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Voting with my Wallet - Uninstalling the Game

Been playing the game for about a year now, maybe a little more. I've always found both roles to be pretty enjoyable, but I tended to play killer more when I wanted to feel more engaged with the game's mechanics. Every DLC that has come out? I've purchased. Good skins/outfits that I like for my characters? I've purchased. I've bought both Rift-Passes, also.

But I have to say now... i'm done.

Let me make one thing crystal clear as to why: This has nothing to do with the Ruin change in a vacuum, even though by proxy it has to do with that. What the Ruin change has demonstrated to me is simple: By my observation, there is no long-term strategy, or high-level view of the overall game mechanics and how everything works together by the dev team. Changes like this are made willy nilly without any seeming understanding of what it would do to the overall health of the game.

Ruin was a problem for a number of reasons, but it was more of a sign of the greater issues with the game itself.

~Games are too short.

~There is only one objective.

~Survivor's task in repairing generators is not that engaging.

What did Ruin do? It alleviated these problems to some extent. It added in an (albeit droll) side-objective, and it extended the length of the game. That's it. Nothing really much more.

But when you make a change like this? What happens... All of those problems suddenly become exacerbated, and incredibly obvious. Games are now flying by. Survivors, especially those on comms, are able to pull off the game's objectives way too fast. Even at a baseline, the duration of time that a killer takes to down and hook one survivor against a coordinated group is not enough to have them succeed in getting the kills they need to win the game unless they are ***extremely*** practiced. That doesn't include Survivor Perks that continue to extend it even further: like Decisive Strike and Borrowed Time, or the relative power of Toolboxes.

If a change like this is made, it needs to be done with an overall vision of and wholistic approach to the game's design. That needs to be communicated to the players as well. IE: "We're making changes to perks that are frustrating to play against on both sides, but here are the changes that we're going to package in with that. Side objectives, Gen Speed, Toolboxes, game-lengthening perks, etc. We plan, as a team, to release those changes in this order to test them. 1, 2, 3, 4."

Barring that, the visibility that the players thus see is that the Devs are winging it: "Oh, this perk was frustrating for survivors because they had to hold M1 longer on a gen." .... thus... nerf. It seems short-sighed. Like there isn't a coherent, long-term goal behind such a thing, or that crucial wholistic view of the game's overall pacing.

And the result? Every killer game I now play is frustrating as hell. It's not uncommon to get Survive with Friends teams, and really, i'm not complaining about it when I do... but it really shows how quickly generators can be done. The sheer number of games i've "lost" because of how fast they are ending is beyond count at this point, and what's funny is that the survivor teams i'm facing even seem to recognize that. They've told me to just play survivor until it blows over.

Well... here's the deal: I've played games like this for over twenty years now, and I know for a fact that what speaks heaviest? Is when people who spend a decent amount of money on the game vote with their wallet, and that's just what i'm going to do now.

I have uninstalled the game. I will not approach it until there is a clear direction on the game's health, and a clear plan for how these things are going to be addressed. Enough is enough with the winging-it changes.

You guys, as a team, have clearly demonstrated that you can do some cool things when you put your minds to it. I have loved some of the new killers you've put out, your art and sound design is incredible, and you clearly have a love for your players.

You just need to have a better idea of how even a small decision like this negatively impacts the state of the game, you need to have a better vision for changes like this in the future, and you need to be better at communicating that with players.

Until I see those kinds of changes? I'm done.

And no, you can't have my stuff :P (Old MMO Term. Points to those who are aware of it)

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