8891 réponses à ce sujet

[ninja1900001990]

Is it kinda weird that I want this post to reach over 300 pages for some abstract displayed analogy...

[Innocent Bystander]

never targeted a specific individual

[REDACTED ANGRY RANT]

Surely you must be joking. That or you think that we are dumb as [REDACTED]. News flash, we can all read, you're not fooling anyone, except maybe yourself. I'd recommend using common sense instead of those big words.

[Filament]

This use of the thesaurus isn't poetic, it's just stilted and pretentious.

 

Nothing more needs to be said on the matter IMO.

[BansheeOwnage]

I can understand it from a business point of view, but it's dealing a devastating blow to the community.

That's the thing though, I think even from a business PoV, it's a bad idea, at least in the long-term. I've explained at length in other posts that I think the hype generated here before a release, ongoing discussion post-release, workarounds, bugfixes, guides, etc. keep a lot of people interested in the game long enough to buy DLC, the MP community makes it more likely that people will buy microtransactions, and in-depth reviews/opinions will encourage some people to buy new/old games.

 

But more importantly, the feedback generated here (and nowhere else on the same level) - if taken into account - would single-handedly overshadow all of the above in making people happy and therefore generating sales, whether that be at launch or adding improvements/features in DLC and patches.

 

Alas, Bioware's ego has grown too large to accept that maybe, just maybe, the fans have valid concerns, suggestions, and criticisms. Too large even, to swallow their pride and improve their games for the sake of professional integrity, pleasing fans, having a better reputation, and increasing sales. And I speak from personal experience when I say that.

 

And I have seen some with supporting arguments, too. But again, the vocal tantrums, spam, etc that has occurred will likely overwhelm the good done by the few; just like the rest of the forums.

You either have selective-vision, a selective memory, or a very limited opinion of what constitutes "good posts" combined with a very expansive opinion of what constitutes "spam" and "tantrums".

 

Now, begone with you and your hypocritical negativity.

Witch-slap.

 

They were also very present here on the months right before DAI release and vanished when people started complaining about problems with the game on PC.

Exactly. They were just fine being here pre-launch, when they could easily hype their game, but conveniently disappeared post-launch when began the feedback and inevitable response to glitches, bugs, and problems.

 

I LOVE YOU GUYS

“I am glad you are here with me. Here at the end of all things, Sam."

 

Y u do dis to me, Solas?

 

But I agree, it's been a blast being here with you guys

[ModernAcademic]

Been listening to this all night long, knowing we have only 3 days left: https://www.youtube....h?v=o22i_gqAf_o

[Illyria]

That's the thing though, I think even from a business PoV, it's a bad idea, at least in the long-term. I've explained at length in other posts that I think the hype generated here before a release, ongoing discussion post-release, workarounds, bugfixes, guides, etc. keep a lot of people interested in the game long enough to buy DLC, the MP community makes it more likely that people will buy microtransactions, and in-depth reviews/opinions will encourage some people to buy new/old games.

 

But more importantly, the feedback generated here (and nowhere else on the same level) - if taken into account - would single-handedly overshadow all of the above in making people happy and therefore generating sales, whether that be at launch or adding improvements/features in DLC and patches.

 

Alas, Bioware's ego has grown too large to accept that maybe, just maybe, the fans have valid concerns, suggestions, and criticisms. Too large even, to swallow their pride and improve their games for the sake of professional integrity, pleasing fans, having a better reputation, and increasing sales. And I speak from personal experience when I say that.

 

You either have selective-vision, a selective memory, or a very limited opinion of what constitutes "good posts" combined with a very expansive opinion of what constitutes "spam" and "tantrums".

 

Now, begone with you and your hypocritical negativity.

Witch-slap.

 

I'm really going to miss seeing your posts and perfect use of gifs.

[Lady Artifice]

This is a bad decision, Bioware. 

 

It's just a really, really bad decision. 

