[idea] NFS sites, screw the game.

[TraffikD]

Anyone think that if all the nfs sites were to close for about a week EA would notice? Maybe if they all had the same message slapped on them explaining why.

We could flood them with email. Making sure everyone sent mail to the same address or something. Also snail mail.

Or we could send bulk loads of AOL cds.

Ideas?

I doubt anything will do anything (weird grammar). Anyways. * sigh *

=[

[jtace]

I think a mass email campaign would be most effective, I doubt they even notice us websites anymore. Maybe if someone drafted an email for everyone to email to the PR department or something...

Maybe ask them to get somone to shoot us websites some bones on NFS stuff every week or two and pay attention to the goings on in the community or something...

I'm sure NFS 6 will pick things up again, hopefully for the better too. I've been meaning to draft a letter to EA here already, I could do so if someone could dig up some appropriate addy's to email it to, like the PR department and some project managers. Maybe post the letter in a thread and have people sign it or something...

I dunno just rambling...

[TraffikD]

I have the email address of a PR representative I've been corresponding with.

I _might_ be able to get a couple more. Need to snoop around.

[jtace]

I have some contacts as well, but most of them aren't related to NFS in anyway and are on other projects. A good one would be to if nothing else get someone to forward it ot the project manager for NFS 6, the next game out in the series, that might hit someone who would care about the success of NFS6.

I'll put up a few points I know the community would like to be mentioned in an email in my next post in this thread.

[Cheyenne]

I hate to say this, but those things have no affect against "corporate decisions". Modern corporate management dictatates that management must have the utmost confidence in their own decisionmaking. Unfortunately, what this means is that if you've said you're damn well going to steer the ship "this way" and there's an iceberg there, it means well, you're going to bravely and unflinchingly ram the iceberg, convert your stock and watch some other fellow go down with the ship &(

As long as EA has strength with its stockholders and its stockholder aren't second guessing corporate decisionmaking, EA is married to it's current strategies. If you really want to get at them, go to a stockholders meeting (buy 1 share, okay?) and see if you can take a turn at a mic. Hey, anyone ever seen "Roger and Me" by Michael Moore? Yeah, very effective huh? Only stockholder confidence crisis or management restructuring can generally change corporate strategy. Very sad, but I fear very true.

There is, however, another way. So much that is done in any industry is "me too!". If there's a game out there that's more what you want, grab it and make a fuss. Corporations that are unresponsive to what you want from them, are sometimes quite responsive to what you want from a competitor!

Keep your dreams and your wish lists alive. Give them voice. Post them. Don't give up on EA. Everything you do directly to them will most likely prove frustrating. Still, we always have hope. I do suggest we always deal maturely and civilly with them even when they're at their most obtuse, that way, we can never be faulted in our behavior, and to any neutral observer, it will be so very simple to determine where "fault" truly lies.

:soap:
Yes... and the judges give a 9.5 - 8.7 - 10.0 for a near perfect soapbox dismount!
:crowd:

[jtace]

Good point Chey. That's the reason I think the most important person to get any letters to is the project manager of NFS 6. He/she will care more the most of the suits at EA and might be interested in listening.

[TraffikD]

Anyone object to me creating a petition at petition online for editing in nfs6? Then again, maybe not.

I don't live on the west coast so buying a share of stock and going to a meeting would be quite costly.

I think jtace is right. We need to find out who the people behind the scenes of NFS6 are that are in charge of it all. Maybe we can convince a dev to _accidentally_ weaken the file formats so they are very easy to crack or leak an editor or something.

[Cheyenne]

No, DPK, I know that I would appreciate that very much. If you could say, post a thread heresoliciting, maybe, other opinions (not to muddy the water, but maybe some good solid suggestions for gameplay, online stats/records?) to petition EA with on this same ducment, I think that would be wonderful too.

Thanks!

