An Interview With A Former Elements Player

[Exeneva]

As for my information not being good, I disagree. I don't need 'up-to-date' information on Elements. That doesn't make sense as a developer of a game in the same genre, because my target audience is going to be the people who left Elements to find something else. Clearly at some point they were interested in the concept of an online card game, but something about Elements made them leave and I don't want to have that same problem - I want to attract the players who left Elements by "fixing" what they hated about Elements.

Yes you will need up-to-date information on Elements for the following reasons
1) Games have pros and cons. To attract the players who left Elements you will need to match or improve the pros of Elements while fixing the cons.
2) Sometimes a false con (something that is seen as a con but is not) is observed. This is usually due to lack of sufficient analysis (which would be a common trait).
3) Games change and usually improve. Up to date information will let you see what new pros and cons emerged and how effective/ineffective the solutions to previous cons were.
In short: You will need to look at more recent information to have obtained all the lessons that using EtG as a example would provide.

This is largely true. But the problem once again is that the best person to interview would be someone who has left Elements, and that has the problem of being an outdated source at some point or another. Regardless of the age of the source, the fact is that the player still stopped playing a game and through that can give me reasons (whether biased or not) as to why they left and how to capture the attention of a similar audience.

The problem with interviewing someone who is 'up-to-date' and still playing is that I risk not being able to acquire the information I need to build the audience I am seeking. This is the problem I face as a game developer - I want to draw in the audience of those who have quit Elements but like card games in general, but to do that I would need to interview people who have left the game (those would be the best sources), and that poses the issue of having my sources being outdated at one point or another.

[Xenocidius]

The problem with interviewing someone who is 'up-to-date' and still playing is that I risk not being able to acquire the information I need to build the audience I am seeking. This is the problem I face as a game developer - I want to draw in the audience of those who have quit Elements but like card games in general, but to do that I would need to interview people who have left the game (those would be the best sources), and that poses the issue of having my sources being outdated at one point or another.

Playing Elements and playing your game are not mutually exclusive. In fact, it is quite likely that 'fanboys' of Elements will be the 'fanboys' of your game, as we are the people who both like card games and are dedicated enough to stick around and play them for a long time, as opposed to 'casual' card game players, who simply grow bored of card games and continually find new ones.

Considering that, and the fact that many of us will eventually be people "who have quit Elements but like card games in general", it's probably a bad idea to antagonize your target audience.

The biggest problem I see with the interview is that it is clearly biased. I mean, when the interviewer says things like:

That, to me, seems like a pretty lame way to handle creatures.

Then that's a problem. Still, this is an interview being conducted by a soon-to-be-rival card game, so it is naturally biased.

To be honest, I see this topic as a disguised method of getting Zems more traffic. It does seem to have provoked an interesting discussion, though, so at least that's something.

[Exeneva]

Xenocidius, I believe a lot of points you make are right. I guess it's hard to not antagonize the people of this forum after they've done nothing but tear up the article.

As for the bias in the interview, I could clearly tell he didn't like the way creatures were handled, and as an interviewer, you have to go with the flow set by the interviewee. A lot of people say I didn't address enough positives of Elements, but if the interviewee had gone that direction, then that's what the interview would have resulted as, a positive light on Elements.

And you're right. Zems, although it does target a slightly different niche, will be a rival to Elements at some point or another because both are card games. As for getting Zems more attention, I cannot say that observation is far from the truth. Any sort of controversy, whether negative or positive, will result in traffic. However, as a whole I am very interested in learning what people liked about a card game they play or have played, and what they different, this way we can build on those lessons in the development of Zems.

Interesting discussion is good; controversy of this state is probably something this forum hasn't seen for a while, and I love having a good debate

[OldTrees]

As for my information not being good, I disagree. I don't need 'up-to-date' information on Elements. That doesn't make sense as a developer of a game in the same genre, because my target audience is going to be the people who left Elements to find something else. Clearly at some point they were interested in the concept of an online card game, but something about Elements made them leave and I don't want to have that same problem - I want to attract the players who left Elements by "fixing" what they hated about Elements.

Yes you will need up-to-date information on Elements for the following reasons
1) Games have pros and cons. To attract the players who left Elements you will need to match or improve the pros of Elements while fixing the cons.
2) Sometimes a false con (something that is seen as a con but is not) is observed. This is usually due to lack of sufficient analysis (which would be a common trait).
3) Games change and usually improve. Up to date information will let you see what new pros and cons emerged and how effective/ineffective the solutions to previous cons were.
In short: You will need to look at more recent information to have obtained all the lessons that using EtG as a example would provide.

