RIP General

[SoulRevenge]

I don't have a tendacy to post these sort of things, nevertheless even try to appear to agree with these sorts of things, but this? Taking away a chat, basically allowing a 3D-CHAT GAME to collapse upon it's self a bit, is what I could title the 'last straw' for several users.

Raz, you might of listed a few reasons for why this chat had been taken down, you might've listed a few advantages as well, but quite frankly, it won't cover up the terribly disadvantages. As many have mentioned before, it is pratically impossible to advertise for a roleplay now. In-fact, a low of people seemed to have joined a few on 'happy accident'. They were there, not looking for a roleplay, but then something caught their eye, and they were interested and joined. You might say this might improve 'socializing' in the game, but that's what I might as well just title as a 'lie'. This game, quite-frankly, isn't something where you'd most likely go around and chat with other users UNLESS you're in a chat such as general. That chat might as well of been the most important thing in FeralHeart, because it permitted communication, it didn't prevent it. And as far as the 'trouble makers' go? Those are normal, and you can't have a good community without them, quite honestly. By shutting General out, you have removed yet another pillar that holds this game up- perhaps two or three, actually. You don't have any idea on how much issues that this action has caused within the COMMUNITY. It might not be a big deal for you staff-members, and I do not mean to sound rude or selfish or whatever, but you don't TALK to the community anymore. We've been abandoned, really. And even those trolly things, what we would've considered as 'annoying' earlier, we miss it. We damn-well miss it, because that missing is like a part of us, as annoying as it might've been, ripped away.

Another thing, though. . as others might've have mentioned, of whom have you discussed this with? Did you ever think that, perhaps the community would be better at deciding what would be the best choice for this action? Evidently not, because you have lacked communication of any sort with us for quite some time. Yes, sometimes we don't care about little 'updates' or whatever, but sometimes simply the knowledge that something HAS been posted is sometimes sort of just 'reassuring'. We know that you're here, and we know that you're not going to pull any crap with us without our knowledge of it. Now, I realise that you're staff-members and all, and this is not directed towards all of you, no, not at all- but you can't let power go to your brain. You're like a king passing a law of some sort, I don't know- commending another citizen to death. If you ignore the other citizen's pleas, then they'll eventually revolt. I wouldn't call all these replies 'revolts', but a lot of people are dissapointed in this, and some are even considering (if they have not yet already) leaving.

Over-all, though, if you want to fix FeralHeart up, if you want to 'fix this community up', we don't have to be more socialable towards eachother. It's you lot that have to talk more to US. We want an input sometimes, and you don't ever neccesarily have to listen to us, but it's good to have our words out there, you know?

[starthewolf445]

Honestly I am extremely disappointed in the shut down of General.Yes people did cause trouble on it.And yes people did spam.But General was also the center of advertisement.All of my groups including mine are loosing the opportunity to recruit active and literate members.Not only that but using movie as a backup for recruitment simply does not work for some.People look for interesting groups with a well thought plot and background and maybe even a website or any extra information.
Movie does not have the space required to plan that all in.Perhaps if you spruced up movie a bit with the ability to add screenshots,more text,or multiple frames to add in more film I would be fine with either of these options or at least you could allow General to be on at certain times.
Plus there's a General group stirring up trouble.Not that I blame them for their efforts I find it very sweet that they care for the chat that much.But soon there will be more and more bring back General groups and you could only imagine what future events that could stir for the other players.

[YouheiSunohara24]

I also agree with most people here... Especially WhiteLightHeart and Raskolnikov, and the other people who gave the reasons why this was a bad idea... It just isn't fair to the members. Sure, some people trolled and acted up. But why should you have to punish the ENTIRE community for something a select few people did? Why punish the people who have done nothing wrong? With General gone, I just really don't want to play FH anymore. It's just... boring, now. I can't chat with people. And I'm also like the 'shy' type. I don't like going up to random strangers and chatting... most of my friends, I found from General. It's just not fair to take this away... it really isn't.

[SpringLeaf]

I have one more thing to say. Please excuse my rudeness, but I must say this. I think the most experienced, active, and helpful members, not the staff should have decided to taken general away. This was in the shadows for a while, and I, personally, think that the community of FH users should have taken a vote, a poll, anything of the sort. I'm not afraid to advertise rp in Local. I am not afraid to whisper people of my animal to join the rp. I am willing to get off my lazy wolf bum and find members.

