darkSpyro

Let me start with the good:

• First, a compliment. For me you have achieved something no other mobile game has achieved - I've spent money more than once, and probably more than I would have paid up front if the game were offered for a flat fee with no upgrades. The additional compliment is that this game absolutely does not require money in order to be successful at it. Good job.
  
• Additionally, I'm humbled that you take the time to read AND particpate in a fan forum not of Activision's/VV's making. It'd be great if you could particpate more, but then we might not get feature updates as much as we do. And the response to the cloud saving issue and chompy pod confusion is great - we don't all have to like it, but you turned around a quick fix/update (I'm assuming fix, I fortunately did not experience any of the severe issues reported).
  
• I like the kudos so far (except I agree with other statements about it being a bad name). I don't mind a fourth currency to manage if the rewards are good and it remains unique. The party invitations were worthless, and the small chance of gems wasn't worth the time to me.
  

I could descibe more things I like about the game play, but I'll sum it up with it's a great game.


Now for the bad and the ugly:

1. The social system still needs work. A few things:
   

- I think players with existing friends before the kudos update should be retroactively awarded kudos. Not doing so makes me feel like a TV service customer (at least in the US) - I see/receive ads for great prices for new customer signups, but there's no loyalty rewards to existing customers - so once the contract is up, you jump to another provider for one of their deals. Contract expires, repeat process.
- The ratio of kudos received for new friends, gifts, and visits is backwards. If you were really trying to drive social, the biggest reward would be from visiting, second biggest from gifts, and least from adding friends. With the current setup, I put very little emphasis on visiting, because the reward/time ratio sucks. It'd also be very easy to milk this economy by continually creating fake activate accounts (using new free email accounts), adding a friend, deleting friend, and repeating. That takes between 5-10 minutes to get 50 kudos, which putting the same time into visiting would earn ~20 kudos.
- Social stats - Bring back social stats. It's fun to see. It adds a little competition (I never could catch back up to Woz after he got ahead of me).
- Sorting. User-defined sorting would be great. If that's not in the cards, at least setting a consistent sort order of friends would be great - either alphabetically, or by order added as friend. I understand that when gifts/visits are available, you want to show those at the top, but the rest of the list after that could be sorted.
- Fix the loss of kudos when an error is received visiting a kingdom. Currently, the moment you tap on name/icon to visit their kingdom, that person's kingdom is somehow marked as 'visited'. If that kingdom fails to load, we're unable to visit it again until the 22 hour period is over. Makes farming new accounts for kudos more attractive.
- Speed of loading. S-L-O-W. I haven't tried to discover, but where is the time spent? Is a savefile delivered to the device then loaded, or is it more service-call based to retrieve bits of data in small chunks, or something else? If a savefile is delivered, can they be loaded in the background while the game is being played (for example, build an on-device cache that updates like once an hour based on friends kingdoms that have yet to be visited).
- Possible bug? When I go from my kingdom into the social menu and then tap to visit a friends kingdom, my game saves to the cloud, then very briefly the kudos value is updated to a significantly larger number before loading the friends kingdom(for example, I was in the 1600s range, and it would flash to something between 2000 and 2050). The interesting thing is that each time I went to repeat this (after collected a few kudos from another kingdom), the number that flashed was higher by 3 or 4 consistently. So this number seems to be clearly related to the value of kudos I have/collected (Maybe it's the kudos I should have based on unawarded pre-update friends).


2. The chompy pod change was the wrong direction. You're encouraging players not to use the sidekicks for adventures or sanctuaries to keep one available for pods, or to play the game less (as in set up houses/adventures and stop playing for 6 hours).
   
3. More land is needed. My used islands are packed tight because to have all the buildings I have (all non-gem bought community buildings, all sanctuaries, shrines, special awards), it requires that much space. I have no room for decorations. And you keep adding more buildings.
   

Qanai, you're level 40. Any building that doesn't generate gold is now useless to you since experience is now worthless. Simply tuck them away into the inventory and bring them out if and when you get quests requiring them, or until they next raise the level cap. Then you'll have all the free land you want.

I acknowledge that increasing the inventory space means spending a few gems. Devs note - there's NEVER been a sale on inventory space.

Thank, Qanai, for your thoughts. They are interesting to think about, and I hope that the devs do consider it. However, I might have to disagree with a few things, at least from a dev pov.

For one, developers usually try to develop the social system with rewards to add people to it. So having a bigger reward for adding friends makes people get more friends. From a game playing pov, it does seem backwards, especially with the slow load times to go from kingdom to kingdom, but the devs don't usually care about how many visits you make but how many people you can add to the game. I would say most of the people who play the game aren't on these forums (though the majority of the serious players probably are), so they aren't just adding people from the forums. They have to try to get other people to play the game in order to get friends, which is why they added facebook interaction. They even added an "ask for kudos" option to post to facebook. I'm not sure how well that will work since it's not available to play on facebook, though. I would rather them up the rewards for visiting or make it easier. I have gotten a few gems, though, (the first day I seemed to get more than I used to, but that could have been a fluke).

