The online shooter Anthem is in a difficult situation two months after its release. Our author Schuhmann notes: The worst thing right now is how deeply the players’ distrust of BioWare runs. According to the insider report, the developers’ credibility has reached a low point.
This was the relationship between fans and BioWare at the beginning: It started off so well – BioWare’s communication ahead of the launch was really good, somewhat unconventional, but okay.
The producers of Anthem, like Ben Irving, Mike Gamble, or Mark Darrah, tweeted regularly, engaged in the forums, discussed with the fans, and appeared authentic and close.
It was a little difficult to follow the flow of information about Anthem because the tweets came sporadically and on many topics, but the relationship between BioWare and the players was completely okay and intact before the release and even during the demo.
Even in the first weeks, when difficulties arose, such as during the demo, everything was still okay.
BioWare behaved authentically, admitted problems, and promised solutions.
The fans showed understanding: Every beginning is hard, this is a huge project, take your time, as long as it’s good in the end. That was the sentiment.
This is the relationship now: This mood has completely shifted. The developers have become scarce in recent weeks – after the big “revelation report” about what went wrong at BioWare for years, there seemed to be almost silence. A strong signal would have been so important then.
This silence has negative effects on the mood.
When yesterday BioWare postponed the live stream, allegedly due to technical issues, it was clear that many in the community simply did not believe the reason for the cancellation.
They accused BioWare here of outright lying and coming up with an excuse to avoid streaming.
This is how fans reacted to the stream’s cancellation:
- Under the tweet, there were countless Gifs signaling a kind of “weariness” and “typical BioWare”.
- A reddit user even called the building of BioWare and asked the office manager of another company if they had internet. They did – and the forum had fun with it. (via reddit)
- Others compared the statement: “We have to postpone the stream for a week, we don’t have internet” with the bad excuse of a student who hasn’t finished his homework.
This shows how important such a relationship of trust between developers and players is and how uncomfortable it becomes when it is disturbed.
What can BioWare do now? It will probably take time for this relationship to normalize and for trust to be rebuilt.
For that, it is necessary for BioWare to communicate more with the fans, even if they have little to say at the moment and bear the anger of the players.
But silence only makes the situation worse. The most important thing now is to give fans the feeling that they are taken seriously and to communicate with them on equal terms.
This was ultimately the formula for success for every game that managed to emerge from such a difficult situation.
A good example of how to do this was seen here with Anthem:
For many, it was clear: Internet outage was a lame excuse from BioWare – they just aren’t ready to present the next patch yet.
This is the problem: Whether BioWare had internet or not is ultimately irrelevant. What is important is that the incident shows how much trust has been shaken.
After the revelations from the US site Kotaku regarding the product development of Anthem, trust has been fundamentally disturbed.
Because after the report, many got the impression that BioWare knew about the problems of Anthem and deceived the players. This led to many now assuming the worst and attributing bad intentions to BioWare.
- The decision of Anthem to now postpone content to first solve problems is interpreted at BioWare as “another broken” promise.
- While those at Massive, who are doing exactly the same with The Division 2, are rather positively received.
This shows how important such a relationship of trust between developers and players is and how uncomfortable it becomes when it is disturbed.
What can BioWare do now? It will probably take time for this relationship to normalize and for trust to be rebuilt.
For that, it is necessary for BioWare to communicate more with the fans, even if they have little to say at the moment and bear the anger of the players.
But silence only makes the situation worse. The most important thing now is to give fans the feeling that they are taken seriously and to communicate with them on equal terms.
This was ultimately the formula for success for every game that managed to emerge from such a difficult situation.
A good example of how to do this was seen here with Anthem:
