IMO unfair critique to TL, and more constructive suggestions for TL and the forum

[ogreve]

Hi all,

Over the past few weeks I've been reading a lot of posts here, and I've been sitting on my hands for about equally long. Today, for the first time I added a post, which can be found here:
http://forums.storm8.com/showthread.php?82008-Mini-tournament-Dread-Panda&p=1118856#post1118856

The main reason for posting that, is that despite the fact that I too live in Europe and have an extremely hard time with flash tournaments, I wanted to contribute a more positive note to it.
Initially, I had typed the text that appears below to the end of the above mentioned post, but it became off-topic for that post and resulted in a very long post. I decided to move it to a separate post, and I hope it can contribute to a more positive view on matters and less complaining. There are also suggestions for TL in there. Possibly some of the TL members will get to read it, and if more people agree with me, this forum and the game might become a more fun place to be, as the critique on TL is starting to put me off.

Here goes. Do note that these are MY opinions, and mine alone. Feel free to flame/hate/love me over them. It's all the same to me, but it is certainly intended to give a more positive swing to the forum...

Firstly, I have a general remark to those who don't like to spend gems: please do not take this the wrong way, but I am going to stand up for TL somewhat here. I myself am working as a programmer (a.o. things) and for me there would be no bread on the table to feed the kids and rest of the family if no one paid for my work. TL is a part of a commercial company that spends a LOT of time and effort to make these games. Trust me: it's a LOT of work to make games like these. Obviously they can only do so if there is some way of making money from it. It basically comes down to the ground principle of: you get what you pay for. And having said that, with these games you actually get a LOT for free. Up until now, by my own choice, I've not yet bought gems. I'm not against doing so, and perhaps I will buy some too one of these days. The only reason why I haven't done so yet, is that I find it more of a challenge to try and see how far I can get without doing so. It makes me feel bad for TL, because they put in all the hard work to make a living too, and so far I've exclusively been on a free ride. For that reason alone already, I think it is likely I will buy some gems soon. I'm a bit 'scared' by what Zenobia wrote about how she thought that after buying gems, no more ultra rares will be the outcome of breeding.
As mentioned, I am in software development, and I know that technically spoken it would be very easy to implement such logic. It would surprise me if TL has indeed done that though, because by doing so they would "punish those who pay" which essentially is biting the hand that feeds, and it would cause the paying customers to not spend more.
Bottomline though: flame me all you will, but I think it's unfair to TL to make statements like "money grab" etc. For me it makes perfect sense to try and get people to spend money on their products. Of course I also enjoy free rides, but it's just not how real life works. :/
In all reality, I find posts that make such statements and/or contain other complaints about "how unfair TL is and how everyone is going to call it a day" more discouraging than TL's money making schemes with the game. I hope everyone can put a lid on constantly airing all that negativity a bit.
Remember: the world doesn't stop turning if you don't have ultra rare animals, nor does it when a limited animal is missed out on, and neither does it when a tournament is not won. If you really want to have ALL animals that are available in the game, you just have to realise that it will be pretty much impossible to do so without spending real money on it. At the end of the day it is your call whether you choose to spend money or not, and if so, how much. But please stop complaining about TL trying to make a living off it. :/

Having said all that, not all critique that's aimed at TL is uncalled for. Here are some constructive suggestions to TL that might alleviate a lot of pain, and still do not get in their way. In fact, I think that an implementation of those suggestions would cause more people to remain satisfied with the game, which ought to result in more revenue for TL too then:
-Flash tournament duration: the 36 hours is an odd choice due to the different timezones. This part of the critique is totally called for. A simple change would be to simply change the 36 hours limit to 36 + 8 = 44 hours, to account for those that have to deal with two nights in it, or better to up the time limit to 48 hours. Granting an additional 12 hours would then perhaps come at a cost of having an additional 2-3 low level rounds, i.e. NOT rounds with ultra rares. I hope someone from TL reads this and does something with it.
-Completion durations: TL please take notice of this one: a game is fun to play when significant progress can be made in a reasonable amount of time. For the first 30 or so levels of the game that's definitely the case. After that, the timers on just about everything quickly get longer and longer. By now, for me every day there are only very few "real fun" moments left, which is when something has bred, or when I can feed animals or so. I find an amount of more than 20 runes per expansion very off-putting. I know that gems alleviate that, but IMO the price for doing that is too steep, so I choose not to do so. If I'm going to spend gems, it's not likely to be on the expansions.
-Several of the breeding and evolution times also take very long, resulting in little game play when a long timer appears for animals that are not really all that rare. I can understand the timers on breeding/evolving super rares and ultra rares to be long, but I would wish that the common and rare ones would be short.
-Money spending options: due to the slow expansions, I'm getting near that break-even point where money is starting to be made more quickly than it's spent. It would be really nice if there were some more "handy things" that could be bought with money. The two things that spring directly to mind are realm runes and food. Even if the cost would be pretty high (e.g. 500,000 coins per realm rune or so), it would be like "a knife that cuts both ways": the advanced players would then have something useful to spend money on and the expansions come a bit quicker again.

That's pretty much it. It's a long post. I hope that at least 1 person finds it useful. I also hope that the forum contributors stop complaining so much and just stick to making posts about the game itself. The posts often contain very useful information, but it is a pain on my eyes to see them being blemished so much by constant complaining. Sorry guys. Don't take it personally. No offence is meant, but that's just the way it comes across to me.

Special note to Zenobia (if you're perhaps still reading this someday): I was sorry to see you go: most of your posts were very informative and have helped me a lot, especially those about the opponents for each element, etc. I hope you'll reconsider in due time, and just don't get frustrated anymore over limited animal fails, etc. :)
Trust me: been there, done that. Some of my major fails were the Mamaroo, the Aperil Fool, Kitsune and Caboodle and for the first 11 days the space animals too. There have been good successes too: got the Lemurcury and Caturn ones easily when I again went for them, got the Hedgehog required for the Pigmy quest on my first attempt and got a Ladypug the first time when combining it on a 4 element attempt at a unicorn. So far I've tried dozens of times for treasure animals and gem animals too. All resulted in failures. I can only hope the joy to be all the sweeter if I now ever see a 24 or 45 hour timer finally appear! :)

Finally a big thank you to TL for making the game and providing a lot of fun for free!
I do hope some TL member looks at the suggestions and does something with them, so as to make the game stay fun to play for advanced players too!