As for the chompies, that's another dev vs. gamer argument. Of course it's easier if the chompy pods stayed after going inactive, but that takes away the challenge. I was actually bored with the chompies and saw no point in them. I usually let them collect, waiting for a quest or something, but I was getting tired of looking at them. They didn't seem to offer much, and the amount of energy the chompies gave out were almost pointless. The initial concept was to encourage the use of sidekicks by making them faster to clear and giving a slight gold boost from the inactive ones. But with the implementation of Cape Girl, the time doesn't matter and, to me, the gold benefits weren't that significant with the extra energy used. It needed to change to encourage using sidekicks. Now there is a challenge as you have to decide whether you want to use your sidekicks on adventures or keep them available for chompy pods. That makes it more interesting and is really the point of any game. A lot of the game is about gambling challenges. Do you send all your Skylanders of a certain element away or do you keep one around for elemental totems? It's the same difference. If you only have one or maybe even two Sidekicks, that makes it even more challenging (especially as you try to level them up and do their quests, including the 22 hour one). But that's part of the challenging decision making you have to make. Is it worth losing the chompy pods for the rewards of sending them away? If you have a few, like a lot of us do, then you really don't have that issue. And if you don't, then that encourages either spending the gems or playing more to try and win them with spins. And I wouldn't even worry about the bonuses a sidekick gives. It is 25%, but so are giants and alter egos, and with #1 fans and Gigantus, that makes other Skylanders even better or equal. I'm not that concerned about having, at least, one sidekick free (especially after I've maxed out their level) because I have enough giants and alter egos to make up for it. It definitely isn't encouraging people to play less. The chompy pods are no different than the elemental totems, to me. Another thing is that they have boosted the rewards for chompy pods. So far I seem to get more gems on occasion and chests. I have had more give gems and/or chests than not. And with Capyara King, that means even more gems. I've gotten 20 gems just in the past day, and that's mostly from chompy pods and chests (granted 2 of the chests were gold chests, so that gave me 8 of them, right there, with Capyara King)

One more thing, though...if the devs are reading this. We really need some clarification on the Thumpback house issue. Why were some people seeing it and getting the free house, and others seeing the offer and it still costing 350 gems, and even others not seeing the offer at all? Was it meant to be in the update? I would ask if it was meant to be a limited time, but I'm pretty sure people were reporting it was until the 29th. I know this isn't necessarily a bug that's causing problems with the gameplay and isn't priority, but it has caused a lot of confusion and bitterness. Plus if everyone was getting the same update, it seems to be an issue why people were seeing it differently (or at all) and why some who got the "free" offer still cost them 350 gems. That seems to be issues that could cause problems later on. Even if there is no solution, an answer or some sort of information would be nice.

Prior to the dev message about the change, I used my sidekicks in sanctuaries for their 25% gold bonus.

Since the change, I kept one free. I get 1500 gold using a sidekick to clear the a pod.

I've had 1 pod spawn so I earned 1500 gold. I've lost a 25% boost to a sanctuary payout (~5k gold) twice already (so 10k gold) in order to earn that 1500 gold. Yes I realize there is a chance at a gem, but you are leaving a lot of gold on the table holding a 25% gold character in reserve just for pods.

In fact, at 1000 gold per hour and wish stones on elemental days, a shrine is a VASTLY better investment than sidekicks.

Quote: obidawsn

For one, developers usually try to develop the social system with rewards to add people to it. So having a bigger reward for adding friends makes people get more friends. From a game playing pov, it does seem backwards, especially with the slow load times to go from kingdom to kingdom, but the devs don't usually care about how many visits you make but how many people you can add to the game. I would say most of the people who play the game aren't on these forums (though the majority of the serious players probably are), so they aren't just adding people from the forums. They have to try to get other people to play the game in order to get friends, which is why they added facebook interaction. They even added an "ask for kudos" option to post to facebook. I'm not sure how well that will work since it's not available to play on facebook, though. I would rather them up the rewards for visiting or make it easier. I have gotten a few gems, though, (the first day I seemed to get more than I used to, but that could have been a fluke).

You have good points, but I will offer further opinions on this one. Front-loading the bigger rewards (more kudos for adding instead of keeping) makes sense from a business/marketing perspective - get as many people in as we can, and if 1% stick around we'll be profitable. Toss your loyal consumers a bone every now and then when they get too whiny. I know I'm giving an extreme example and so far doesn't apply to Lost Islands, but I don't want to see Lost Islands turn into this.

I don't think either model really relates to a devs point of view - ultimately they will probably do whatever direction marketing decides on. The developers work doesn't change much between the two scenarios (bigger rewards for adding versus visiting) - they still have to code both, and the reward amounts are just pieces of data. There may be some tuning or scaling differences based on usage expectations, but that's just part of the job.

