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Two months ago, we asked you all for your experiences with social features in games: how you’ve used those features to interact with other players, which features provided you the best experience, and how those features could translate into an RTS game. Now we’d like to share some of the highlights of that thread and our own perspective on many of the topics discussed.
In our original post, we touched on the prevalence of third party platforms, like Discord, Reddit, Twitch, and YouTube, that have enabled communities across gaming titles. As /u/RoxasofXIII pointed out, the developers of these tools are exclusively focused on refining and improving them, so they tend to be streamlined and efficient in their ability to connect people. Despite this, we think it's important to enable players to establish connections and friendships inside the game as well—even if they eventually take that relationship to a third party tool. We also think that we can make it easier for players to find some of these external communities. The means by which we facilitate this, whether it be through customizable player profiles, direct links to specific communities embedded in the client, or a forum that lets groups solicit new members, remains to be determined.
Those of you that played on the Battle.net of old will remember logging in and being placed by default into large chat channels based on region and language. /u/_Spartak_ touched on this in his post, and we agree with his note that chat rooms should not fragment the community. Instead, chat rooms should provide an extremely easy and intuitive way to bring together groups of players who want to communicate with each other. RTS games of the modern era can feel lonely at times, and making it easy for players to quickly see and chat with others is one way to mitigate this.
Many of you shared fond memories of your experiences participating in clans, especially in Warcraft III and StarCraft I. /u/Deathly_God01 and /u/SorteKanin shared interesting perspectives on the place of clans in RTS in general, and specific aspects of clans that are important to keep in mind. We agree that clans should not be designed exclusively for competitive players. Some of the largest clans in StarCraft I and Warcraft 3 were dedicated to custom maps and those that enjoyed them. One of our main goals is to onboard new RTS players, and clans oriented towards casual players looking to improve would certainly help. Some of you also discussed clan-oriented rewards such as avatars or skins to incentivize players to collectively climb the ladder. We think that these incentives, along with potentially streamlining the way in which clans organize competitions amongst themselves and with other clans, are features of a greater clan ecosystem that merit further exploration.
Social features go beyond these obvious chat-based systems, however, and we will be looking at ways to make post-match features both robust and easy to use. Many responses to our original discussion thread (/u/psValki’s in particular) highlighted the importance of a strong replay system, and emphasized that one which is collaborative, offering the ability to watch replays together or share them easily, not only helps build community but also helps teach players the game. /u/Dance_SC brought up several interesting ideas, including voting on publicly available replays to increase their visibility to the community. In addition, we will also be investigating ways to make a player’s match history informative and useful so that players with a positive match experience can more easily connect post-game. We recognize that in many modern games, the opportunity to connect with a player is largely lost after the match ends or shortly thereafter, and this is something that a thorough match history could help mitigate.
Some of you indicated that when you play RTS, you don’t actively seek to engage socially with other players, but do rely on non-verbal and non-text-based communication methods, such as pings. We agree with /u/barrettb77 that a comprehensive ping system is important, especially for players that fall into this bucket. This feature is critical to rapid communication within the dynamic and fast-paced environment of an RTS, and sometimes it is all you need to communicate with teammates during a match. We also plan to look into the best ways to allow players to disable social features, for those who prefer a more solitary gaming experience.
With all of that said, social features are something we will prioritize going forward as we look to increase the accessibility of the RTS genre. We think that having a strong community both inside and outside the game is critical to its longevity, and we will be considering many of the ideas highlighted by you as we develop these features.
Thank you all for your ideas and perspectives. We read all of the comments on these discussion posts and we hope you will continue to participate in them! This fall season we wish you a happy and fruitful harvest, whether that be pumpkins or minerals. Stay tuned for the next discussion: Competitive Map Design.
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