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League of Legends designer shares game design field manual

areadenial.games

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Re: League of Legends designer shares game design field manual

#51

Post by throw10920 »

cowthulhu wrote: post #50
throw10920 wrote: post #16

AI-generated, and also highly untrustworthy given its source - Riot Games is an extraordinarily player-, community-, and pro-player-hostile company. On top of all of the new and exciting ways that they manage to not only screw up software engineering but also screw over their users, their business model is selling skins at the expense of their games (in the sames sense that Google's business model is selling ads at t…

This is the first time I’ve heard someone criticize the “selling cosmetics” business model. I assume you feel the same about R6, TF2 and CSGO, naturally. Since selling skins is unacceptable, how would you have them make money given the game is F2P?

> I assume you feel the same about R6, TF2 and CSGO, naturally.

It seems like you think you've pulled a "gotcha" on me?

I don't play those games. I don't have any feelings about them. And they're not relevant to this discussion.

Please take a look at the HN Guidelines, and especially:

> Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith.

> Eschew flamebait. Avoid generic tangents. Omit internet tropes.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: League of Legends designer shares game design field manual

#52

Post by throw10920 »

AstralSerenity wrote: post #27
throw10920 wrote: post #16

AI-generated, and also highly untrustworthy given its source - Riot Games is an extraordinarily player-, community-, and pro-player-hostile company. On top of all of the new and exciting ways that they manage to not only screw up software engineering but also screw over their users, their business model is selling skins at the expense of their games (in the sames sense that Google's business model is selling ads at t…

Honestly, I strongly disagree. I've played a wide breadth of games, and I can't think of a game studio the size of Riot that is as community-engaged and pro-consumer. Examples range from the quality of their patch notes, dev articles and videos, to their constant presence on reddit, and willingness to walk back decisions based on public outcry (Hextech Chests, League Classic monetization, etc). Heck, after Riot gave…

> I can't think of a game studio the size of Riot that is as community-engaged and pro-consumer

Valve.

This is also just a crazy statement to make.

> Examples range from the quality of their patch notes, dev articles and videos, to their constant presence on reddit

None of this is pro-user.

What's highly anti-user is the not only permittance but endorsement of smurf accounts, kernel-level anticheat, penalizing users for your own bugs (said anticheat, crashes, LLM chat filters catching on nothing, "parental controls" that trigger on every user multiple times), propagating an extremely toxic community (players telling others to kill themselves or using racial slurs is a regular occurrence) by refusing to do chat moderation or any sort of sane penalty system, fining pro players in pro games for picking a champ+rune combo with a bug that they refused to fix for months (and that the player didn't exploit), whatever this[1] is, the CEO of the company intentionally doxxing the lead developer of a competing game, and many, many other malicious things.

[1] https://www.resetera.com/threads/riot-games-sends-cringey-ed...

Re: League of Legends designer shares game design field manual

#53

Post by [deleted] »

throw10920 wrote: post #51
cowthulhu wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the first time I’ve heard someone criticize the “selling cosmetics” business model. I assume you feel the same about R6, TF2 and CSGO, naturally. Since selling skins is unacceptable, how would you have them make money given the game is F2P?

> I assume you feel the same about R6, TF2 and CSGO, naturally. It seems like you think you've pulled a "gotcha" on me? I don't play those games. I don't have any feelings about them. And they're not relevant to this discussion. Please take a look at the HN Guidelines, and especially: > Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume g…

[deleted]

Re: League of Legends designer shares game design field manual

#54

Post by AstralSerenity »

throw10920 wrote: post #52
AstralSerenity wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly, I strongly disagree. I've played a wide breadth of games, and I can't think of a game studio the size of Riot that is as community-engaged and pro-consumer. Examples range from the quality of their patch notes, dev articles and videos, to their constant presence on reddit, and willingness to walk back decisions based on public outcry (Hextech Chests, League Classic monetization, etc). Heck, after Riot gave…

> I can't think of a game studio the size of Riot that is as community-engaged and pro-consumer Valve. This is also just a crazy statement to make. > Examples range from the quality of their patch notes, dev articles and videos, to their constant presence on reddit None of this is pro-user. What's highly anti -user is the not only permittance but endorsement of smurf accounts, kernel-level anticheat, penalizing users…

Note my comment on size. I think folks forget how lean Valve is with only ~330 employees. I love Valve, but it's not quite apples to apples. Their flat, lean structure doesn't function like a typical corporation, and their industry-leading margins and functional monopoly (one that I enjoy) places far less pressure on their need to monetize.

That said, if we're trying to hinge our discussion on moderation, anyone who plays CS knows players to this day can utter the most reprehensible, racist garbage and expect no punishment. There is a reason Valorant, in comparison, has an incredibly diverse gender pool. I've heard from plenty of women about how "enjoyable" it is to use voice chat in CS.

This also doesn't even touch on Valve's role in gambling addiction...

I still stand by my original statement as it was intended.

Re: League of Legends designer shares game design field manual

#55

Post by slumberlust »

stephbook wrote: post #38
lostmsu wrote: post #2

If only the popularity of the game wasn't 100% derived from original DoTA map by IceFrog, which this guy had nothing to do with.

If you want to criticize LoL design, simply mention that Pendragon stole all the community hero designs from dota-allstars.com

AND tried to bury the dota community in the process. Complete scum.

Re: League of Legends designer shares game design field manual

#56

Post by eska »

cowthulhu wrote: post #50
throw10920 wrote: post #16

AI-generated, and also highly untrustworthy given its source - Riot Games is an extraordinarily player-, community-, and pro-player-hostile company. On top of all of the new and exciting ways that they manage to not only screw up software engineering but also screw over their users, their business model is selling skins at the expense of their games (in the sames sense that Google's business model is selling ads at t…

This is the first time I’ve heard someone criticize the “selling cosmetics” business model. I assume you feel the same about R6, TF2 and CSGO, naturally. Since selling skins is unacceptable, how would you have them make money given the game is F2P?

Selling skins is what they used to do originally, which was their edge over their competition that didn’t want to do F2P. Nowadays they engage in gacha, with skins effectively costing hundreds or thousands of dollars.

Backed by statistics, champs that receive new skins are also always guaranteed to be strong or even overpowered for a while (rebalanced before any tournament patch).

Re: League of Legends designer shares game design field manual

#57

Post by smolder »

icantevenhold wrote: post #42
smolder wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand what you're saying. I hold a different view of what is well made or not. Commercial success isn't the only measure. I believe dark patterns detract from the cultural value of a thing, which is how they came to be called that. Meta is a valuable company, but they could have made less money and provided much more value to society with different practices. There's a "rising tide lifts all boats" approach to…

I think it’s pretty subjective at that point what is good and what isn’t. Totally agree on the dark patterns though. Out of interest what is a game you consider excellent that maybe wasn’t marketed as well? Personally I really like dungeon keeper 1 (& 2 as well somewhat) - but Bullfrog was very unsuccessful as a company and went under. I don’t know exactly why, should look into that history

The example I always go to for oddly unsuccessful games, (good at least, I don't know about excellent,) was Super Monday Night Combat. It was something like Valve's Deadlock, a 3D MOBA game more than 10 years earlier, with a bit of The Finals aesthetic. (Coins, instead of blood, gameshowy, announcers quipping over the gameplay.) I had a lot of fun with it, but it seems like hardly anyone noticed it existed. They never got the critical mass of players needed to keep it going.
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