Cheers for now,
Olafo

PS: For those who'd like to follow my progress so far, my id of the main account is: ogreve

[chippychan]

I generally feel as you do.

I'm not in software development myself but my daughter is in the technical engineering field so I do have some understanding of the work involved and I do know that developers should be compensated for their efforts. This goes for all professional fields really, but I do think there are people out there that don't understand just how much work goes into making and maintaining a functional application or game. A lot of people don't take "games" seriously at all, let alone the hard working people that make them.

Even though I'm not in software development, I do own and manage a business (with my husband). From the nearly 2 decades of experience I have with our business I understand that all successful businesses are in the business of making money. However, I also know that a business needs a certain level of customer service to be successful.

I don't agree with a lot of the critiques on TL, but I *do* feel that they lack in the communication area. I think they need to be more open to dialogue with their user base. I'm not saying they need to make every change that players suggest (you can't please everyone & a change that 1 person may like is not necessarily something that all players will like), but they could be more forthcoming with what new features are in the near future, or if bug-fixes are incoming. I think this would foster excitement and anticipation in their user-base.

Aside from that I'm generally fine with how things are handles in the game. I understand why animals/goals have been implemented in a way to encourage gem-spending and I'm fine with that. I know that if I'm unlucky that I may need to spend gems if I want something and I just decide if I want it bad enough. Usually I'm fine without it. The only thing I'm less than pleased with is that there's no extra confirmation step when spending gems to speed something... I'm sure we've all accidentally spent some gems by clicking on the wrong icon at one point or another.

I've seen a lot of comments about how the forum activity has dwindled and people blame the game. But I wonder if that's really it? To be honest I feel a lot of the negative attitudes and comments prevent me from chiming in on certain topics. I mean why bother getting involved in something that would drag me down emotionally? I've been down that pessimistic & negative road in my past and it brought me no joy. These days I like to keep a positive perspective and I’m happier for it.

Maybe a more positive atmosphere would be more inviting to new players and encourage them to join the conversations.

[ogreve]

Hear, hear!

I agree with everything you wrote!
Yes, the communication could indeed be better and YES: a "Do you really want to spend xxx gems to do yyy?" button would be so, so sweet.
When doing continuous harvesting and making a "money collecting strafe run" it has happened so often that I accidentally click the wrong farm, only to be quickly followed by an unintentional hit on the "finish for 1 gem" button, just to speed up a 3 minute harvest time. I lost of lot of gems that way and it caused me to click more carefully now.
Worst though was last week Monday: a big electric enclave was being built when I made a money strafing run: I automatically also strafed over the one that was under construction and bam, I ended up hitting the "finish now" button, that at that time cost me 15 gems. Gems that I had very carefully collected in order to be able to use them during tournaments. :S

Other than that: I don't have any real issues with the game that I can't deal with. I'm perfectly fine if I don't end up getting all animals that have ever been released. It would be nice if some of my suggestions (and the one of the confirmation button) would be followed up on; it would add more game play and more game play = more fun. :)

I hope others also agree with us, and that the forum, and perhaps the feedback to TL will be better for it!
Life's short, so let's enjoy the game play and focus on the positive sides and enjoy those, rather than getting bitter over the things that are seen as "less pleasing". I too have been frustrated about not being able to obtain some limited animals despite breeding for them 24/7, but well, that's just the way it goes and after a day or so there's something else to focus on, and the frustration wears off again. I rather tend to enjoy the small victories when the breeding attempts DO result in a desired animal.

As for me: I just set small targets for each day. Today I'm battling hard to get my biggest Gold Lion from level 13 to 14, that's an animal that my daughter and I really want at epic level. I can almost make the 3rd 4000 apples feeding and then it's going to be two more of those today. Hopefully by Thursday it will be at epic level. :)
Also: my nest is about to be cleared of my 3rd Thunderhawk in a row; curious if the 13 hours breeding that's been going on in the meantime in the breeding den is going to be a Sea Horse (which I don't have yet) or whether it's the so manyth Conduktor...
And... in a few more hours TL is likely to release "something". As I don't know where to find information about their planned updates (other than at this forum, when someone mentions something in advance, like was the case with the Ladypug) I'll keep the breeding den clear until I know if perhaps a new quest is coming up, or perhaps some special breeding combination. When the Ladypug arrived, I "incorporated" it into "4 element" breeding attempts for a Unicorn, such that the Ladypug could be one of the outcomes. Nicely enough, right on the first try indeed the Ladypug WAS the outcome. That was really encouraging. :)
I tried the same for the Shockatoo and since its release I've constantly been breeding a Planther with a Conduktor (the breeding calculator at the Wiki shows that the combination of those elements can produce quite a few animals that I don't have yet and "need" to complete goals, etc.). I also tried a few straight up Pandaffodil - Lightning Leopard breedings: only Thunderhawks. No problem though, since the Shockatoo is not limited.

Quite enough going on still to be motivated! :)

Enjoy the game, and cheers,
Olafo

[readysetgo888]

Sigh....

I just love it when new players, who don't have much experience with this game or other TL games, post comments about how they want others to stop complaining and how their complaints are unfair to TL. You have no idea the history behind those comments. Unless you've played this game since close to the beginning and followed the forum that whole time, you can't possibly appreciate the REASON behind the complaints. (Ogreve, this is not directed just at you, as at least you did post some of the legitimate complaints about the game in this thread... there are MANY newbie players that LOVE the game and hate reading any negative stuff. This is for them).

Almost every single player that I started playing this game with, that was an active poster for a long time, has become frustrated, not just with the game, but with TL and their disgusting tactics, and quit. I'm just about the only one left, and maybe two others that I can think of, aside from the ones who spend tons and tons of money on the game. I'm just about the only one left, especially after Zenobia quit, that will criticize TL any more. Everyone else is a newer player, who simply can't appreciate the fact that the game is designed to be NICER to newer players, and that the longer you play, the worse your experience with the game will get. Newer players have absolutely no business telling older players to stop complaining. Period. You have no idea the difference in the way TL treats its long time players vs newer players until you become one. And I think they wanted it that way.... some of the awful changes they made to the game, I'm convinced they ran off the older posters deliberately.

