First of all, thank you Sloclap
I sincerely consider this game to be the BEST fighting game ever made. And I truly mean that. I also like how hard you guys try to improve your game, and I'm actually a big fan of Ubisoft (heard you all used to work for them), any of you work on Assassin's Creed, Splinter Cell or any tom clancy game tbh, Rayman, Prince of Persia? I love those games...
Honestly, I complain about this game and it's community so much because I just love them both, and I really don't like seeing the state that it's in. It literally causes me emotional pain, and it's very mentally stressing.
Anyway, what grieves me most is that Absolver is not doing as well as it should be. I've said it before and I will say it again, this game can reach success levels of household competitive fighting games like Tekken or Soulcalibur. I think it could even reach Fortnight levels of success if I'm being honest.
Now, I'm going to be careful not to start complaining, I'm just going to state my opinion on certain issues and make a couple of suggestions that I think could really improve the game.
I'll start with manual doge. I think that manual dodge has become such a big problem because of all the other predeccessing balance changes. I think there was not a great awareness within the community just what impact the balance changes we have asked for would have on the whole state of the game and how it plays out on in the Combat Trials.
Every mechanic was originally so intricately tied together and delicately balanced to a point of perfection, and as soon as you change one thing, a billion other things need changing. Think of it like coding. The "meta" is one big code, and manual dodging was not a problem until all the other changes were implemented.
Now, manual dodging in itself should not be nerfed. If you continue down this line, Sloclap will probably be tied down with balance updates for the rest of the games lifespan, leaving the already sparse resources within the studio to be stretched even thinner. If you do nerf manual dodge, then Kahlt will probably need a rebalance too and if kahlt needs a rebalance... I think you guys know what a nightmare that is.
I honestly think that Kahlt was always fine, people just didn't wanna adapt their playstyle to beat it.
I also think that manual dodge is an important tool for newcomers to get to grips with the game. Historically, Sloclap have nerfed such tools coz players complain that such tools are too easy to use. Yes they are easy to use, but they are also easy to counter if you just stop complaining about it. I think that Sloclap's historical nerfing of such tools is the reason why a lot of new people cannot get in to the game anymore. Not that I'm complaining, it just is what it is, and it's our fault as players coz the community complained about these mechanics in the first place, and you guys were only listening to us, so you're not to blame. In fact, I'm thankful that you guys listened to us so closely.
I don't want to start suggesting balance changes within the game, because I think the game was perfectly balanced at launch. Even if kahlt had a higher win rate, it's only because it's easier to use, not because it's insanely overpowered.
What I will suggest are new features within the game to make it more in line with a true and fair competitive fighting game;
1. Have a ranked mode. For balancing, no powers, weapons may be allowed but do not do any cut damage. Health is restored after every round, and both players respawn at the start of each round to avoid spawn killing.
2. Have a spectator mode. This is essential to help expand the game's following. Everyone enjoys watching two highly skilled players fight.
3. Add new PvP game modes. We have 3v3 already, and it works brilliant. The reason why it's not popular right now is simply coz the game isn't popular and we all know how hard it is to find a match. 2v2s, tag team battles, ladder matches, king of the hill etc... Hell even a battle royal would be nice one day (although I don't expect it to happen soon, it should be a long term goal).
4. Add more content to downfall, or more PvE gsme modes. It's over way too quickly, I know that was the original complaint that made it get created in the first place, but trust me. If we want more, that is a testament to how much we loved it. Maybe you could add a hard mode, impossible mode (where you die in one hit), or certain challenges and gameplay modifiers... There are a lot of PvE games that add stuff like this for replayability and it really works well. You can even take some of the objectives in Downfall and expand them make completely seperate game modes. Imagine a game mode where you and your friends are trapped in a room and you just gotta try and survive as long as you can against endless NPCs.
5. Expand communication features in the game, and add an in-game reporting feature. Now this needs to be carefully thought out because it can easily be abused, but just coz it needs thought doesn't mean it's impossible or not worth doing... Tons of games do it right, there is no shame in looking at their examples.
