Update Campaign #10 Nature has been released

Discussion in 'Game changes and Updates' started by Eric, Sep 18, 2015.

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  1. Eric

    Eric Administrator Staff Member Administrator Forum Moderator Official Author

    Agreed, this is a rant and in my experience with replying to rants it is usually difficult to break them down, but nonetheless thanks for taking the time to post and I will do my best to respond to your points.

    We went through every track submitted as well as playing through all the featured taking those into consideration that seemed to fit. I wish we had taken the easy way if that is the effort players think that we are making, would have saved us a lot of time. If you have track recommendations that you feel have been lost, PM them to me and I will take a look and respond to you on if they were overlooked or why they were not included.
    Water Campaign had a mix of 6 tracks less than 40% completion rate with 3 of those less than 25%. Nature I's most difficult track is about 20% balanced evenly around 50% completion, easier at the start working down to 20%. Nature II that we have tentatively selected is all under 20%. Tracks were shared with a few players beforehand to get feedback and overall from what I heard feedback was mostly good.
    Listening to the community isn't the same as doing everything that individuals want, it is balancing what will best serve the entire community. I am sorry that you view tracks in which 1 in 4 people can complete as a hold up, believe it or not these campaigns are for the majority of the people playing very difficult to get gold or even complete all 10 in each. Saying that we don't listen is just simply a cheap shot for the amount of time that everyone involved in the game has spent on these forums interacting with the players, we are, have been and will continue to be very active on the forums.
    If you have any direct suggestions with issues on the layout, please let us know. Free Rider HD layout is the first Free Rider game to adapt screen sizes and enable cross platform play on pretty much any device which has and will open up the game to a bunch of new players and authors.
    The editor is also something that we have spent a lot of extra time on taking in feedback from authors, if you have specific issues please spark up a thread and we can discuss there. The offline editor is something we added for authors as that has been requested previously.

    One of the reasons why we picked development of the game up is because we felt and could see that it was being under served by being part time projects by people that did not have the rights to the game. If you feel that the community was better informed on past sites, I would be interested to know how you think we can do a better job at showing players that we are indeed involved with the game and here listening to input as well as interacting with players. I know for a fact that I have not posted +1000 times for my own enjoyment and has been rooted in an effort to make the best FRHD experience as possible for all players, pretty confident Chars +1000 messages isn't just posting memes either and are responses to players about the game, issues and ideas for future additions/changes.

    One of the difficulties that we have when putting together campaigns is that those detailed / quality tracks in most cases have a completion rate of less than 5%. Again if you have tracks that you feel were over looked please PM them to me and I will respond back.
    Candy Crush is a very different game, yes it gets tougher but that is to encourage in app purchases so that players can complete levels, which is a decision early on a direction that we didn't want to go with Free Rider HD, we really wanted to keep it a skill based game but from your feedback maybe we did make the wrong decision and should have incorporated lives into campaign tracks and prompted players to pay to increase the number of lives, we would then be highly aligned to put in tracks with 5% completion rates in the 9th and 10th campaigns, heck why not even put them in the 2nd.
    What is a company? Kano Apps is a company yes, it is also a bootstrapped company in which we have not taken any external funding and was built off of the founders time (of which I am one). Kano Apps is as Indie of a company as you can get, we have no external board telling us that we must do certain things within the games in order to monetize them (like the previous candy crush example) Free Rider HD would be a very different game if we did have a board and would likely look and play a lot more like candy crush. Free Rider HD is a project between Kano Apps and the founder of Free Rider 1 & 2. I do see negatives with bigger companies driving games 100% for revenue targets and look at players as numbers seeking to drive as much $$ from them as possible not concerned with the longevity or experience of the game of which I am and have always been very concise of making sure that doesn't happen to Kano or in Free Rider. I look at Kano as a group of 20 people all aligned to make games that players enjoy to play while generating enough revenue from them to do so.

    If you do have specific examples of additions or changes to the game outside of a rant please post them in threads on the forum of which we are very active on (I personally read it daily) or PM me and we will do our best to respond.
     
    Last edited: Sep 20, 2015
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  2. jroles

    jroles Well-Known Member

    who
    whoa your turning into Jefe ahahaha
     
  3. Eric

    Eric Administrator Staff Member Administrator Forum Moderator Official Author

    We really need to get Lifetime achievements out there as the intent is to leave room to reward coins based of off grouped accomplishments like earn 5 gold medals, earn 15, earn XX... that will allow us to reward the payouts that better associate completing difficult tracks. Now that we are at 100 campaign tracks we will look to prioritize that feature.
     
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  4. Eric

    Eric Administrator Staff Member Administrator Forum Moderator Official Author

    Who wants to take the lead on that? We have never been opposed to players suggestions on creating a campaign.
     
