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Comments
You Will play zee game our way, or you WILL be punished!
"This isn't the way the game is SUPPOSED to be played!"
Really? I thought a strategy game was supposed to be left up to the strategy of the player. I guess I was wrong.
Nothing to see here, move along. Going to tell us what to think next?
But I did, repeatedly. We are testing how removing the "buy wares" button out of a particular menu affects playstyle and behaviour of players, mainly new players who didn't get used to how it usually works. This test will run for 1,2 months, until enough data is collected (I can't say for sure how long it will be, I would if I could), and then the test will be over.
We will take our findings and use them to create a new option to buy/sell things, which for now we'll call a "market".
There are absolutely no plans whatsoever to take out all 'buy' options completely, but right now, they hurt the game more than they help, due to various reasons.
The update name was obviously not chosen because of that matter, but as a pun about how there are no real changes regarding this forum's server at all.
If you need data to "create a new option", it means you are quite far from implementing this new feature. Maybe it will take another 6 months until the so-called market comes online.
So, the torment of tens of thousands of players will have no immediate result. If you would have created a test-server and ask for new players there, this all process of gathering data would have been quicker and much, much more appreciated by the community.
Plus, you could have used the server for future testing of whatever craziness comes to your mind next. Small investment with huge benefits. But as we already know, "thinking" and "brainstorming" is not a strong point of GGS developers...
If, on the contrary, you are close to finish the market, why not test the market itself? Give people some option of buying and adjust the figures on the fly.
Your choice of testing is simple cruel and brutal. The worse option of them all.
But that's exactly what you did!!! Took the "buy" option out completely from entire communities!! You hurt the game, you, GGS, not the players, no matter what they do!!!
Can you give as sample of those "various reasons"? There are some pretty smart people here on the forum, maybe you should bring the developers here for a talk, I'm sure we can solve your problems fast and without any further damage to Italian and Brazilian servers.
Due to various reasons? Would those reasons be that people were not buying enough gold? Not playing the way GGS THINKS the game should be played??? Hurting the game or hurting the GGS coffers?
That GGS doesn't care about the people who have played the game a while and invested real money into it? That they like to see the monkeys dance? I guess since "experiments" are done on monkeys, that must be what we're seen as.
Because from where I'm sitting, the players don't seem to feel the game is hurting. Only the people herding us into playing the game one way. Their way.
Double-talk indeed. Various reasons? For real? REALLY REALLY?
Most companies would see what a huge mistake they've made, cut their losses, and do a mea culpa. Not GGS. Nope. They're doubling down and making people even more pissed off.
either cancel the whole thing or bring the whole new "market" feature on "all" servers first then we'll talk about "reasons", if u need data, make a beta test server.
atm what u are doing is just killing the game.
If i read this correctly, the buy option is hurting the game and therefore you create a new option and you call it a market. So there will be a market without the buy option?
Finally i understand why the fairytale tower is a themed deco.
I understand you intended it as a pun and how there were no major changes on this server in the update.
The big problem is your staff were concurently attempting to hide the biggest, and most nasty change on *other* servers. That is some irony there.
In order to conduct the most damage control, please allow all players to vent their (justifiable) anger, rather than dictating the topic of conversation at this critical (to your future wages) time. Its no use pretending it will go away. Psych 101 has much to say about ethics in experiments and there are apparent violations here. Who is to say that our servers will not get similar treatment some other time? We have concerns which need to be voiced.
Simply, your company has been found out. Restoration to the effected servers players with some compensation to them will be the least GG$ can do right now.
Because the market is not even close to being ready yet - that's what the test is for, to figure out how to do the market best.
Of course. This is the main problem: The game was built around production and organizing said production chains, not about "just" buying everything one needs. When we built in the option to buy all wares as needed, the game was way smaller, the buy option was not remotely as essential to overall gameplay as it is now. With the ship and everything regarding the Farm environment it's now possible to skip a substantial part of the game now, only through buying wares, and that's something we clearly didn't anticipate or want to happen.
Personally, I also think that the game will change gameplay to be a lot more specialized, so it won't be able to do everything at once all the time, through just buying the ingredients to do so. We might see a bit of a change in this direction as well, but - again - that's just me thinking about various little things I heard and suspect, so don't take my word for it yet.
