ruxius
Posts: 909
Joined: 5/5/2000
From: ITALY
Status: offline
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Thank You Dude !
You did what I asked ..I am very happy you respected my desire ! It's very kindly from you !
Here is the flow of discussion :
REPORTS...
Les the sarge
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Loyalty hmmmm.
I think this sums it up well.
Will you be playing Steel Panthers tomorrow?
Will You be playing Steel Panthers next week?
Will you be playing Steel Panthers next month?
How about next year?
Will it matter if a shiny new game comes along?
Even if its made by Matrix?
Even it its Combat Leader?
Would you download it even if you had to wait fully 3 days while your phone was tied up?
Would you get a copy burned to a cd even if you had to whine to your friend that has a burner.
Would you turf something more useful off your limited hard drive before Steel Panthers?
Is most of your web browsers book marks dedicated to Steel Panthers sites?
Do you even know any other web sites?
Have you ever even tried any other games other than Steel Panthers?
Are you of the opinion you could care less if there even IS any other games out there.
Being an old ASL grognard I know what its like to also be a fanatic when it comes to ones wallet as well. You are talking to a person that owns waaaaaay to much ASL. If it had the ASL logo on it I had to buy it.
Unfortunately as is my case, ASL was originally sold as a product found only on stores shelves. I come from an era that predates online marketing.
Maybe that is my trouble. I just dont do well with anything that only exists in the electronic world.
Sorry if this post has been long Ruxius (actually by my regular standards this is brief for me heheh).
I think one of the problems though, in being "loyal" to Matrix, is that the core product was never a product at all. Steel Panthers WaW is after all a free game.
I bought the original game way back when it was just Steel Panthers with no numbers or anything after the name.
It was part of a compilation of wargames. I ccouldnt find the time to get into playing a computer game much though.
Finally I gave it to a friend to try. Next thing you know he is raving about it (he is my regular ASL opponent). So I had to give it a try I guess.
I have been downloading each update ever since (and lamenting the size of file and speed until I got a larger hard drive and a faster connection speed). But all along I have never reeeeally had to pay for anything.
I bought Squad Leader when it first came out. Still have fond memories of thatpurchase. I bought each module as it appeared and wanted more and more. Then ASL came out, bought it ravenously. Then the most horrible thing happened, AH died.
But it was reborn due to a fantical devotion to the game.
Thats where Steel Panthers though is different. If you want the reborn ASL you have to buy it. None of its free. And its damn expensive.
I am waiting to get Steel Panthers WaW 7.0, and you can be sure I will download it the second I get a chance. But should it be free? Is it possible the time has come to sell it.
Yes I know that Matrix doesnt really own it. Maybe this is the time. But no one will buy it you say. I say maybe thats not entirely true. Maybe 7.0 should be put on the next Mega CD and not made available as a free download.
Lets separate the fans from the leeches right now eh. Who would support making 7.0 for fans only. Who will stand up and be counted and say "Yes put it only on Mega Campaign". This way we reeeeally find out who really wants to play Steel Panthers. Matrix wont reeeally be "selling" Steel Panthers WaW 7.0 per se, but they will sure find out if anyone really cares.
Coffee Mugs and T shirts sales are fine I guess. I just dont have that sort of money though. But maybe I might say I would order MC knowing I will also get the next Steel Panthers incarnation as well.
No amount of praise is going to hide the fact that Steel Panthers is an awesome game in the absence of MC. And just how many MC sales are being lost by players figuring hohum I can live with just having the basic game.
Maybe free downloads of Steel Panthers should stop entirely. Maybe it is time you either pay or get lost.
If I had never played Steel Panthers before would I like it? Damn right.
Is Steel Panthers as good as all them shiny new games out there? Damn right it is.
Why are we still giving Steel Panthers away? Because people still want it perhaps?
There is a good reason why in the last 10 years, almost all my board game related wargame purchases have been almost entirely ASL.
It is entirely possible I could say the same of Steel Panthers (I expect to be playing Steel Panthers long after most of those shiny new games are forgotten).
Again apologies Ruxius for babbling. We will never know about loyalty though until it is really tested.
Ruxius
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I only intended to think at this post as a call for the members who joined it ..it is supposed to be a way to express approvation to what Matrix is doing (with a lot amount of time and resources) to growing up..the try to keep alive an "experiment"..
Ok !
Let's start from the beginning...
Matrix took the SP3 engine and redesigned it to make it basically a SP1 modern-Windows compatible-multiplayer online wargame
These are the best developments since SP1...
Before , SP3 was very different from SP1 , you know...
Here starts the SPWAW era...
The agreement with SSI was that they could access the source code..but they couldn't sell whatever they realized from that code..
Matrix established through Paul Vebber ,Wild Bill and David Heath a direct channel with SPWAW's supporters through this forum...
Players gave a strong contribution to the develepment of SPWAW 6.1 from its first version..
we helped to correct bugs and added thousands of design tips..(there is a list of them somewhere..)
All of this flew in a way that was never attempted before..
The numbers I reported into the first page of this topic show what I am saying..
Matrix worked hard to this project..but they were not allowed to have any economical return to pay programmers ,designers ,engineers ecc.ecc.
(this forum should comprehend a fee to be paid to Bulletin vboard for instance) (also servers to make this forum available all the day maybe need money) (who pays ? )it was all FREE !
MONEY AND TIME ...
During the golden age Paul And WB ANSWERED to almost ALL POSTS HERE ! THEY DIDN'T LET ANYONE without an answer..ALMOST NEVER !!!!!!!!!!
