Periple Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 10 minutes ago, robgraham said: Why not have a public trello roadmap and tracker? There's no way you'd want to open your internal issue tracker to the public, it would reveal way too much including information you might not be legally allowed to disclose (e.g. personal information of devs working on it). You'd have to have a separate "sanitized" public issue tracker. Somebody would need to keep it up to date, and that would be a lot of work with no immediate, tangible benefit for your development process. Plus it'd just be another PR channel, and haven't you all said how tired you are of PR? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meecrob Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 6 minutes ago, Periple said: There's no way you'd want to open your internal issue tracker to the public, it would reveal way too much including information you might not be legally allowed to disclose (e.g. personal information of devs working on it). Nobody asked for access to the internal bugtracker; people are asking for a public bugtracker. 9 minutes ago, Periple said: You'd have to have a separate "sanitized" public issue tracker. Somebody would need to keep it up to date, and that would be a lot of work with no immediate, tangible benefit for your development process. Plus it'd just be another PR channel, and haven't you all said how tired you are of PR? No tangible benefit to development? Having a centralized place to report bugs and track their progress has no tangible benefit to development? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Periple Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 47 minutes ago, Meecrob said: No tangible benefit to development? Having a centralized place to report bugs and track their progress has no tangible benefit to development? Bug reports from the public are useless. People without any QA training are terrible at writing bug reports. All you'll get out of one is a gorillion badly-written duplicates of bugs you already know about. Studios that have them, have them purely for the optics. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Aziz Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 People without QA experience can write a proper bug report if given the right tool to do so. Example? https://www.playstation.com/en-us/horizon/support/ Everything is already categorized and you can't send the report without filling all the blanks, including game version, platform etc. A vague instruction with a single text box (forum section) won't help anyone. Hell, I happened to fill a bug report on KSP1 tracker that was properly described, acknowledged and resolved, and the situation was niche enough that there was a possibility that QA team wouldn't catch it. So yay I helped. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meecrob Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 (edited) 24 minutes ago, Periple said: Bug reports from the public are useless. People without any QA training are terrible at writing bug reports. All you'll get out of one is a gorillion badly-written duplicates of bugs you already know about. Studios that have them, have them purely for the optics. If bug reports written by the public are useless, why are the Devs asking for them/posting instructions for us to properly report bugs? Optics? Edited May 31, 2023 by Meecrob Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Periple Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 34 minutes ago, Meecrob said: If bug reports written by the public are useless, why are the Devs asking for them/posting instructions for us to properly report bugs? Optics? Yes Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gussi111 Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 17 minutes ago, Periple said: Yes Are you serious? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
darthgently Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 (edited) 2 hours ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said: Yeah - 'wobbly' is a feature, up to a point. It forces you to move along from the skinny parts when playing the progression system - at least in KSP. So in the aspect of 'you can only go so tall for a given diameter', I like wobbly rockets. But they should not be wobbly just for the sake of wobbly. A medium diameter rocket of the same length /part count of a small diameter rocket should be rock solid. My issue is that the wobbling defies the physics involved. I'd rather have sounds indicating increasing stresses as feedback to the player. Increasing metal groaning, "oil-canning", creaking as point of failure is within, say, 10%, then metal crumpling, snapping, shredding, flapping sounds at failure. Visual cues would be fairly subtle in the 10% zone, some slight visual bending/wobble. While big visual cues would be reserved for actual failure. But no rubber rocket, just RUD. And there doesn't always need to be an explosion, just as all cars that crash don't necessarily explode. As a nod to Hollywood, perhaps all fuel tanks, RCS, and engines could 100% explode gloriously on failures and collisions involving those parts Edited May 31, 2023 by darthgently Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Periple Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 1 hour ago, gussi111 said: Are you serious? Yes! I've been at the other end of a public beta and the bug reports are hopeless, if your goal is to find bugs and fix them. The effort trying to make sense of them and locate the odd extremely rare useful report would be much better spent on professional QA instead. I know fans would love to help but it really doesn't work that way! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