We are not trying to hurt the players here. The affected servers just are the best platforms to effectively see how this change is taken by mainly new players. Of course I am completely aware that this can be super annoying for players who use the 'buy' option often right now, but we will stop the test when it's done, and even if we will take out this option to buy wares, we will add another one, in form of said market.
It's not great for a lot of players, but honestly I think "torment" might be a bit far fetched here.
Of course, feel free to discuss everything. I can assure you we won't censor any discussion, or shut it up all together, as long as everyone keeps it on a civil level. Usually this agreement works perfectly, and as long as the discussion keeps away from actually insulting people (including GGS staff) or, well, just goes completely bonkers, I have no problem with leaving it open and free to discuss.
Also, we will of course compensate all players on the affected servers. I can not tell you what exactly the compensation will be, but of course we will find something appropriate.
Thats all I wanted to hear .... Giving them a bit of warning would have been nice, but I am glad they will be compensated. ^^
We would have loved to give an earlier warning, sadly we hadn't much of a chance
Some players may be glad to hear a promise, personally I actually like to see it happen.
Also, thank you for not censoring the posts as most forums do.
Perhaps if it was explained to everyone a bit earlier with all of the reasons, it wouldn't have blossomed out of control like this. Just a suggestion, but maybe in the future, these kind of things can be planned out a little better, to minimize the damage. That post would have been great at the top of this section.
This may make all look a bit less wrong, but it will not make right in any way, if GGS wanted the data of live server, the most advisable choice would have been the replication of live servers in test servers and to invite players to play on it, many gaming platforms do it.
You said that GGS is going to compensate all players in the affected servers, but I have read all 52 pages of this topic in the Portuguese/Brazilian Forum, and I can assure you that compensation was never mentioned there, what we were told there is that GGS won't stop the test and that it will run for at least 2-3 months.
The way things are going in the Brazilian server, GGS must really come out with a very, very, very good compensation, or the server will soon start to fall apart. Players are very distressed there, which is probably a common feeling to all affected servers, Brazilian server is just an example because it's the reality I know(I have friends that play on it) and I like to comment based on real facts.
We will add some kind of "test server" eventually, but as it is now, we would need a different client software (the part of the game that's actually on your pc while playing) for every minor change, which would make it nearly impossible to work with. This is a plan we have for the future though, so things like this are hopefully no longer necessary. It's actually been worked on right now, as we speak.
Regarding your other point, I already asked to not discuss the Brazilian/Portuguese forums in here. While I'm sure it has been said over there as well, I don't want to discuss the moderation of said forums in this forum, since it's unfair for all the CMs and Mods that can't defend themselves, and to all other players who can't understand the language. Please let's be respectful and not do that.
That was a pretty much quick action! It's there....
I think it is safe to say that you have many interested parties in this thread who would really, REALLY like to know SPECIFICALLY just how the "buy" option is hurting the game. Just what, exactly, are the various reasons?
ETA: I see this explanation, I do:
and I get that it might be possible to fulfill *parts* of the ship's cargo via the buy option (or maybe the entire cargo, if a player hasn't activated the island farm). I understand that. But how else does it allow players to "skip a substantial part of the game" or "everything regarding the Farm environment"???
I'm sorry, I just really can't understand 1) why buying, even if prevalent, should be considered so "bad" and 2) how it could possibly negatively impact every aspect of the game.
So thank you for offering some of the "reasons" but the vagueness is still troubling.
There are several other things but parts of shipments that can be skipped pretty easily if you have amassed enough dollars in your account.
If you take Gourmet farms, for instance, our data shows that some players actually demolished their gardens and replaced them for other production facilities (for more $$), because they are able to buy all needed crops right from farm management. So they skip one essential part of the whole gourmet farm production cycle.
Furthermore, some themed event and task steps are easily finished by just hoarding enough cash to buy and sell products, buy and make available products, buy and start productions, ... I bet you see a pattern there.
And these things are only 2 examples of many many smaller and bigger problems the 'old buying' system brings along. Due to 'exploitability' I'd rather not mention any more examples - I guess that is understandable.