[Illyria]

This is likely going to be one of the last posts I make here.

 

I started using the forums back in 2014, when the hype for DAI was getting going.  I hung out in the original Cass thread, the Sera thread and the Solas thread (which became my home).  It's thanks to this forum that my interest in DA didn't immediatly fade after finishing DAI.  Unlike the other games (which I played isolated from the community) I had people who wanted to talk theory and lore with me.  I've always enjoyed Dragon Age and been a fan, but I became a bigger fan of Dragon Age thanks to being on these forums.

 

Being on these forums hasn't always been fun, and sometimes it's a very toxic place.  But that's what happens when a very large group of people with very different opinions come together.

 

So... yeah.

 

I'm going to miss this place.

[Ghaleon]

This is one of those decisions that really very clearly illustrate that this is no longer the Bioware that i think most of us liked, games we were drawn to. I am not sure if it was  EA buying Bioware or what  but the once great company definitely is  gone at this point.


It is  a  sad  thing to see this happen to a  company, it is funny Bioware a  company that once gave  CD Projekt Red a chance, has  fallen so  far. In a  vain  hope that anyone in charge of  Bioware reads  this you really should reconsider this decision, trying to force  your fans to Twitter and  facebook is a horrible choice and very much shows how out of touch bioware has become with it's  fans.

Take a  look at  CD Projekt Red and  learn from them instead of ostracizing your fans you should really try and welcome discussion and feedback instead of cutting fan base in half to only those with twitter and  facebook.


I know there are  toxic  people but do what any other development studio does, hire mods and community managers to help control that and create a friendly welcoming  place to socialize for  fans. And on that subject  seriously it's not  just the fans, quite a  few developer posts of former developers  etc were pretty damn condescending and only  fueled the issue.

As i have said before i know it matters little to a company that has  sold out what it once was, but unless Bioware shows it does care about fans i will never spend another cent on a  game or any  merchandise, i will buy future titles as pre owned so no money goes to Bioware. And i will encourage my friends to do the  same. Bioware won't notice i am sure but it makes me feel a bit better about this situation.

[Elhanan]

You either have selective-vision, a selective memory, or a very limited opinion of what constitutes "good posts" combined with a very expansive opinion of what constitutes "spam" and "tantrums".
 
Now, begone with you and your hypocritical negativity.

Don't believe so, but Thanks for the invite. Perhaps some simply get here before the mods clean up the thread.

[Fexelea]

Adding here too!

 

Fextralife mod applications are now open!. Click here.

[DragonRacer]

There is no more fitting music to listen to for the following on-topic post (it is "concerning our forums", after all) than this:

 

 

I've been dwelling on what my final thoughts here should be ever since the announcement. After the initial grieving and anger, I threw myself head-long into helping Cyonan build up a fan-run version of the BioWare Forum - a harkening back to the old BioWare Social Network/BSN. Frantically trying to save my MP Resource Libraries for both Mass Effect 3 and Dragon Age: Inquisition, resources that thousands have used and upon which many still count. Trying to bring over as many of the core group here as possible in the hopes that the community wouldn't completely fragment and be scattered to the winds.

 

Doing so was a helpful distraction, but now the countdown timer is nearing an end. The enormity of the situation is truly at hand. Reflection has started to occur and it hurts.

 

It hurts a lot.

 

Those who know me already know why both BioWare and this forum mean so much to me, have been such a big part of my life, and why it's so personal. For those who don't, this explains everything: https://www.youtube....h?v=VGTcp9-xLjA

 

In short, I've made many dear friends here - developer and fan alike - that I otherwise might not have if not for these forums. I know it had its moments and had its trolls, but there was a lot of good here. It was worth saving. I am immensely saddened that this was not taken to heart.

