So I am fairly well known to be a critic of the development process. It is a fact that this process has been a shambles, not an opinion, and even Asylum would probably agree they messed up a lot. But I was going through some previous old posts looking for some quotes I vaguely remember, and I came across a lot of posts complaining about how they had missed another deadline. I think it was the April delay (if I remember correctly) where we were all getting frustrated that the devs had missed an other date, and it resulted in a lot of us asking what the point of a date was if you weren't going to stick to it.
Looking back I do really appreciate how the devs learned from that and decided against setting another one. I don't know if I am right, but I'd like to believe we played a part in that decision. Although I have major problems and concerns with the development, I do think that was one of the best decisions you have made, to not release another date until the store page went up. Now I know I was having issues with you not releasing a date the other day, but that was different as I was led to believe that there was already a definitive date set, and there would be no point in keeping that from us if it was already set in stone, but I am glad that you stopped giving estimates. Although I am considering the store page not being published by the end of October a delay, I was already expecting it so it didn't bother me as much as the other ones, so I will ignore that for now.
I propose that you do this more often. There are tons of suggestions on the forums, and even if it is just explaining why you can't do it, that's enough to show we are being listened to. I have noticed Paratus respond to a lot more posts now, which really does help us to empathise with you. We have been waiting a very unreasonable amount of time, and people are getting agitated, and seeing that the CEO took 30 seconds to reply to your opinion really helps calm us down. I understand John cant reply to every thread, but it does work when he does.
Also, no offence to the moderators, but you really do not do a great job with handling criticism to this game. You lock posts that criticise, you get very defensive and you dismiss people who you consider 'haters' because they have genuine concerns. One person I would like to mention and thank is @LuckyDuck. I'm not sure if its intention, but I have noticed that Lucky has been improving a lot lately. Instead of attacking criticisms, he argues them with actual facts. I had a disagreement with him the other day, for example, and he presented factual arguments back calmly and without attacking my character. At the end, he said a final argument but also said that he understood how someone could misinterpret what he said, which is what I was arguing. When a moderator, or anyone really, is open to accepting both views and not just telling me I am wrong, it makes them so much more respectable. Because of his reply, acknowledging my point of view as legitimate but disagreeing respectfully, I didn't feel a need to continue arguing.
Now I do still think he could improve, I am not saying he is perfect, but I genuinely have a very negative opinion of the moderator team for their conduct and LuckyDuck is the only positive influence on me at the minute. This is what all of the mods should be like, if someone is very annoyed or heated, don't just condemn them and lock their topic. This makes you look like you are censoring peoples opinions. Actually enquire as to what the problem is and how to resolve it, and then say you will convey it to the dev team. You are there to moderate, not police. Even if someone is entirely wrong, ask them why they think a certain thing, ask them what they think could be done to resolve the issue. Even if it is a rule violation and the topic kind of needs to be locked, drop them a PM to check up on them and continue the discussion privately. If you lot could do this, people would respect you a lot more. But when you lock topics that criticise, refuse to admit fault and just argue without helping, you create a negative reputation for yourselves and the developers. The mod team represent the developers, so if you change your behaviour, peoples opinions of the dev team will also change.
Now one of three things will happen. 1. The mods will ignore, lock or simply not read this. 2. The mods will read this and proceed to do exactly what I am suggesting not to and pick this apart for mistakes or things I got wrong or get very defensive and blame everything on me or the community. 3. They will simply say thank you for the suggestion, acknowledge what I am saying has some merit, and actually try and see if they can make adjustments.
When I was on the Discord the other day I brought up another delay that happened and people just started arguing with me without considering that I may have reasonable concerns. When people are so unaccepting, it makes us want to argue our points more aggressively. Calling me toxic and a spammer does not do anything but show your arrogance and delusion. Then banning me from the Discord for what? I read the rules, I did not break them. If I did then so did everyone else in that discussion. You left me, a member of your community, annoyed so that you could feel like you won, instead of listening, explaining and concluding.
Now for the final part. The 30th of November release date. I am disappointed this is later than I expected and genuinely think you should have done better, but at the end of the day it is here and final. Thanks for the work, and I hope the launch goes well. It could have been worse, and at least we will be playing before December. Thanks.
I welcome any challenges to this and any extra opinions or suggestions, but if you are just here to argue instead of discuss I won't be responding. I ask you all to do this too, if someone comes across as aggressive, react to it with the confused face to give them a chance to reword. Do not respond to people who are just attacking, arguing or just being a nuisance in general. Thank you.