  5. Elibloodthirst

    Elibloodthirst DeadRising2 VIP Team Helicopter Official Author

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    What wasn't said is that you're actually doing something right now opposed to nothing. Although I would love a difficulty spike that isn't judged off completion rate as that doesn't represent tracks difficulty properly
     
  6. jroles

    jroles Well-Known Member

    yes
     
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  7. alexander

    alexander Forum Legend VIP Team Truck Official Author

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    Ok, I just messaged you.
     
  8. CityShep

    CityShep Gay Furry Memoriam VIP Official Author

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    I suggest this site's admins quit attempting to profit from sh*tty ideas and marketing towards twelve year olds who only want a f*cking 'hold up' or 'pixel art like and sub'.

    I only visit here to post my tracks because this whole site is a catastrophe. We all know that this game only took off in the first place due to its creativity and simplicity, and you're spoiling it with the horrible marketing and childish features. Sure, you can make an extra buck trying to get little kids to buy sh*t and play stupid tracks, but you're only adding fuel to the fire that is the death of this game and it's community.

    As a long time member of this community, I agree with Stig in that you guys should listen to the members that make this game what it is. The campaigns, 'pro' versions, ridiculous marketing and coins don't make this game what it is, it's the great authors that do. No wonder every skilled user took off to BHR and only posts here to get publicity for their hard work.

    It sickens me to see what Kano has done to Free Rider 2. I miss the days when .me and CR admins actually listened to their communities.
    *sigh*
     
  9. jroles

    jroles Well-Known Member

    thank you for sharing your knowledge
     
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  10. Minus

    Minus Well-Known Member Official Author

    you make some valid points. I agree that FRHD does have to market better toward BHR authors/players
    however, I think you're undermining FRHD
    some very good authors and players have come out of this game (e.g: CHOLO jhayde4564 tetrationiscool Silver_bird7 among many, many others ), you can't say that this game is trash when people like this play it
    BUT:
    you can consider my point next to invalid as I don't play BHR, FR3, .me, and FR2, so I can't speak for those games, but I still think you're very much undermining this game
    I do very much respect your opinion though as you are a very legitimate creator
     
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  11. Stig

    Stig Stig VIP Official Author

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    Eric
    I'm going to leave out quotes for this, because that will make my reply seem more messy when i type:

    If you're trying to convince me that you didn't take the easy way out, that is completely false, atleast by a players perspective. Basing your campaign tracks on completion rate is obviously a total failure. How many who completes a track, in the 20%'s says little to nothing at all about the difficulty. People will automaticly spend far less time on a track in which they are not amused with (i.o. sh*t, easy, too lightly detailed or even too hard, last one because theyve been trained w/ hold up campaign tracks). If they die, they will most likely go on to the next one. Which is impossible in the campaigns. And so makes people try harder. If you had a look at the completion rates of any of your previous campaign tracks before you posted them, and to now, I guarantee you, they will have gone up much, close(r) to 100%.
    People WILL spend more time playing a track of which they find impressive, especially when it comes to detail. This also goes for tracks, in which they have to complete to progress further.
    This is where my candy crush comparement comes in. Do you think it would be as successful as it is today, if any of the levels could be completed in one try? Most likely NOT. Because its not addictive being able to complete anything with little to no effort.

    Why I personally hate the layout/editor is something I'll leave out, because it will increase your feeling of being offended, and result in you becoming more defensive, rather than actually considering what I have to say. They are also my personal opinions, and I know most people have different things that make them less satisfied with the layout/editor. Not saying there aren't people who are satsified with it, but they probably never experienced Canvas Rider, and Maxime's dedication to improving it.

    And I literally laughed at your reason as to why you took over this game. It made no sense at all. It is obvious that you saw a great potential of income, that you were missing out on. Pretending anything less is as transparent af.
    And it's not about the quantity of your posts here that shows whether you are dedicated to the game or not, it's what you choose to do. The results have been utterly dissapointing. And most ideas that not only i have recognized as great, have been neglected, because you refuse to alter the game too much because of A) it's possibly not worth your time vs income, or B)you're afraid of altering the game too much, in case you're gonna reduce popularity=income.
    And mentioning cheap shots, you know as hell i dont support in-app purchases, and that it is not anything i want. but you obviously want people to buy coins, with real life money, so it is a fair assumption of me, to think that this is a way you'll want to go. you even managed to turn it against me, to make it appear as it was me who wanted that, lol. nice one though.

    your reply was defensive piss, and proves the fact that you don't listen unless you want to, and you will go to any extent of defending your capitalistic intentions. which is okay, but its starting to affect the game big time. Grab your balls, put them back into your trousers, and accept the criticism, even if its harsh. don't tell me you're gonna take it into account, but instead, try to actually take it into account for once.

    Edit; the support I'm getting, should be a good pointer to whether this is something to go defensive about, or to actually commit yourself to a new perspective when it comes to further development.
     