Now, I have a ton of other ideas, but I'm not going to go into that right now because at this point you've heard me say all this before, and I always hear back that there is simply no scope within the studio to work on all this.
This is my main suggestion; make the game F2P and follow the examples of Warframe, Fortnight, GTA V or Red Dead Redemption Online. All content is free, but super grindy. People who actually love the game like we all do deep down won't mind grinding for everything, and those who don't have the time can just pay for it. It soynds dirty but it's actually totally ethical and widely accepted practice within the gaming community, only those who don't wanna spend time OR money on the game will complain. But it is a good choice to offer to the players, spend time or spend money to unlock everything. Some players can't afford to spend time on a game just as much as some can't afford to spend money. As long as everything can be unlocked for free, it is completely fair and not pay 2 win at all. For those who paid full price for the game, give them in-store credit equivallent to the price they paid, and if you are worried that there is not enough content to follow this example, I just want to reassure you that your creative team is absolutely brilliant and if you were able to focus on creating new content indtead of fixing the already existing content then this game would truly flourish.
Now, I understand that you guys are contractually obliged to dedicating all your resources to the Xbox port, but imo if that port gets released in the game's current state... Let's just say that xbox players are not so kind and patient as the PS4 players and that is really saying something coz we are pretty trashy to begin with.
I think you guys should be open and clear with your publishers and explain to them what is going on with the state of the game. I think you'll find that they will probably be a lot more understanding and reasonable then you guys might expect.
Finally, there are still a lot of players out there who would be willing to give you more of our hard earned money if you actually made clear that this is the kind of roadmap you are working towards. Don't feel discouraged, there are still this of us who love you despite our frustrations. There are some who won't support you anymore, but some of them will change their minds if you change your perspective a little bit.
Anyway, thank you for taking the time to read through all of this.
I truly hope it helps, God bless you all Sloclap team!
Kindest and Sincerest Regards,
ColonelKlutch619
P.S. if it helps, please say it was an anonymous submission coz I fear I may just be completely dismissed simply because of who I am.
P.P.S. Please do something about cross region play.
Honestly, I complain about this game and it's community so much because I just love them both, and I really don't like seeing the state that it's in. It literally causes me emotional pain, and it's very mentally stressing.
Anyway, what grieves me most is that Absolver is not doing as well as it should be. I've said it before and I will say it again, this game can reach success levels of household competitive fighting games like Tekken or Soulcalibur. I think it could even reach Fortnight levels of success if I'm being honest.
Now, I'm going to be careful not to start complaining, I'm just going to state my opinion on certain issues and make a couple of suggestions that I think could really improve the game.
I'll start with manual doge. I think that manual dodge has become such a big problem because of all the other predeccessing balance changes. I think there was not a great awareness within the community just what impact the balance changes we have asked for would have on the whole state of the game and how it plays out on in the Combat Trials.
Every mechanic was originally so intricately tied together and delicately balanced to a point of perfection, and as soon as you change one thing, a billion other things need changing. Think of it like coding. The "meta" is one big code, and manual dodging was not a problem until all the other changes were implemented.
Now, manual dodging in itself should not be nerfed. If you continue down this line, Sloclap will probably be tied down with balance updates for the rest of the games lifespan, leaving the already sparse resources within the studio to be stretched even thinner. If you do nerf manual dodge, then Kahlt will probably need a rebalance too and if kahlt needs a rebalance... I think you guys know what a nightmare that is.
I honestly think that Kahlt was always fine, people just didn't wanna adapt their playstyle to beat it.
I also think that manual dodge is an important tool for newcomers to get to grips with the game. Historically, Sloclap have nerfed such tools coz players complain that such tools are too easy to use. Yes they are easy to use, but they are also easy to counter if you just stop complaining about it. I think that Sloclap's historical nerfing of such tools is the reason why a lot of new people cannot get in to the game anymore. Not that I'm complaining, it just is what it is, and it's our fault as players coz the community complained about these mechanics in the first place, and you guys were only listening to us, so you're not to blame. In fact, I'm thankful that you guys listened to us so closely.
