each time we publish something new.

Thanks again for the opportunity to serve. Whether our relationship began today, 10 years ago, or anywhere in between, I very much appreciate your time and your trust.

And congratulations to all at Convince & Convert for being extraordinary every day, and for getting us to TEN YEARS! I don’t say it enough, but I love each and every one of you.

https://ift.tt/2Kq7zA8

#My 10 Biggest Mistakes in 10 Years as an Entrepreneur

0 notes

dainiaolivahm · 6 years

Text

My 10 Biggest Mistakes in 10 Years as an Entrepreneur

We’re so fired up; we even created a temporary new logo to commemorate the 10th anniversary of Convince & Convert.

Instead, here are the 10 biggest mistakes I’ve made in 10 years with Convince & Convert.

I Didn’t Delegate Early Enough

Social Media AZ – back in 2009

I Was Late Adopting Systems

I am a feel golfer, but in business.

The Convince & Convert Team – 2012

I should have systematized earlier.

I Resisted Specialization For Too Long

The Convince & Convert Team hiking in 2014

But you can’t play that game too long, and I did.

This division of labor isn’t always perfect, but it’s much more sensible than putting everything on one person, and it’s enabled us to continue to grow. I should have done this earlier, too.

I Didn’t Set Appropriate Customer Expectations

It’s hard to set customer expectations appropriately, especially when I am the most visible member of the team and clients think I will personally manage every project.

I Gathered Too Little Customer Feedback

I wish I would have started this program years ago!

I Gave Disorganized Feedback to My Team

The Convince & Convert Team – 2014

And then I realized that every time I emailed her, she had to stop what she was doing and address whatever crazy idea I’d come up with in the prior 11 seconds.

I Didn’t Force Proximity EVERY Time

Convince & Convert Retreat – 2016

That one year, I didn’t. We did a hotel instead of a house. And it’s not like it killed the company or anything, but it hurt our cohesion a little, which is why we went back to a house this year.

I Pursued Ideas Without Execution

Lesson learned (I hope).

I Gave Up First Mover Advantage

Partially because I was first (or nearly so), and partially because the content was at least decent, Jay Today got pretty good traction. Not Gary Vaynerchuk traction, but good by my mortal standards.

I let fatigue convince me to give away an edge I’d developed. That was a mistake.

I Picked the Wrong Competitors

We tried to fight that fire with our own fire, and our editorial approach here began to embrace volume and practical advice as key components.

We regained the right focus and are trying to serve the same, smart audience with both content and consulting.

I hope you agree. If you like what we’re doing here, you may want to visit this page to sign up for our feed, where we’ll send you a quick email each time we publish something new.

Thanks again for the opportunity to serve. Whether our relationship began today, 10 years ago, or anywhere in between, I very much appreciate your time and your trust.

And congratulations to all at Convince & Convert for being extraordinary every day, and for getting us to TEN YEARS! I don’t say it enough, but I love each and every one of you.

https://ift.tt/2Kq7zA8

#My 10 Biggest Mistakes in 10 Years as an Entrepreneur

0 notes

christinesumpmg1 · 6 years

Text

My 10 Biggest Mistakes in 10 Years as an Entrepreneur

We’re so fired up; we even created a temporary new logo to commemorate the 10th anniversary of Convince & Convert.

Instead, here are the 10 biggest mistakes I’ve made in 10 years with Convince & Convert.

I Didn’t Delegate Early Enough

Social Media AZ – back in 2009

I Was Late Adopting Systems

I am a feel golfer, but in business.

The Convince & Convert Team – 2012

I should have systematized earlier.

I Resisted Specialization For Too Long

The Convince & Convert Team hiking in 2014

But you can’t play that game too long, and I did.

This division of labor isn’t always perfect, but it’s much more sensible than putting everything on one person, and it’s enabled us to continue to grow. I should have done this earlier, too.

I Didn’t Set Appropriate Customer Expectations

It’s hard to set customer expectations appropriately, especially when I am the most visible member of the team and clients think I will personally manage every project.

I Gathered Too Little Customer Feedback

I wish I would have started this program years ago!

I Gave Disorganized Feedback to My Team

The Convince & Convert Team – 2014

And then I realized that every time I emailed her, she had to stop what she was doing and address whatever crazy idea I’d come up with in the prior 11 seconds.

I Didn’t Force Proximity EVERY Time

Convince & Convert Retreat – 2016

That one year, I didn’t. We did a hotel instead of a house. And it’s not like it killed the company or anything, but it hurt our cohesion a little, which is why we went back to a house this year.

I Pursued Ideas Without Execution

Lesson learned (I hope).

I Gave Up First Mover Advantage

Partially because I was first (or nearly so), and partially because the content was at least decent, Jay Today got pretty good traction. Not Gary Vaynerchuk traction, but good by my mortal standards.

I let fatigue convince me to give away an edge I’d developed. That was a mistake.

I Picked the Wrong Competitors

We tried to fight that fire with our own fire, and our editorial approach here began to embrace volume and practical advice as key components.

We regained the right focus and are trying to serve the same, smart audience with both content and consulting.

I hope you agree. If you like what we’re doing here, you may want to visit this page to sign up for our feed, where we’ll send you a quick email each time we publish something new.

Thanks again for the opportunity to serve. Whether our relationship began today, 10 years ago, or anywhere in between, I very much appreciate your time and your trust.

And congratulations to all at Convince & Convert for being extraordinary every day, and for getting us to TEN YEARS! I don’t say it enough, but I love each and every one of you.

https://ift.tt/2Kq7zA8

#My 10 Biggest Mistakes in 10 Years as an Entrepreneur

0 notes