darthgently Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 10 minutes ago, Periple said: Yes! I've been at the other end of a public beta and the bug reports are hopeless, if your goal is to find bugs and fix them. The effort trying to make sense of them and locate the odd extremely rare useful report would be much better spent on professional QA instead. I know fans would love to help but it really doesn't work that way! If anything, the reports are telling you what is important to an actual paycheck providing customer, and what thier platform specs are etc. That is valuable marketing information from the real world even if other bug report info is less useful. Even if you "already know about the bug", well now you know the problem is one person more important (they took the time to report it) and perhaps their specs further narrow platform specifics of the issue. Never tell a paying customer their feedback has no value, primarily because it is almost never true unless you don't care who your customer is and what is important to them. This is (or was) basic, common sense, if you want customers And not just for "optics", but ideally because you truly want to know your customer and target your product accurately and efficiently Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
herbal space program Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 (edited) 1 minute ago, darthgently said: If anything, the reports are telling you what is important to an actual paycheck providing customer, and what thier platform specs are etc. That is valuable marketing information from the real world even if other bug report info is less useful. Even if you "already know about the bug", well now you know the problem is one person more important (they took the time to report it) and perhaps their specs further narrow platform specifics of the issue. Never tell a paying customer their feedback has no value, primarily because it is almost never true unless you don't care who your customer is and what is important to them. This is (or was) basic, common sense, if you want customers And not just for "optics", but ideally because you truly want to know your customer and target your product accurately and efficiently Spot on. I was about to post the same reply. The real value of user bug reports is in deciding what to prioritize based on the number of complaints. Edited May 31, 2023 by herbal space program Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scarecrow71 Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 3 hours ago, Periple said: Bug reports from the public are useless. Because not a single bug that's been reported here has been squashed, right? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meecrob Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 23 minutes ago, Periple said: Yes! I've been at the other end of a public beta and the bug reports are hopeless, if your goal is to find bugs and fix them. The effort trying to make sense of them and locate the odd extremely rare useful report would be much better spent on professional QA instead. I know fans would love to help but it really doesn't work that way! There is more than one way to skin a cat. You speak in absolutes when the situation is neither black, nor white. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Periple Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 16 minutes ago, darthgently said: If anything, the reports are telling you what is important to an actual paycheck providing customer, and what thier platform specs are etc. The problem is that the reports are almost always so badly written you can't make sense of what's important! Telemetry is good though -- you can get the system specs and all kinds of useful stuff from that. 18 minutes ago, darthgently said: Never tell a paying customer their feedback has no value, primarily because it is almost never true unless you don't care who your customer is and what is important to them. This is (or was) basic, common sense, if you want customers Oh I wouldn't! Instead I'd set up a public bug tracker and be extremely polite and pretend that I'm doing something with their reports Thing is I'm not here representing my studio or talking to our fans, so I can tell it like it really is, instead of what they want to hear. 19 minutes ago, darthgently said: And not just for "optics", but ideally because you truly want to know your customer and target your product accurately and efficiently Absolutely, and there are WAY better ways to get that information than in a public bug tracker or any other bug reports submitted by them. In fact things like public bug trackers are worse because people who are so into the game they want to participate in EA or a public beta and are motivated enough to submit reports are a tiny fraction of your market -- and if you listen to them, you'll get a TOTALLY distorted view of what your customers really want, and you'll end up making really bad decisions! If you make a game to please the hardcore fans, only the hardcore fans will be pleased, and there aren't enough of them to make it pay! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