Of course, we also considered Balancing changes to keep up the challenge. But in some cases it's almost impossible to find a right balance between beginners and high level players with enormous amounts of dollars to spend, between non-deco and deco players, players who only play casually and players only farming for cash... there is only so much you can do by changing the numbers to keep up the challenge whilst making it fair for all sides - especially since farm management is available right from the start - with the same conditions for all players.
The new marketplace feature, that this test is a preparation for, will enable us to set different conditions for high and low level players if needed, just like we're already able to with themed events and other new features.
What happens now with ths "buy-button" is similar. Only a few players found a way to get around building fields/gardens, (not producing the basic products), so they could have far more stables on their farms and simply BUY the necessary basic products.... I am afraid that the story will repeat itself: now that all players have this knowledge, far more players will build such farms... And to avoid this, GGS now decided to take out the "buy-button" for all of us.
So - due to only few players - we all have to suffer the loss of our buy-button! Just like happened in March, because of only a few players, the "happiness meter" was altered for all of us.
I wonder what would have happened if GGS would just have left these few players be? I myself don't like to rush to the top rankings by buying my way out and I know many more players think the same. I like to figure out the best strategy for each and every feature, all the tricks in the game (as a game befits). Buying myself out with gold or via this buy-button would bore me hugely. I just use the buy-button occasionally, to complete a task of an event i.e.
But if other players want to do so, I would say just let them do so. But I am not a game developer, so maybe I see things wrong. Maybe GGS has good reasons to rule out this "buy-me-out-way" .... :S
Edit: was typing at the same moment as Nafaru (her post explains a lot!)
If it's not close to being ready yet, why not take a couple of days and put together a test server?
And don't give that software crap again.. You didn't need a special client-side software for the Italians and Brazilians, haven't you?
Latten, no one buys everything. If a farm is specialized on milk, it buys apple or vice-verse. But no one buys everything. Farms that don't produce anything do not exist. And even if they were, why do you care? People are playing the game the way they want to. Why do you need to impose a certain chain of action? WHY?
You didn't anticipated, I understand. But why don't you want it to happen? Why do you care so much? Give us the real reason. WHY? Why do you hate specialized farms so much? How are they hurting the game?
I play for 2 years now and the game is running just fine, there is no need to stop the buying process. You must have some other reasons for that, not those described above.
Rumors or not, why this strong need of yours to change the gameplay? If you want to make a different game, make a different game, don't change this one.
Why is it so wrong that we want to do everything in the same time? WHY, GGS, WHY?
Funny thing that you are not trying, but succeeding
If new players are what you care for, MAKE A NEW, TEST SERVER!!!
This make no sense, Latten, and I trust that you, at least, are smart enough to understand it and you won't serve this crap on us again.
So, the buying hurts the game, but you will provide a market. In a market, people BUY staff. So how does it solve the buying problem, that hurts the game so much? They will still buy staff, from the market!!
You could have implement many different solution to limit the buying process that you are so afraid of:
- limit the amount of $$ spend daily
- limit the amount of products being bought
- increase the prices
- forbid the buying of products requested by events, like buying apples when you need to donate them
But no, you make a market.. What will keep me from buying apples from the market and donate them? You put limits? If you put limits, why go to all this trouble and not just put the limits, without the market?
My only logical conclusion is: THE MARKET will run on GOLD. It's the only possible explanation for everything.
And the test you are running on Italians and Brazilians are mainly to see how much gold they are willing to spend on speeding up production, so you can adjust the prices in the market.
You don't care about the buying process itself, you just need a new source of revenue! Only this, GGS, will truly hurt the game. Too much greed from your part will make people leave. And the ones staying will just produce, like you "want" them too (no, not really want them to, but that's what you say), and you will gain nothing... at least, not relevant amounts. So, you will invent new sources of revenue, until you'll crash the game completely.
Read the Italian and Brazilian forums. You will see just how "fetched" it is...
No compensation would be enough for 2 months of crippled game play. What would give them? 10 Super Humus and 100.000$? Maybe 250 Corn? Get serious, people, weak up! 2 months without buying hurts the players too much for any such compensation. Or, you can give them something like 20.000 gold each. That would be close to a true compensation. But somehow I doubt that you will be so generous with your test subjects, people you have no respect for...