I agree 10000% with Charred. Short of completing a quest there is absolutely no reason to ever hold back a Sidekick just to clear pods.

Holding back a sidekick to clear pods gives you a possibility of getting a gem, fwiw. I also use my free sidekick to clear trolls and sheep - I know I could save them until Tree Rex is free, but I like my kingdom clean.

Once you have all the skylanders, you need to generate gold goes way down. At that point, anything that improves the chances at gems (or even stones) is probably the preferable approach. That is why Qanai (already level 40 and with all skylanders) and Charred (languishing at level 38 and possibly not with all skylanders) are both right.

Quote: Qanai

Quote: obidawsn

For one, developers usually try to develop the social system with rewards to add people to it. So having a bigger reward for adding friends makes people get more friends. From a game playing pov, it does seem backwards, especially with the slow load times to go from kingdom to kingdom, but the devs don't usually care about how many visits you make but how many people you can add to the game. I would say most of the people who play the game aren't on these forums (though the majority of the serious players probably are), so they aren't just adding people from the forums. They have to try to get other people to play the game in order to get friends, which is why they added facebook interaction. They even added an "ask for kudos" option to post to facebook. I'm not sure how well that will work since it's not available to play on facebook, though. I would rather them up the rewards for visiting or make it easier. I have gotten a few gems, though, (the first day I seemed to get more than I used to, but that could have been a fluke).

You have good points, but I will offer further opinions on this one. Front-loading the bigger rewards (more kudos for adding instead of keeping) makes sense from a business/marketing perspective - get as many people in as we can, and if 1% stick around we'll be profitable. Toss your loyal consumers a bone every now and then when they get too whiny. I know I'm giving an extreme example and so far doesn't apply to Lost Islands, but I don't want to see Lost Islands turn into this.

I don't think either model really relates to a devs point of view - ultimately they will probably do whatever direction marketing decides on. The developers work doesn't change much between the two scenarios (bigger rewards for adding versus visiting) - they still have to code both, and the reward amounts are just pieces of data. There may be some tuning or scaling differences based on usage expectations, but that's just part of the job.

Retroactively awarding the new friend bonus would have inflated the value of Kudos and/or completely bypassed its intended purpose. If every longtime player received 5000 Kudos off the bat and was already able to buy all the Kudo awards there'd be little incentive at that point to keep using the social features. So they'd either have to increase the cost of Kudo awards across the board (making them seem unobtainable to newer players) otherwise their biggest advocates (veteran players) are not using the social features and enticing new players to come play the game.

It's not a perfect situation right now for those of us who have been playing for a long time but in the long term the new Kudos system is going to benefit us. We just need to get past the fact that we don't already have a billion Kudos saved up and have to wait a few extra days to get Admiral Thumpback.

By the way, the only thing on my dev wish list is for an increase in the number of gems winnable from visits. Seems like the percentages have gone way down since the changeover to the kudos system.

Quote: portalflip

Retroactively awarding the new friend bonus would have inflated the value of Kudos and/or completely bypassed its intended purpose. If every longtime player received 5000 Kudos off the bat and was already able to buy all the Kudo awards there'd be little incentive at that point to keep using the social features. So they'd either have to increase the cost of Kudo awards across the board (making them seem unobtainable to newer players) otherwise their biggest advocates (veteran players) are not using the social features and enticing new players to come play the game.

It's not a perfect situation right now for those of us who have been playing for a long time but in the long term the new Kudos system is going to benefit us. We just need to get past the fact that we don't already have a billion Kudos saved up and have to wait a few extra days to get Admiral Thumpback.

This makes a lot of sense, and is a bit of my thinking. Although I would agree that maybe they could find something to do, like raising the max number of friends so that those who are already maxed out have a chance on getting those 50 kudos rewards. I'm sure it will all balance out in the end just like everything else, and I wouldn't doubt that there will eventually be other ways to earn kudos as we move along (just like it has been with wishstones).

Quote: Charred

Prior to the dev message about the change, I used my sidekicks in sanctuaries for their 25% gold bonus.

Since the change, I kept one free. I get 1500 gold using a sidekick to clear the a pod.

I've had 1 pod spawn so I earned 1500 gold. I've lost a 25% boost to a sanctuary payout (~5k gold) twice already (so 10k gold) in order to earn that 1500 gold. Yes I realize there is a chance at a gem, but you are leaving a lot of gold on the table holding a 25% gold character in reserve just for pods.

In fact, at 1000 gold per hour and wish stones on elemental days, a shrine is a VASTLY better investment than sidekicks.

Then that will have to be the choice you have to make. That's part of the game, deciding which is a better strategy for you. I currently have enough giants and alter egos that I usually have a free sidekick, anyway (and I only have 3). But that's how I play it and it may differ from person to person.