I am by no means the only one who complained. EVERYONE ELSE who ever had the same complaints has quit. There is a thread here on the forum that has pages and pages of these legitimate complaints. Find it and read it and then you might understand better.

Now, I understand that TL is a business and deserves to make money. However, there is a difference between "fair" tactics to encourage people to spend money and blatantly "unfair" ones and TL crosses that line.

I have never wanted to take the enormous amounts of time that it would take to support my claims that TL is awful, greedy, and doesn't care about their customers. Believe me, I CAN prove that. It is 100% true. I could prove it beyond any shadow of a doubt, if I had hours and hours and hours to go back through the forum and collect the evidence and write it up. I just don't have that kind of time. You'll have to take my word for it that TL has done some of the most disgusting things they could possibly do to try to make money, stuff that is totally unfair, and that they do not care about their customers one bit. If you think TL cares about you, or your suggestions, think again. They could not possibly care less.

[Drachenia]

Hi all,

Over the past few weeks I've been reading a lot of posts here, and I've been sitting on my hands for about equally long. Today, for the first time I added a post, which can be found here:
http://forums.storm8.com/showthread.php?82008-Mini-tournament-Dread-Panda&p=1118856#post1118856

The main reason for posting that, is that despite the fact that I too live in Europe and have an extremely hard time with flash tournaments, I wanted to contribute a more positive note to it.
Initially, I had typed the text that appears below to the end of the above mentioned post, but it became off-topic for that post and resulted in a very long post. I decided to move it to a separate post, and I hope it can contribute to a more positive view on matters and less complaining. There are also suggestions for TL in there. Possibly some of the TL members will get to read it, and if more people agree with me, this forum and the game might become a more fun place to be, as the critique on TL is starting to put me off.

Here goes. Do note that these are MY opinions, and mine alone. Feel free to flame/hate/love me over them. It's all the same to me, but it is certainly intended to give a more positive swing to the forum...

Firstly, I have a general remark to those who don't like to spend gems: please do not take this the wrong way, but I am going to stand up for TL somewhat here. I myself am working as a programmer (a.o. things) and for me there would be no bread on the table to feed the kids and rest of the family if no one paid for my work. TL is a part of a commercial company that spends a LOT of time and effort to make these games. Trust me: it's a LOT of work to make games like these. Obviously they can only do so if there is some way of making money from it. It basically comes down to the ground principle of: you get what you pay for. And having said that, with these games you actually get a LOT for free. Up until now, by my own choice, I've not yet bought gems. I'm not against doing so, and perhaps I will buy some too one of these days. The only reason why I haven't done so yet, is that I find it more of a challenge to try and see how far I can get without doing so. It makes me feel bad for TL, because they put in all the hard work to make a living too, and so far I've exclusively been on a free ride. For that reason alone already, I think it is likely I will buy some gems soon. I'm a bit 'scared' by what Zenobia wrote about how she thought that after buying gems, no more ultra rares will be the outcome of breeding.
As mentioned, I am in software development, and I know that technically spoken it would be very easy to implement such logic. It would surprise me if TL has indeed done that though, because by doing so they would "punish those who pay" which essentially is biting the hand that feeds, and it would cause the paying customers to not spend more.
Bottomline though: flame me all you will, but I think it's unfair to TL to make statements like "money grab" etc. For me it makes perfect sense to try and get people to spend money on their products. Of course I also enjoy free rides, but it's just not how real life works. :/
In all reality, I find posts that make such statements and/or contain other complaints about "how unfair TL is and how everyone is going to call it a day" more discouraging than TL's money making schemes with the game. I hope everyone can put a lid on constantly airing all that negativity a bit.
Remember: the world doesn't stop turning if you don't have ultra rare animals, nor does it when a limited animal is missed out on, and neither does it when a tournament is not won. If you really want to have ALL animals that are available in the game, you just have to realise that it will be pretty much impossible to do so without spending real money on it. At the end of the day it is your call whether you choose to spend money or not, and if so, how much. But please stop complaining about TL trying to make a living off it. :/

Having said all that, not all critique that's aimed at TL is uncalled for. Here are some constructive suggestions to TL that might alleviate a lot of pain, and still do not get in their way. In fact, I think that an implementation of those suggestions would cause more people to remain satisfied with the game, which ought to result in more revenue for TL too then:
-Flash tournament duration: the 36 hours is an odd choice due to the different timezones. This part of the critique is totally called for. A simple change would be to simply change the 36 hours limit to 36 + 8 = 44 hours, to account for those that have to deal with two nights in it, or better to up the time limit to 48 hours. Granting an additional 12 hours would then perhaps come at a cost of having an additional 2-3 low level rounds, i.e. NOT rounds with ultra rares. I hope someone from TL reads this and does something with it.
-Completion durations: TL please take notice of this one: a game is fun to play when significant progress can be made in a reasonable amount of time. For the first 30 or so levels of the game that's definitely the case. After that, the timers on just about everything quickly get longer and longer. By now, for me every day there are only very few "real fun" moments left, which is when something has bred, or when I can feed animals or so. I find an amount of more than 20 runes per expansion very off-putting. I know that gems alleviate that, but IMO the price for doing that is too steep, so I choose not to do so. If I'm going to spend gems, it's not likely to be on the expansions.
-Several of the breeding and evolution times also take very long, resulting in little game play when a long timer appears for animals that are not really all that rare. I can understand the timers on breeding/evolving super rares and ultra rares to be long, but I would wish that the common and rare ones would be short.
-Money spending options: due to the slow expansions, I'm getting near that break-even point where money is starting to be made more quickly than it's spent. It would be really nice if there were some more "handy things" that could be bought with money. The two things that spring directly to mind are realm runes and food. Even if the cost would be pretty high (e.g. 500,000 coins per realm rune or so), it would be like "a knife that cuts both ways": the advanced players would then have something useful to spend money on and the expansions come a bit quicker again.