 

But I fear it's a decision that was a long-time coming. Back in January 2015, I started to sense the forums might have an unfortunate end impending. I wrote a seven-page dissertation on my thoughts concerning the forum, its problems, and how we might be able to work together - fan and developer - to help resolve them, and submitted them to a few of the devs in the hopes the marketing team might take it under consideration. For any curious, the full transcript is in the spoiler below. Seven pages. That's how much I personally cared about the forums and the community here.

 

Spoiler

Thoughts on Forum’s Potential Future
By Tiffany/DragonRacer

The BioWare Forum is a subject very near and dear to my heart, and also one that brings me some measure of sadness. I imagine my journey into fandom started like many others. I had never before paid much attention to specific developers or publishers; I just picked up games whose description on the back of the box sounded fun. A year after Dragon Age: Origins released, I picked up a used copy and gave it a whirl… and instantly fell in love.

What was the first thing I wanted to do? See what others were saying about it. I had questions to ask, feelings to share, other viewpoints to seek out. A quick Google search for “Dragon Age message board” brought up the BioWare Social Network. I lurked for a few weeks, reading countless threads and learning much. I also noticed there were certain posters in the forum with a BioWare tag denoting them as devs and I thought, “I have found the Holy Grail of gaming. An official forum where some of the developers of the actual game talk with the fans? Wow!”

I joined not too long after and made my fair share of posts and new threads. From the forum, I learned about Mass Effect, the other game series developed recently by BioWare. I was on PS3 and so only had access to Mass Effect 2 at the time. I asked fans on the forum if it was worth jumping into the trilogy without having access to the first game. Based on their feedback, I picked it up and fell in love all over again.

I followed the forum much more closely after that. Watched the pre-game hype for Dragon Age 2 and greatly enjoyed my time. And then came the post-release discovery that the forum had a darker side, as much toxicity came brewing up and anyone who enjoyed any aspect of DA2 was publicly flogged. I stopped visiting the forum so frequently.

Eventually, I came back again in full force as Mass Effect 3 came up on the horizon. I know I don’t need to rehash how the forum went after release; y’all had to live it and suffer it. It was watching the toxicity and insanity on the forum that spurred me to write that letter of “thank you and keep your chins up” after ME3 played a part in helping me deal with the aftermath of my mother’s suicide, the letter that was met with such an outpouring of care and love from you all that you made a loyal fan for life.

I determined not to be run off by negativity again and decided to work extra hard at being a positive influence in the forum. I mostly kept to the ME3 Multiplayer forum while the single player forums burned during that timeframe and focused on helping new players adjust to the game. I eventually went on to create a stickied thread of helpful links (http://forum.bioware...source-library/) and even ran the first, and only, successful fan tournament (http://forum.bioware.com/topic/449437-ultimate-n7-gauntlet-tournament-bonus-round-results-pg-37-thanks-to-all-for-a-great-tournament/). Much to my surprise, I became a bit of a leader in that forum and there are many now in the DAIMP forum who recognize me from there.

After making such an impact in the Mass Effect forum, I endeavored to do the same in the Dragon Age forum as you worked on Dragon Age: Inquisition, returning to my original roots as a Dragon Age fan. That was where I discovered the Twitter thread, fan-run and fan-updated, and eventually led to creating a Twitter account myself, as well as creating a stickied DAIMP resource thread in the same vein I made the ME3MP one.

I gave that long-winded back story to lead up to this (and this is where my public relations major from back in my college years starts to rear its head): your forum – your official forum – is a 24/7 public face for your company and your games. I started as a used game player who did a quick Google search one day and landed in your official forum. That led to me learning about your other games, purchasing them (even the older ones, like Baldur’s Gate and Neverwinter Nights), religiously preordering all your new games as the pre-game hype built, refusing to buy used games ever again because I want all my money in your pockets and not a used game store’s, and following your Facebook and Twitter accounts as well as your website and YouTube channel. I was led to those other official sources of information through the forum.

