Why Ryan is wrong, re Versus and new players, IMO (recent tweets) - comments from a recent NOOB

Gears 5
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So we finally have explicit answers about why Gears 5 Versus is the way it is . I am watching Duchy’s video on the subject, where he goes through the back and forth tweets re that

Ryan, here is my perspective , as someone who entered the Gears Multiplayer about 2 years ago, as a COMPLETE NOOB.

I have played PvE in every Gears title; I got into GoW4 multiplayer to play with some people I enjoyed playing Horde with - they sucked me into KOTH. I had NEVER played ANY online multi player before. Ever. Any.

So I am the one you are talking about, about new people coming into the game.

Coop again AI and/or private games filled with bots are AMAZING tools to let new players learn the game mechanics. I spent a lot of time playing those, learning movement, learning the different weapons, leaning the different covers… And then I played ranked…

It was extremely frustrating and off putting to be put into games with much better opponents… It was horrible, to be honest. It made me feel like nothing but cannon fodder…

But there’s the THING: that’s a MATCHMAKING ISSUE!!! It doesn’t matter what changes you make to weapon tunings, it doesn’t matter what new features or weapons you add, there will always be people who will get and be extremely good at the game, and who will absolutely destroy new players with barely any effort!

Your changes only switch the HOW the new players will get destroyed… They might not get killed by wall bounced gnasher shots to the face, they will get killed from a distance, with aim assisted longshots, embars, claws, or active lancers, unable to get out of spawn even… You are not protecting new players - you are simply changing what it takes to become a really good/high ranked player in this game…

There will always be people who are awesome, and people who are new, and as long as your matchmaking keeps putting a Diamond with an Onyx with 2 Silvers and 1 Bronze again a team of 3 Onyx and 2 Golds, those silvers and bronzes will still get demolished, while the Diamond quits in frustration over the clueless team mates … (right, @Krylon_Blue, @mike_yaworski, etc)>?

People where were Diamond 5s in GoW4 can become Masters in G5 - they might have to focus on slightly different elements of the game, they might have to use different weapons, different strategies , but they will still become the best.

The problem is, a LOT of them, DON’T WANT TO, because they don’t like what they would have to do - it’s not what they want from the Gears experience.

But those top slots will be filled… If not by the top GoW4 players, than others, who choose to push through the gag reflex, and perfect what need to be perfected to dominate in G5. And those people will still destroy the new players without any effort.

I truly enjoyed the challenge of GoW4’s Versus. Took me a long time to get it, I got to mid Onyx, and in the end I enjoyed playing against the Onyx and Diamond players who once frustrated and disheartned me, at the start… It gave me a huge sense of satisfaction…

I was sooooooooooo looking forward to trying to get even better in G5.

But in G5, I feel zero such desire. I can see what I would have to work on to get “better” in the game, and I’m like “nah, thanks, I’m good. I’ll play GoW4 KOTH”.

So, what you are doing is basically this:

  1. get rid of the existing fan base, because it’s not big enough
  2. change the combat to focus on very different elements
  3. have a new set of players become the dominating players in versus
  4. new players will get destroyed by the top players, just with different weapons/mechanics/etc.

You cannot make weapons idiot proof so much that a new players can kill an experienced player, outside of a random accident.

So as long as your matchmaking puts beginners again experienced players, the problem you list will exist - you have just pushed away your existing core fan base, for no benefit.

And if you fix your matchmaking to focus on reducing the skill dispersion with the teams, then the standard Gears weapons and strategies and tunings will be just fine - new players won’t get killed by experienced players, AND you will keep your existing fan base.

I know others have very strong feelings about MTX and the Store. I respect that…

Personally, I have no problem playing for custom cosmetic content in a game I enjoy playing. GoW4 was such a game. And I spent a LOT of money on packs…

Gears 5 is NOT. and I’ve spent very little, with no plans to spend any more.

Your changes are basically a bet that you can attract and retain new players to the game, and that those new players will become big enough fans that they will spend enough money in the store to make up for the loss of income from the existing fan base.

GOOD LUCK!

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While I disagree with your overall opinion on Gears 5, you make excellent, well thought out points and I understand where your coming from.

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I got my ■■■■ rocked in Gears 1 and was pretty decent by Gears 2. I enjoyed the challenge as well, but I don’t think he’s wrong about “If players don’t get 6 kills” thing. I’ve tried plenty of multiplayer shooters in which I tried it once, did bad, and quit.

For some reason, I stuck with Gears. Not sure why.

I still think if they wanted to noobify the game, they should have better marketed Arcade Tuning to get new players involved and and then have Ranked and Quickplay be the same old Gears experience we’re used to. And I personally think ALL ranked games shouldn’t have aim assist turned on. They can still turn this around and I think they’re showing some promise in regards to weapon tuning, but it’s frustrating that they don’t seem to be listening to us about not wanting so much aim assist and not removing these movement input delays. Get rid of those two things and I think most people will be pleased.

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Be careful man.Since he came on the forums, the fanboys have been out in full force thanking him for making a few posts. Be warned.

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that’s ok, it’s good to hear all opinions, I don’t think it’s useful to have only 1 side represented.

So they talked about other games, right?