Why not adjust the prices on current buy/sell to reflect the playability you seek?
If corn is say, 50 per unit and you think it is being exploited, adjust a percentage up to compensate, no? I'm not a programmer, but I'd have to assume changing a valuation field from 50 to =150 would have been a snap instead of .....of..... well, I have no clue anymore what you call this. Did nobody come up with a simple explanation there? If so, how or why was it refuted?
It's a "butterfly effect" of sorts. Maybe bringing a cannon to a knife fight, all of this. Once you add a new element to make another less controllable, you have adverse ( or positive, that's also a possibility, folks. ) reaction throughout the system. Like I said, it may be perhaps a very simple elementary question and view, but wouldn't simple and gentle have solved this?
Price change to bring an element under control would still allow playability for all involved. If you don't play that style, it doesn't even affect you. If you do, then it brings it to more reasonable level to other stykes. New people won't find the exploits, old people will find in time that it's better to put some fiedls back, etc etc etc.
A very roundabout way to the original question "why not raise the prices instead of doing away with the system". Sorta like fix the healthcare system and THEN pattern a blanket off of a good model. But that's political and holy moly, I don't intend to get into another blow-up here, lol.
As long as I've played the game, GGS has been adding and changing things to get players to buy and spend gold. This is just one more example. Under the pretext of "improving" the game,they will remove the buy option. This will force players to demolish stables and build new fields and gardens to grow crops. Those same players paid gold to build those stables thinking they would be permanent as they were led to believe. But it seems that this company won't leave a single stone unturned when it comes to seeking revenue, even if it means turning their customers against them. And if they didn't envision the game being played as it is presently, what makes them think that they have such foresight now?
This, I think, is the crux of the problem they are trying to address - and having a lot of egg production also gives distinct advantages in 2 of the 4 existing missions (eggs and dung). When a certain type of build is superior in multiple ways, the game is not well balanced.
Introducing that would likely have a lot of the same problems as removing the ability to buy altogether - people would login to find that they could no longer afford to feed their animals - and it still wouldn't solve some of the other inherent imbalances. Also, it would hurt most those who can afford it the least - lower level players who are trying to scrape together the farmdollars to buy land and develop it. Thus far, GGS has done a pretty good job of making this game playable for those who don't purchase gold, imho.
I've no idea what their real plan is regarding this new market, but if it allows farmers to exchange goods based on supply and demand, any farmer with excess feed crops available for sale could find themselves sitting on a gold mine. I find that idea pretty intriguing - although I don't think I would want it to be purely supply / demand, because it would make each individual farmer too dependent on what other farmers are doing.
On another note - not addressed to either of you - quite a few people are accusing GGS of not allowing them to play the game as they wish, some quite vociferously. The truth is that GGS has always dictated prices, quantities, workers required, space required, etc. for every single aspect of the game. There have always been built-in advantages and disadvantages to every build / buy decision in the game.
Quite a few people have chosen to run without any pigsties, but they are not able to do the 'feed pigs x times' step in a themed event, nor can they clear the 'collect pigs' repeater task. One could, I suppose, build a farm with nothing but orchards if one was willing to spend the $ on gold to purchase premium fertilizer to operate it. Those are a couple of examples of the different build choices people can make and the associated advantages / disadvantages.
Personally, I've always thought it might be fun to build a farm focused primarily on field crops - but the abysmal profit margin along with the fact that events, projects, and missions require other facilities and goods make that awfully restrictive, if not impossible.
If GGS really wanted to provide everyone complete freedom to build their farms as they wish, they would do a lot of things differently... like offer alternatives for events, for example: collect x eggs OR collect y cabbage OR start production of milk z times. If they were to start offering such options and even out the profitability a bit, it would really open up the viability of different builds... although you'd also have people complaining "but why can't I collect half-x of eggs plus half-y of cabbage to complete it?!!!"... so those things tend to get pretty complicated.
In any case, I'm quite intrigued by what this new market might bring to the game.
Just my $0.02 worth.
This.
And isn't it oh so convenient that there is an option to buy fields with gold ("fertile fields")? Gee, what a coincidence.