And yet, the forum seems to be the most “neglected” of the media sources you utilize. Obviously, somebody runs the website, the Twitter account, the Facebook account, the YouTube channel, and the blog in some sort of official capacity. But the forum feels a bit like a rudderless ship. News from those official sources oftentimes only shows up on the official forum when fans re-post the info. It’s like the forums exist and the fans largely run the show (which makes some sense, as we outnumber you by an extremely large margin; there will always be thousands more threads and posts by fans than by developers), but the only official presence are some faceless, numbered mods from what I’m guessing (perhaps wrongly) is an outsourced commodity. Occasionally some of the developers will volunteer their time to post, and that’s a mixed bag – sometimes people are nice and grateful for the information and other times people are complete and total dicks. Which often leads to the devs pulling back and then the fans grow restless and the cycle repeats itself over and over.

Threads like this one, they make me weep inside: forum.bioware.com/topic/545013-bioware-i-feel-like-youre-avoiding-your-customers/

It was started by a fan who I’ve always viewed as a good and positive one in the forums. The fact that he/she feels that way, and that many others echoed the feeling, is not a good situation.

Now, that being said, the interaction as of late has vastly improved. Vastly. Many devs are now posting informational threads on upcoming events or patches. Some are bouncing around answering questions. The fact you grabbed some PC folks to help beta test Patch 5 is simply phenomenal, in my opinion. This is good. No, this is great. This is what one envisions seeing in an official forum. The sad part is that this sudden resurgence of interaction appears to have occurred because of a literal fan uprising in the DAIMP forum that involved a very public lynch mob against one of the few devs who voluntarily tried to interact and caught the worse end of the deal.

Teddie Sage’s thread brings up an incredibly valid question: who is our Community Manager? Do we even have one? I had thought it was David Huleegard, but that doesn’t really seem to be the case as far as the forum goes. It was Chris Priestly once, and everyone on the forum knew this. Then it was Jessica Merizan, and, again, everyone on the forum knew this. Now both are gone elsewhere and we are left with literally zero clue. Who is running the forum in an official capacity? Is it even being run in an official capacity?

If there is a Community Manager for the forum, they may want to revisit how it’s being run from the top down. Or, if there isn’t one, the absence is most certainly felt. If there is one, but their job is to focus on the other official modes of information dissemination, then perhaps it may be time to consider a second position devoted to the forum? Perhaps it seems much to saddle a forum as only one position, but I do understand the forum is a massive beast compared to running the other accounts, which are largely about dispersing information moreso than direct fan interaction on as intimate a level as a message board presents.

I do not say all this to make anyone feel bad. I especially don’t say this to make any of the devs who do dedicate their own personal downtime to the forum feel as if they are not doing enough. Many of you know me well enough by now to know the depth of genuine love and respect I hold for you. And I have been there in the trenches, miserably watching as you get dogpiled sometimes. I know. I understand. But I recognize that you have your very unique dev perspective on the forum, while I have my own unique fan/user perspective on the forum. I say all this simply to try and express a fan’s view of the forum to you. That includes where it feels lacking and why.

So, what are my thoughts on how we can try and improve this? How can we make a safe space for the devs to interact without fearing witch hunts and for fans to feel like they have a positive community to interact with, rather than a place that drives them away because of negativity and toxicity (a complaint I see on Twitter a lot, sadly, and occasionally still feel myself at times)?

Let's pretend we blew it all up, Anders Chantry-style, and started from the ground up again.

I view maintaining a forum much like tending a garden. These are my three major guides:

1. You have to seed it properly and give it love and maintenance to grow good things. This means you need to have some type of presence in it – something regular, preferably, rather than in spouts and bursts dependent on mood and level of forum vitriol/happiness. Someone or several someones who regularly interact, even if that is maybe only once or twice a week and – this is important – spread equally across at least the most active subforums (i.e. giving more love and maintenance to the DAIMP forum may – and will, as I’ve seen grumblings – lead to dissent in other subforums, such as single player, who may feel neglected, ignored, cast aside, or less important than the multiplayer fans).