This is largely true. But the problem once again is that the best person to interview would be someone who has left Elements, and that has the problem of being an outdated source at some point or another. Regardless of the age of the source, the fact is that the player still stopped playing a game and through that can give me reasons (whether biased or not) as to why they left and how to capture the attention of a similar audience.

The problem with interviewing someone who is 'up-to-date' and still playing is that I risk not being able to acquire the information I need to build the audience I am seeking. This is the problem I face as a game developer - I want to draw in the audience of those who have quit Elements but like card games in general, but to do that I would need to interview people who have left the game (those would be the best sources), and that poses the issue of having my sources being outdated at one point or another.

The best person to interview would be the one that knows the pros and cons of the game in the most depth. Obtaining knowledge takes effort so it correlates with how passionate someone is about the subject of pros and cons of the game. Furthermore knowledge accumulates so the best person would be someone that studied the game over a long period. Finally the best person would be able to empathize with new players and experts alike.

So ideally you want someone that is a veteran PvPer that is a frequent poster in game suggestions and feedback and is looking for a better* game. Some background in design theory would give their opinions about balance some credibility but well informed posts in the Buff/Nerf section would be better for your purposes.
*You do not want Zems to be different but equal (pandering merely to people that left EtG) rather you would want it to be more diverse and better.

[Xenocidius]

Xenocidius, I believe a lot of points you make are right. I guess it's hard to not antagonize the people of this forum after they've done nothing but tear up the article.

I understand this, and I'll admit some posts on this thread do resemble fanboy comments more than anything.

As for the bias in the interview, I could clearly tell he didn't like the way creatures were handled, and as an interviewer, you have to go with the flow set by the interviewee. A lot of people say I didn't address enough positives of Elements, but if the interviewee had gone that direction, then that's what the interview would have resulted as, a positive light on Elements.

I'd like to believe that, but we both realize that it is in your game's best interest to cast Elements in a negative light. You may very well have attempted to subtly steer the interview back to the negatives of Elements, or possibly even not posted the interview if it had been too positive. I may be wrong about this, though.

And you're right. Zems, although it does target a slightly different niche, will be a rival to Elements at some point or another because both are card games. As for getting Zems more attention, I cannot say that observation is far from the truth. Any sort of controversy, whether negative or positive, will result in traffic. However, as a whole I am very interested in learning what people liked about a card game they play or have played, and what they different, this way we can build on those lessons in the development of Zems.

Fair enough. For what it's worth, I think I will be following the development of Zems, being both a fan of card games and a developer.

Interesting discussion is good; controversy of this state is probably something this forum hasn't seen for a while, and I love having a good debate

Internal controversy isn't anything new, but external controversy like this is certainly quite refreshing. Good debates are good (duh), as long as they don't turn into flame wars.

[Shantu]

Since it's clear all interviewees are biased in some way (quitters toward negative, long-time players toward positive) why not make multiple interviews? You could, for example, take 3 interviews with:
- Someone who has left
- An experienced and long-time player
- A newbie that is just exploring Elements

This way you could have a much better picture of the pros and cons of the game - from different viewpoints. The quitter can tell about his reasons of leaving, the loyal player can tell about what keeps him/her playing the game, while the newbie can tell about what caught his attention and what his initial feelings are about the game. And other things.

Of course, this takes more time and work, but if you truly want to get a whole picture of a game it might be worth it.

[Exeneva]

Since it's clear all interviewees are biased in some way (quitters toward negative, long-time players toward positive) why not make multiple interviews? You could, for example, take 3 interviews with:
- Someone who has left
- An experienced and long-time player
- A newbie that is just exploring Elements

This way you could have a much better picture of the pros and cons of the game - from different viewpoints. The quitter can tell about his reasons of leaving, the loyal player can tell about what keeps him/her playing the game, while the newbie can tell about what caught his attention and what his initial feelings are about the game. And other things.

Of course, this takes more time and work, but if you truly want to get a whole picture of a game it might be worth it.

I'd be willing to do follow-up interviews.

[Naesala]

Comment on how the interview naturally went or whether it was steered, etc.: You've said a couple of times that Jeff spoke with you after the interview about the positives of the game. Now, I don't know how much after this was, but it seems as though this could have easily been added to the interview with a little foresite. Additionally, the job of an interviewer is to be prepared with questions prior to the interview to address all the information needed. If the interviewer isn't prepared as such it becomes more of just a persons opinion on the spot; whatever he/she remembers is what he/she says, without being sparked by questions to mention other points.