I don't want to start suggesting balance changes within the game, because I think the game was perfectly balanced at launch. Even if kahlt had a higher win rate, it's only because it's easier to use, not because it's insanely overpowered.
What I will suggest are new features within the game to make it more in line with a true and fair competitive fighting game;
1. Have a ranked mode. For balancing, no powers, weapons may be allowed but do not do any cut damage. Health is restored after every round, and both players respawn at the start of each round to avoid spawn killing.
2. Have a spectator mode. This is essential to help expand the game's following. Everyone enjoys watching two highly skilled players fight.
3. Add new PvP game modes. We have 3v3 already, and it works brilliant. The reason why it's not popular right now is simply coz the game isn't popular and we all know how hard it is to find a match. 2v2s, tag team battles, ladder matches, king of the hill etc... Hell even a battle royal would be nice one day (although I don't expect it to happen soon, it should be a long term goal).
4. Add more content to downfall, or more PvE gsme modes. It's over way too quickly, I know that was the original complaint that made it get created in the first place, but trust me. If we want more, that is a testament to how much we loved it. Maybe you could add a hard mode, impossible mode (where you die in one hit), or certain challenges and gameplay modifiers... There are a lot of PvE games that add stuff like this for replayability and it really works well. You can even take some of the objectives in Downfall and expand them make completely seperate game modes. Imagine a game mode where you and your friends are trapped in a room and you just gotta try and survive as long as you can against endless NPCs.
5. Expand communication features in the game, and add an in-game reporting feature. Now this needs to be carefully thought out because it can easily be abused, but just coz it needs thought doesn't mean it's impossible or not worth doing... Tons of games do it right, there is no shame in looking at their examples.
Now, I have a ton of other ideas, but I'm not going to go into that right now because at this point you've heard me say all this before, and I always hear back that there is simply no scope within the studio to work on all this.
This is my main suggestion; make the game F2P and follow the examples of Warframe, Fortnight, GTA V or Red Dead Redemption Online. All content is free, but super grindy. People who actually love the game like we all do deep down won't mind grinding for everything, and those who don't have the time can just pay for it. It soynds dirty but it's actually totally ethical and widely accepted practice within the gaming community, only those who don't wanna spend time OR money on the game will complain. But it is a good choice to offer to the players, spend time or spend money to unlock everything. Some players can't afford to spend time on a game just as much as some can't afford to spend money. As long as everything can be unlocked for free, it is completely fair and not pay 2 win at all. For those who paid full price for the game, give them in-store credit equivallent to the price they paid, and if you are worried that there is not enough content to follow this example, I just want to reassure you that your creative team is absolutely brilliant and if you were able to focus on creating new content indtead of fixing the already existing content then this game would truly flourish.
Now, I understand that you guys are contractually obliged to dedicating all your resources to the Xbox port, but imo if that port gets released in the game's current state... Let's just say that xbox players are not so kind and patient as the PS4 players and that is really saying something coz we are pretty trashy to begin with.
I think you guys should be open and clear with your publishers and explain to them what is going on with the state of the game. I think you'll find that they will probably be a lot more understanding and reasonable then you guys might expect.
Finally, there are still a lot of players out there who would be willing to give you more of our hard earned money if you actually made clear that this is the kind of roadmap you are working towards. Don't feel discouraged, there are still this of us who love you despite our frustrations. There are some who won't support you anymore, but some of them will change their minds if you change your perspective a little bit.
Anyway, thank you for taking the time to read through all of this.
I truly hope it helps, God bless you all Sloclap team!
Kindest and Sincerest Regards,
ColonelKlutch619
P.S. if it helps, please say it was an anonymous submission coz I fear I may just be completely dismissed simply because of who I am.
P.P.S. Please do something about cross region play.
Comments
My suggestion is to not let players have any control over such things, and that is a practice that most fighting game devs adopt.
Also, hate to be that guy, but I'd love to hear from a Sloclap rep.