Quote: obidawsn

Quote: Charred

Prior to the dev message about the change, I used my sidekicks in sanctuaries for their 25% gold bonus.

Since the change, I kept one free. I get 1500 gold using a sidekick to clear the a pod.

I've had 1 pod spawn so I earned 1500 gold. I've lost a 25% boost to a sanctuary payout (~5k gold) twice already (so 10k gold) in order to earn that 1500 gold. Yes I realize there is a chance at a gem, but you are leaving a lot of gold on the table holding a 25% gold character in reserve just for pods.

In fact, at 1000 gold per hour and wish stones on elemental days, a shrine is a VASTLY better investment than sidekicks.

Then that will have to be the choice you have to make. That's part of the game, deciding which is a better strategy for you. I currently have enough giants and alter egos that I usually have a free sidekick, anyway (and I only have 3). But that's how I play it and it may differ from person to person.

Your can also be sending your 'reserve' sidekick on short missions - depending on how often you check in - to get back some of the difference in gold. So far, I've gotten 2 gems from clearing pods since the update, and I don't have Cape Girl. I don't think those gems were available before the update, but I could be wrong.

Quote: HappyGamer

Your can also be sending your 'reserve' sidekick on short missions - depending on how often you check in - to get back some of the difference in gold. So far, I've gotten 2 gems from clearing pods since the update, and I don't have Cape Girl. I don't think those gems were available before the update, but I could be wrong.

That's what I usually do. I don't send my sidekicks on sanctuaries. Never have. I also base my adventures on how often I can play, so I'm usually not checking while my adventure Skylanders are gone. Besides, with the sidekicks I have, I have better choices to send. I only have Whisper elf, Gill Runt, and Eye Small. I don't use Whisper Elf because I already have 2 Tree Rexes and an 2 Alter Egos to use, so I usually have him free all the time. With Gill Runt, I have Thumpback and Surfer Slam Bam and also get 25% bonus with Zap for having #1 fan. I also have Legendary Chill, so I usually send Thumpback, Surfer Slam Bam and Legendary Chill on sanctuaries (since the 3rd has more of a chance of just getting a gem/wishtone). I can also use Zap with his #1 fan for a 25% bonus. The only sidekick I have where I don't have many more options is Eye Small. The only other undeads I have with 25% bonus is Eye Brawl and Grill Master Chop Chop. Since I have GM Chop Chop's hut, I always keep him there, so that just leaves Eye Brawl. I rarely use my undead sanctuary, though, to save on using too much energy. The only time I did was when they were 50% less energy or during the double gold Super Tuesday. Then I would just throw in some of my level 12 undeads (Eye Small is still level 8, so he loses some gold, anyway, compared to a level 12).

So, in other words, I've been typically using Eye Small and Gill Runt on a regular basis, and only using Whisper Elf on adventures when it's a Life day. And I never use them on sanctuaries. So the new chompy update is no big deal to me.

I have all the Skylanders and I wouldn't say my need for gold has gone down at all. I'm a day away from hitting 39 and at that point I'll start replacing all the acorn houses with the wood stacks to free up space. There is plenty of need for gold once you get all the guys.

I conceed that sidekicks are more useful for pods *if* they have increased the gem chance. Personally, I'm 0/2 and I do have Cape Girl.

BTW - even though I am languishing at 38 (rofl...), I have all the skylanders but the new sidekicks which are in the mail. I run all sanctuaries wide open with 2-3 in each one every single day. Those second and third slots turn energy into gems. That is another strategy of gaining gems.

P.S. Still not sure how so many of you got to 40 so fast. I've got all the same buildings boosted by all the same decorations.

To be fair, it's mainly about playing style and managing the units/resources.

Also, I think gems are a general option for chompy pods - Advisor_Orville said they upped the reward, and I've twice now gotten 2 gems from a single Chompy pod.

The thing with Chompies is that it isn't really a challenge. Sending them off on adventure doesn't feel like something that really needs to be kept in mind. The Chompy burrows are just a minor setback that can be cleared with a few gold in a second each, making it feel like an annoyance over anything. It's not like clearing the inactive pods with a regular Skylander takes hours(oh god! please don't implement that!). Actually, this is what troll camps and sheep mobs feel like as well, because after about level 10 their rewards are very small, so all they do is steal some space for a few minutes. This could be rectified if they changed the rewards for the mobs, etc. depending on what level you were, so that they felt like you did get rewarded. White Claw helps a bit, though, I'll give that credit since it's due.

Anyway, here are a couple of criticisms (I posted on another thread) about some of my major problems with this game...
Quote: Arc of Archives

Quote: Pico

My problem is it takes time to get the Kudos. It's that the game became work. Personally I think games like this are better designed to allow me to pop in and out for 5-10 minutes rather than sit down and slog through a 60 minutes of click a name, find the shiny, rinse/repeat.