DO YOU UNDERSTAND what I say ? read their numbers !
4500 fellows here had a home and a game that was trying at his best to fit our desires...
(for sure that everything was not possible !..but they tried to do it for each of us at their best!)
The megacd , t-shirts and gadgets were the only
way to have a return only to cover some costs !
Thus they started an experiment..implicitly they GAVE without asking nothing...
Which was the result of this experiment ?
74 Loyalists...
74 fellows who understood that we were not asked anything..BUT WE HAD TO DO SOMETHING TO MAKE ALL OF THIS GOING ON AND ON...
There is a lot that can be done to still improve SPWAW6 !!!
The results ?
WB retired as a full time helper of this forum
and Paul V wrote the post I reported in my link at the first page...
Have you read it ?
I don't think I have to explain more about my call for loyalty except to the newbies who are too young to know what happened here ...
Since I do not thing they are allowed to put SPWAW7.0 into a CD with MEGACD and not put it allowable for a free download (it violates the
agreement with SSI)
many of us demonstrate why other gaming companies
do not open towards supporters too much..
Simply we DO NOT DESERVE IT !
You have to force people to buy..that must the only rule...
What a pity !!
it seemed here it could be different..just for one time in History..
But the experiment failed...
Les the sarge
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Hello Ruxius
Still a bit foggy on eeeexactly what you call a "Loyalist", but its not entirely important that you make that clear to me personally.
Ok deep breathe here.Slooooowly re read Paul's post.
Must have missed a few comments (I sometimes read to fast).
Now I get it. Or rather, think I knew it all along.
I consider myself a loyal Steel Panthers player as far as the word "loyal" is used. I cant claim to have put any cash into anyones pocket as yet though.
But I fall under the heading "retired and on disability pension" (that surely cant be held against me). Its a major accomplishment I am online at all I guess.
I can freely say I would have bought the first Mega Campaign and anything related if my income would have sponsored it.
Heck this computer I sit in front of was bought for me by a veeeeery generous friend.
But I guess the story behind the story, is that Steel Panthers was free.
Most were predictably happy with that. And likely a large portion of the posters have never actually done anything to actually pay into the Steel Panthers experiment.
But as it has been said to me before in conversations "there is no real money is wargame software period".
If I was in the market to sell a wargame myself, it would be a side show indulgence and never anything more. I would only produce one for amusement at best. My bills would get paid by another activity (whatever that would be is immaterial).
As I have mentioned in many cases, I am a fan of ASL (an old board game). The owner of MMP is currently Curt Shilling (might be other owners but he is the man I know). Mr Shilling is if you are not familiar with the name, a major league baseball player. So his income through MMP is not his sole income.
I cant say I know much about Paul. I can only say thank you Paul for all your devotion. I can only hope him great success in any venture his pursues. But I hope he is not attemptng to get rich developing specifically "wargame" software. It wont happen. There industry wont allow it. There wll never be enough sales.
Well I am likely not going to pursue this thread any further. I am perhaps intruding here.
I will likely continue to post on the forum where Steel Panthers is concerned. I am grateful the forum exists. I cant say I know why it exists. It must be costing someone a good deal of cash. I hope the cash is generating a decent return.
That is all, dismissed.
Paul Vebber
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Get Rich...LOL...I have a good job (Nothing like Curt Schillings!) That I don't expect game stuff could come close to replacing...
We will see what happens as Matrix gets more "for sale" games. The "experiment" part was about putting our time and effort in with Free SP:WaW and seeing if folks would reward that with purchases of the MC.
For whatever reason, we have not sold nearly as many MCs as we had hoped (Our goal was 3500 each for the first two to support Combat Leader/Close Assault development...we didn't make it).
People seem to be of 2 minds in the wargaming community, as I said, those who think that if a "Holy Grail WarGame" were made 100's of thousands of copies would sold... That Its poor quality, poor marketing and poor support that has lead to the demise of mainstream wargames.
Others think that the basic market is just too small to support anything more than "hobbyist" efforts - no matter how much support, quality and marketing go into it.
Visibility is a big factor. As are "impulse buys". Games like "PaintBrawl" sell more copies than the most popular wargames becasue kids see them in Walmart and EB and buy them on impulse. Wargames get dissected until the unavoidable flaws are exposed and then cast off as not "The One".
We are trying several different ideas to try to be able successfully create and publish wargames. Our first happened to be working on SP:WaW - a game forced to be "free". We have developed a decent following if the number of forum registrations is any indication.
But it remains to be seen if these folks are "loyalists" in that they will make some "impulse" purchases as a measure of suppport to the future ability to make wargames that may be of more interest to them. Or whether they will look at the negative things and "wait for the Holy Grail".
I and several others spent a LOT of time maintaining a presence here on the forum in the hopes that that effort would be rewarded. It was not, so in that regard the "support" piece of the equation, at least in thse forums made no impact on our ability to meet our sales goals, so it had to be curtailed.
Time spent here, from a business standpoint, is time better spent on other things, or so sales seem to indicate. So that is what has happened, allocating our time to other areas.
This thread was an attempt see how many of the thousands registered on the forum would take the time to post to it "to show support". Very few have, and that does not bode well for our future or the future of wargaming.
"Getting Rich" on wargaming is a pipedream...we are talking will the genre cease to be viable as a business venture of any type...or is it simply dying off...I personally think there is life out there, or I would not be here.
Ruxius : here we are...I will answer soon about this...as you noticed I respected your words ..
Indeed I asked you to delete it ..but now I report them here as they were...
Bye !
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Italian Soldier,German Discipline!
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