PlaneShift

Gameplay => General Discussion => Topic started by: gonger on September 16, 2018, 09:33:42 pm

Title: And so, my fellow PlaneShifters:
Post by: gonger on September 16, 2018, 09:33:42 pm
Dear PlaneShifters,

Ask not what PlaneShift can do for you; ask what you can do for PlaneShift.

We have the Dev Team, doing a great job porting the game to Unreal Engine.
We have the Game Masters, doing a great job running events and helping players.
We have some players who are doing a lot to make the game better known and to keep newbies in the game.

It is clear that not everybody is able or willing to spend a similar amount of time to support the game.

However, there are a few things anybody can easily do, without spending too much time:


I am sure you can think of other kinds of support that take neither much time nor much effort. Please feel free to share your ideas!

Enjoy the game, and drag your friends over!

Gonger
Title: Re: And so, my fellow PlaneShifters:
Post by: Damola on September 23, 2018, 09:29:10 pm
Gonger, thank you a lot for your efforts to make Planeshift better known.

I joined the advisors channel, so far I did not see anyone asking there, but I am usually only around on evenings during weekends.
Title: Re: And so, my fellow PlaneShifters:
Post by: Can-ned Food on October 03, 2018, 04:16:06 am
The Kran are obviously the best part of PlaneShift. \\o//
We need to ensure that all advertising emphasizes that fact.

Discussion of merchandising was made a few years ago.  What about a shirt with a silly message on the front like
I EAT ROCKS.
or
Sandstone chunks.
Granite pebbles.
Flint shards.
That's my favorite trail mix.
and a portrait of a Kran on the back?  PlaneShift logo could be small at the bottom on the front and large at the top on the back.

So far as the Kran are concerned, I think there is enough to attract people and keep them or bring them back for future improvements and additions.  (Retention of players is important but not topical here.)

ADDENDUM 1:
Lilura, aka Lilu, came up with a few other choices in #planeshift on IRC.
Title: Re: And so, my fellow PlaneShifters:
Post by: gonger on October 06, 2018, 12:40:11 pm
Quote from: Can-ned Food on October 03, 2018, 04:16:06 am
The Kran are obviously the best part of PlaneShift.
[More kran praise deleted]

Can-ned Food, you did not really understand what this thread is supposed to be about: Pointing out how people can with more or less effort actively contribute to PlaneShift. See also Damola's answer. She did understand.
Title: Re: And so, my fellow PlaneShifters:
Post by: Can-ned Food on October 06, 2018, 02:55:33 pm
Disclaimer:  Much of this does have a rather snide tone to it.  It comes across snidely, you could say.  I just want to make sure that nobody gets any whiplash from reading it.  You know, that Snidely kind of Whiplash...
:ban:
Okay, okay.  Bear with me while I attempt to explain myself.

1.
I don't use Twitter, or Facebook, or anything like that, so “social media” is pretty much out.

2.
I don't feel like I would be helpful as an Advisor.  Frankly, I didn't know how to become one until you posted it — the documentation needs to be improved.
If it was described in-game, then that's one more reason I shouldn't be an Advisor. :(
(P.P.S. I since began adding myself via /advisor on regardless.  I've learned a few things about NPC locations and crafting, and would be able to provide some help in a way which doesn't violate IC awareness.)

3.
I do the third thing anyway, and have done so in other places outside PlaneShift and even outside MMOGs.  I've learned not to be overbearing, though.  However, unless it is very obvious someone needs help and doesn't know how to ask, I mostly wait for them to ask.
Maybe they'd rather figure it on their own — maybe they genuinely aren't interested.  I'm not pushing PlaneShift on someone who isn't seriously interested.

I am, and have been, contributing a little here and there.  Most of it has not been received well or has been overlooked.  Maybe nobody wants my help here.
(P.S.  I'm not talking about that whole Kran Pronouns thing.  I can understand why people wouldn't want to get mired in something like that, and I don't hold that against anyone.)

So far as contributing goes:
If I was to advertise PlaneShift, what exactly would I be advertising?

Answer:  The Kran.  I know other people — well, at least one other person, someone in the echelons on the PlaneShift team of public relations — who thinks the Kran are their favorite thing about PlaneShift.

I regret digressing your topic, but I thought that my suggestion — advertising PlaneShift in the form of gimmicky, but sincere, apparel — was aligned with the whole geist of it.

Let's face it:  we don't want people to begin playing the Crystal Space version of PlaneShift.  We want to appeal to the Settings, to the whole premise of the thing.  We want them interested in something other than gameplay as it is now so that they will maintain their interest until the UE4 server is running and accepting client log-ins.
Even then, PlaneShift will have a staggered, incremental release.  Quests, NPCs, features, and zones will not all be released with tidy edges.  They will often have very rough edges.  We want people who will be interested in the thing despite all that.
Most of the complaints during the time PlaneShift has been around were from people who were expecting completion.

If I was walking around a ComiCon, or a Gamer Convention, with a teeshirt showing off one component of the PlaneShift world — and most likely Luca's personal favorite, I might add — which was especially attractive and especially well–developed …

It's called precision marketing.  Well, more accurately, it is a whole strategem which is chiefly applied through the aforementioned marketing technique.
You aren't attempting to convert someone or leverage their disinterest by convincing them otherwise.  It's about attracting the attention of those people who genuinely want your product.

I was about to launch into a discussion of all that stuff, but I won't do it in this topic. :-X

And, so, if that isn't a contribution, then I guess there is nothing more I can do here:  so long, hope you get something worthwhile out of it all, maybe I'll see some of you in a few years, et cetera. :surrender:

In closing,
I will say that I'm going to make up those teeshirts some time this year and wear them myself.  I'll post pictures.  If Atomic Blue likes them, then I'll either transfer the account at the printing service to them or work out whatever other arrangement they want.
Title: Re: And so, my fellow PlaneShifters:
Post by: Dilihin on October 06, 2018, 04:10:20 pm
tl;dr?
Title: Re: And so, my fellow PlaneShifters:
Post by: Volki on October 07, 2018, 12:24:13 am
I scrolled all the way to the bottom thinking you'd have some kind of contribution.

My contribution: the game needs more appeal beyond the niche obsessions that some players have developed. Integrate RP into player interactions. Make it more like D&D.
Title: Re: And so, my fellow PlaneShifters:
Post by: Can-ned Food on October 07, 2018, 04:21:06 am
Quote from: Dilihin on October 06, 2018, 04:10:20 pm
tl;dr?

Very well, Dilihin.  I was thinking it as I wrote it, but I usually forget to make synopses or the like when I'm not writing a full essay or thesis.
Unfortunately, they will be missing much, but those people who don't read English as a primary language should have some abbreviated version.

I think the best aspects of PlaneShift are various settings of the world, rather than the present status of the engine and mechanics which facilitate it.
Any advertising I do for PlaneShift will be for the world thereof — especially for the pieces of it which I like best.