That's pretty much it. It's a long post. I hope that at least 1 person finds it useful. I also hope that the forum contributors stop complaining so much and just stick to making posts about the game itself. The posts often contain very useful information, but it is a pain on my eyes to see them being blemished so much by constant complaining. Sorry guys. Don't take it personally. No offence is meant, but that's just the way it comes across to me.

Special note to Zenobia (if you're perhaps still reading this someday): I was sorry to see you go: most of your posts were very informative and have helped me a lot, especially those about the opponents for each element, etc. I hope you'll reconsider in due time, and just don't get frustrated anymore over limited animal fails, etc. :)
Trust me: been there, done that. Some of my major fails were the Mamaroo, the Aperil Fool, Kitsune and Caboodle and for the first 11 days the space animals too. There have been good successes too: got the Lemurcury and Caturn ones easily when I again went for them, got the Hedgehog required for the Pigmy quest on my first attempt and got a Ladypug the first time when combining it on a 4 element attempt at a unicorn. So far I've tried dozens of times for treasure animals and gem animals too. All resulted in failures. I can only hope the joy to be all the sweeter if I now ever see a 24 or 45 hour timer finally appear! :)

Finally a big thank you to TL for making the game and providing a lot of fun for free!
I do hope some TL member looks at the suggestions and does something with them, so as to make the game stay fun to play for advanced players too!

Cheers for now,
Olafo

PS: For those who'd like to follow my progress so far, my id of the main account is: ogreve

Hello! I can only agree, Thank you

[Drachenia]

Sigh....

I just love it when new players, who don't have much experience with this game or other TL games, post comments about how they want others to stop complaining and how their complaints are unfair to TL. You have no idea the history behind those comments. Unless you've played this game since close to the beginning and followed the forum that whole time, you can't possibly appreciate the REASON behind the complaints. (Ogreve, this is not directed just at you, as at least you did post some of the legitimate complaints about the game in this thread... there are MANY newbie players that LOVE the game and hate reading any negative stuff. This is for them).

Almost every single player that I started playing this game with, that was an active poster for a long time, has become frustrated, not just with the game, but with TL and their disgusting tactics, and quit. I'm just about the only one left, and maybe two others that I can think of, aside from the ones who spend tons and tons of money on the game. I'm just about the only one left, especially after Zenobia quit, that will criticize TL any more. Everyone else is a newer player, who simply can't appreciate the fact that the game is designed to be NICER to newer players, and that the longer you play, the worse your experience with the game will get. Newer players have absolutely no business telling older players to stop complaining. Period. You have no idea the difference in the way TL treats its long time players vs newer players until you become one. And I think they wanted it that way.... some of the awful changes they made to the game, I'm convinced they ran off the older posters deliberately.

I am by no means the only one who complained. EVERYONE ELSE who ever had the same complaints has quit. There is a thread here on the forum that has pages and pages of these legitimate complaints. Find it and read it and then you might understand better.

Now, I understand that TL is a business and deserves to make money. However, there is a difference between "fair" tactics to encourage people to spend money and blatantly "unfair" ones and TL crosses that line.

I have never wanted to take the enormous amounts of time that it would take to support my claims that TL is awful, greedy, and doesn't care about their customers. Believe me, I CAN prove that. It is 100% true. I could prove it beyond any shadow of a doubt, if I had hours and hours and hours to go back through the forum and collect the evidence and write it up. I just don't have that kind of time. You'll have to take my word for it that TL has done some of the most disgusting things they could possibly do to try to make money, stuff that is totally unfair, and that they do not care about their customers one bit. If you think TL cares about you, or your suggestions, think again. They could not possibly care less.


Hello, I play the game well from the beginning and have now all extensions and me missing some animals.
But it's all about fun, I do not understand you. The what left the game no desire or time more.
I know that it will be given the opportunity, for example, Pumkin Panda comes back for breeding. In the tournament, for example, Steamtrunk it Water / Fire is I would use nature / water against Steamtrunk.
In tournaments you have to think carefully about what kind of animal you take as an opponent and if that does not work the same, so then another animal and not always the same animal.
I want to say that it is up to the players and one can think of a part, but I also do not want annoy or insult and I am from Germany

[Jennerwein1]

[QUOTE=readysetgo888;1118966]Sigh
I 100% agree with you readyset. In the beginning I would have a reasonable chance at breeding and battling. (Was fun!!!) This has gone by the wayside since I have reached max level (Can't even remember when that was). I have spent money, since I also believe TL should be paid for what they do. I bought Unicorn, Nightmare, and Emerald. I have spent money in other TL games,too.
BUT: I am not happy with what I am getting in return. As a paying customer I want some modicum of enjoyment. And unsuccessfully breeding over and over again, random battle odds, which defy any sort of strategy and changing the rules midstream in a tournamet/quest do nothing to achieve that.
And yes, I will voice my displeasure, because in this country customer satisfaction is important for most corporations. This is how a capitalist economy is successful.
From experience I know things are not quite the same in Europe, so maybe some Europeans do not expect as much.
There is an American saying: "you get what you pay for", but the reverse also applies, at least for me: I only pay for what I get.
Should TL decide to be more customer friendly, I will gladly buy gems, packets, whatever it takes to enhance the game. But I will not pay to be frustrated over and over again.
Oh,btw: in 2014 S8 was #12 most successful app companies wit 250 employees. They are a gaming app powerhouse. I am suspecting they are getting paid, again ... I think they should. But the players should get value in return. Dang ... There is that capitalism thing again :)

[cocauina]

Sigh....

I just love it when new players, who don't have much experience with this game or other TL games, post comments about how they want others to stop complaining and how their complaints are unfair to TL. You have no idea the history behind those comments. Unless you've played this game since close to the beginning and followed the forum that whole time, you can't possibly appreciate the REASON behind the complaints. (Ogreve, this is not directed just at you, as at least you did post some of the legitimate complaints about the game in this thread... there are MANY newbie players that LOVE the game and hate reading any negative stuff. This is for them).

Almost every single player that I started playing this game with, that was an active poster for a long time, has become frustrated, not just with the game, but with TL and their disgusting tactics, and quit. I'm just about the only one left, and maybe two others that I can think of, aside from the ones who spend tons and tons of money on the game. I'm just about the only one left, especially after Zenobia quit, that will criticize TL any more. Everyone else is a newer player, who simply can't appreciate the fact that the game is designed to be NICER to newer players, and that the longer you play, the worse your experience with the game will get. Newer players have absolutely no business telling older players to stop complaining. Period. You have no idea the difference in the way TL treats its long time players vs newer players until you become one. And I think they wanted it that way.... some of the awful changes they made to the game, I'm convinced they ran off the older posters deliberately.

