I have always been of the mindset that if you build a quality game, revenue will come. Of course this puts me in opposition to literally every AAA game maker out there that has the philosophy of "milk the customer as fast as you can and never mind about gameplay."
I wonder how many people on this forum would be surprised to know what these big game companies are like? I worked for Electronic Arts for 2 years and was astonished to find that maybe 1 person in 20 played ANY kind of video game and among management that dropped to maybe 1 in 100. All they care about is milking the customer and that is primary. That is why Bungie went to garbage after it was acquired by Activision, Ditto Blizzard and now ... apparently ... Ditto GGG.
In an effort to milk the customer a bit more, Tencent wants more transient D4 style customers. Their entire calculus is marketing vs revenue. They could care less about whether the game is boring, end game design problematic, campaign long and boring. They have decided.
1. Long campaign means we hook the player to buy more loot boxes / cosmetics / other MTX and by the time they find out the end game is bad they have probably already been milked as much as possible.
2. Longevity is irrelevant, these people only care about the next quarter profit. To these executives D4 is a phenomenal success. Gamers mostly agree that it is a poorly executed travesty and stain on a good franchise to gamers.
3. Killing POE1 was a given the moment they made 60m on early access keys. Also by extension other givens are that POE as a free to play game is no longer a thing (since they have proven people will pay for it) and that the priority is money. Don't be surprised if there is now pay to win in POE2 before it comes out. Gamers might see that as messed up but game companies love it on their revenue projections.
4. Engaging gameplay, bots spamming RMT and other things are no longer a priority. If it doesn't contribute directly to revenue it is no longer a priority.
POE2 is a total mess right now and not because they didn't have the tools to make it right but because boneheaded decisions are being made in the senior offices.
As for me, they got me. I loved GGG so much that I bought the most expensive pack for POE2. I am a long time GGG fanboy. But then I hadn't been keeping up with current events since my work and home life are chaotic and I didn't know Tencent had bought a controlling share in GGG. If I had I probably wouldn't have hit that purchase button. My bad.
Now you all know where things stand. If you expect POE2 to ever be worthy of the name, you are going to be disappointed. I would love to be wrong on that but I fear I am not. As for POE1, it is dead. The execs have decided a crowd of flyby transient gameplayers are more valuable than the long time customers and have kicked them to the curb.
For all you flamers loving POE2 and thinking its the best. Most of you have never even tried POE1. Go play it while you can, get a player to maps, beat maven. Come back and tell me how good POE2 is in comparison after i see your char in your profile. I will still disagree but then you will be talking from an informed position.
To GGG, if you can, stop chasing the $ and get back to making good games with the lessons learned over the last decade. If Tencent wont let you then ... well you have lost me as a customer and i doubt I am alone but you have also lost any claim to "vision" in games.
