Yup, we are definitely the loud minority here on the forums, but on the other hand a design wisdom is “players don’t know what they want”. And it’s kinda true, most players probably don’t. If players crave a chocolate ice cream because they had chocolate ice cream in the past and loved it, it’s a designers job to give them mango ice cream, because they never had it and don’t know that they love it much more than chocolate ice cream.
In the end it boils down to data-driven and informed design decisions, this is why Avalanche grabs all the telemetry while we play, why the forums and the discord exist and why they do surveys AND have designers.
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While it’s true that players don’t always know exactly what they want in a game, it’s also true that they often have some pretty clear preferences and desires when it comes to their gaming experiences. Here are a few examples to illustrate this point:
- “I want a game that’s challenging, but not too hard.”
This is a common desire among many gamers. They want to be challenged and feel like they’re making progress, but they don’t want to be so frustrated that they give up entirely. Games like Dark Souls and Celeste have received praise for striking this balance.
- “I want a game with a good story.”
Many gamers enjoy immersive, story-driven experiences. They want to feel invested in the world and the characters, and they want to see how their choices and actions affect the outcome of the game. Games like The Last of Us and Life is Strange have been successful in delivering these kinds of experiences.
- “I want a game that lets me explore and discover things on my own.”
Some gamers enjoy open-world games that allow them to wander and explore at their own pace. They want to feel like they’re discovering secrets and uncovering hidden treasures, rather than being led by the hand through a linear narrative. Games like Breath of the Wild, Skyrim and of coarse Generation Zero have been praised for their sense of exploration and discovery.
- “I want a game that’s just plain fun.”
At the end of the day, many gamers simply want to have a good time. They want a game that’s entertaining and enjoyable to play, regardless of its other qualities. Games like Mario Party and Fall Guys have been successful in providing this kind of lighthearted fun.
So while it’s true that players don’t always know exactly what they want, they often have some pretty clear desires and preferences when it comes to their gaming experiences. Game designers who pay attention to these desires and try to fulfill them are more likely to create successful and satisfying games.
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I agree with everything you say. What you just described are player archetypes, and that is what for example analytics and market analysis is for (even before the first line of game code is written!), these are general kinds of gamers a game wants to appeal to, normally also including things like age, similar games they play and also countries a type of game is popular in. Which players you want to appease is normally decided very early on, and this is the general direction a game will always go in. Consider them like fishing nets, you cast it out to cast a certain type of fish (and hopefully wales, lol).
For example, since you mentioned souls, adding an easy mode would probably attract players who would previously shy away from the game, but it would also alienate the grand majority of the existing playerbase, people would be outraged! And this is why games normally do not change direction while they are in live mode or have set up an identity, we could name all of the games Capcom let western developers do in the 2010s who lost their identity and all failed as an example.
Now, what I was referring to is more specific features and adjustments. Let’s stay with hunger and thirst, would some players feel the game is better with it? Likely. Would the rest of the players be annoyed by having to suddently micromanage character stats or feel like the dev time could have been invested into something the grand majority of the GZ player archetype wants? Very likely. Something like this would entirely change the direction, it would likely work with some dev time, but it would also alienate the main playerbase and if it was only an option the devs would have to still design all future content with this in mind. Having to many directions a game goes in is very problematic, especially with a small live team.
Let’s bring this in for item weights. Items do have weights, inventory space is limited, this means there is a design intent to make players manage their inventory and make decisions about what items to loot part of the gameplay loop. However, several ammo types with vastly different power are weighted the same, with some differences on scarcity. However, the devs have added crafting, entirely eliminating ammo scarcity. Players can now produce as much of a single ammo type as they want and only run the weapon they like most by just recycling all other ammo types! Scarcity is suddenly not an issue anymore, and the stronger ammo types that used to be (somewhat, if you dedicate yourself to missing targets) rare suddenly lose their only drawback. So we want to refine what is already there, to improve the experience of the people that already play the game the way it’s meant to be played.
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Sure, I can certainly understand your perspective on this matter. But as a longtime fan of “Generation Zero”, I have a deep investment in the future of the game and its continued success. And given the challenges currently facing the development studio, it should be understandable that some players may be more concerned about the future of the game, instead of the weight system. In times like these, it’s important to prioritize the development efforts on the most essential and necessary aspects of the game.
I have no problems that some players have concerns about the weight system of weapons and ammo, however, for me it would be a waste of devs resources. It’s important to consider whether this is truly the most pressing issue facing the game. Instead, it may be more beneficial for the studio to focus on areas such as the story, new areas, and missions, which can help to keep players engaged and invested in the game. And I am worried that your fine-tune proposal get preference to the more pressing needs and wants.
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I agree with you.
But sadly we have no influence on what has priority for the devs.
changing item weights would take two weeks for a single designer tops, it requires likely no programming, no art/animation and no audio. That’s the point, it’s something that can be done on the side since it’s just a lot of number crunching without adding any new systems. New content can still be done on the side, dev studios have different branches, you gotta keep the 3D people busy, gotta keep producers busy, gotta keep the programmers busy and QA too ofc.
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Maybe we should stop the discussion about the pros and cons and the “why” of this and other feature requests in general now and get back to topic.
Nobody is stopping you, @Madchaser . 
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