I am by no means the only one who complained. EVERYONE ELSE who ever had the same complaints has quit. There is a thread here on the forum that has pages and pages of these legitimate complaints. Find it and read it and then you might understand better.

Now, I understand that TL is a business and deserves to make money. However, there is a difference between "fair" tactics to encourage people to spend money and blatantly "unfair" ones and TL crosses that line.

I have never wanted to take the enormous amounts of time that it would take to support my claims that TL is awful, greedy, and doesn't care about their customers. Believe me, I CAN prove that. It is 100% true. I could prove it beyond any shadow of a doubt, if I had hours and hours and hours to go back through the forum and collect the evidence and write it up. I just don't have that kind of time. You'll have to take my word for it that TL has done some of the most disgusting things they could possibly do to try to make money, stuff that is totally unfair, and that they do not care about their customers one bit. If you think TL cares about you, or your suggestions, think again. They could not possibly care less.

Would never say better!

I'm a long timer player also, playing since the beginning.. And honestly, like you said, TL has been done changes and added things to the game that are impossible to do! The last one that TL has done, at least to me, was with the Pigmy goal, I was collecting the rest of the food taht was enough to complete the goal to get Pigmy in the last couple of minutes but I didn't received the Pigmy! I've sent an email to TL right after this happened and guess what? The problem is still not solved! I've sudmitted the request on May 26! It has been 1 week! I already had problems with other games and the problem was solved in less time.

The constantly changes with the elements behavior in the battles were horrible! The impossible timed goals from the Tournaments where the Flash Tournament has a duration of 32hrs and TL makes the incubation of the animal reward impossible to win and hatch the Tournament without spending gems!

And still there are players that defend TL? Oh god, you are so blind. The time will come to you and show that TL is not what you think. TL needs money to leave? Of course they do, I know that, I know that programmig is hard, but doing a game impossible and only possible if we spent gems? Nop, TL can do better and proof of that is the game Dragon Story that honestly is more fair than this game and both of this games are exactly the game. In DS there are a lot of players that spend money in it and TL doesn't need to make the game impossible and unfair so the players spent money in it. Since FFS is becoming a horrible game it's normal and I understand that the players are starting to leave the game and starting to not spent any more money in this game.

When a game is a piece of cr*p and they continue to do more cr*p, it's normal that the players leave the game and start criticizing it. Zenobia? Oh boy! Zenobia was one of the best players that TL could EVER HAD and what did TL about that? NOTHING, they ignored us, players, they didn't care about our opinions, honestly? The staff from the forum is more helpful and communicative with us than the real TL staff does! A couple of the admins from here are normal players like us, I think, at least is what is seems to be, and Kooky is the one that helps a lot in here! maguar already saw a couple of times helping, and FrozenTurtle also.

Honeslty, if this game was fair like DS is, the long time players had never leaved this game, more players would start to spent money on it and there wasn't so many critics about this game. DS is more possible to finish things than FFS is, and both games have the same mechanism.

[patriziaf]

@ogreve
Well? There are workers, miners, farmers,.. in some places and countries that work more hard than you and I and they don't earn enough to live... (Buy Max Havelaar products and pay fair amounts!). Should I cry for the developers in rich countries?
Requesting 2500 gems (=100 dollars?) for 1 centimetre of coloured points representing an invented animal is a shame. Are you kidding? Creating new animals in an already existing application is not so difficult. It is just duplication. Other types of softwares and applications require real hard work, developers face big problems, with serious consequences. I bought many games for iPhone and computers and played them for months. And then replayed them, and loaned them to friends and I payed only one time, and less than 50 dollars. Do you realise that some people spend 2500 or 5000 dollars for all these virtual animals in Dragon Story, Fantasy Forest,...? Crazy.

[Jennerwein1]

@ogreve
Well? There are workers, miners, farmers,.. in some places and countries that work more hard than you and I and they don't earn enough to live... (Buy Max Havelaar products and pay fair amounts!). Should I cry for the developers in rich countries?
Requesting 2500 gems (=100 dollars?) for 1 centimetre of coloured points representing an invented animal is a shame. Are you kidding? Creating new animals in an already existing application is not so difficult. It is just duplication. Other types of softwares and applications require real hard work, developers face big problems, with serious consequences. I bought many games for iPhone and computers and played them for months. And then replayed them, and loaned them to friends and I payed only one time, and less than 50 dollars. Do you realise that some people spend 2500 or 5000 dollars for all these virtual animals in Dragon Story, Fantasy Forest,...? Crazy.
Thank you!

[Clark_Wayne]

Would never say better!

I'm a long timer player also, playing since the beginning.. And honestly, like you said, TL has been done changes and added things to the game that are impossible to do! The last one that TL has done, at least to me, was with the Pigmy goal, I was collecting the rest of the food taht was enough to complete the goal to get Pigmy in the last couple of minutes but I didn't received the Pigmy! I've sent an email to TL right after this happened and guess what? The problem is still not solved! I've sudmitted the request on May 26! It has been 1 week! I already had problems with other games and the problem was solved in less time.

The constantly changes with the elements behavior in the battles were horrible! The impossible timed goals from the Tournaments where the Flash Tournament has a duration of 32hrs and TL makes the incubation of the animal reward impossible to win and hatch the Tournament without spending gems!

And still there are players that defend TL? Oh god, you are so blind. The time will come to you and show that TL is not what you think. TL needs money to leave? Of course they do, I know that, I know that programmig is hard, but doing a game impossible and only possible if we spent gems? Nop, TL can do better and proof of that is the game Dragon Story that honestly is more fair than this game and both of this games are exactly the game. In DS there are a lot of players that spend money in it and TL doesn't need to make the game impossible and unfair so the players spent money in it. Since FFS is becoming a horrible game it's normal and I understand that the players are starting to leave the game and starting to not spent any more money in this game.