Is this post helpful or would you rather I stopped "plaguing your forums" lol.
If Sloclap tell me to go away now, I will and I won't come back.
Anyways i like your attitude towards sloclap and the game and your ideas are reasonable even so i see problems with some of them.
Overall:
you mentioned quite a lot of changes and from the time sclp needed to release downfall we can predict how long it would take to create other changes.
Ranked mode , spectator mode , pvp modes ,pve content and ingame communication would probably be to much for the time and budget sclp has.
1.: ranked mode:
I know there are more ps4 players but at pc we absolvers know each other and our skill anyways and ranked would just split the matchmaking even further.
So that would be unnecessary effort.
2.: id suppot that
3.: make 3v3 queue work first imo. More details...
https://absolvergame.com/forums/discussion/27257/3vs3-how-the-queue-would-work#latest
Nevertheless 2v2 would be very nice.
And absolver royal would be innovative and over the top awesome but although not really realistic with the needed effort.
4.: pve. diffeculty lvls and fighting each of the 3bosses directly on epic diffeculty with 2 friends necessary to even have chance. That would be very awesone and wouldnt cost to much effort i think.
I hope sclp considers this.
5.: maybe a little ingame chat would be nice... nothing to complicated that would take alot time to create.
At last:
F2P with buyable cosmetic items and maybe some epic skins that can only be obtained with real money would be a good way to fund absolver in the future but free weekends might do the job as well and in general i would like to keep micro transactions away as much as possible.
Those are some really good points. The one thing I'm not too sure on is the free weekend point you made. Sure it will bring in a lot of players, but most players don't buy the game once the free period ends. It's a problem with the gaming community nowadays, sadly.
It is a really good idea though as we've seen when it released free on PSN; we had a HUGE influx of new players, but I doubt Sloclap made much money with that, sadly... Not to completely dismiss your opinion, it's really helpful!
Thanks for feeding in bro, really helpful
Edit: I know my suggestions would be hard to pull off, but making this game in the first place couldn't have been easy... I'm gonna keep hoping that one day it can happen
Im not sure if theyd put more money in microtransactions. free weekends really bring some life into the community.
I looked up the player numbers again and after the last absolver free weekend the playernumbers stayed 2500 current players higher than usual(25 times higher) for almost one month! So at least 1000 if not 2000 bought the game. I really thought that would be the breakthrough for absolver but unfortunatly the numbers crashed after 1 month and now we are back to 100 current players on pc.
Although downfall has shown almost no impact on playernumbers, so what the most players need for long time interest in absolver, is a good pvp. ok thats pretty obvious.
Anyway...
Historically speaking, the discounts and free PSN have worked to bring in new players... I don't think that's the main problem though, sadly. Wish it were that easy. The game design and visual appeal of the gameplay is great enough to draw in the players, and the excellent PvP will make people come back for more, but gamers are not very patient or focused these days, and two or three good game modes and a modest sum of unlockables/challenges is just is not enough to keep most gamers invested long term. Also remember that the grind for loot is basicalky non-existent anymore because everything is now very easily unlocked after an hour or two in Downfall.
Obviously, the issue is clearly player retention. Similar cycles have happened over the game's lifespan on both platforms; influx of new players, then everyone leaves after a month...
I think a big part of the reason behind that is that the game doesn't pump out new content fast enough. If you look at For Honour, they are constantly bringing out new stuff. Pretty much every popular game at the moment has the same pattern of frequent new content updates.
The issue is that Absolver kind of stagnates after the new players arrive. I think what happens is that Sloclap just sit back and hope the players don't leave rather then proactively giving them new reasons to stay. No fault to Sloclap, we all know they are stretched thin as it is... But it is going to cause problems given the state of the industry where new games and content are being pushed out so frequently.
There will always be a core segment that will never stop playing no matter what rep the game is getting/state of the meta/ frustrations with the game.
But to keep a healthy player base, their needs to be constant expansion, not just one big update and endless balance changes...