My morning routine was to fire up the Kurig and start clicking through my collections and missions while I finished a cup of coffee. Now I'm going to have to fire up the full pot just to get through all the Kudos collecting.

What's going to really piss me off is when they offer a new companion that automatically collects your island Kudos for 3000 gems. This just reeks of a setup to add another big ticket money sink into the game. I've never had a problem with the premium item but this one might be too much.

Btw, while I'm complaining congrats to those who got a free Thump house. I'm a little irritated they didn't refund gems to those of us that bought it at full price. I don't have issues when they offer things at reduced rates after I paid full price but it's pretty annoying when they eventually offer it for free.

THIS! I stopped playing the game about two weeks ago because collecting everything started to feel like too much work, and it was hard to just "check in and out". I'm fine with them giving bonuses for using the social features and this update doesn't actually sound that bad... But they've added little things over time so I need to spend about 5-10 minutes just to collect things in my kingdom. I just wish there were some ultimate way to collect everything at once, but they lock it to companions, and I've spent so much on them and saved gems up for more useful things like houses, so I either choose between adding a convenience or not buying what I'd like to be convienence-ing. I simply want to go in and have my things collected, then re-activate stuff. I don't want to need to clear troll camps, Chompy pods and so on. Even with Cape Girl(who I caved on since she's so cheap), it's tedious. Collecting and re-gifting itself feels primitively slow, which is what many aspects of the game felt like before- there will inevitably be a 1000s of gems Kudos collector. If I wanted a collect-a-thon like the game is feeling now, I'd just quit and play the console games, which is what I'm going to be doing.

Quote: Arc of Archives

I do like to take long sessions to play every few days. The problem is when I just want to check in a 4 minute or so waiting room or just before I'm going to settle into sleep, have nothing else to do, and am restless. Gotta clear the totems, get rid of those infestations, tap Quigley, get my crops, steal from my houses and any non-cleared things, finish adventures, and then I can re-activate my things which takes about two minutes in itself! Again. I liked setting to the really long times because I just enjoyed checking once in a while best(usually once quickly when I wake up, once more during spare time in the day, and an hour or so session in the evening for final collection, decorating, gifting and reactivating). When it's that much time each day, and I'm not feeling rewarded or having fun enough(which is another rant), it adds up to frustration and I decide to quit to give myself more free time.

The collect-a-thon feeling about it is with Companions, houses, alter egos etc. I bought Flynn (got the gems for him with some relatively good sales) and Ermit just because they were leaving. There was no way I could save up for them and houses at the same time, and have no desire to pay for them because I've already paid for my 119-figure collection which I've registered to my game. I think the fact that they're removing things also added to my leaving- at least with past alter egos, you could win them in the well, but they haven't made it clear wether Flynn will be back(and that's different from alter egos in that now that we know alter egos do come back, it'd be nice to know if Flynn is going to as well...).
I already had to do this collecting alter egos and the houses, come on. Collecting these things feels like a whole extra collection from my toy collection, which was already frustrating to get, not something I could do alongside that and I'd have fun doing. They're both the same in that if I don't get something right away, I'm worried that the stock will be completely gone when I'd prefer to(Skylander restocking is very poor here), but the difference is that the console games are so good they make up for it, but it makes up most of my experience with Lost Islands so it's frustrating there.

Maybe this is just an issue with city builders as a whole, though. I wouldn't know because I've only played a couple, but they kept me more interested and entertained than this one even if I played them for less time(I mostly kept playing this one just because it was Skylanders, to be blunt).

Unfortunately, I can't look at this from a dev viewpoint as I have no experience there, so sorry if I sound harsh. I just think that the game feels more like an extra way for Acti to get some cash rather than adding much exciting to the experience, honestly. >.>

City builders always annoy me. That's why I was reluctant to play this game. But my son wanted to play it, so we installed it. Eventually, I became hooked. I've been much less frustrated with it than other similar games. It's been fun working towards collecting Skylanders (especially the alter egos) and even the companions. I know that I won't be able to get all the companions and I'm ok with that. At least they don't hinder you from playing the game. The companions that have made it easier (Quigley, Beetrees, Cape Girl) have been quite inexpensive comparitevly, especially with sales. I've gotten all the alter egos and most of the companions (except for the real expensive ones) without spending any real money on the game. So I'm happy. I know I'm not the type of person Activision wants (since I don't spend any money), but I've felt they've done a decent job. I play often, but it's usually only a couple minutes at a time. The way the kudos system works with having to visit has slowe things down, though. But I can't complain that much. Sometimes, I feel people just want to find something to complain about. Really? Complaining that clearin troll, sheep and chompy mobs are tedious even with Cape Girl? It takes 2 seconds to clear a mob with her. People complain that it takes too much time to so things then get upset that they offer a companion to make it faster? People like that will never be happy and no one (not even Activision) cares if they leave the game. I don't mean to sound harsh, but it's the truth.