2. Weed regularly. There are a lot of troll accounts that exist only to raise people’s hackles and negative types who post the same copy-pasted complaint in every thread or make multiple threads across the forums to express their disdain… or, worse (in my opinion), only seem to exist to pop into any positive thread they see and immediately poop (real time forum note: a stronger word was used here, but I know better than to avoid the profanity filter) all over it. Please excuse the language on that, but there is truly no polite way to express how disgusting it is to see thread after thread started by a happy fan literally get shot down in the second or third post by one of the “resident whiners”. There is a fine line between someone expressing concern or a legitimate complaint about an issue they are having or a feature they dislike vs someone who appears to get their jollies by just being a Negative Nancy in as many threads as possible. Perhaps these simply aren’t being reported enough, but the weeds need to be pulled regularly. A thorny plant is fine and can be beneficial – after all, constructive criticism is how we all learn and grow, and there are plenty of fans capable of dispensing that in a civil manner – but the really bad or regularly bad ones need to be shown the door. These are, after all, your forums. You do not have to put up with a guest coming in and proceeding to lay a deuce on your fine Orlesian rug.

3. Maintain the mature plants while grooming the seedlings. This is just Business 101 no matter what you’re selling, whether it be newspaper ads or video games. You want and need to maintain your core (often hardcore, yes) customers while gaining news ones. After all, there is natural attrition as people move on to other games, become too busy to consider themselves gamers anymore, or otherwise leave the fandom and/or forum and you need fresh blood coming in to replace them and become your future “veterans”, while growing your overall baseline. This means patrolling subforums where the “newbies” are most likely to start their forum experience and making sure it’s a positive one (such as the general help subforum or the non-spoiler discussion one, as well as MP subforums where you’ll often see threads made by new players looking for help or advice). Nothing can be more off-putting than joining a forum and immediately getting assaulted by negativity. I saw that happen a few times in the ME3MP subforum and I made every effort to step in and tell people to chill out, and often would personally message the new person and apologize on behalf of us all. Made some friends and some new forum “veterans” from the experience, but I can only do so much. I am, after all, only one fan and I only have so much influence with my fellow fans – I am sure there are some who view me as just a “BioWare shill” or what have you.

These guidelines sound pretty solid, right? They also sound like so much puffery from a self-help book or one of those “30,000-mile bird’s eye view of the situation” types of meetings that look great on the paper and maybe you leave them feeling good and motivated, but then you realize nothing REALLY got said or done. How do you take a lame analogy about a nice garden with pretty flowers and make steps to actually, really achieve that?

I have a few thoughts on that front, too. You can take it or leave it or say, “Tiff, you’re out to lunch because you have no idea how our inner workings go down”… and you really can say that, you know, you’re not gonna hurt my feelings. I’m a forum “veteran”, after all, so my skin is Deep Roads-thick from mere survival. My only hope is that some part of this may be deemed a useful thought, if nothing else; a starting point for brainstorming.

1. Community moderators brought back or new ones enlisted? I remember back when we had named moderators, people like Ninja Stan (former employee, I know) or RaenImrahl. It seemed more personal and people tended to at least behave a little better if they felt like they “knew” the mods, even if they didn’t. Switching over to the BioWareModInsertNumberHere was a move that I understand from a bottom line and time management standpoint, but it raised a lot of discontent. And, honestly, it made things pretty awkward because I saw people and posts get temporarily banned/deleted because of an inside joke between friends getting taken totally out of context. Rules are important, but so is some level of leniency. Nobody wants to fear posting in a police state. Surely a good balance can be struck? After all, our own real life communities are monitored by the police who live among us, who know our community and are aware of “the usual suspects”. The original reason we were given for bringing the “faceless” mods in was that it would free the named moderators up to interact more with the community. Instead, they disappeared entirely. Perhaps a return to them or, at least, their heritage is one for consideration? Heavy forum users who are online a lot, who are familiar with the community, who have proven trustworthy (Hrungr and ElitePinecone immediately spring to mind as examples), who are in a lot of the threads every day. If they were empowered to redirect the flow of a hot topic thread or to warn a troublemaker, I think that would be immensely helpful. I think many posts or threads go unreported simply because people might not understand the report feature, they fear a full thread closure/deletion rather than one or two people/posts being moderated, or the general disdain of thinking themselves a “snitch”. Regular community members – empowered – could address such issues when they see them, rather than rely on hoping someone reports trouble while a thread festers more and more.

