Do you want to be a member of "Stencyl Syndicate"

how to choose what is bad or what is good?
good for somebody can be bad for others...

I will talk on examples.
Angry Birds, most popular game now.

Is it super quality, very innovate game, super interesting game? no.
Was it popular from the start? no

When it was published at first time, nobody knows about this game several month, but than, Chillingo , trough their frends, and big money, nominated Angry Birds with title "most popular game", placed on front page of the APP store for a long time.
and miracle... Angry Birds really became popular...

It is also not moral or fair but it is happened and it is really helps to Rovio to show to all planet their really good game.

This is why game published by large Publishers, are more popular that game published by indie developer himself.

I saw so many games, very bad on my taste but with good rating. And I can't tell that Stencyl is bad, I can just tell that my taste is different from the taste of those who gave those ratings.


In fact, I just want to offer to help each other, as we can, even if you think, that game is bad, ok, tell to your friend what is bad but give him a good rating, it will motivated him in future.

You have no idea what you're talking about, to be brutally honest.

-You don't nominate a game for Best App on the App Store. :/

-It's morally wrong to inaccurately judge a game

You may find people to do this but I will not be participating in a club of sorts that gives unfair ratings to undeserving developers who won't get feedback and hence won't be able to improve their game.

ipe 369

  • Posts: 1001
A better way of going about things would be to get the forum to PLAY your game, not just rate it well.

The 'Announce your Game' section of the forum works:)

Max Finch

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  • Posts: 2174
I don't think you know much about angry birds. For example you say the game is not "super quality". I feel you're wrong. Angry Birds is a top notch game built very carefully from notes taken on focus groups. From the art, mechanics, sounds, and the fact that the game is one of the most popular games in the world. The game is so high quality people feel addicted and the amount of hours spent each day playing prove it. You say it's not innovative, Angry Birds is about as innovative as a game can be. If a pick up and play game can easily be played with little instructions that's innovative. Take for example the sling shot, it wasn't there in the early prototypes, when the sling shot was added you knew exactly what to do. Now I've played the game so much that I don't find it interesting anymore but saying that it's not interesting is your opinion. You can't say that a game being played by millions of people every day isn't interesting. Now to the "popular from the start", this is probably the main aspect of this thread. Angry birds was never published and then republished through chillingo. It was published one time through chillingo and became extremely popular. This is called marketing and this is how you get your game known and if it's good quality "popular". In this business there's no "morals" for marketing like you think, marketing is marketing and it's a tool you'll use if you want to get your game known period. Chillingo doesn't publish games that are crap. They publish top quality games that will also boost their ego. Angry Birds being one of them.

All that aside, this group should focus more on giving each other feedback then rating games "5" because your quality will never change if you never receive feedback. Mr. Tart recieved a lot of feedback both good and bad. The game was reviewed on indiestatik and pcgamer, as of this post I have 1 million gameplays. I used all that feedback and a lot of criticism when I created Mr. And Mrs. Tart. I think the sequel is way better then the original because it has all the nit picky things from the original fixed, focuses on levels that work more on teamwork then balancing and some other things. That's just my two cents after being in this business for over two years.

GeorgeN

  • Posts: 856
Basically I was first :P

http://community.stencyl.com/index.php/topic,26939.0.html

Indie Syndicate I also made a logo for it but I was to lazy to continue my ideea and because almost nobody gave me feedback.

Angry Birds is a clone as it is Candy Crush Saga. They have succes because of marketing and ofc other things.


thegenericbanana

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Yeah, there should be no rule to give high ratings (not like anybody could check it, anyways, so the presence of that rule would do nothing), if you make a group like that the group should be about giving/getting constructive feedback, collaborating, and interacting with other stencylers (kinda what the forum is about, not sure what you're planning on having the group be on, sounds more suited for a facebook group or something- I was once part of a facebook indie dev group where people posted their games and asked for feedback, many people dled/bought others' iOS games or played their PC games and gave feedback and there was a really good vibe). Making another forum or website wouldn't be worth it as it'd just be the Stencyl forum except with less traffic. There's an FGL group (https://www.fgl.com/view_thread.php?search=1&offset=0&thread_id=40211) where there's 15 members and everybody's required to play and give feedback on the games the other members submit- if somebody no longer has the time and doesn't give feedback for a while and skips on some games, he leaves the group and somebody else can open. Maybe something like that would be cool, but there would have to be some entry rule to make sure the entree isn't just a person that's new at stencyl that doesn't really know anything about it and says "I don't know".

As for Angry Birds, I really don't feel like it's a top notch game (their backbone uses Stage2D and they didn't even credit the creator!), but it's very polished, a fun (for some people) timewaster, easily accessible and very advertised and that seems to be what makes an iOS game famous. That's the same reason Candy Crush is famous.
Johnny Turbo's Surgery Frenzy

1MrPaul1

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  • Posts: 1285
In fact, most people do not have their own taste, they always likes what other likes or well known brands.
It is everywhere in Art

another example
pictures of Picasso....
I draw pictures like this when was 5 years old, but my pictures not so popular and not cost millions. why?
some art experts can spend hours to tell how amazing and well done some picture of Picasso, but, if it was my picture with the same content and quality, the same expert probably will tell that the picture is sh....t. it is not fair, but it is reality...