When a game is a piece of cr*p and they continue to do more cr*p, it's normal that the players leave the game and start criticizing it. Zenobia? Oh boy! Zenobia was one of the best players that TL could EVER HAD and what did TL about that? NOTHING, they ignored us, players, they didn't care about our opinions, honestly? The staff from the forum is more helpful and communicative with us than the real TL staff does! A couple of the admins from here are normal players like us, I think, at least is what is seems to be, and Kooky is the one that helps a lot in here! maguar already saw a couple of times helping, and FrozenTurtle also.

Honeslty, if this game was fair like DS is, the long time players had never leaved this game, more players would start to spent money on it and there wasn't so many critics about this game. DS is more possible to finish things than FFS is, and both games have the same mechanism.

Agreed !
I play DS and FFS, and DS players are better treated than in FFS :D
I'm not as frustrated when i'm playing DS ( i enjoy playing DS ! ) as i'm when i'm playing FFS. And i did enjoy when i started FFS, but now...

[ogreve]

Hi all,

Thanks for all the input, it certainly helps to give me a bit more insight in where the grounds of the complaints tend to come from!

My main point with the initial post was (and still is) that to the newer players it comes across as off-putting when each topic about a new animal and/or tournament has so many comments where the "gem spending aspect" is criticised. That is the part where I say: o.k., obviously TL does that to make money of the game, and it is your own choice whether you want to actually spend those gems or not.
Just like mentioned in one of the last posts, I too cannot understand why any individual player would want to spend thousands of Dollars on a single game, for me spending such amounts of money (even if I were in a position to do so) is over the top and it wouldn't make me feel as if I would have achieved anything with the game. Still, it's their own choice. If they can and want to afford spending that much, they can do so. I don't think TL will get the expectation from those extremes that everybody will start spending such amounts.
There are two money making business models that could be aimed for here: getting either few players to spend high amounts of money, or getting many people to spend small amounts. They could both add up to similar totals, but I think generally spoken for things like Lamborghinis etc. the former works better, and for iOS games the latter seems the smarter choice. ;)

I recognise several of the complaints made in this thread from my own experiences with a different game.
Up until some 2 years ago I was really hooked on the game Monster Life. Gameloft had a smart tactic: apart from crystal sales, they would also have weekly animal sales. A major difference is that in Monster Life animals could not be bred, so buying them was the only option. Some of them could only be bought with vast amounts of crystals (the most expensive animal at full cost would set you back 2400 crystals) and until the tournaments were added to that game, you could never earn that amount of crystals in the game, unless you bought them. What Gameloft did though, was to even include that very rarest animal from time to time in a sale with a 90% discount, making that animal only cost 240 crystals at that time. Often of course this followed about a day after a crystal sale would end. I bet you that a LOT of people (me included) several times made use of a crystal sale, for the moment that the animal sale would be coming up, hoping there to be something rare in it at a good price.
That really did get me to spend money several times and then afterwards to still feel good about it, because I had then managed to get an otherwise unobtainable animal at a good price.
What went wrong with Monster Life? I don't know why, but for some reason at the height of the success (and this was not that long after they won a "number 1 game award" for it!) Gameloft seemed to have completely dropped all work on it, whilst they did continue to add new things to e.g. the My Little Pony game (which my daughter at that time also played). So there I was. I had managed to acquire ALL animals in the game (with NO exceptions), I had all of the land expansions, everything was full with top level buildings (not crystal bought ones though), sitting on a pile of over 3000 crystals, that were partially bought with real money and partially earned through very extensive tournament battling and nothing new appeared anymore. Guess what I did after that situation was still like that some two months later. And then, guess what happened to Monster Life? The other day my daughter wanted to install it again from scratch on the iPad and it appears it's not even available anymore in the App Store. Quite to the contrary of FFS the reason that caused me stop playing Monster Life was that there was really nothing more to do, other than senseless money collecting and tournament fighting. There were no more land expansions and no more monsters to be obtained. Even then I hated making the decision to call it a day.

So, even though my point about not liking to see constant complaints about "the gem spending" still stands, I do understand (and recognise) some of the other comments that were made somewhat better now. I agree with you all that customer care is a very important thing: the customers do have the power to make or break companies (as per the "capitalism comments" that were made earlier in this thread, which in Europe are recognisable too ;) ). It would be unwise to not address fair issues of players. Of course they cannot accommodate every thing that is being reported as an "issue", but e.g. the Pigmy example that was made is something to address.

Another thing which is also important for TL to know, is that the long term users are the more likely ones to actually spend gems on content, as long as the amounts are fair and the game stays fun. I mentioned this in my initial post too, and that too has not changed. The above made Monster Life comparison should make clear to TL just WHY it is important to get those advanced players to remain interested too. I first played FFS in August or September 2014, but that was only very occasionally when my 7 year old daughter called in my help. The both of us didn't start to play it extensively until around mid February. Last week the main account reached level 40 and my next upcoming expansion will require 34 realm runes. The amount of actual game play is rapidly decreasing for me too, and that is a thing which I hope is something that TL will actually at some point pay attention to. If they can make some small changes, such that the game remains "playable in a fun way" because significant progress can still be made in reasonable amounts of time for advanced players too, then that will only be so much the better for their business model too.
After all... just how tempted wouldn't I get to buy a gem pack soon if something like a gem or treasure animal goes on sale with e.g. a 75% discount relative to the normal gem amount... I would really like to get them through breeding though, and possibly use gems for occasionally using an ultimate attack when in trouble in a tournament, but I would definitely be very tempted to buy one of them at such a sale, as it would open up a new array of game options for me (particularly a gem animal, of course). As it stands I've had countless fails on trying to breed a unicorn and also on trying to breed a treasure animal. It would be so nice to finally get one, especially through breeding.

Here's some "positive note advice" on how I go about it:
Fortunately there are still quite a few less rare animal gaps to fill for me, and quite a few of those are currently getting filled by the "fails" of my (carefully chosen!) "Conduktor-Planther breeding attempts at getting a Unicorn". Yesterday was good: the 13 hours timer was not yet another Conduktor, but FINALLY the Sea Horse! \O/ YAY! \O/
I previously tried quite a few times for that one and for the Ocean Owl too (which I still don't have). Also, yesterday I got my biggest Gold Lion from level 13 to 14 and it just received it's 3rd feeding to push it to the point where it can evolve to epic level.