2. A moderator or developer assigned to each subforum or similar grouping of subforums? Maybe this is a bit much to ask of people who are already volunteering their limited time, but it may behoove considering. Of the devs who like and want to interact with the forum, perhaps they could all get together and organize themselves into a collective and segment certain parts of the forum out to “monitor” or “maintain” (preferably the ones they have a direct interest in, of course). For example, someone taking on the Dragon Age: Inquisition single player forums, someone taking the Dragon Age: Inquisition Romance/Character forums, someone taking the Dragon Age MP forums, someone taking the Mass Effect 3 single player forums, repeat previous examples, etc. That particular dev who has taken on a certain subforum or set of subforums would take it upon himself or herself to be responsible for stickied topics, providing general info such as an FAQ (if needed), a list of bugs being reviewed (if allowed to disclose), balance changes, hints at upcoming content (as allowed and if allowed, of course), announcement of weekend challenges/insider videos/livestreams, etc. If it’s worthy of being posted on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or as a news update on the website or the blog, it’s worthy of being posted on the appropriate subforum. These are the official forums, after all. 

3. If that’s not feasible, could “Community Collectors” be a viable option? Good forumites like myself, Hrungr, ElitePinecone, etc. that could be given some type of displayed status showing we have a semi-official capacity forum-wise (a step below moderator?), who can collect the hottest topics/issues and maybe submit a weekly report/inquiry to a designated dev liaison? That could help to give the forum answers/some “official” dev presence without asking the devs themselves to stick their necks out on their free time. Let us take on some of your burden and help funnel the most important issues, if need be. You need not shoulder this alone. Let some of your “super users” help with the task. I am sure many would see it as a great honor.

4. Create surveys for folks to provide real feedback they feel is actually viewed? Like the Keep team did during the Beta. Because having a Feedback subforum specifically for “Want to get your thoughts directly to the BioWare Community Team? Put it down on paper here” and then nothing happens in there save for faceless mods locking threads is just… it’s quite possibly the most neglected subforum and in that there is an irony I cannot quite describe given what its intended purpose was for. Is that subforum even being looked at? By anyone? That one should perhaps get the most attention out of any since that is what its stated purpose is.

5. Community Manager – maybe this needs to be extended to a second person, if the current role is too much for just one to handle? And that very well could be (I know I said that before earlier in my ramblings, but I feel it deserves repeating). 

I will leave this rather long-winded dissertation on these final thoughts:

I remember David Huleegard blogging about a “Day in the Life of a Community Manager” a long while back, how much coordination with the various teams that entailed, but I saw a lot of mention about YouTube videos, the Twitter account, and the Facebook account. And experimenting with Instagram. No real mention of the official forums. At all. Which is as perplexing as it is a bit disturbing, honestly. These aren’t unofficial fan forums. These aren’t a random place on the Internet or a subforum on some random gaming site. These are your official forums. When people who have bought your games go online to find info – be it general discussion or tech help or “how do I solve this quest, help, I am stuck” – the BioWare forum comes up basically at the top of the organic Google search engine. That’s money. People spend a lot on search engine optimization to rise that high in Google searches, and that money doesn’t guarantee the kind of positioning you already have (I know this for a fact because I sell this in my daily job). 

