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Announcement - Big Farm: Some words of the Product Management team

CM NafaruCM Nafaru Posts: 1,325
edited 25.03.2014 in Official Announcements
Hey everybody,

the last couple of weeks were not easy for all of us, because a lot of changes have been made to already existing features... that's why our Product Management team would like us to forward this message to you to give you some insights on why some things had to be changed and what is going to change in the future:
Hi there,

I would like first of all to thank you all for the extensive feedback! Your comments help us to continue to improve Big Farm and to assess the impact of our changes better. I've been following discussions in the forum regularly and watch some questions/topics come up again and again. I want to do my best to answer some of these questions here:

1) "Prime prime prime" - why is there such a huge focus on Gold features?
Every company has economic goals. These goals can usually only be achieved with sales growth. Whether we go to the supermarket, get on the train or pass the time playing an online game, behind all these actions are large companies and their economic interests. This is neither good nor bad, I just want to say that Goodgame Studios is no exception. Paying customers get a company going and make these things possible.

I understand that, especially non-gold players are annoyed by the many offerings. But remember: Whenever you close a dialogue, there are some players, spread around the world who choose to pay for the offer. These players make it possible that you can continue playing at all after closing the dialogue; that you can take care of your farm and there are regular updates. For you it is "only" the closing of a dialogue, but for us it means a safe workplace and the existence of Big Farm. The confrontation with these offers is the only price that a non-gold player must pay.

2) Why are there always changes in the game which obviously no one likes?
We know that we have to expect that with the new decoration formula, price increases or the new dialogue for Prime Days, that it will not be popular. The reasons for these changes are different, but let’s look at the new decoration formula:

A basic building block of games is the challenge. If there is no challenge, the motivation to play drops significantly. Getting the operating costs to -100% was not a particularly difficult task. At the same time, the need for satisfaction and new decorations is reduced considerably. Without the need for new decorations there is a lack of incentive to participate in much of the game content such as quests, events, and much of what we have planned in the future. The need for decorations is therefore an important part of the game. Now that the formula is adjusted, this once again opens up the opportunity to offer more new decorations as a reward. It was an important decision for the future of the game, even if the game does not feel as good as before right now.

The increase of the maximum operating costs from +300% to +500% had another reason. We think it's great when players develop strategies, even when we had not previously thought of them. The possibility to dispense entirely with decorations on the main farm and still achieve a positive balance of dollars was something we had not previously thought possible. It is not about banning this strategy, but we had the feeling that the resulting advantage over the players that were playing the way we intended has been too great. We wanted the adjustments to the decoration formula to counteract this. Each strategy should have its pros and cons.


3) Why is the fourth farm not being added?

To develop a game like Big Farm means there is a lot to plan in advance. We are planning some months into the future and then work step by step towards that goal. In order to shorten your waiting time, we give little hints to what is waiting for you in the future.

Unfortunately, it sometimes happens that during the concept phase we make new findings, which makes us question the planned feature. With the fourth farm, growing concerns were raised that with four permanent farms we would overwhelm the player. At this time we want to work with limited available farms to offer the widest possible variety. To take care of four permanent and one temporary farm would mean a large expenditure of time for most players. This does not mean that there will definitely never be a fourth farm. It only means that this is not currently planned.

I'm sorry that the sign for the fourth farm had been in the game for so long and that we subsequently decided against it.


4) Why are the "Official Announcements" not detailed? Do you want to deprive us of something?

Announcements about updates should always be accessible and clear. Everyone should get an idea of what to expect in the next update within a few minutes. For this it is necessary that we present information in a short and concise way. To provide all the data of each new buildings in all available levels would cause numerous tables in the forum. The manual effort would be enormous and would slow down our production speed. Remember that these would have to be translated into various languages and would have to be re-uploaded along with any adjustments that needed to be made. Furthermore, we do not want to present you with information that is not yet final. Details such as building costs may change shortly before the update if we notice in the tests that they need to be changed. If we announced it then we have given you a false "promise", which really helps nobody.

So it's usually not that this information is "secret" but rather an effort to prevent false information being posted in the forum.

5) Why must the gourmet farm be revised?


Those who start playing Big Farm again from the beginning will notice how "round" the main farm feels while playing and that the transition to the gourmet farm is very bumpy. We feel the gourmet farm was a break in the quality of Big Farm. When we analyzed the reasons why, we found that the problems are simply too great to try and repair it. Therefore only the choices are to live with the weak gourmet farm or to completely rework it. We have chosen to review it completely and I am confident that this was the right decision to make.

The revision is definitely not a gold feature. From the "gold view", the development of a fourth farm would have been much less work and therefore would have been more lucrative. There would have been no dollar compensation, all farm extensions would have to be purchased along with all the premium buildings. The focus of the gourmet farm revision is to make Big Farm an overall high quality game.

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In closing, I want to give you a little look at what we will focus on next:

So far, the game offers quite a few opportunities for interaction between players. Missions should occupy a more central part of the game, but they are not yet fulfilling this role. Therefore, we will revise the missions. We want to make it clear at the same time that we will make them more accessible and offer a whole new incentive to participate. The mission revision is our next big change.

After the gourmet farm revision we want to make it equal to the main farm. Cooperative projects, missions, events and much more will be added. We want to do this step by step and to make the second farm a beautiful gaming experience.

For higher level players, the game offers very little engagement and challenge. We want that to change! The game content for the new environment will task higher level players with more demands than ever before. Stay tuned!

Horses belong on a farm! We are currently considering how we can best integrate horses into the game. We are sure that horses will take a respectable role in the future of Big Farm. However we will need more time before you can take care of those horses.


I wish you lots of fun with Big Farm!

Regards,
your Product Management Goodgame Big Farm
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