Angry Birds - good game of cause, but far not the best game ever. it's just a well promoted mix of good conceptions that was before with cute art.

I know, our group can't be so powerful as Chillingo, but it will help a little to stencilers.

I understand that this is not right to rate with 5 bad games, but I also don't know how objective judge the games of the group members.
And I don't think that another stencyl forum is needed.
So what to do?
Smaller evil will be to give 4 stars for weak game of young gamedeveloper.

Than, when group will grow, we can have good experts and moderators who will control the quality.
From start member of the group got to have stencyl subscription. If he have a subscription, propably he seriously making games


But main idea is to support each other.
I know, those, who have millions of downloads don't need this kind of support.
But started developers very need.

Anyway, good rating from start, will just help to reach wider audience, than, this wide audience will judge the game very objective...

Group goal - to show the game to people, because as we all know, bigger problem in the main stores now, that new games there just lost in the millions of other apps.



snake13

  • Posts: 125
how to choose what is bad or what is good?
good for somebody can be bad for others...

I will talk on examples.
Angry Birds, most popular game now.

Is it super quality, very innovate game, super interesting game? no.
Was it popular from the start? no

When it was published at first time, nobody knows about this game several month, but than, Chillingo , trough their frends, and big money, nominated Angry Birds with title "most popular game", placed on front page of the APP store for a long time.
and miracle... Angry Birds really became popular...

It is also not moral or fair but it is happened and it is really helps to Rovio to show to all planet their really good game.

This is why game published by large Publishers, are more popular that game published by indie developer himself.

I saw so many games, very bad on my taste but with good rating. And I can't tell that Stencyl is bad, I can just tell that my taste is different from the taste of those who gave those ratings.


In fact, I just want to offer to help each other, as we can, even if you think, that game is bad, ok, tell to your friend what is bad but give him a good rating, it will motivated him in future.
Well Angry Birds is good, but its really hard
Ludum Dare Game: Connected Worlds
URL:http://www.stencyl.com/game/play/27958

1MrPaul1

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Well Angry Birds is good, but its really hard


What is hard?

Galdon2004

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  • Posts: 318
Yeah, Much as I'd like getting a ton of free 5's it would lead to an immediate backlash when bad stencyl games get "suspiciously high" scores. People on sites like Newgrounds would assume the group was just pulling a stunt like the Kitty Krew. (if you are not familiar, they were a spammer group which voted all their stuff up to pass judgement and get spam onto the site)

Although, a group which instead just encouraged you to take a look at, and vote honestly on the game's page to help them get out of judgement sooner, and leave constructive feedback would be a lot better. It would help people grow, and get more attention, but would also not give newer developers a false sense of where they stand on their skills.

snake13

  • Posts: 125

Well Angry Birds is good, but its really hard


What is hard?
Beating the levels is kinda hard with limited birds.
Ludum Dare Game: Connected Worlds
URL:http://www.stencyl.com/game/play/27958

1MrPaul1

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  • Posts: 1285
Beating the levels is kinda hard with limited birds.
Sometimes yes, it is hard, but this is very easy game I think.

Quote
Although, a group which instead just encouraged you to take a look at, and vote honestly on the game's page to help them get out of judgement sooner, and leave constructive feedback would be a lot better. It would help people grow, and get more attention, but would also not give newer developers a false sense of where they stand on their skills.

People are lazy in most part or busy, how to motivate members of the group to comment and to vote always in the games of other group members?

Photon

  • Posts: 2691
Quote
Although, a group which instead just encouraged you to take a look at, and vote honestly on the game's page to help them get out of judgement sooner, and leave constructive feedback would be a lot better. It would help people grow, and get more attention, but would also not give newer developers a false sense of where they stand on their skills.

People are lazy in most part or busy, how to motivate members of the group to comment and to vote always in the games of other group members?
And how is handing out automatic 5-star ratings not lazy? Think about that for a second. I understand that you are trying to help, but credibility as game developers isn't as easy as getting twenty guaranteed 5-star ratings. It's not very morally sound either which is very important as well not only from a character standpoint but for "credibility" as well.
Do NOT PM me your questions, because I likely will not respond. If I have replied to your question on the forum, keep using that topic. Thanks!

1MrPaul1

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  • Posts: 1285
I'm talking not about 5 stars at all.
I just want to find a way how to make a strong branch of stencyl developers who will help to each other.
Good ratings - it is just idea, also, I assume that all games of the group will be good, but because of different tastes and own ego some developers may thing that the game of other developer is bad. In this case I offer to give five star and be objective, forget about your ego and that (for example) as you think, only pixelart game are good, all other - garbage.

irock

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  • Posts: 2891
I wouldn't even give my own games a 5/5 and some of them are among my favorite Stencyl games.