Hi there.
First of all, i want to thank Panzar Studios and Troxit Services Ltd. for the work provided to Panzar. Even with criticism, you keep working hard because you care about your Baby.
So, the title says everything, my suggestion is to make a big overhaul. Lemme explain:
I've been here since exactly 2 years (Happy B'Day to my Char
) And i've been following the progression of the game from the EU release until patch 37. I also did some digging to find the informations you provided since 2008.
Panzar is a great game, i think no one could argue about this fact. On the paper, it's a real diamond.
- Cry Engine 3 Graphic Engine,
- Plenty Of Maps,
- Ultra-dynamic gameplay,
- Clear Interface, In-Game and in Lobby
- Open from casuals to Hardcore Gamers,
- Teamplay in the front line,
- Open to competitive Gameplays [including strategies, specific builds, communication, visibility]
- Accessible community communication
- And a few other things which make this game doesn't look like another
Panzar Studios has done a great developpement job and the game attracted people....Yes,
BUT:
While getting deeper in the game, there is bugs....A lot of it, which, as i heard, are mainly caused by the Graphic engine (Which causes some physics and ragdoll troubles.), but not only.
Recently, with the New Patch (New Dawn, patch 37 out May 17th), It has gone crazy, but hey... Let's just say you didn't except a high step and the foot went in.
The Cash shop is not clear, and could appear as expansive. I personally disagree with this fact,
considering the legal and economic duress of the UE market. but that is something else.The major problem Panzar encountered from DAY-1 when the game was distributed in EU and abroad:
MARKETING AND COMMUNICATIONThe name of Panzar has been heard the first time in mid-2008, with a set of artworks and an argument which was pretty ambitious:
"Forged Of Chaos: A MMORPG With Crysis Engine" Pretty ambitious and seductive considering the success of Far Cry and Crysis.
Then, nothing for about 10 months..... It was a huge gap until you present the first set of Images, from a technical Demo... But the point of the game wasn't even clear for anyone.
And then, Nothing....For 4 years....Nothing in Europe...No news, no promotion, a Facebook page which is empty of informations until the European Release; but it was already too late.Some "Hardcores" must have looked toward the Russian website to gather a bit of intel about the game, how it works... but the based audience was totally in the Dark.
The team who was based in Dublin did their best to lift this potential Titan with their little arms, but how can you do this when After such a blackout, the little pieces of communication and marketing which can get through some League of Legends, DoTA, Smite and all the Triple A games massive communication feeds, almost daily.
Now that the communication "Error" has been scratched (talking about a 7 years overall communication, even if we've seen almost nothing in EU, is a real pain.), let's talk about the other pieces:
- Developpement schedule issues (I remembered having waited 5 months from the announcement of patch 30 until his application. And waiting even longer to see the holy lvl 30 [It was our Grail, at this time.]
- Catastrophic EU Community management since the Dublin's office closed. (I don't blame Queen Bee or White Wolf, but the fact that they were ALONE...)
- An Off-Game ageing communication (A simple PHPBB Forum and an empty website )
- A Lack of game optimization (When you see some players with graphics incompatibility (Especially Sli and Crossfire users) and/or framerates loss from an exclusive NVidia parcel of optimization
- A lot of other little things which i'm sure, Russian and European community already talked about
I'm not a marketing professional, a game designer, a developper, or anything like that, this is a sufficient argument to discredit me; but those problems are too visible and are, i think, the main cause of the lack of population, credibility and The studio's account in the Red (For this one, i dunno, but it's unfortunately a credible supposition.)
That's why an overhaul of the game would be, for me, an idea which would be very appreciated, in order to bring back "lost fans", bring a whole new population, and to finally give this game the credit it deserves !
Of course, the famous question "How?", I'm not experienced enough to give a good answer, but the 2 leads in my mind are: COMMUNICATION/MARKETING.
You'll have to review your communication campaign through Europe, with a constant feed with parcels of USEFUL informations (Patch notes, events, etc, which you'll have to send to a big number of websites in order to be seen (Trumendous work indeed.).
You'll also have to look again for sponsors, in order to promote the competitive involvement of the game, (which i'm sure, is even a bigger work than the constant feed.) and prove them your efficiency over time.
Finally, you'll have to, unfortunately, put some clothes to your ice which and your SoF, in order to enlarge the targeted audience (Seeing their "juicy" butts for the first 10 levels isn't a gift.
)
(And a review of the source code, in order to correct the reccurrent bugs, to provide the best experience possible for players AND to let you work on your patches without reconsidering any potential old-file conflicts when you out the new ones out.)
Now, I don't know if this thread will ever be read, or reach the Panzar Studios Big Boss, but i've tried my best to put my little stone to repair this Giant.
Regards.
PS: I'm far from a perfect English Speaker/Writer, my apologies every syntax faults I eventually made.