It does get tedious when I want to play a small session. Poof, ten new objects appeared on the map- I have to use another whole minute minute to scroll around, find, and select Skylanders, then clear them out so that my kingdom isn't infested with more when I come back, and looks hideous at the end of the day. >.>
The only thing I'd look forward to from them are chests and even those are random drop chance(personally, I have terrible luck with White Claw).

They are small annoyances. But a lot of small annoyances add up over time... Especially when time is daily.

The problem isn't nessicarily the time cleaning them out- but that I don't feel rewarded for it, yet need to waste time cleaning them unless I want my kingdom to look like rubbish. I feel like the purpose of them is just to annoy me! And they just aren't fun! If they aren't giving me a great reward, what do they add to my experience? It's like the Chompy mounds- they're very easy to weed out and give you poor rewards that add up to an amount which isn't much in the long run. So what's the point? The camps and mobs are a gimmick I felt became frustratingly annoying by June.

And then, for our convenience, we have to pay for little things. Look, I wouldn't mind if this was a game on its own that I bought without ever having touched the figure collecting side, but I have a collection that has over 100 figures and all of them are registered on that game. I know that they need to make money, but they already made money from me.

And as for buying Houses? Well, unless I have those, I feel like half of my Skylanders are doing nothing. And the rewards for adding even one house to your kingdom are nothing to scoff at(lots of gold, XP, or several gems).
Collecting companions? Well, I already paid for the figures from the game(see below). Shouldn't that get me at least somewhat closer to getting them? I feel like I need to pay for all of them and that the game isn't giving me a fair oppurtunity to get many of them with everything else I need to save for, which is my problem with that. Alter Egos are fun to collect since you have plenty of time to get each and they're simply cool bragging rights, Houses and Companions are not because you virtually need to pay for gems to have the chance to buy many of them.

Another problem with this game is that even if you have a large collection registered, you won't get a big reward for it(I think once you have about 20 Skylanders, you don't need more unless you want a lot of backups). Here's some extra energy for registering that army you spent hundreds of dollars on! Now buy gems. It feels like a Pay-To-Win- but I already paid, can't I get something for that? The huge majority of my problems with this game are from the viewpoint of a loyal customer to the franchise, which I just think ain't right. Yes, the console games have this kind of issue to an extent *cough*needorangebasesforheroicsingiants*cough*, but they're much more fun and inventive to make up for it at least somewhat!

... And back to the mob problem, for this, I would suggest a companion who gives you the option to turn off Mobs and such altogether. It would just add so much convineince to short check-ins, while giving those who enjoy the extras from clearing out the option to continue, and a small advantage over us lazy bums. Maybe they can use Tessa for that. >.> As long as it wasn't 3500 Gems-overpriced, I would be all over it and actually start playing the game again.

You can get rid of you mob problem.
As they seem to be limited to 10 maximum you can designate a specific place on you island for them an fill the rest of your island with roads. Once 10 have spawned where you want them just let them be.

Personally I like troll camps and sheep mobs because of the change for chests.
I like troll camps more for it's fun to chase the wizard trolls, they should introduce teleporting sheep!

I don't share you criticism on not being awarded for having a lot of physical toys. I also own a lot of those and I feel you do benefit from having them compared to someone who is only playing Lost Islands and hasn't got any physical Skylanders.
You don't have to pay for them of win them, each toy gives you 12 free gems from leveling up, you can earn more gold early on because you always have enough Skylanders to power balloons and shrines, if you win a house you can use it immediately and don't have to save for getting the accompanying Skkylander.

Sorry to keep disagreeing with you Arc of Archives. It's not that I find your perspectives invalid. I just have different perspectives, which I want to share since you're sharing yours...

I used to hate the "blight" on my islands caused by mobs, but thanks to folks on this board I've learned to love them, or at least tolerate them. The reason I don't mind them (and generally don't clear them) is for the occasional quests you get (either from leveling skylanders but especially for weekly or monthly timed quests) to clear mobs. I almost always have 10+sheeps and trolls hanging around my islands that I can pounce on at a moment's notice. Turning off the mobs means you would lose these quests. (Though I suspect you may just argue that they should get rid of this timed quests too?)

I do hate the chompy pods because of the little mounds they leave behind, which really are disgusting to look at. But I like the idea of having to using minis to stop them (and I can't wait to actually own a mini). It makes working towards earning a mini (which I don't think you can spin for until you own every other skylander) that much more worthwhile.

In terms of rewards for registering skylanders into the game, I think there are quite a few. First, you don't need to waste time or coins spinning for them. That's 5,000,000 coins for each skylander (though I think the first few spins are cheaper, it ramps quickly). Second, each skylander will generate about 15-20 gems as it levels up. That's not nothing at all.

