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This is a really good idea. We do actually have a "contents" that's gets shown in stream explaining the upcoming sections or information within the stream that we are going to talk about.
However, this would be really good to coincide with a post-stream information topic such as the one earlier discussed in the early posts within this thread.

That's nowhere near close to accurate. I have a ticket for a known bug, and it isn't on the list, and I know another person with a ticket, and that bug isn't on the list either. There are a lot of bugs in the XBox version. I have been told that my bug is being looked at so it should be on the list.

Here's my post from 6 months ago... we are still having the same discussion...it's the same bug! Isn't a list of bugs communication? Why can't we make our own list of bugs stickied at the top of the page.

Edited by user Thursday, August 1, 2019 6:13:20 AM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

At the bottom of that page: 30 out of 302 found this helpful

There's a reason for this, it's incomplete by an order of magnitude.

Communication is key to players so they can keep up to date with developments. One good example would be Rare and their game Sea of Thieves. They do a weekly dev video in which the executive producer goes through what the team at Rare are working on and the general progress. They also do a written version as well and this is shared across all their social media platforms and their website. Am I saying weekly updates is what we need? No but perhaps a progress report on specific issues such as garage size and the sound bug would be helpful to players and make them know the progression of the game. Also many dev companies are interested in listening to their player base. Although I am sure that both PGG and T10 do listen to their player base many players have voiced that they certainly don't feel this is the case. I also believe a Xbox insider programme would massively benefit this game and help dev's get useful information on how the game functions and what players would like to see improved. Understandably this is easier said than done. I also feel the website could do with updating to make it easier for people to navigate and thus communicate with dev's about ideas etc. I hope that the ideas I have posted will go someway to help improve things and in the short term threads like this are massively appreciated so a huge thanks to RetroKrystal for making this possible.

You are best talking to @NitroGlitter regarding the information posted on there if you have feedback.

Edited by user Friday, January 25, 2019 8:45:57 AM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

I really like how Sea of Thieves do their weekly dev updates and I do try to watch these myself. I have discussed about having a more visual or video-based update for future information but it is currently in the planning stage of spitballing ideas (hence also this thread). But it is definitely something I want to look into.

You may want to stop me right here, but what I've gotten is that we can talk about talking, but if we want to critique the game or discuss improving it, such discussion is to be buried in a ticket. Otherwise such discussion will be locked or ignored. I suppose if I have an issue with submitting a ticket, though, I should submit a ticket.

Issues, bugs, suggestions & feedback should be submitted by a ticket.
If you have an issue with the support page itself or information on the support page - Contact @NitroGlitter
This thread is for discussion around transparency & communication between the developer and players.

Retro...will PG implement a way to report rammers in the game. Like an option over their profile or something. I think the one's I've seen is inspect player, mute, kick from the convoy etc etc. Some people will seriously ruin the experience by not racing but just ramming you in every corner

I've said it before but I'll say it again: You guys should really have a look at how Paradox communicates with their customers on their forum. Developers do their weekly dev diary posts and then engage with the community directly - communicating plans, taking feedback, good and bad, acknowledging mistakes and looking at suggestions for improving their games. Do I think the devs come here and read stuff sometimes? Absolutely. But we don't SEE them, and they don't interact with us, so there's no way to know anything is going on. PDX's system isn't perfect -- some members of the community are quite outspoken about things they see as a problem -- but ultimately it's a net positive, in the experience I've had with them at least.

If I might make a suggestion about the information given out on streams, some sort of summary on this website would be great, and it would be even better if each section could be linked to its corresponding section of the stream. Interested in multiplayer changes? Here's a summary of them and a link to the point in the stream where they're talked about. New season content? Summary and link. So on and so forth.

I'll also chime in with (and this is absolutely a communication topic) agreement that "known issues" should be a list of the confirmed, demonstrable bugs that the dev team has been able to identify, even if they are not yet presently working on them. Indeed, listing the status of it, whether it's being worked on or not would additionally be useful, but ultimately it's a matter of "How many times does this bug need to be reported before the devs take notice" when, in fact, they very well know about it but it hasn't been listed as a known issue -- that makes no sense. In general, there should be more communication about bugs and issues, even if it's just "We know about this, and we plan on doing something about it soon." Or whatever.

Anyway, I'll end the post with this: Working with the community on this sort of thing is probably a rough job. Especially in the condition it's been in, specifically with a lot of people feeling like they're being ignored. I wish you luck, I'd really like to see a more open, friendly relationship between ourselves and the developers.

I think Grim Kidaver meant something along the line of this:



The threads in which a Blizzard employee answered are automatically marked with the blue "Blizz" logo while threads in which "Community MVPs" (somewhat comparable to Max or Hiero) replied are automatically marked with the green "MVP". So everyone can instantly notice which thread has an official reply or confirmed information.

After clicking on a thread there is a clickable icon on the right side to instantly jump to the Blizzard answers:



This makes navigating to official answers very easy and comfortable. On these forums here threads aren't automatically marked if you, JONK or Max replied neither are we able to directly jump to yours posts.