In the above I have found a strategy to keep "constructively busy" at useful stuff, without getting frustrated over gem or treasure breeding attempt fails.

My main missions/strategy that will see me well occupied for weeks to come (at times that no particular quest or so is on) can then be summarised as follows:
1-Do 24/7 4-element breeding as much as possible, and whenever possible using combinations that can also result in "reward animals" to be bred. A good example is the Punk Skunk that was released yesterday: I don't want to bother with Pandaffodil-Skyger breeding, but just make sure that my 4-element attempts include the nature and dark elements.
2-Try to make as many as possible of those attempts with at least the water and nature elements involved in it, so the Ocean Owl can result as a "fail" (ahem!) outcome, and so I can also try for the Treasure Toucan.
3-I currently still have the Pigmy and Dread Panda eggs in storage to hatch. I'm waiting for a large gap between an ongoing egg hatching time and a breeding time. I have a 7 hour gap coming up around midnight today, I may put that towards either of them (most likely the Dread Panda), though I would love to see a 45 hour breeding timer appear soon, so I would have plenty of time to hatch both of them, which is what I have been holding them back for...
4-Get as many of my "super rares" up to epic levels, in such a way that I get as many as possible different element combinations at epic level. This, of course, is a strategic move to be better prepared for the tournaments.
5-Get as many land expansions as possible, so I can optimally make use of habitats and animals in them.
6-Do as many as possible "low cost" feeding of lower level animals, such that they make money more quickly, which in turn allows me to gain more money in shorter time, and that allows me to every night plant Nexus Nuts, and wake up to having 4800 food available for point number 4.
7-Towards points 4 and 6: try to plant Power Pears as often as possible during the waking hours. I can often just hook my iPhone up to the computer via the USB cable for power and then just make sure the screen doesn't go black, then pretty much each 3 minutes I plant the Power Pears, lay the phone next to the computer (such that the farms are visible) and when I see the apples appear, collect them and make a new iteration. This is something I can combine in an unobtrusive way with work and when not in the presence of others, of course (as it would then look silly, IMO :P ). At moments that this can't be done that way, I just try to make a different smart harvesting choice, like planting Charm Cherries.

So, though I too am facing the difficulties of slow expansions etc. I decided to base my game play around the above 7 points. This should still see me well occupied for quite a few weeks, especially as other things like tournaments, limited animals, quests, etc. can come between points 1 and 2.

Forests like Zenobia's one are so beautiful, I wished mine were only half as nice. I also now wished I had picked up the game actively back in 2014, so I would have had a chance at the previous tournaments, world events and limited animals. Zenobia also added so many great informative posts here. It's so sad to see the 'bye' text on her forest now. Particularly for her own sake it would have been so much nicer if she could have found a way to not be frustrated over the things that caused her to quit, but well, I'm sure she had her own good reasons for quitting, despite new content being added. Many thanks, and all the praise in the world for having done so well on the game and having been such a role model!

Well, this post has drifted a lot. I do still hope that at least the "gem spending complaints" get aired less in the threads that treat actual game play topics. It's fine of course if they're aired in topics like this one you're reading now, as that one is explicitly about complaints, etc. :)

To conclude on a positive note:
Again, I'd like to thank you all for your opinions and new insights!
I hope everyone, including the long term players, can find some way to still get fun out of the game. Towards that end maybe there is some strategy for you too, similar to the mentioned "7 steps" that I now do. Hopefully that will give some focus and something concrete to work and focus on, with at least some successes and progress as outcome, instead of only having failures as outcomes of breeding attempts...

Cheers,
Olafo

[Jennerwein1]

Olafo, your analysis is very thoughtful and thorough. I have been through most of your suggestions. Planting mainly Nexus nuts, because 1. I cannot log in that often and 2. I have over 150 Mio to spend ( and growing).
This game used to be fun when there was some positive reinforcement, but even Pavlov's dog will stop salivating when the reward is too scarce.
DS and CS are way more fair and enjoyable, so I am willing to spend a reasonable amount of money there.
I will continue to post critical (and positive) remarks, not to be negative, but in the hope that TL will listen and this game will go on and improve. :D

[readysetgo888]

I'm pleased to see there are still many here that will still criticize TL after all....


Are you kidding? Creating new animals in an already existing application is not so difficult. It is just duplication.

Thank you so much for this comment!!! I don't understand how there are some players who don't realize how little work this game truly requires on the part of developers. Recoloring an animal and re-releasing it with a different name probably takes them about 10 minutes. Seriously. And many of the animals, they haven't even bothered to even kind of disguise the fact that all they have done is recolor it! I will never forget the Yule "Mule" that they were too lazy to take the antlers off of when they cloned it from the Reindeer. Seriously, how lazy can they be. And yet they probably earned thousands of dollars off that animal.

Yes, sometimes TL is creative and comes up with more interesting and unique designs for the animals, but the incredibly lazy clone animals that they spend 10 minutes copying and releasing, and then make thousands and thousands of dollars for that particular animal... that does bug me a lot. Yeah, sorry. Of all the companies one could feel sympathy for, this is not it, I promise.

[Jennerwein1]

"Yes, sometimes TL is creative and comes up with more interesting and unique designs for the animals, but the incredibly lazy clone animals that they spend 10 minutes copying and releasing, and then make thousands and thousands of dollars for that particular animal... that does bug me a lot. Yeah, sorry. Of all the companies one could feel sympathy for, this is not it, I promise." Posted by Readysetgo88



At least it makes it less frustrating for me when I don't get the clone. (Cheaper,too) :)

[rjazz]

There's good stuff & bad stuff about the game. On the whole I really like it - here comes the but... but it's getting boring with such long breeding, evolving times. You can have nothing to do for days at a time-just planting & maybe breeding once or twice. I want to be able to do something! And not all at once. I just started on DS and there is much more to do on a daily basis-not just when they are having events.

[55lee55]

Okay, some things written in this thread I agree with and some I don't.

I don't have the time, energy, or desire to go through all of the comments and leave my own. None of my opinions will change the way anyone feels about this subject.