I think having more than 20 skylanders is very useful, though as you collection builds I do agree that the "regular" ones become pretty under-utilized. You can use up to 24 for sanctuaries. You also need to keep another 8 for elemental totems (which, if we're speaking of tedium, I find tedious). Then you can have another bunch on adventures. That's probably at least 40. Also, having more of each element allows you to benefit from elemental days (using skylanders on their elemental days provides bonus gold), so really it's a benefit to have as many as possible.

But to each his/her own!

I tend to agree with Midas. I don't mind the build up of the trolls/sheep. If they were to make a change to how they spawned I'd like to see companions added that you could activate to cause a certain type to spawn more frequently. Say have a single item that allowed you to assign a Skylander to attract more trolls. It's probably not easy so I'll leave it up to the smart guys making the game.

I completely disagree that I should be given something because I own 90+ figures. I've reaped the advantages similar to what was laid out above. I'm never lacking for spots to fill. I've never had to spin for a character. For every two Skylanders someone picks up with spins I'll be able to add 3200 Mabu. That being said I view Lost Islands as a companion game to the console versions not a stand alone entity.

<rant>

I sure hope that the DEVS are reading this forum still... Not to be a downer but this Kudos addition is CRAP. CRAP CRAP CRAP CRAP CRAP. What total nincompoop thought this up? I mean - say I want to purchase some of this stuff so I need a boomer-load of these Kudos bricks so I have to go out and get a boomer-load of friends to sign on to support me and then I need to gift them every day and I need to go to their kingdoms and (get this) *search* for the darn bricks over and over and over. WTH?

So if I add 50 to 100 friends and with the on-load and off-load times and search times for the bricks, that's about 1-2 minutes per friend per day. I just don't have that kind of time to invest in this game people. So now those people who trusted me to become my friends will drop off my friend list and I will be screwed because I could not keep up with the daily commitment to this monstrosity that they have created. Nice going Activision. It's the L-Rod challenge bug all over again.... S-B-a-T.

Just drop this Kudos crap and lets get back to coins and gems like a real F2P game should be like. JCoaPS.

</rant>

-VM

Quote: ViDeOmAnCiNi

So if I add 50 to 100 friends and with the on-load and off-load times and search times for the bricks, that's about 1-2 minutes per friend per day.

I don't agree with this. You're quoting a best case scenario, when at present, it's obvious that you CAN'T visit all your friends without encountering errors, crashing to the desktop, and having the in-game lists refuse to recognise all your Activate friends.

The reality is far worse than the highly optimistic CRAP rating you're giving the game.

What is worse about the Kudos system is the 100 friend cap. I have currently 85 invitations waiting to be accepted, that is over 4000 kudos I am missing because of the absurd cap. Options are either not giving 50 kudos per new friend (that's not in balance with 1 kudo per present) or raising the 100 cap.
Not talking about errors in visiting, errors between friends in Activate account and friends in the application, and long time on loading friends' kingdoms. I think these are bugs that will be solved sooner or later, but it is frustrating.

Quote: ViDeOmAnCiNi

<rant>

So if I add 50 to 100 friends and with the on-load and off-load times and search times for the bricks, that's about 1-2 minutes per friend per day. I just don't have that kind of time to invest in this game people. So now those people who trusted me to become my friends will drop off my friend list and I will be screwed because I could not keep up with the daily commitment to this monstrosity that they have created.
</rant>

-VM

While I agree with you in general, your statement that you don't have 1-2 minutes per friend to support them so they'll drop you is a little erroneous. Your friends don't even know whether you're visiting their kingdoms or not. The only way you support your friends is clicking on the green envelopes next to their name in your friends list to send them a gift. That shouldn't take more than 1-2 minutes total per day for the whole list, even if you have 100 friends. Visiting their islands only helps you, by giving you "extra" kudos, as it were.

Just saying.

I definitely agree that making visiting mandatory to earn enough kudos to buy something decent with them is total crap when the visiting system is clearly broken. It has broken my game as well as several others. I'm still trying to get help on the Activision site, but not much luck so far.

In certain ways, the new kudos system has been a rousing success. The friends/visiting concept had been around for several months before the kudos system was implemented. During that time, finding 100 friends was slow going. The moment they announced the kudos system, people started coming out of the woodworks and I now have reached what I think is the cap on allowable invitations (100) in addition to my capped 100 friends. So in that sense the system and rewards "worked" in that it has increased the size of this community at the very least.

I am completely with Sungren150 that they need to raise the friend cap. I've heard people say "not until they fix the visiting issues" but I see that as separate. The gifting mechanic works great now and adding more friends would allow people to have a greater benefit from the part of the mechanic that definitely works.

