UF NEWS: Interview with Brian and Sean: Owners of Utopia

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Originally Posted by beeper

indeed, it explains why they destroyed game, having no ideea what are they doing:
"Sean: I used to play a lot of Quake and Counter-Strike"
- that's why they dropped strategy part of the game that made this one of a kind and make it more like a shooter game, despite the fact it can't be a shooter
- another thing still they did not learn is about cheating: design game so cheating does not make much impact. they made changes so cheating is encouraged then complain they spend too much solving the issue :)

Here 2 changes that totally destroyed original game:
1. attacking time in war does no longer take account of prov. NW difference
- this made cheating a big advantage and destroyed strategy war game, making it more like a shooter and along with reduced attack time 50% of players had to quit. there were players doing 14...16 hours attacks and was not a big problem. right now if you don't make min. 2 attacks/day you have to quit. it takes no brain for a multi to make 16 hits in 10 seconds and destroy a province. hard chaining , like in a shooter game is most used now.
2. introducing destructive races like avian, undead ... and helping big kingdoms to attack or raze-kill much smaller kingdoms. why big kingdoms have still good gain attacking 1/2 their size and not fight each other ? who want to play such an unfair game ?
3. still no definition for war wins, game scope ... so what else is this game about if not about cheating ? because cheating is the only fun part this game offers now , for those that can enjoy doing it of course

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no definition for WW? no fun outside cheating? introducing avians an undead?!?!? (alrdy been said how early they were introduced), comparing this to CS? my man. im sry, i will take a 24 hrs ban for saying this but you are the biggest noob on the farking planet to spout the nonsense you just said with your post. i have not read crap like this since... since.... ever. i was around when undead were introduced and they were my main btw. actually i was around before then but still. you sir have no tactful mind or you just suck at life.

Brian and Sean,

thank you for not giving up on Utopia. I know there was a time when these boards were 99% flames and I'm glad you didn't let that deter you.
About the cheating: perhaps an amnesty for people revealing the secrets might help preventing cheating.
I'm also glad you will not give in to a pay-to-win concept
Those taunts sound interesting


To all the others, when you complain about deficiencies in the game, please don't forget to mention all the things that are working flawless. This thread received a disappointingly low number of replies
http://forums.utopia-game.com/showth...7813-good-work

rather than condemning in a negative tone...why not give a positive suggestions & comments...
and yeah, please check the FACTS before jerking in out of the blue...

haish...sigh

Well, guess we can quit griping about OMAC and Jolt now.........

just keep making my thieves stronger and ill be happy!

Excellent inteview, thanks for doing this and sharing your thoughts. Timing is good too.

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Originally Posted by Bishop

FYI: i was a community member. This division you are on about, i don't get it. You expect them to release the code for us to decide on changes?

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Was a community memeber? WAS? WHERE'S THE LOVE FOR THE COMMUNITY BISHOP?

This whole mod thing has gone to your head...... you used to be cool
Also.... am I supposed to keep those posts on topic or not?

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Originally Posted by Mad_Scottish

Graphic design. We are grateful for the offers from programmers in the community to help out, but we don?t have work that can be managed remotely at the moment. However, if people in the community want to volunteer good graphic design skills, please step forward. There is a place for both illustration and CSS work. If anyone wants to try design a new VBulletin skin for Utopia, please go right ahead. If it looks good, we can install it and make it available to everyone. If its really good, we might make it the default. Down the line, there may be an opportunity to try some game themes too.

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i don't have any VBulletin system but if anyone will give me access to the forum css or server css i can build for you guys any thing you want with html js css etc...

i worked and managed forum boards in the past as well as installing mods etc...

and like always its all for free because i love this game ;)

I don't mind pay-to-play, but I'm against pay-to-win.

This game brings enjoyment to its members, despite the amount of *****ing and moaning that we do. If someone hates the game/devs/mods/etc so much, they wouldn't be logging in every day to play the game. They play because it must bring some level of enjoyment for them.

I don't know how much revenue the banner ads bring in, and I can't verify if the devs are rich men crying poor (like the NFL owners and players fighting over the $9,000,000,000+ annual revenues). But I don't think paying $5 an age is a big deal. That's over $100K revenue a year, enough for 2 full time employees, especially in this economy.

Plus, if they can't eliminate multis completely, then at the very least tax them for multiple accts. Just like RL. If we can't keep the 20 million illegal immigrants out of our country, then just assign them SSNs so we can at least tax them for their stay.

Thank you Bishop for the reply, however you are only proving the paradox.

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First point to address - the plan is to have more than 7k people.

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They can't afford advertising, they aren't trying to go mobile, they aren't about to get onto Facebook either. The plan to have more than 7,000 people is to have community members spread the game via word of mouth...

