When developing an MMORPG, one should better not mess with the community. But that has now happened to the developers of the role-playing game Shroud of the Avatar.
One would like to write something positive about the game, but the development process since the beginning and how the community reacts to the game resemble more of a crime story. There is a lot of tension. The “Selective Multiplayer RPG” Shroud of the Avatar is not received as well by fans as hoped. Especially backers of the Kickstarter campaign are showing disappointment. At that time, the game was not announced as an MMORPG.
MMORPG- Community are trolls
Even now it can still be read on the Kickstarter website: “Though Shroud of the Avatar won’t be a massively multiplayer online role playing game, it will be a multiplayer game.” In German: “Obwohl Shroud of the Avatar kein Massively Multiplayer Online Roleplaying Game wird, wird es ein Multiplayer Spiel werden.”
Currently, it plays like an MMORPG with open PvP zones, raids, crafting, housing, social activities, and a lot of grinding. However, the plan was more of a type of single-player RPG with a rich story, quests with choices and consequences, and the ability to experience this cooperatively with friends.
But since there is hardly anything to see of that, the quests are currently not very convincing, and MMO elements are in the foreground, criticism has been pouring in for a long time. Especially on forums like Reddit, Steam, and MMORPG.com, there is heavy criticism.
Shroud of the Avatar: Forum is strictly moderated – But criticism arises in other forums
In the official forum, however, there is strict moderation.
When criticism was once again raised in the MMORPG.com forum, the Technical Director of SotA, Chris Spears, intervened in the discussion.
It became so heated that Spears referred to the community as trolls. As a result, a small shitstorm swept over the developer studio Portalarium.
Also for this reason, because Spears stated he would put the blinders back on and continue working on the game. But those who work with blinders and ignore the criticism of those who have spent money on the RPG but are not satisfied, might be working against the wishes of this community.
Therefore, it is no wonder that SotA has been criticized for a long time. The reviews on Steam are not particularly great.
Did the developers even have a plan?
What has additionally fueled the fire is a now re-emerged, somewhat older video in which Richard “Lord British” Garriott talks with his colleagues Chris Spears and Starr Long about the development process of SotA.
In the video, Garriott explains that they had decided on short notice to launch a Kickstarter campaign to save the company, which was on the brink of bankruptcy. They quickly worked out a concept for a game and started the crowdfunding campaign. However, what they showed there was just “smoke and mirrors.” This creates the impression that the developers had absolutely no plan.
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This would also explain why Shroud of the Avatar plays so differently and differs from what was announced during the Kickstarter campaign.
The developers get entangled in contradictions when trying to explain. On the one hand, it is said that games change during development. On the other hand, it is explained that they have adhered exactly to the wording of the Kickstarter campaign and would develop a mix of MMORPG and single-player RPG.
As you can see, SotA is not under a good star. The criticism does not cease, the reviews on Steam are anything but good, and the player numbers according to Steamcharts are a maximum of 155 per day. Portalarium states that this is only about 20 percent of the total players, as most would play without Steam. But even then, the number of players would still be under 1,000.
The persistent game world has been around since July 2016, which many have seen as a “release.” However, the development team resists calling SotA officially released. The release is supposed to take place at the end of the year, but even for that, the game still seems extremely unfinished.