[jtace]

Yeah petition would be a good idea. Maybe have it be more then for just NFS 6 being editable? Maybe list a few points of interest to the community as well. Like Chey suggested. :)


1) Editability for NFS6 Cars and Tracks. Online racing can be covered easily by doing a file integrity check when racing online like MCO does. That way you get editing and hack free online racing (at least a much better chance of it).

2) Ability for community maintained Stats for online racing. There have been a number of methods discussed that would work depending upon the storage method for the stats.

3) Someone to work with the community to identify and fix any bugs or problems that arise in the game.

I think NFS PU is a lost cause right now but we can throw in

4) A stats reset for NFS PU.


.
.
.
.


... others?

[p5.]

Originally posted by DPK
Maybe we can convince a dev to _accidentally_ weaken the file formats so they are very easy to crack or leak an editor or something.
And EA says: "What's in it for me?" You can of course create a whole shopping list of things that would be cool to have, but there has to be a sound business case. Big companies are very conservative, as Cheyenne pointed out--they are not going to spend money (paying developers, testers, technical writers, analysts) to add a feature because there's a *possibility* it will profitable.

Are there games out there making money for their producers because they're editable?

Also, I wonder how important the PC market is compared to the console market for game developers? I'd have to guess the console market is far more important.Gran Turismo 2 probably sold more copies than all PC driving games (ever) combined. If this is the case, the last thing they would want to do is spend money on a feature of zero value to console players.

Paul (.p5.)

[Cheyenne]

Well, personally I think the "Stats reset for PU" should probably be an "independent" issue, and not included in an NFS6 community features list.

Other things to keep in mind are maybe how stats/records would be maintained for online NFS6 play. I like jtace's "file intergrity check" suggestion. I'm not familiar with how MCO does it, but I take Josh knows. Still, things like stat reset periods what stats are maintained, forward, backward mirrored - currently EA has no "mirrored" stats - stock versus mod (this is moot, perhaps, if there is no equivilent to an Evolution mode or car setups are largely irrelevant. A lot of things would depend on the features and style of the game and the type of multiplayer community the game would support.

I agree that a solid community liason is extremely important. It's my understanding that "Valve" (the makers of Half-Life) does this, they have a full-time employee who handles requests for information, suggestions etc from the community and sees they get to where they need to go in the company. That one thing, I guess, over any single feature, "responsiveness to the community", is the single most important thing I can think of for a non-disposeable piece of software (one with longevity, not a play-it-for-a-week-and-toss-it type of game).

I would like editability too. If EA would like to move on to other projects, quickly and efficiently and still make good mone off the longevity of their product line, maintaining a strong user/mod community is a great way to go. It keeps the current product fresh, the community strong and generates buzz for upcoming products in that line. It's all good (so where is EA? =[ )

[TraffikD]

I'll let this thread run its course some more and setup a petition on Petition Online tomorrow morning. Collecting a list of things to put in the petition. Keep 'um comming.

[Sepecat]

If you can set up the petition then I dont mind signing it at all.

About ideas I have nothing right now but if I get one I will post it.

Good Luck Mate<
George :beer:

[jtace]

I think you're right, the NFS PU stats reset probably is better left as a seperate issue.

I'm thinking of many First Person Shooter games when it comes to editing. Look at Quake, Half Life, all the mods and the huge communities they have. I think it could be easily turned into a selling point to have some sort of editability with your game.

Another suggestion, maybe they could take another page from MCO and either instead or maybe in addition to the NFS PU type stats have a weekly Top 10 (or 50) on each combination that get's reset each week.

I'm not sure how the multiplayer is going to work, but it sounds like we'll be stuck using Gamespy Arcade as a meeting type tool to find and join IP races. I really think EA should create a Quake 3 type multiplayer system. An in-game browser looks at a master server that keeps track of every user's computer that is hosting a multiplayer race and connects you up with them. Add an IRC channell to that and you got a "pit system".