    Last edited: Sep 20, 2015
  12. CityShep

    CityShep Gay Furry Memoriam VIP Official Author

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    Those players likely would've come out of it regardless of whether or not we marketed it toward a younger age group. I just think that it's a bit of a turn off to people who haven't played the game before / are great at,twists as it's not really the greatest place for appreciation of great tracks. Also, the editor is now sh*t and nobody new to the game would ever give it a chance. Unless you've been here for a while or are younger, you're likely not gonna find this place appealing, therefore driving this game further into the grave. We need to promote it's creative aspect to draw in better and more talented users. Tracks nowadays have become somewhat tasteless unless it's creator had an idea of what this game used to be like.
     
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  13. CityShep

    CityShep Gay Furry Memoriam VIP Official Author

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    So much this. The editor and community is a matter of opinion, but you're basically making it harder for good users to get their work noticed, and promoting a lower standard where the tracks are simply easy and only designed for completion.
     
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  14. Creak

    Creak Well-Known Member Official Author

    Example: I take a look in the newest section and all I see are scribble tracks. Then I take a look at the hot section and the top track is a 5 second track that requires no skill.
    I look at trending and maybe there is one good track on page one.


    This has got to improve.
     
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  15. Eric

    Eric Administrator Staff Member Administrator Forum Moderator Official Author

    I haven't gotten a chance to interact with you much CityShep but do not think that is from lack of effort or involvement here on these forums like as you say you only visit here to post your tracks, if you would like to be more involved here and provide specific feature requests, changes or additions to the game we are hear to listen.

    Free Rider is definitely an interesting game to say the least, has many long time and incredibly talented authors that make tracks that consistently blow my mind, that have been playing the game for years! From my experience, a lot of these players & authors first picked up the game at a younger age and evolved into these incredible authors that they are today, others didn't. We still want to appeal to a younger audience, to help introduce a new generation of players and authors with the support of long time players but as your feelings and thoughts show that is not the easiest of tasks.

    For those long time players and authors that have been on the forum interacting with us hopefully they feel differently as I have interacted with all those that have been active here. Things like Featured, Author Subscriptions, Offline Editor, 2nd Revision of the Editor, the countless tweaks / fixes Char has made directly based off of feedback have all come from talking with players off the forum.

    The addition of coins / points was discussed very early on in the release of FRHD.

    I do agree with you, that the players and authors are what make Free Rider the game it is. If you have specific suggestions that you feel are important for a player & author like yourself please call them out in new threads for discussions around those topics.
     
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  16. Eric

    Eric Administrator Staff Member Administrator Forum Moderator Official Author

    Everyone is entitled to their opinions and perspectives. I can only re-iterate that if you have specific suggestions for features, additions or changes within the game feel free to spark up threads around each individual suggestion so that we can take a look.

    If you feel that we overlooked specific tracks in the 2 latest campaigns please message me directly so that I can take a look.
     
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  17. iTzChuckNorris

    iTzChuckNorris Forum Legend Elite Author Official Author

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    well i mean... why do you think he chose the less quality ones

    edit: Stig you have a good point with the completion rate being much lower on non-campaign tracks. If people spent a little more effort on some tracks, the completion rate would be much, much higher. You also have to take the perspective of people who haven't had 10 years of experience with this game. I'm not saying I'm happy with the nature campaign.
    My honest opinion: The campaigns should be difficult with better rewards. Maybe a custom helmet/gloves or w/e for beating them that can only be acquired this way. A cool one too. I don't see why this isn't a thing, honestly. The campaigns may be difficult for the average 10 year old, but who cares? I don't think the difficulty of the campaign is going to make someone quit the game. In fact, it seems as though the easiness of the campaign is causing people to want to quit. Maybe people will spend hours on a single track, but some of these tracks deserve the attention.
     
    Last edited: Sep 21, 2015
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  18. iTzChuckNorris

    iTzChuckNorris Forum Legend Elite Author Official Author

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    Another idea:
    http://www.freeriderhd.com/t/128626-super-mario-bros-1-gc
    http://www.freeriderhd.com/t/161980-super-mario-bros-2
    These two tracks are awesomely done. The completion rates are 0.01 and 0.00. Why not have different "bonus campaigns" that if you complete, you either get a massive amount of coins, or in this case, a mario hat (copyright problems, maybe..)?
    But yeah the campaigns are way too easy and the only incentive to beat them currently is to get rid of the little red circle with the exclamation mark on the left side of my screen.
     
  19. Elibloodthirst

    Elibloodthirst DeadRising2 VIP Team Helicopter Official Author

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    Bhr is the only one of the four that is still existing/in use.

    Out of "good users" on frhd, there's a few but nothing compared to the ole route but that's probably experience talking
     
  20. ThreeAreFour

    ThreeAreFour Well-Known Member Official Author

    You guys forget that you aren't the only ones representing the community. The vast majority of players aren't as talented as some of you guys, yet most of you act like everything needs to be done to your own personal standards. Drop the egos and play the game.
     
    JerryAxi, Nitrogeneric, FOIL and 6 others like this.
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