NM

Edited by user Friday, January 25, 2019 11:57:27 AM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Communication and transparency does not include censorship. You now want suggestions, after having a mod censor/remove/not allow any suggestion I have offered.
I have been a fan of racing games since the mid 90's.
You've abandoned everything that made this series enjoyable.
I could give you hundreds of ideas to improve the game, but as I have seen in the past, you will only censor them.
I went from a daily player to checking in once or twice a week.
One thing I would like to point out, people spent a lot of money on Fortune Island, yet the only prize we get for seasonal events is wheelspins. Convince me I should pay for the second expansion if I already know all I will get is useless wherlspins for my money. Want advice, talk to real gamers.

This is an example of something that we could do with better communication about. There are so many bugs in the game that if I reported them all it would be a full time job for weeks. I've submitted the odd one, but most of them I tend to just think surely they must already know about this. There's one where I know for certain another forum member has reported it, so I haven't reported it. But release after release goes by with almost none of the bugs ever being fixed, and indeed new bugs get introduced.

I suggested in the past that the devs could get a much clearer picture of issues people are experiencing if all known bugs were listed and there were a simple button to click next to each one to say "I'm experiencing this too". Then I could just go down the list clicking on buttons and they'd get a true picture of the vast numbers of people that will be experiencing all the bugs.

But if you want to have the same issue reported over and over again by different people, and won't fix it until a certain number of different people have reported it, then please let us know. It's not an efficient use of people's time to have to do this, so I'd rather we didn't have to, but at least we'd know there's officially no chance of bugs being fixed unless enough different people submit a ticket about the same bug.

Utilise the in-game messaging system for important announcements. I would have appreciated such a message in FH2 alerting me well in advance to the fact that the DLC was going to be removed from the store - and now it's too late!

Biggest issue for me is just the overall lack on communication coming back to us. Or the ratio of it. Perfect example was the 1st multiplayer discussion thread that ballooned to 60 pages. Then we got a couple sentences in the livestream(again, I wont watch them) about something something super vague changes. The result of all our discussions turned into getting one new thing implemented in the online multiplayer of the game(FFA).

I would like to see an issues status sticky thread. You could add issues that the dev team have actually discussed, and give a very brief response.

Example

Issue:wallriders are ruining online
Status: the team is aware of this issue and a fix is actively under development. No ETA available yet.

Issue: garage limit too small
Status: a fix isbcurrently being tested. It should release along side season 6 update in February

Issue: I want to paint brake calipers
Status: dev team has investigated this and determined it would take too many resources to develop in a reasonable time frame. Currently not being worked on

This is exactly what I was getting at. Thanks Rayne SE for giving an example.

I have to echo what Max and others have said regarding receiving information via stream/video. I do not watch the streams so the only way I receive information is when Max posts about it here in the forums, and I have to add that he does a fantastic job. I think an official summary posted in plain text here on the forums would be extremely helpful to those that can't watch the streams. Maybe even with time stamps for certain topics within the steam/VOD for those that want to watch that specific portion.

I appreciate what you're doing here. Just getting a discussion going around communication and transparency really shows that you care and I hope others can see that too.

Yes, to this. It would be nice for a single source (for example, this forum) to maintain a Full List of Items that are in discussion. If you don't have control over the Support Page where tickets are submitted and the list of "FH4 Known Issues" is kept, maybe this forum could take the information from the Support Page's "FH4 Known Issues" and add the additional issues that are brought up here that moderators here have passed on to the development team. In the same simple manner that Granola stated above and similar to the style that is on the Support Page. PG also implements some updates that are never specifically addressed anywhere to my knowledge (For example, extending the time to accept a ranked lobby session alert to allow adequate time to get out of your garage, paint job, photo mode, etc. and accept the alert. By the way, that little modification seems to have gone a long way in improving the chances of getting 12/12 for a session). It would be nice to see a more complete list of items (especially ones that are constantly brought up in the forums or that solve/help address issues that relate to common problems brought up in the forums).

There seem to be too many different locations with bits of information here and there, that make it difficult for users to find a one stop shop to find out what is going on. It feels as though if I were to go grocery shopping that I need to go to one store for milk, go to another store for cereal, and a third store for bananas.... Lists are a simple tool to maintain and update. Even if you can't discuss anything on a topic just seeing something show up on the list like the following would at least let us know we were heard by at least one person on the Forza Staff:
(These are just example responses that could at least satisfy the forum users that an issue/popular topic of discussion was acknowledged, these do not necessarily reflect an accurate disposition of the topic and I am using them merely for example of a response that would be better than silence on a topic)

Multiplayer Ranking Points System: We are unable to provide any additional information at this time on this topic.

Gifting of Hotwheels Rip Rod: This item will not be gifted.