[Tension]

i think cloudfish said it best for me.

the lack of interaction is what really bothers me, i feel like it's as if the staff really don't care any more. i understand that it can be because of an occupied schedule or agenda or w/e but this is a community that requires moderation and attention and it isn't something you can just ignore. that's why you staff are here, to keep us under control. with removing general, it makes it seem like you were tired of trying to control the chaos - which even really wasn't that bad to start with - whether you like to think of it that way or not. it's the truth, it's what it seems like, even though i can imagine that wasn't the real reason. if you want to suppress the trouble-makers, you tell them to stop. that red chat is what gave the intimidation and moderation necessary to keep things under control.

all i really want right now is to see the staff involved in the community more. it's disappointing that, like cloud said, there hasn't been one of those monthly news posts.

regardless, i'm not entirely flustered over it like some people are, but it does bother me because it was a forced change. i'm simply willing to see how things turn out and i already know there are ways to advertise for roleplays, so i'm not complaining about that.

[Raxoremys]

Right. My last post was a bit of a heat-of-the-moment rage, so I'd like to come back now and perhaps articulate my opinion a bit better. I know, everything I'm going to say here has probably been said by fifteen different people already and at least half will have said it better. But I'll be damned if I'm not chucking my two cents in.


I can see why some people may have felt the need to get rid of General: trolls, spammers, inappropriate conversations and the like certainly were a bit of a problem. But you know what? That's why the mods are there. To keep unruly players in check with that all-commanding red text and sparingly given words of warning when the occasion required it. I can't help but wonder if this was partly a way to avoid hard work, pretty much the only in-game work that was ever necessary. Also, reporting was definitely an option if no mods stepped in, which I've gladly done on more occasions than I can count. The trolls, spammers, and inappropriate conversations haven't gone away, not at all. Only now they're in less public chats where they can't always be seen by the right people and shut down. To me, that seems like creating a problem rather than solving it.

In terms of advertising: it's just...it can't be done properly. General gave RP leaders a place to state some info about their group, and invite in anyone who chose to read the chat. But with Local ads and movies, advertising has become a primitive and somewhat clumsy activity, a rather painful one to watch and even worse to try and participate in. About a week ago I created a group, whipped up a nice little map and got everything set up. I was so excited to go and grab some members and make some new friends, when suddenly this happened. The character I use to lead the group is one of my current favourites so I often go on him anyway, but it just ends up saddening me when every now and then I think "Oh, I should advertise for some members!- oh wait...I can't. Goodbye group".
The kind of long, descriptive ads that once graced General seem useless and out of place in Local. You spend all that time typing out a concise, informative ad and then it only gets seen by seven people. Movies are worse by far however, with their extremely limited text space and tendency not to work for so many players.

Life on FH now: whenever I log on, I feel like I've entered a ghost town or some quarantined city with no means of communication to the outside world. There's this giant, oppressive emptiness that just takes all the life from the game. Yeah, so it forces people to go and look for each other, but why was that necessary? What was wrong with sitting comfortably in a nice spot and participating in a good old bit of General chat? I, like many others on here, was one of those people who didn't enjoy the crowded spots where all you could see was nametag after nametag. I loved nothing better than finding a quiet spot to watch the sky or spectate a random RP while I had a good time on General. Now that's gone, because apparently there was something wrong with staying in one spot that you enjoyed.

And most importantly, about the execution of this change: I didn't hear a peep about this until I wandered confusedly into the forum, and found this topic after an eerily quiet day in Fluorite. There was no little notice on the login screen, no "monthly update" forum topic as it has been mentioned by other people here, no warning whatsoever. I wouldn't be half as frustrated as I am if you had told us what was happening before it happened. Heck, would it be so hard to put up a poll and ask us our opinions before you go wrenching out such an important part of the game? Lots of people have said it before, and I'm going to back them up. This game has really lost its sense of community in the recent past, and this didn't help that one bit. You say that other people's opinions were asked, but who? Were they players who loved General and used it every day, or were they mods who looked at the green chat and saw nothing but a mild inconvenience to be swept under the carpet? I really don't understand what possible reason you could have come up with to justify ripping away one of the best parts of the game. Now advertising is awkward as hell to say the least, and I feel completely alienated from everyone in-game as no doubt others do too.