darthgently Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 4 minutes ago, Periple said: The problem is that the reports are almost always so badly written you can't make sense of what's important! Telemetry is good though -- you can get the system specs and all kinds of useful stuff from that. Oh I wouldn't! Instead I'd set up a public bug tracker and be extremely polite and pretend that I'm doing something with their reports Thing is I'm not here representing my studio or talking to our fans, so I can tell it like it really is, instead of what they want to hear. Absolutely, and there are WAY better ways to get that information than in a public bug tracker or any other bug reports submitted by them. In fact things like public bug trackers are worse because people who are so into the game they want to participate in EA or a public beta and are motivated enough to submit reports are a tiny fraction of your market -- and if you listen to them, you'll get a TOTALLY distorted view of what your customers really want, and you'll end up making really bad decisions! If you make a game to please the hardcore fans, only the hardcore fans will be pleased, and there aren't enough of them to make it pay! What a convenient philosophy overall Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meecrob Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 (edited) [snip] The thing is, your replies kinda boil down to "you guys wouldn't understand how this works." Having said that, I'm not saying you are incorrect. I am saying that we have conflicting information; The Devs asked us for feedback, then didn't make a proper pathway to give that feedback. I totally get your point about being overwhelmed with poor quality bug reports. I think there is a way to meet in the middle, as countless games have been developed with feedback from the community. If the call has already been made that feedback is not wanted, I'd hope they would tell us. Edited June 1, 2023 by Meecrob Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RocketRockington Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 (edited) 1 hour ago, Periple said: Yes! I've been at the other end of a public beta and the bug reports are hopeless, if your goal is to find bugs and fix them. The effort trying to make sense of them and locate the odd extremely rare useful report would be much better spent on professional QA instead. I know fans would love to help but it really doesn't work that way! It depends on the project. Tbh, I think for KSP1, public bug reports actually were useful. Partially because some bugs were well written, and because some repro cases are difficult, and often because some portion of the community was investigating much more deeply than a typical user was/were allowed to through the EULA. Some of the people submitting those bugs went on to be hired by Squad and/or become part of their preview-test group, afaicr. The thing is, badly-written bug reports are easy to spot & bin. A public tracker also allows some portion of the user base who spots a bug report to add more info to a badly written one. Managing them is not too hard - mark a bug 'needs more info' or 'cannot reproduce' and either the poster will never revisit - or you'll get more info/better repro steps. Many other games - I agree this wouldn't be the case. But I think you're applying your personal experience in too much of a black/white answer, unless you've personally worked on a small indie title with high technical complexity with a somewhat-smarter than average user base. Now, for KSP2 - for them, I think a public bug database would just be another PR move, as you said - not because all the reports would be badly written, but because clearly they don't have the capacity to address enough bugs to make it useful. On the other hand, I think it'd be a better one than the investment they've been putting into PR with blender renders, trailers, and dev videos, given that it's currently EA and an EA that's mostly populated by hard core KSP fans, who want more meat on the bone and are sick of the over hyping and over marketting that has characterized the last 4 years, as evidence from this post which took the hype down from an 11 to a 5. Edited May 31, 2023 by RocketRockington Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Periple Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 (edited) 51 minutes ago, Meecrob said: I think there is a way to meet in the middle, as countless games have been developed with feedback from the community. If the call has already been made that feedback is not wanted, I'd hope they would tell us. I'm sure feedback is wanted. It's just that the feedback isn't necessarily what you think it is. Telemetry can tell you what players are actually doing, and not just the vocal ones. Like, if they're consistently bouncing at some point, you can then try to figure out why and address it. An EA is also really good for gauging general interest in the concept -- how many people are buying at some given price point, how many are refunding, and so on. Things like Steam reviews are useful. Social media are super useful -- how many people are on your Discord, how engaged are they, and so on. But bug reports have almost nothing to do with that. You need a little bit of training to be able to write up a usable bug report, and QA needs to be focused where the dev team can act on it. You can't do that in a public beta or EA. The trouble is that fans really, really want to report bugs because it makes them feel that they participate in making the game. So the smart thing to do is to give them a way to do that, in a way that doesn't eat up your precious resources any more than it has to. You'll be fixing the bugs anyway and then you can maybe make somebody happy by pointing out that you fixed something they reported, even if you already knew all about it because your internal QA logged it ages ago. Is it a little bit disingenuous? Sure. But the thing is that while individual fans are usually wonderful people, collectively they're a mob that needs to be managed, and a lot of that management involves tricks like this. To be completely honest, I don't like fandom at all. It's one thing to really enjoy something, but in fan culture that becomes a a part of your identity. Then you think you own the thing your a fan of. Then you think the people making it are beholden to you. Fans will start telling you how to do your job, and then how to live your life. If that turns sour, you'll be getting death threats, or somebody will doxx you and dig up stuff about your family and send them death threats. Community managers are heroes for the work they do to keep it