Of course, an excellent PvP is necessary too, and if I'm honest I think we started with that at launch. I think player numbers probably started dwindling as soon as Sloclap started rebalancing the game although I don't know where to find figures that could back that claim up. I could be completely wrong but from the players I talked too, everyone agrees that the game was just better the farther back you go.
Again, I could be wrong coz I don't have any figures to back that up, but I have a feeling that I'm not wrong...
Even so youre right that constantly increasing the content could work, from experience we should know that sclp isnt that fast. Therefore wed need another way to make players stay.
One method might be player content, like a world editor to create training grounds or a school dojo.
I heard thats not to hard to accomplish in unreal 4 engine.
Another way might be official tournaments wich will definitely boost the core community. Ofc the most important game play fixes have to come first.
But for the balancing im hopeful. Feajin is very good balanced for first attempt so sclp might be able tu pump out alot more combat styles without ruining the balance. I think they got the hang of it .
I dont think absolver was necessarily better back than. It highly depends on the when. With only 3 combat styles it was pretty good. Stagger was very unbalanced with massively strong double hits and a backdodge that couldnt be countered except by laggs.
I think the game bevame alot more fun only downfall brought major issues in addition its good changes. For example stagger is fun like never before, aaand its finally pretty balanced.
But the delays on the def. Abilities and the manuel dodge passing through the attack, eq spam and khalt gaining no or even frame disadvantage, is pretty frustrating ofc.
If we could take it back to that version but keep the new content I think everyone would be happy.
Umm, this may be an unpopular opinion but I dunno if Fae Jin is balanced tbh. Once you get over the stance changing it's pretty easy to use, and it's ability to negate feints is insanely OP and no other class can do that.
Making something harder to use does not make it balanced imo coz it's only a matter of time before you become efficient and then there are basically no countermeasures...
This type of balancing where you make something it harder to use simply doesn't work in fighting games anymore, all it does is limit the accessibilty of the OP mechanics, but they srill exist and they still OP.
I don't know if the devs understand that though because back in the day they said Forsaken was the most balanced class even though there was only 2 input choices, and a succesful parry would lead to 130+ damage confirmed every single time whereas kahlt cant even defend against guard breaks or double hits and could barely confirm any damage plus they refused to buff stagger pokes or fae jin pokes keeping them at low damage coz it would be too OP even tho Forsaken was confirming nearly triple their damage...
Forsaken was also the only class that could defend reliably against double hits, Forsaken was clearly the best class for a long time and yet the devs said it was the most balanced class simply coz it was harder to use.
I don't even think it was the hardest to use tbh. Windfall has pretty strict timing constraints too, and it's much more susceptible to mix ups and feints then Forsaken is coz it has twice the input demands. Yet Forsaken clearly had more benefits than Windfall.
Also, I heard a rumour that someone beat the Forsaken dev with Kahlt, and the dev then went on to say that Forsaken needed more tools... This could be false, but if it's true, I can imagine that the Fae Jin poke that negates feints was the answer to it. I dunno how I feel about that tbh. It's like the resilience mechanic, or unbreakable. They just feel like they were tacked on at the end to cover for a players lack of skill. Again, I could be wrong.
Honestly, I hate to be too critical, especially of the developers, but it's just my opinion... I apologize deeply if I am causing offence to anyone, it's not my intention to do that and I could be misinformed.
>~
Faejin parry and dodges are a bit simular to stagger, they trade less risk for less success.
Feajin doesnt deal as much damage as a successful parry and it doesnt restore that much stamina.
Additionally feajin is punishable. Its just more difficult to punish faejin.
Very fast follow ups after a feint punish faejin and everyone can just use their defensive ability to counter their hit after a feint. You can even feint, manuel dodge and still confirm a fast hit.
The dodges on the backstance trade the same. Damage and stamina for less risk of getting punished.
To forsaken, yes it WAS unbalanced as fuck but im pretty sure sclp knows that cause they changed it x)
14frames punish is ok.
Dont worry im not offended in any way , i just fought enough faejin to counter them.
Well, I don't really see much from your post which contradicts mine.