Improvements to Online Matchmaking:
- Session Alert time to accept has been increased to 30 seconds when in freeroam and additional time provided to exit out of menus.
- Stability of matchmaking during Forzathon Live events is being investigated.
- Issues with full convoys having trouble joining a session is being investigated.
- Matchmaking to help pair skill levels of teams/individuals to match players against opponents of similar skill levels is currently not an issue that will be addressed.

Freeroam Rush: Will be kept in online adventures as is. Not enough feedback has been submitted through the Support Page to warrant a change.

etc, etc, etc.

You can group items by related topics/issues and update it weekly by showing the newly added/revised items for that week in BOLD RED and items that will no longer be addressed in ITALIC BLUE or something like that.

Edited by user Friday, January 25, 2019 2:48:01 PM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Nintendo released a short video today, addressing the status of a major game that was in development. Long story short, they're not happy with the game and have decided to start over with it. In the video, however, the developer/rep was straightforward with what was happening behind the scenes, and apologetic/acknowledged that the delay would push the release date back by a few years.

I think that Nintendo's video is a great example of how Playground could communicate with fans in the future. Not really the video aspect, but if possible, giving people additional information about things that are going on. I feel that the more things that people know, the more secure they'd feel about investing their time into the Forza Horizon franchise.

@retrokrystal i think you may have missed my point. it was not of tickets per se or the support page but of communicating in a more open manner here on the forums. this was only an example that would go far in bridging the communication gap between PG and end users. thx, marc

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I'm going to stop you there. Everything support page/ticket related needs to be messaged to @NitroGlitter as feedback.

Edited by user Friday, January 25, 2019 3:07:50 PM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Krystal, I have also opened tickets and I have received these responses:

"Thank you for reporting this issue. We are currently looking into this and your ticket will be added to our investigation. We will send out an announcement to the Community when we have a resolution. Thank you for your patience."

And then my ticket's status is marked as CLOSED.

Given that this is the "Transparency & Communication Discussion" thread, I feel the best constructive criticism I can give here is that you this is not a good way to handle customer-facing issues. It isn't transparent at all since I have no idea what really happens to the issue I've reported. All I know is that someone said you're "aware of" the issue, and yet it does not show up on the list of known issues (the page you linked above). And telling me I should take it up with @NitroGlitter directly is only going to pile on even more work for her and I imagine she's already completely swamped handling fresh batches of incoming tickets.

Transparency would, in my opinion, be well defined state-transition logic for customer facing tickets. Just brainstorming an example here: I submit a ticket describing my symptoms, screenshots, etc … let's say that becomes ticket 123456. When NitroGlitter or whoever ultimately triages this ticket, it can go into "Investigating" mode. If it's a known issue, you could mark it "Duplicate of 123444" and respond to the submitter … then the submitter can see 123444 as an issue on that page you linked above. That way the hundreds of us that are probably reporting the same general error would have some place to look, instead of some nebulous promise that it will some day appear in patch notes some time in the future maybe.

If it's not a known issue, you could leave it in "Investigating" state until you can justifiably decide to reject it (for example, not enough info, not reproducible, not-really-a-bug, etc) or add it as a new open issue on @NitroGlitter's afore-mentioned page.

The current policy of simply closing all customer-reported issues immediately and then not even tracking them on that page is the very opposite of transparent.

EDIT: also THANK YOU for making this thread. You're doing a great job as Community Liaison :)

Edited by user Friday, January 25, 2019 6:04:43 PM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

My 2 cts,

On a forum and on a thread, only last pages are read and new people are coming every day, 7 millions potential visitors as you stated it very recently. So if burning subjects are mixed, there is no way some are not going to create new posts and you will spend huge time locking again and again and again.

For instance, It is not good not to have pinned topic on wall riding / ramming and FFAA is not Ramming subject dedicated because it is not the only subject there. Class selection, this is bouncing several times a week for month now and still one coming to the forum willing to share about it will find no specific thread just like he was first willing to share about it.

I would propose 2 things.
- first, already shared, sorry for spamming, would be to have yourself a post where you list all the burning topics. It is for any visitor, new or not, to know that the subject is actually acknowledged from the staff. Single post, no comments just you to update it. I am sure you can list all the burning subjects by heart, many here can also but, new visitors, not a chance.

- Second, is one thread by subject, chase mixing subjects and fans here will do the same reporting people not going that way.

Possibly this discussion section needs to get folders representing the different feature of the game , Garage, AH, Online, Tuning , Painting , etc , just exact same you did on the support bug form 'Game Area' in fact.

Current feeling is more of a censoring raising thing going on overtaking moderation, group them in dark and hide them from everyone, same for requesting support tickets, much sound as a tentative to break the wave and hide. Support may not be a black box for you but it is for any visitor.

Last, when one quits forum upset, it is often to reach another he has more possibility to express,

Major Nelson offers a transcript for his podcasts:

https://twitter.com/majo...atus/1089234683278254080

Have you submitted a support ticket for that?


In all seriousness, a transcript would be great. Especially if the livestreams are organized so that each topic is covered once, and moved on from. That way there could be bullet points to note the various topics discussed at different sections.