I took a very long break from this game. On my old account I had probably 3k hours on it, and the community drove me out, and to DOTA2. However, this game is still the most difficult MOBA on the market.
Now, coming back, nearly 10 years later, I can say that I still love its difficulty. I love how intense and fast it is.... but this game has a lot of unacceptable things going on in it that need to be fixed.
For one, as a returning player, I have little eagerness to stay for several reason:
1. The user interface and UI is STILL clunky. It seems to not have changed at all in A DECADE! In GAME it is fine. Im talking about the selection menu, stores, Pinko, etc... its cluttered, disgusting, and looks like a market Id find in Thailand.
2. You need to give players an option to turn off the annoying announcer banners on the top of the screen, and the announcers in other voices, and leave the game at its standard announcer ONLY. If the player wants to.
That level of trolling does nothing but create a super toxic environment. This game is a TEAM game, so TEAMWORK should be promoted. Not teased and diminished. Nor should rage be promoted along side indifference, and incentivized leaving....
3. LEAVERS NEED TO BE PUNISHED HARD. And I MEAN HARD. You leave once, you get a 5 minute ban. You leave twice in a day, you get a day off. You leave three times in 3 days, you get a week off. You are considered not a leaver again after having played 10 games to completion. I played 8 games tonight, and my carry on bot left after 1 death, 7 times. THATS UNACCEPTABLE TO HAVE THAT KIND OF STATISTCAL OUTCOME! Why are you as developers not doing your jobs and regulating a competitive game?
4. You need to restrict player chat to team only. There is no need for teams to be able to talk to one another since there is nothing good being said to one another, and no need for the teams to interact. Teams only troll one another. Especially on remakes. So what is the point? Its stupid and irresponsible.
5. Remakes need to be team vote only, 3 out of 5 to pass. Queue times, even on US servers which are already 8 minutes long, NOT 2 MINS EVER, even though it advertises itself as such, are unaffected by such an option as remakes. In fact, they will improve! Anyone afk or disconnected by the time the remake vote is cast, is punished as a leaver; which, refer to #3.
6. There needs to be a report system in place that is actually effective. Meaning if I have a player who is absolutely toxic, players can report him. You are only able to be attached 1 report per match, but if you are reported more than 7 times in 15 matches, you will be banned for a day.
7. There needs to be a much more clear structure of your ranking system. It is loose at best. If a team has a leaver within the first 7 minutes of play, only 5 MMR should be awarded, and none should be taken away. It is completely ineffectual and inaccruate to award a team for wins and losses when you have a plague of leavers in your matches. It is such a high leave rate that it has turned me off to your game within 10 matches. Im not saying I WONT play, but I am disinclined to spend money, which supports you. And I am sure many people feel the same way.
This game has endured. sure. I saw this on a post below. But it has done so with a very poor approach to salesmanship, and what appears to be limited effort in marketing and no effort in evolving. Which is sad, because while LoL is running strong, DOTA2 took a hard hit last year when it patched its game into a completely different animal. It is absolutely HORRIBLE now. And LoL is reaping the benefits of that, while this title sits theres slowly dying like a stroke patient.
This time here is a chance for this title to make a few BIG updates, clean up its interfaces and attack its toxic player base. in doing so you will create a truly competitive player base that is looking to be skilled at this, not just yelling and leaving in 5 to 8 minutes every single match. There are players like me out here. Players who put THOUSANDS of dollars into DOTA, and 7k hours into the game, who remember this title, and like this title, but need you to actually engage us as players with something more than rage and ineffective UI choices.
I was on a discord with several of my semi pro and pro players in games, and a few streamers; two nights ago. We were talking about this game, and they had memories of it; but they all agreed they WOULD NOT stream it and show support, because of the level of toxicity in the matches. Worried that their streams would suffer from the amount of negativity, racism, overt leaving, and rage that happens in every single match.
THAT SHOULD BE A RED FLAG for you devs. Stop promoting trolling and hate by doing nothing and by releasing racist sounding and annoying announcers, and put you money back into the title in a respectful and SERIOUS way to make it bigger and better.
I have a feeling its all going to Cobra whiskey and... well if you watch Archer... you get the rest. Fix the title. Or your grand kids definitely wont be playing your game, it will continue to be the idiot stepson of the original DOTA developers.
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