I'm not trying to sound like I love elements or anything, I'm trying to critique your research so that you can develop your game better, which I'll likely play (especially if it winds up on Kong with badges). You need to just do more interviews with more credible sources, including people who have quit the game. And I still want to say Jeff just wasn't very on it for the posted interview based on facts brought up.

If you want to interview me, I am fully available almost anytime. I am a casual player of the game and an active member of the community, if that influences your decision. And if you want me to talk about negatives I will, so long as I may talk about positives and neutral aspects as well.

[dragonsdemesne]

Well, I'll give a few more suggestions:

1) Based on the comments that 'Jeff' made, he was probably an inexperienced player who played quite a long time ago, before many of the modern changes, most of which have been for the better.  I would recommend asking a veteran player who has experience in many card games and understands the math and concepts behind them, rather than what appears to be a casual player who did not participate in the community much, if at all.  Getting multiple points of view is also a good thing.

2) Any criticism that you receive on that article has no bearing on your own CCG's quality.  Your game might be good, maybe better than Elements; I have no idea, as I've never heard of it before now.

3) Remember that because, by definition, everyone who is on the forum obviously likes Elements and stays, that they are more likely to deliver criticism towards a negative article, and that this should be expected.  It should not be taken as a personal attack, if it was taken that way by you.

4) Elements certainly has its negative points but the interview focused either on nonexistent/misrepresented issues or on Jeff's opinions, rather than the actual flaws of Elements.  For instance, Jeff claimed duos are not viable and that weapons are overpowered, but did not mention any of the most powerful broken cards like nova, which was in the very first version of elements.

[Exeneva]

Comment on how the interview naturally went or whether it was steered, etc.: You've said a couple of times that Jeff spoke with you after the interview about the positives of the game. Now, I don't know how much after this was, but it seems as though this could have easily been added to the interview with a little foresite. Additionally, the job of an interviewer is to be prepared with questions prior to the interview to address all the information needed. If the interviewer isn't prepared as such it becomes more of just a persons opinion on the spot; whatever he/she remembers is what he/she says, without being sparked by questions to mention other points.

Once an interview is 'finished', any comments added after are not allowed to be added back to the original interview. This isn't a personal choice, it's also legality (a respect issue as well) and also why virtually every interview has comments made after airing is done, and yet none of these comments are made public or released with the interview.

I'm not trying to sound like I love elements or anything, I'm trying to critique your research so that you can develop your game better, which I'll likely play (especially if it winds up on Kong with badges). You need to just do more interviews with more credible sources, including people who have quit the game. And I still want to say Jeff just wasn't very on it for the posted interview based on facts brought up.

If you want to interview me, I am fully available almost anytime. I am a casual player of the game and an active member of the community, if that influences your decision. And if you want me to talk about negatives I will, so long as I may talk about positives and neutral aspects as well.

I'm not against doing an interview with you. The only thing is that I will let you steer the interview as that's how interviews are run. So while I would like you to talk about all aspects (positive, neutral, and negative), you obviously will have a preference towards one of the three as no interviewee can talk about each part with equal feeling and that's what will drive the interview. I've said this multiple times, and yet there are still posts being made on this thread about how not enough time was devoted to the positives. The simple fact of the matter is that's not how interviews are run, not even in the real world.

[Naesala]

While I suppose the legality of the issue exists, by "foresite" I meant you could have a)let the interview continued when he obviously had more to say and b) come prepared with more questions, not that you should have taken any information without his prior permission. I call foul on your statement that interviews are steered by the interviewee and not the interviewer. Proper question writing and devoting enough time to the interview are important. If, for example, your first question to me is "What is bad about elements" and I give a 10 minute response with you interjecting for small elaboration questions, and say "thats all the time we have" then I haven't fully expressed my views. Obviously Jeff had other points, did you end the interview and chat more? And if he gave more information, you could have easily asked "May I use this information in the interview as well?"

Again, critiquing your skills as a researcher and an interviewer. I suppose your statement of not being against interviewing me is an invitation to be interviewed, since I didn't really get a clear answer. Give me a medium and some times you are available (not so good with time zones, Im on whatever Indiana is on) either here or via pm and I'll give you a full interview. And I expect you to be prepared with sufficient questions. If i dont have an answer, I'll say so. If positive or negative aspects are to much of a focus, I expect there to be some extra questions added to bring out more information. Your research needs to be important to you; it's a means to make your game grow.

[OldTrees]

http://sync.in/insert word here is a useful medium.