from spiraling out of control and shield the rest of us from the worst of it, and people like Nate who aren't community managers but have to interact with the fans anyway while doing their actual job are heroes squared. So if they need to play a few tricks to make the fans feel that they're contributing even though their bug reports go straight to /dev/null -- or do other similar stuff -- I won't fault them, on the contrary. Edit: As an afterthought, KSP does have fans who do know how to report bugs, because they're devs or modders themselves. If IG wanted to leverage their knowledge without considering the optics/community management aspect, they would set up a closed invitation-only bugtracker for them. That could be helpful and would be a lot less work than having people comb a public bug tracker for their contributions. Edited May 31, 2023 by Periple Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cocoscacao Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 20 minutes ago, Periple said: Then you think you own the thing your a fan of. But I do own a thing... I paid for it... paid for the privilege to be honorable, respected, divine member of EA player group. My feedback is the word of God. I own KSP 2, therefore I own Nate, therefore I own the dev team. I see no error in this logic. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vanamonde Posted May 31, 2023 Share Posted May 31, 2023 Some comments removed. Avoid getting personal, please. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cocoscacao Posted June 1, 2023 Share Posted June 1, 2023 11 hours ago, Meecrob said: the Devs asked us for feedback, then didn't make a proper pathway to give that feedback. If you mean bug reports to be feedback, those two are different things imo. Forum is a good place to cheer/boo some game mechanics, while bug reporting is nice, most of us probably can't do it in the same way QA team does. But even such reports can give them insights how often something happens. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sylvi Fisthaug Posted June 1, 2023 Share Posted June 1, 2023 (edited) On 5/31/2023 at 6:52 AM, Meecrob said: Nobody asked for access to the internal bugtracker; people are asking for a public bugtracker. On 5/31/2023 at 6:35 AM, Periple said: This does not respond to @Periple's argument, here: On 5/31/2023 at 6:35 AM, Periple said: ...it would reveal way too much including information you might not be legally allowed to disclose (e.g. personal information of devs working on it). ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ On 5/31/2023 at 6:52 AM, Meecrob said: No tangible benefit to development? Having a centralized place to report bugs and track their progress has no tangible benefit to development? This falls short under assuming that the dev team does not have a public tracker at all. Also, I feel that you assume the dev team does indeed have an internal bug tracker, here: On 5/31/2023 at 6:52 AM, Meecrob said: (...) Nobody asked for access to the internal bugtracker; (...) EDIT: confirmed here by Dakota: (probably not first time confirmed, but oh well) [snip] Like @cocoscacao said: 16 hours ago, cocoscacao said: (...) Forum is a good place to cheer/boo some game mechanics... (...) This is important. Cheering and booing game mechanics is an ability we have here which should be cherished. But I have seen some of the "booers" pointing fingers at some of the devs, and especially Nate. And then the "cheerers" seem to personally attack the "booers" who do this, which then alone heightens the temperature of the discussion. Both arguments here are just as important, but especially the "cheerers" one. In general, the environment here below this weeks dev post seems healthier, at least by my own eyes. But we can always strive to be better. Especially including myself. Edited June 1, 2023 by Starhawk Redacted by moderator Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cocoscacao Posted June 1, 2023 Share Posted June 1, 2023 18 minutes ago, Sylvi Fisthaug said: But I have seen some of the "booers" pointing fingers at some of the devs, and especially Nate. Not to confuse this with questioning current state of the game. I mean the potential of implemented stuff with bugs ignored. For example, the more I play, the more I hate part manager as default way to interact with craft. I'd still like to see it as an optional feature, as it can bring some benefits, sometimes. Many people, however, either partly or strongly disagree with this sentiment. Numbers will decide I guess. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sylvi Fisthaug Posted June 1, 2023 Share Posted June 1, 2023 (edited) 12 minutes ago, cocoscacao said: For example, the more I play, the more I hate part manager as default way to interact with craft. Me too. I sort of like being able to scroll, but the way it opens the entire group of parts induces a lot of unnecessary scrolling. And they NEED to find a way to reduce loading times of ALL the parts on your vessel. Unless interstellar parts are much bigger, opening part manager will take at least 15 seconds or more, which is at least 14.5 seconds too long. My space stations is a hazzle during docking, I spend minutes in total waiting for the part manager to load. Having two options to choose from (old and new part manager) in the options, should be implemented. Edited June 1, 2023 by Sylvi Fisthaug Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Aziz Posted June 1, 2023 Share Posted June 1, 2023 Well good news because On 5/26/2023 at 11:45 PM, Nate Simpson said: Opening part manager causes major frame lag - Status: experiments ongoing Overall like I've been saying for months, many ideas in KSP2 are good, but their current implementation, not so much. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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