Just to add to it tho;
Even if less risk less reward is the case with fae Jin, it doesn't make it balanced coz fighting games revolve around punishing mistakes and it's much more of an advantage to have less risk less reward than have high risk high reward.
High risk stuff can only be used by very skilled players. Less risk is for beginners.
Honestly, I'm not too fussed about Fae Jin. It's the way devs arw handling balance issues. I don't have a problem with Fae Jin, just the logic that went behind it. It just seem's so backwards.
Also, the community is consistently calling for a nerf on fast jab moves, we have already seen that with the new resilience mechanic. Soon it will be even harder, if not impossible to punish fae jin with a feint.
It's just not balanced at all, it seem's like it's all driven by hubris and not logic.
Anyway, enough of Fae Jin, my main concern regarding classes is with kahlt. I think it's treatment is a big reason why players find it hard to get into the game now, and why a lot of people stopped playing.
They have applied some fixes to counter sll the nerfs it's had, but the best and most popular kahlt player; Ayoukenn (who also had the largest school in the game) said that kahlt is now shite and hasn't played much if at all for 7 months.
My guess is that the playerbase also started dwindling at around that time. I don't have access to figures to prove this, but I am willing to bet my life savings that there is a direct correlation.
as long as the reward/risk ratio remains the same.
We already had the example of Forsaken. It was way to op back than while you could punish a wrong parry the most because of the long recovery time. But the rewards for a successfull parry was so high that it doesnt matter.
The reward for feajin parry isnt to high. The relative high damage of 75 gets evened out by the almost non existent stamina recovery. Although feajin is punishable for about 70 damage denpending on your combos and feint times.
Feajins parry really dont make it op.
If something make it op it would be the very good stopping move or the backdodge of the back stances because its very save, so the reward/risk ratio is different. But even than i wouldnt consider feajin to be op. Windfall takes a little more risk for way way higher rewards and less complicated playstyle.
Forsaken has about the same reward/risk ratio as faejin but is less complicated and although easier to predict.
So id say forsaken is only slightly weaker than feajin.
Stagger is just as strong with less damage but much more stamina regeneration. So stagger has about the same reward/risk ratio. But i have to mention stagger gets countered by feajin due to the stopping move mid thrusts feajin can use all the time, and the backdodge that dodges all stagger moves except for the front charge.
And khalt is just a bit to weak atm so i wont use that as comparison.
Windfall is definitly stronger so no feajin isnt op.
I'm not saying that the Fae Jin parry is overpowered at all, it's the follow up poke that basically immunises the player against the opponent feinting into anything higher than around 14 frames... If the community has it's way, and faster attacks are nerfed further, than how are we as players able to get around that? And also, Kahlt is weak because the community kept complaining about it... And I'm saying that Kahlt's treatment probably correlates with the drop of active players, since kahlt is a good class to start fighting competitively with.
Those were really my main points. I don't actually have any problems facing any class, I already know how to beat Fae Jin. What I'm trying to highlight is that the communities' approach to balancing is ridiculous and how can you expect to retain new players when skilled players like us are rewarded with less risk and the new players have to play with more risk from the start?
If you want a fighting game to be both competitive AND accesible, what you need to do is reverse that. Newcomers should play with less risk and skilled players should play with more risk.
I'm just saying it's wrong for a fighting game to offer more experienced players less risk and newcomers more risk. Compare Fae Jin to Kahlt. Fae Jin is lower risk and higher reward compared to kahlt.
How can we retain newcomers with this type of attitude to balancing where we are always making things harder for newcomers?
the perfect style for newbies would be windfall atm. its intuitive, fast and easy to use, almost 2 dimensional (cause the pure low sweeps are very rare) and offers pretty high rewards that almost every deck can get use of.
Might be that theyve changed khalt due to bad influence fro mthe community BUT they said it doesnt work as intended so maybe khalt should still have frame advantage on absorb it just doesnt work.
I like the spells and weapons in general. Just some spells are booring and should be replaced like eq or shockwave, .
A little nerf for cut damage might be needed too but its not gamebreaking.