I tried a NUMBER of other shooters…

PubG, Apex, Ghost Recon, CoD, etc…

My experience has been pretty consistent - I die, instantly, and I have no idea from where, from whom, or by what weapon… I just poke my head out, or I’m walking, and boom, I’m dead…

So any idea that other games are somehow noob friendly is pure BS…

When i was being destroyed in GoW4, at least I SAW what was happening! I saw the other player move so well and smoothly around me, I saw them slide out of the way of my feebly attempts to shoot back, I saw them roll away after taking a shot, etc… So I knew what was possible, what could be done, and I had to learn how to counter that, or how to mimic that. And the game had built in modes (like coop or private) which allowed me to practice DOING those…

With the other shooters, it was really a constant case of “what TF just happened?” THAT was a HUGE turnoff to me… Plus the fact that I constantly kept hitting A to slide to the cover in front of me and nothing was happening, hahahah!!

it really feels like TC/Rod/Ryan are trying to do the Moneyball thing ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moneyball_(film) ) : what Billy Beane did to baseball, with focusing on JUST the stats and nothing else, they are trying with a video game… But they aren’t doing the same thing - it’s like Billy Beane looked at his stats and decided : we need to make the bat longer, we need to increase the size of the ball more, we need to add another base to the game, we need to make outfielders wear lead shoes, and make everyone’s gloves 50% smaller… Then the beginners will get more home runs, and will stay playing the game longer…

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Yep laughable…just go back to work…and fix the game perhaps🤔

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There is nothing wrong with being nice to someone. I think Gears 5 is horrid and I will shelf this game as soon as I get the general achievement. Its a shame because I love gears but this inconsistent excuse of trash that is called multiplayer gives me no reason to play after this. With that said, if Ryan was here I’d be cordial. There is nothing wrong with that.

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Pretty sure I can agree 100% with everything you said. Love the baseball analogy too.

I was a newcomer in Jan 2018 also except I hadn’t played anything at all before that. Playing a video game at all was new to me. It was a week or two before I stopped shooting the ground in 1v1s. I mean I was bad.

I got obliterated by bronze players. I have clips of that happening. I look back sometimes and laugh.

By the end I was high onyx 3 mostly playing solo.

One thing I didn’t do was blame the game. I just tried to get better. And it was months before I could even compete with gold players. Everything was my fault when I played bad. I didn’t want or ask for things to be easy. I wanted to do what was done to me. So I had to watch other people play. I had to look up tutorials. Because the game never mentioned any of them. When I knew there was going to be a boot camp in G5, I thought “finally!” They’ll teach people how to play. But they didn’t. And I shouldn’t be surprised.

It’s sad what they tried to do with the game. Very sad. I’m not motivated to go up the ranks anymore. Wins and MVPs are nice but theyre not nearly as fulfilling as they were in GOW4. They don’t feel earned. Losses, likewise, are just…meh.

Only hope is they can make some aggressive changes. I don’t think they should just sit in the middle and try to cater to everyone. Being a jack of all trades isn’t gears. Gears should be a master at one and that is fast paced cqc cover based shooting.

Rather than dumbing down the game I really think they should just embrace some of the “exploits” that separate the veterans from the casuals and actually put them in their boot camp. Or maybe have an “advanced versus boot camp”. The fact that I had to go to YouTube to figure these things out shows there’s a disconnect somewhere and it seems quite deliberate and I’m not convinced it needs to be there.

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Great post. What are your thoughts on this @N0DEZER0 ?

The total skill points matchmaking doesn’t work well in reality.

The bronze and silver players you put with the two masters on a team are just going to be cannon fodder for the two masters on the other team. For example.

It really should be matching players within the same rank tier.

If you have to include a tier below and a tier above to make it work, fine. Bronze will face bronze or silvers, silvers face bronze, silver or golds etc.

It’s much better than having a few high ranking players in a match against bronze or silvers.

Those are my thoughts. I think we should see how the remaining matchmaking fixes and rank changes affect things though.

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I don’t see the issue with people thanking him for answering a few queries…

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Overall an excellent comment but this bit right here is the crux of it.

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Yep, there is very little to do in Gears 5 in terms of this. The game doesn’t make me want to grind. I can hop on casually and compete vs anyone - masters, pros, whoever!

Sure, I’ll give myself a bit of credit for been a veteran of the game who studies the game, but I shouldn’t be able to just hop on and play. That has never been Gears!

yes, how can people not understand this?

It’s beyond frustrating and infuriating.

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It really doesn’t matter what rank you are. I’ve played dozens of games from different genres and regardless if you’re high or low you’ll still end up in matches where it’s like as if you’re all in grand finals competing for thousands of dollars.
You get multiple issues in team based games that will never be resolved like random players that can hold their own but will perpetually be kept under ranked from where they belong because of their less skilled teammates.

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Ok with most of the forums bad mouthing the game, he comes here, makes a few posts and those same people who bad mouthed him now praise him and mind you, the game still has tons of issues. Ok

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Still don’t see the issue.

And personally, I haven’t seen those same people bad mouthing him specifically asking questions and thanking him for answering, including myself. I bad mouth the game, sure, bad mouth the studio in general too, ok, but never the individuals.( Except maybe Rod and his fruity cocktails).

And yep, the game still has issues. That doesn’t mean we can’t be civil when the dude’s just trying to be more active in the forums. Something a lot of us has been asking for from TC for awhile now…

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Couldn’t agree more.

It doesn’t mena TC gets a pass for all of the issues, but people appreciate communication.

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You guys are ignoring the context that this happened in g4 as well. That to the game that 5 v 5 the op set up balances out rank wise.

You also have to consider people making alt accounts as well gaming the system. Which you will always have. The game has issues that they are addressing. Will they fix them? Who knows. But like with every other gears game you have to adjust your gameplay to the new system. Takes me a week to figure out the movement and such with a new game.

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I mean you did just contradict yourself but duly noted my friend.

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Little communication. Don’t worry, it’ll probably come to a stop soon enough.

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I don’t see why. You’ve been so friendly and appreciative of him taking the time to interact directly with the community.