So, let me give you a fact, not an opinion. I am telling the truth, and if you wish you can look at my Forest.

I have been here from the beginning like some of those who have commented here. With the exception of the Shockatoo which I am still trying to breed, I have every animal that has been released. If you don't see one in my forest, it means one of two things. It is either in my storage waiting for me to finish breeding all available animals because it is an animal I won on a tournament so I keep my nest open for breeding until I catch up, or it is evolving.

I have been very lucky with this game and yes, I have spent gems, usually to speed tournaments, but sometimes to speed breeding when an animal is first released. If I don't breed it fairly soon after the release time I usually stop speeding and wait until I my luck kicks in.

What does this prove? Nothing except that every animal that has been released was available at some point because I have it in my forest. Someone, in this instance me, has been able to obtain these animals either by breeding or winning tournaments. I am not the only player who has a full album. These are the facts, from my point of view.

Yes, I have opinions and speculations as to why some people are unable to breed certain animals no matter how hard they try. I believe that some try very hard and still cannot breed the animals they are trying to obtain. I believe this is extremely frustrating to them and discouraging to those who are also trying without success. I have seen many long time players give up and leave. I have observed changes in rules in the middle of the game.

Do I get annoyed when new players complain about all of the complaints? Well, yeah. Can I do anything about any of this? Absoulutely not.

So you can take the fact that I have all of the animals as proof that for me, at some point in time, I was able to obtain them all. I have spent gems. I have had animals that were extremely difficult to breed. Many people have no treasure animals, yet I have two of each, the maximum allowed by the game. I just recently bred my second Golden Retriever which was my fall-back breeding attempt for a long time. It can be done. I can state this because I did it.

But, does my success prove that everyone has the same chance to succeed in this game? We have all seen those who fail time after time. Of course I failed to breed most animals the first try, so I was not a success for most of the animals until I did breed them.

But what about those who don't/can't/couldn't breed them? I will leave that discussion to others. I will say that success in this game, for me personally, seems to be a matter of luck as opposed to a matter of perseverance. No, I haven't given up, but I might give up when I reach a point where I am unable to breed limited animals within the time they are offered and/or I lose tournaments.

We all have reasons why we continue to play any game, and my personal motivation to play FFS is to maintain a full album. I will definitely stay, despite what may appear to me to be a history of unfair rule changes, because I still have a chance to catch up and regain my full album. If that changes I may follow in the footsteps of many old-timers. But I will leave for my own reasons, as everyone who has left has left for theirs.

[ogreve]

Hi,

I did just sent a "friend request" (coming from 'ogreve').
Not that I don't believe you and want to see it as "evidence", but just because I love seeing those maxed out forests with (close to) ALL animals in them! I'm looking forward to seeing yours.
It's also very encouraging to hear that you have managed to breed the ultra rares too, despite being extremely advanced and despite having spent gems from time to time. I too think it's all mere luck and that TL simply uses a common "randomiser strategy" for generating a number, which will then determine what the outcome of the breeding will be. It's possible to implement far further going checks (like the amount of available gems, etc.) and other "seeding" criteria, but I doubt they would do so. They would certainly shoot themselves in the foot if THAT ever came out...

Cheers,
Olafo

[55lee55]

,l
Hi,

I did just sent a "friend request" (coming from 'ogreve').
Not that I don't believe you and want to see it as "evidence", but just because I love seeing those maxed out forests with (close to) ALL animals in them! I'm looking forward to seeing yours.
It's also very encouraging to hear that you have managed to breed the ultra rares too, despite being extremely advanced and despite having spent gems from time to time. I too think it's all mere luck and that TL simply uses a common "randomiser strategy" for generating a number, which will then determine what the outcome of the breeding will be. It's possible to implement far further going checks (like the amount of available gems, etc.) and other "seeding" criteria, but I doubt they would do so. They would certainly shoot themselves in the foot if THAT ever came out...

Cheers,
Olafo

Thanks for coming to look at my Forest. I too like to visit forests which are fully expanded with many animals. I admit is is a rare occurrence in this game.

It's not like they haven't shot themselves in the foot before. I cannot explain why I seem to be able to breed animals that others can't, or conversely, why it seemed to take forever to breed a Plantler well after everyone else was getting them as fails for other breedings. The best hypothesis I can come up with is luck. It is kind of like seeing those people who have won the largest lotteries four or five times, while I have won only twice in about five years of playing two cards a week, for a total of $2. I am lucky in FFS and unlucky in the lottery. I have to admit that I would rather win the Powerball ;-)

[RorJam]

My problem is lots fire/earth, nature/fire and earth/nature. Just don't understand why some are or were limited I feel that limited is a waste it could've been awesome but it was a super rare panda yippee lol. I Still feel we need new permanent elements. Myself personally I'm not a fan of the triple breed thing. Breed this then breed that then breed together, but that's something I have to deal with its not going to go away. Also Why have the Treent if we can't breed it? Just one example. I also feel we should be able to breed treasure to make more treasure. We got the charger battleground but I feel we should have more battlegrounds quarterly. Other than this I've stopped venting to tl. I did stop playing for a spell and tried DS and CS because it doesn't do anything to keep venting my frustrations and I'm not even sure if people agree or agreed with my past frustrations. I went to "greener pastures" which weren't that greener lol. So now I'm back since the last mini tourney at or around the last world event. I kept playing DS through their world event then stopped playing. I don't like gem traps but understand why they're there and the purpose of gem sales. I was a gem buyer and have bred an ultra rare the Ruby razorback that's it for gem but I've bred Retriever and money badger I was not smart and bought toucan should've kept trying but oh well. Honestly I've had up and down breeding I'll go a month with nothing new then I'll get a good string of luck. lately this week it's turned good I've bred lulibison then yesterday bred punk skunk my "new" account isn't as lucky though no ultra rares at all barely get any new animals but then my album on that account isn't as full so I get older animals then once and a while get a pretty new animal like talisama . I just try and keep my mouth shut these days and play or don't play it's easier since I've quit and come back for me to say" do I want this animal or that one, is this tourney one I want to win on both accounts or just this one, and more importantly do I want to buy this gem pack, animal or value pack" I don't feel the pressure anymore so it's more enjoyable than before even when my luck isn't great! Best of luck to all