What's With the Mass Game Culling?

[Branaddar]

Ever since I've joined, the games that I own have been slowly culled from eGO's forums to the point where the only one I own is TF2, which I'm not really interested in playing.

Do we pay per subforum / Vent channel? What's the harm in keeping them alive for games that people are actively playing?

It's frustrating. APB, Brink, Killing Floor, Guild Wars... all games I enjoy, all gone.

I joined this clan to have fun with the games I like, not be forced into mass-consumed games I'm not interested in (CoD, WoW, etc.)

So... I suppose I'm going to continue being "inactive" on our servers until BF3 comes out, purely because the clan currently doesn't support a single game I enjoy playing. Apart from BFBC2, which I own for PS3. And at this rate, I'm wondering how long eGO will support BF3 before they decide MW3 is a better game, so they just shouldn't bother supporting BF3 anymore.

I'm sorry if this is harsh, but it's really bumming me out. At least with the forums or Vent channels there was a chance of finding people to play with. Now, unless I go and manually add every eGO member to my Steam list and send messages begging people to play with me, it's not gonna happen.

 

[Yolobot]

Insurgency is being removed aswell.

Dude, It's not about a game being better than another, that they get removed. They get removed if the server costs are too high, if they don't get many new members from it, if there are many hackers, if there are many complaints, ect.

It is annoying, but understandable. BF3 will never be removed, don't worry! It's too popular!

Unless servers are too unstable, or too expensive.

 

[Spitfire'd]

eGO never officially supported any of the games you mentioned.

We had members that played and loved Guild Wars, Brink, Killing Floor or APB. We had several members that got sub-forums dedicated to them. Sure we had a Brink server, maybe an eGO group in Guild Wars and I don't know about the other two...but they were never official divisions or officially supported by eGO.

Vent channels do cost money. If you kept track during the summer it cost eGO about $2500 (if not more) a month to keep everything that you have to pay for (game servers, Ventrilo + channels, website) running. If funds get tight, people stop donating or whatever, then things have to go like it or not.

We are dedicated to our divisions, so you have to understand if they had to cut something, they would likely look for the most inactive stuff that we don't officially support. In this case if there was barely anyone ever in an APB Vent channel then it's pretty obvious that has to go if cuts are made.

The answer is, like it or not, to add the people on Steam or get permission from eGO Council to create an eGO Steam group. Is it going to take awhile? Yes. But really when it comes to our other games it is the best way.

I'm sure we would love to support anything and everything we could if there was interest. But being a non-profit organization that relies on donations you have to roll within a very limited budget.

Believe me as someone who has seen his favorite DoD server repeatedly get taken down and put back up I know where you are coming from, but you have to trust that leadership is doing what's best for the clan even if you don't like it. And if you do like it or something, donate more? Help make it happen? Harsh? Maybe, but it doesn't get any plainer than that.

 

[Kamakize Tommy]

You will find Guild Wars in the start division.

 

[itBurnsWhenIPee]

I'm going to take a shot in the dark and say it is all about activity.

Looking at eGO, this has got to be one of, if not, thee largest community out there. I think the leaders are trying to 'support' every possible game they can, but servers get expensive, and I assume those games just don't have enough activity for =eGO= to actively support them.

As Spitfire said, the monthly cost of running =eGO='s site, Ventrilo and Game Servers is extremely high, and I can't imagine there is much cushion from donations to meet the monthly requirements, so they need to carefully pick games based on popularity as a whole, and popularity within the community.

I am sorry to hear that games you enjoy aren't necessarily supported by =eGO=, but you shouldn't worry about BF3 being dropped. There is a Battlefield division and a Call of Duty division - they will not conflict with either other, and both games are going to STRIVE in =eGO= .. I guarantee it!

 

[Branaddar]

Didn't mean to ruffle feathers, just that I'd like to be an active member of the clan, but it's hard when there's no games I want to play left.

So looking at my upcoming PC game buys, I'll be getting BF3, which I'm sure will be supported. What about Dead Island, or GuildWars 2? Dead Island would probably be forum-ified by now, and with the lack of competitive play, I'm guessing probably not?

Hopefully Origin gets some much-needed upgrades before BF3 arrives. The lack of groups or server favourites is disturbing to say the least. For now, I've added a bunch of eGO folks. Hopefully the server browser will be easy to use (and hopefully have favourites built into it!)

Oh, and I'm not seeing GuildWars 1 in the Strat section of the forums, though it is still in Vent.

 

[Branaddar]

Double post ftl

Feel free to delete me!

 

[Snipeye]

1) Guild Wars 1 subforums is located under Game Forums -> Role Playing Games. Not Strat.

2) There is a sizeable number of eGO members who have expressed interest or planning on buying Guild Wars 2 when it's released sometime next year.

3) Battlefield 3 is the next big game being awaited by the Battlefield Division. I would suggest you talk to one of the advisors from that division about the game.

4) I think saying eGO choosing to support only BF3 or MW3, and not both, is an injustice towards leadership who are responsible on making such decisions. Like some of the earlier comments, it's hard to support a game that people are not interested in playing, and the clan is losing money by not drawing in new recruits or numbers on the server. Unfortunately, sometimes we must make the decision to cut the game from our server listings. FPS:X, or OP:X as it's now known, is a division dedicated towards testing and finding new games that would work well for the clan. Sometimes the games the division try doesn't work out through no fault of the division. If you have concerns or questions of the purpose about the OP:X division, please message your division's advisors as they can set the record straight so there's no confusion.

Hope this helps.

 

[Rathion]

If you link into all the Games that were phased out of eGO there are valid reasons for them not being supported in a official or unofficial capacity whichever the case may be.
APB
APB was phased out because the portion of eGO that played it, that was putting their foot in the philosophical eGO door of acceptance lost interest, after playing and dealing with LOADS of hackers, glitches, etc. I believe the decision was made to back off and let the game mature further and maybe give it another try. eGO simply lost its community support for the game point blank.
Brink.
I do not know a lot of what happened with Brink, I do believe we still have a number of people in eGO that play brink consistently. From what I understand there were a number of glitches with the game, and when they were brought to the developers attention the developer quickly changed the subject and offered everybody Ice Cream as he got on his knees and kissed the communities feet as if to avoid work so they can through a number of frat parties and drink coca-cola to their hearts content while riding the video game money train for a little while longer without doing any actual work to support the game. (FYI. The past few sentences have been blatant sarcasm and humor that I believe got the issue across.) So when the developers backed off, so did we pulling the plug on our server.

99% of the time if eGO pulls its support for a video game, it has a good reason behind it.

 

[Spitfire'd]

A game like Dead Island will probably not be supported by eGO. But by all means I would recommend posting about the game (or using the search function to see if someone else did already) to find out who else has it. Chances are if you have a game there is at least one other person in the clan that does also.

For example, I tried to generate buzz for Darkspore when it came out. Only two other people in the clan got it, no one else was interested. We still grouped up and have some fun when we can. That's really the best you can hope for.

Keep bringing the games up, keep asking around. We don't "officially" support Left 4 Dead 2 for another example but I found a sizable group in our clan that plays it almost nightly.

I hope what I said earlier didn't discourage you. Rather it's meant to invite you to get more involved, get in Vent and ask around! Find the people that enjoy the same games you do, and play with them. That's all part of the eGO experience, and you don't need "official support" to do that!