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main point - is how are you going to get people to work on the game? Its no where near as simple as you seem to think.

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Everything in the world is simple if you chose to see it as such. At the same time, the choice can be made to assume everything is complex. But when you break anything down into smaller steps for analysis, things become simple. The more people working on small steps, the quicker and more simple things become. That's how everything in this world works whether it's Physics, Economics, or Religion.

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First, you need to asses that these people who volunteer can help - devs cant afford to spend a week helping someone to get up to speed and then have them not bother helping - that's time wasted.

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The devs can't even afford to write a text-based guide that would take all of one weekend to type. If that's what the devs can't afford, what CAN they afford?
If they have own(ed) a company, they should know how to hire a qualified worker. Hmm, a simple "we need help fixing ticking, if you are an experienced game-programmer and are willing to work for free and sign a contract of NDA, please apply." A great start would be to ask the developers of uToos, Angel, and Pimp to join the team. But no, 3rd party programs must remain 3rd party - this is what they said in the interview.

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Second, doing work remotely isn't really ideal or what they want - they said that themselves.

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Once again, it has to be done their way. This is the division. 2 vs 7000. How can 2 devs with zero free time and a lack of income cater to the needs of 7000 vocal players and NOT include them. Nothing about coding this game seems to be ideal so I'm not sure where that became the norm. If they can't adjust to the modern world where businesses conduct multi-million dollar deals via the internet, then this is a failure on their part. Online chatting and video streaming is so easy there is no reason to make that an excuse.

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Finally, who owns the code created? Youd need a watertight NDA and security in place, as well as vetting of volunteers.

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I would assume Arcadia (aka S&B) owns the code since they're being so watertight about any sort of involvement or changes to it.
Scenario 1: Two people with little time or money are planning gradual changes - banking on the fact that they can add premium features to produce more income. Then once they have enough money they will try and get another dev. Then with another helping hand, they still might get this game into a Lite version. Apps and mobile support are still not getting enough attention. This is what the interview says.
Scenario 2: The same two people take a month to draft an NDA (I'm sure they have a model they can use from the other games they've worked on.) During this same month they ask for applications from the community for experienced coders (so many people work on open-source projects - it's not like that will be hard). They review applications and form a team of developers. A team of ~8 coders/developers can accomplish a lot. Sync IRC to the KD Chat feature. Form a mini-team to get this game running on mobile platforms and the app store. Fix the small issues like Updating the KD Page and begin planning for the big issues like the Honor system.
In 1 years time, this game could be a tremendous success if properly managed.
If two developers are spending most of their limited time to stop cheaters and run the support team, how do they ever expect to be successful?

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FYI: i was a community member. This division you are on about, i don't get it. You expect them to release the code for us to decide on changes?

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Yes you 'are' a community member. Bishop, you even have admin rights which is a huge step above everyone else. Yet you still do not have access to the code and I have read numerous posts in the Bugs thread where you cannot determine an answer and must ask S&B for the answer. In some cases that took several weeks just to get a simple answer about "Honor generated in war" or "how do watchtowers actually work." That is the best the community has right now. If you don't understand the division still, then I don't know how to explain any further. The community has no say. S&B admitted they ignored the community before. They don't ever post in the forums or announce anything. They refuse to incorporate 3rd parties with the development. Sooo which part of the division do you not get?

They obviously vetted you and Palem... it's time to get more people involved - and extend the involvement past community management.

Good interview.

Thank you for taking the time, and thank you for keeping the game alive.

informatively BoRinG but good to know.... hope mehul does a godly and che copy of his interview....

Great interview and cool to see a lot of responses that are favorable.
To the other whiners and criers, grab a hanky and wipe those crocodile tears away, as we are sick of you tools flaming constantly. Forget about the old days, they are long gone. *undeads came in 6 and avians 7"
I do nto blame them one damn bit for completely ignoring the community long ago. The server was so far under water from all the salty tears and blubbering about how things were not going right. Crying about a 30 second wait for tick, ugh. My kd waited around 15 mins while game was down to finish a wave. Not one of us came crying to the forums. S&B IMO, keep ignoring the spam and flame filled forums, and let the mods deal with them.
I am sure these are the same peeps *****ing that also did the same thing in the Mehul days. For the ones who can not stand waiting that 30 seconds for tick, would have hated to be around ya when the dos attacks were going on.
Just pisses me off and annoys me that some just simply have to nit pick to find things to complain about. This game has never been perfect, and never will be.
Give them time, and I for one, APPRECIATE THE THINGS THAT S&B DO ON THEIR SPARE TIME.

Very interesting and good to hear from them!

Maybe make this a regular interview?