While I agree that visiting friends takes a long time, I view this as a bonus for the truly dedicated players. Everyone can easily get 80-100 kudos per day from gifts and a few visits. That may mean it takes a couple weeks to get something like Admiral Thumpback, but what's the rush really? It takes me weeks to save up enough wish stones for next month's alter ego (and longer to save sufficient gemstones for houses, shrines and companions) so what's the real difference? The other prizes available for kudos so far are relatively cheap and mostly worthless. The only decent item (the sheep topiary) is very affordable.

Having said that, they do need to find a way to fix the "Error" messages and crashes from visiting. That is a total pain in the rear.

Quote: ViDeOmAnCiNi

<rant>

I sure hope that the DEVS are reading this forum still... Not to be a downer but this Kudos addition is CRAP. CRAP CRAP CRAP CRAP CRAP. What total nincompoop thought this up? I mean - say I want to purchase some of this stuff so I need a boomer-load of these Kudos bricks so I have to go out and get a boomer-load of friends to sign on to support me and then I need to gift them every day and I need to go to their kingdoms and (get this) *search* for the darn bricks over and over and over. WTH?

So if I add 50 to 100 friends and with the on-load and off-load times and search times for the bricks, that's about 1-2 minutes per friend per day. I just don't have that kind of time to invest in this game people. So now those people who trusted me to become my friends will drop off my friend list and I will be screwed because I could not keep up with the daily commitment to this monstrosity that they have created. Nice going Activision. It's the L-Rod challenge bug all over again.... S-B-a-T.

Just drop this Kudos crap and lets get back to coins and gems like a real F2P game should be like. JCoaPS.

</rant>

-VM

I completely disagree about the kudos system. I think it's good, on paper. I was tired of receiving gifts and visiting just to get low amounts of xp, energy, or gold. It wasn't worth my time. But giving me something to work towards with the system gives me more reason to do it. You don't have to visit people, if you don't want to, and no one will ever know but you. It usually takes me less than a minute to receive/send gifts to everyone, which is all anyone will know or care about. If you don't want to visit, then you don't have to. Although, you'll get more kudos that way, thus get to the rewards faster. But the problem (and why I say it's good on paper) is that the visiting system is broken. It was broken a while back, too, and they fixed it. People just tend to forget about it. Although, this time, there seems to be bigger issues with corruption and such. I'm not sure that's even a programming issue or a technical issue. So I'm not even sure an app update would even fix the problem. It's probably something on their end. A part of the problem could be the implementation of facebook and game center. I could be wrong, but that is the only thing relating to connecting with the cloud and friends that they changed.

As for how long it takes to get enough kudos, I don't think it's far off from other things. Just by receiving gifts, you can receive the 2000 it took to get Admiral Thumpback in a month. I know that seems like a long time, but just like the other alter egos, that's probably the most they would ever take to put one out. Once they get the visiting system working, you can work on getting more kudos to get the other items/companions. Plus I'm sure, just like the other currencies, there will be other ways down the road to get kudos. Remember when wish stones started, it was only totems, and now you can get them through shrines and other methods. Just like everything else, it may be a slow start, but can eventually be worth it. There are quite a few people who have reached max level and gotten all the Skylanders, so gold, xp, and energy is pointless. They wanted a way to get people to do more social stuff, so this gives a reason for people to do it, especially for those who aren't interested in the gold, xp, or energy. I, for one, am glad the system was implemented. I've had more of a reason to add more friends, and now I'm getting a lot more gems than I did before from gifting, plus building up the kudos. I do think they should raise the max amount of friends, especially for those who were already maxed out before they implemented the kudos system. But overall, I think it's a great idea. They just need to work out the bugs.

What do you think is a reasonable timeframe for them to "work out these bugs" that weren't there a fortnight ago?

Quote: Woz

What do you think is a reasonable timeframe for them to "work out these bugs" that weren't there a fortnight ago?

That I can't say. It all depends on the problem. Bugs aren't always fixed quickly, especially when it's not everybody having the issues. I didn't say the bugs didn't suck. I'm just saying the idea behind kudos isn't bad.

They need to give us a "Super Quigley" that will go to each kingdom and collect the 6 bricks. Don't care how many gems he costs. Just MAKE HIM!

-VM

Quote: obidawsn

Quote: Woz

What do you think is a reasonable timeframe for them to "work out these bugs" that weren't there a fortnight ago?

That I can't say. It all depends on the problem. Bugs aren't always fixed quickly, especially when it's not everybody having the issues. I didn't say the bugs didn't suck. I'm just saying the idea behind kudos isn't bad.

One of the problems is clearly defined. The system appears incapable of successfully transferring a player's Activate list to the game completely. Since it's affecting just about everyone, the problem is obviously at the server end. I don't think it's unreasonable to set a timeframe on how long a bug like this should be allowed to continue while still happily rolling out new content.

I'd rather see no new content for a month and instead have these screw-ups fixed, thanks.

STILL waiting for clarification about Thumpback's House...

They need to hold off the Swap Force till this is sorted.