I suggest that either General should be brought back immediately, or a poll should be placed somewhere very obvious on the forum for every player to give their view and the situation be taken from there. Not that my thoughts matter though. Or any player's. Oh, of course not. Because it's not like anyone who hated General that much couldn't oh, I dunno, mute it.
But nevermind that, I'm going to stop now before I start really digging into some people.

~Ax

[SacuraShadow]

From a view of an advanced mmorpg player I must say this was a bad decision. People have a hard time recruiting. Have a hard time talking with everyone else. I use to look at general just to see whats up. There hasn't been any online games that I've been to that didn't have a world/general chat. This should have been up to the players because we the players have been using them. As for trolls or unwanted things said there's easy fixes, ask them to stop,block them, tell a mod/admin,have a report button on players or if there's no staff on...maybe hire more. I also haven't seen a game where everyone was civil. I think it should be back and for future references ask your players before removing something big from your game.

[Redlinelies]

Sometimes I honestly wish there was a way to stamp my personal feelings and opinions regarding this matter for people just to download like a pdf file or app for your phone, including everything I could ever say about certain matters.

All I can say for now, is that many people are really looking the wrong direction regarding this matter, and always have been when it comes to this very community and game. I can feel how it's more about putting the blame somewhere instead of finding ways for things to work that is actually an option... Something that the staff and even some of the members have done since square one in this place.

I will say, I wish there was an easier way.

An easier way to make things happen, give the game the future it should've had long ago, make players pleased. I wish for it to happen now, just as I did a year back, and a year before that. But we have been left with what we got for grabs, and that's what we have been working with, trying not to complain too much when the insults go flying or people say "what a bad community/game this is".

You are after the wrong thing guys.. And please, take these upcoming sentence with care.

I myself, both personally as a player of any game, and a staff for FeralHeart, rather have a working game that gives new windows and chances for improvements, rather than an extra chat that the game can get along without just fine, being a magnet for issues more than the player can see.

I have read through most of the replies here, many of which easily paints up the picture of the staff being nothing but tools, something taken for granted to exist, and efforts to actually make things better go unnoticed daily, and this is me holding back. I know that there would be a completely different picture if the staff sat around and boasted about what they were, flashed new update content all day long, and showed a game that had progress. But what is seen now is level headed people just taking care of the game and the players within, dealing with your trolls and being the "mean mother" telling users not to do certain things if it's considered bad. Many members of this community expect so much, to be treated with everything on a silver plate, and as soon as something isn't met with the absolute professional response, or maybe even something not going their way, it doesn't matter what has been happening or who's behind the other screen. Someone must listen to it anyway and I believe you can figure who. Question is though, do you believe staff and mods seek out the players after they got their mouthful? They swallow and keep on moving, because many of the times the game goes before their own wellness.

The game lost one of it's chats for the time being, in a change that was asked for an open mind and some time, in a post here to inform and let users post. And even this, just the post, gets rumbled over about how the post itself is wrong... How far must things go before this can be seen and understood. I just hope this post can get at least some to understanding that there's probably a lot that could be taken into consideration, especially more than the chatting and advertising choices being narrowed down with this change. FeralHeart just twitched after a long slumber without any changes at all, and even though I can understand people being unhappy to a certain extent, this is not a life changer, FH would still be here up and online, and people like Razmirz himself would still host the very game server we play on, and this very forum we discuss on still. But in this case, trying something new is not a disaster.

[Cherryvell]

I am really sad to see the general chat go.It's nice to seethe other floofs talking there,and by talking I mean appropiate things,not what the trolls use to say.Now,it'll be a pain to click all the movies for finding a decent roleplay,the chat will be full of them.And for those advertising in local,it's not a good idea.If I wish to talk to two or more persons,we either have to go on a less crowded area so we can see what we type with all those RP advertising and mate begging,or create a temporary group and talk in group chat,which,my opinion,its not right.Those who didn't respected general chat rules were supposed to be reported to the staff and receive their punishment.But,cheer up,who knows,maybe general will come back,it has to.Local won't be able to maintain evrything under control.

[MagicCarpet]