[ArtDent]

As was mentioned, we are dealing with a large Corporation here, I just don't think most of you are going to get much acknowledgement from them. The best suggestion I have seen was Chey's, to buy a share of their stock and go to a shareholders meeting and try to get a turn at the mic, but even then, you are going to need 'ammunition'.
I don't believe that a petition is going to do much good, in and of itself, no matter how many people sign it, you need numbers.
My personal 'beef', is, in one word, support. They (EA) do not seem to support their games beyond a couple months or so. Are there any numbers to suggest that actually supporting a game with both tech support and patches or mods can make money? Maybe. The Sims?
You want editability? Does that help them make money? What (if any?) games are making money that were created with editibility in mind? They are only going to listen if you can prove it affects the bottom line.

Chey, I have actually been considering that very idea (buying one share of stock), but, like DPK, I do not live on the west coast. Are all stockholder meetings in California? Maybe we should all just buy those shares and then send you our proxies (hmm... actually that might not be a bad idea, if not you, then some other volunteer). Whoops, my paranoia tells me that some may not want you or anybody else knowing their 'real' identity. Well, if it is Chey handling the proxies, I think most of us are going to be safe from her, she can not stalk all of us no matter how much some may want her too. ^_^ :love: :Peace:

[Cheyenne]

Well, I can't speak for EA, but it's customary, in general, to hold shareholder meetings in the locality of the corporate HQ.

Well, can editability create money for EA? Hmm, you can't put Customer "Good Will" on a balance sheet. It is not possible. Any accountant (Roger Smith of GM, getting back to my Roger & Me kick again) will argue against it. it can't go on a profit and loss sheet. So when a corporation wants to make good with its stockholders, one of the first things to get thrown out are activities that generate good will. Why? Becuase support and whatnot does fit on a balance sheet. If you're not looking farther ahead that quarterly profitability, that's as far as you see. So you cut off your nose to spite your face and temporarily please fickle stockholders.

So you can't show the numbers that good will generates. Because it doesn't show up intul it hits your next product cycle. Then the people you treated well come back and buy again. But modern corporate doctrine is actually largely alienating the customers, and they can get away with it. Why? Because their competitors are often engaged in the same activity. Why? Because when one guy cuts good will services from his profit and loss reports, showing less expenditure for the same quarterly profits, stockholders buy his stock. So, everyone follows suit (pun intended, "follows suit" - oh, never mind! &( ). Pretty soon corporations are no longer catering to their customers but solely to stockholder interest (sound like any corporations we know? Oh, no, not EA!). :eek: I'm getting on a rant. Stop, I wanna get off! :help:

[jtace]

All of that is why I want to circumvent the EA Coperate runaround and try and get it to the people who care about the game on a personal level, the supervisors and workers on the EA project, NFS 6. They want to see their hard work mean something and succeed, they're our best chance of having someone listen and try to do something.

Doing so is another story as it's tough to feret out the right people within the coperate maze to talk to...

[way124]

As far as I know, EA will come out with NFS:HP2 this fall, released on all gaming platforms including PS2, Gamecube and PC (definitely!). NFS:HP2 for PS2 is going to be released this fall, so we can be really sure that ths game for other platforms (PC) is almost done by now. Any certain changes of "being editable" like many multiplayer games such as Quake is going to push the release date further back and cost EA $$$. Perhaps some programmer in EA with extra time could make a special plug-in, like Windows' PowerToys so that the NFS community could benefit from it. Though that particular employee could face problems releasing company's technology to public &(

On a side note, the EA stats can easily be extracted using programming languages as simple as VB. I have put together a page that does the Top 50 data extraction from "EA server", which in fact is simply a page request to http://www.earacing.com/PU_Top50.phtml. By using multiple string functions I was able to do the same thing, demonstrated here (http://team-ss.irqnine.com/pustats/pustats_top50b.aspx). The page is rudimentary but proves my point. If anyone needs a page that performs like DR-Stats, I can do it within a week, depending on demand of course :D

As far as the topic "NFS is dying!!!" I must say that is hardly true. While it is true NFS:PU, actually the "latest" sequel to NFS on PC is almost (more than?) 2 years old, the NFS community remains strong. New clans are being formed and reliable anti-hacker tools are being made - how can this illustrate the death of the community? Hundreds of people visit online racing servers each day, new friends are made, and some people even buy NFS:PU and just got started! NFS:PU is very well alive, and even though EA stopped supporting the community, I believe this creative, inspirational and crazily-addicted-and-fast-bunch-of-racers-made community could "maintain a decent village on the beach enjoying sunshine even though food supply doesn't come from the mainland falling from the sky".

Phew! My longest post yet. :D

[Cheyenne]

Hehe, Waywaywayway!

Pardon me for poetic license. I didn't mean to suggest it was dying in any way, though I think you have to admit that it will (okay, you don't HAVE to!). Ten years from now we're probably not going to be playing NFS-Porsche, at least this build of it. But yes, I wasn't on much at all yesterday, but I met and did my best to help four new players who had their first races online at that time. People like DPK, Chris and AccadaccA are editors, they're bit is the creative side. NFS5 has given them zero to work with. Yeah, they can reskin a car or a track, but they can't really edit it. I feel we've been privileged to have them with us for so long. If NFS6 isn't editable, it will largely mean the end of their part of the Need For Speed community.

The bare minimum of what the editing community needs (I believe, I'm not experienced in this, just extrapolating the unknown from what I do know) is an understanding of how the file formats are compressed. With that understanding then they can uncompress, alter and recompile the files into useful data. So like you mention a plug in, well, EA was able to encode the files, just that information on what it needs would be enough for the talents of the community to write the software needed to make their visions real. I think I might even try my hand at it, not with hubris to think I could outdo anyone, just because I might like to see if I could make something worthwhile. Among many things I was when I was much younger, I was quite an artist. But somewhere along the line I gave it up for hard science, which I then gave up to study dance, acting and writing craft. Now I'm in computing support. Hehe, sue me, I can't stick with any given thing for too long &(

Well, like I said all the community needs is the info. Software tools would be really nice, but the info is critical.

And as far as our village on the beach, yeah. I like it too. I'll be in a blue bikini in the hammock under those palms over there. I was just suggesting that some of us will come and go and we should celebrate each other a bit, even when we're departing for points unknown. We've all been friends and learned a lot, and have very little but good things to say of each other, I hope.

[Sepecat]

I just came back from my hiatus of a NFS. Believe it or not played NFS every day then all of a sudden I just stopped. I really don't know why I stopped playing. =)^ :clap: :beer:

[way124]

Sorry nfs. I think I can hardly understand what you said :D And those smilies don't help too &(

[Sepecat]

I left NFS last year because some reason I just stopped playing the game. Then I came back from my hiatus in summer of 2001 and this year I regained interest in NFS 5.
So I don't think I would be leaving the NFS Scene anytime soon. Unless something comes up. :beer:

[Sepecat]

LOL I won't be able to see the game until 4pm 9pm london. Here in the USA. But dont worry mate I will watch the game on the spanish channel . LOL :beer: ^_^ :D

[way124]

Oooo... Spidyboy knows my name change - the stock GT1 lover as suspected ;) -- in a new mask I presume? ;) ;)

Have a nice weekend too! As for me, I'm still being turned off by Cogeco :rolleyes:

[way124]

I had discussions with whosyada and 1/2Dozen about the name.. all agreed that [SS] is cool. Sounds like ships' names. Anyway we thought of making a stock clan, so it is officially SuperStockers. But then since I fear stock racing is non-existant in NFS:HP2, I never really set the name for [SS]. But for NFS:PU, it's SuperStockers. Other possible variations are Slow Snails, Sloppy Shits, Super Slow, Sexy Swimsuits, and now I just added Sexy Sluts. :D

[NameX]

Will you all buy NFS6 even if it's not able to be edited?