So, naturally, customers searching see that result link near the top and go there. Only to see some praise, a lot of bitching, some help, and very little of anything official. It’s an untended garden. There are weeds everywhere and a newcomer has no idea where to look other than to be overwhelmed (maybe some type of “Welcome to the Official BioWare Forums” introductory forum or stickied thread at the top of the forum giving further direction/outlining the subforums, etc). That’s how I started my forum life. I took my knocks from trolls and persevered because I’m hard-headed and resilient like that, but new forumites need not have to go through the same.

I'd like to think that the public forum is not beyond hope of saving. It just needs a little extra help and, in my opinion, a unified guiding force, such as a Community Manager. If this is not something deserving of an official BioWare employee, surely it’s deserving of a dedicated fan volunteer, group of fan volunteers, or something. Let’s work together to make a forum that represents your company and games in the brightest light and provides a safe place for fans to gather and talk, both with the developers and amongst themselves.

 

Instead, now we sing a funeral dirge.

 

In closing, I think this is a terrible and disheartening decision. I also know that none of this wailing and gnashing of teeth will do any good. I doubt anyone from BioWare is even reading this far into the thread anymore (feel free to prove me wrong, old friends). I wish it hadn't come to this and, frankly, I'm still in shock.

 

I've been cut deeply by this. But I'll survive. I always do. After all, I've been through worse loss than this.

 

I extend a welcome to those who'd like to join http://bsn.boards.net . Nothing will ever be the same as this place was, but we do what we can with what we have. The community is vibrant and strong, the Twitter threads have joined, the Off-Topic Lobby lives once more, and we hope to have a bright future of being a place for BioWare fans (and non-BioWare fans) to gather.

 

As to the official BioWare forum... goodbye. You will be missed very much by at least one woman down in Florida.

 

[line_genrou]

Like it was said, it's such a bad and nonsense decision that the only reason for this that I can think of is that BioWare is its dying days/months. EA is preparing to dissolve the company. Maybe they will endure a couple of months after ME:A is released but I have serious doubts now that they will release another game.

[thesuperdarkone2]

Pineapple day is coming

[Lewie]

From the beginning, fans of Dragon Age/Mass Effect (etc) have had a place to talk in depth about their experiences, share with other people in a way that you can't do elsewhere. Talk, debate, argue, laugh...  the forums have been a huge part of the core of these games, for a long time, be wary of what you are taking away. 

 

Saying that, I'm not at all surprised, just disappointed. Again.

[felipejiraya]

[QueenPurpleScrap]

My Wardens, my Champions, and my Inquisitors wanted a chance to say farewell. And so, before the end brings the curtain down on us all:

 

[TinaW]

I have been reading this forum for quite a while, always too shy to actually post. So it is now or never, I guess. I am really going to miss this place. It is was a great source of useful information and interesting opinions on various topics. Everything in one place, in a user-friendly layout. It saddens me that all of it will just vanish. Also, closing the forum kind of seems like back-stabbing a really large group of true, enthusiastic fans. Somehow I have a really bad feeling about this...

[Nefla]

RIP BioWare. I will never forget the countless hours I spent totally absorbed in KotOR, Jade Empire, Dragon Age Origins, Mass Effect 1 and 2, and SWtOR's 8 class stories nor do I think I will ever find another game company that makes me feel the way I felt during that phase of your games.

 

I've been thinking for a few years now that it might be time to give up video games all together but I don't know what I'd do with myself. I'm thinking within the next few years I won't really have a choice and there will be zero games I like.

[Cheiron the Centaur]

>> Because we know there is a lot of information on there you may want to keep, the public boards will remain in a read-only state until October 25, 2016. After that date, they will be taken down.

 

 

I never posted much on these forums, but I visit them on a regular basis as a source of information. I didn't visit these forums to talk to developers, I visited to read through the information posted by other gamers. So the reasoning given for closing down these forums, is just plain crap.

And there is so much information here that isn't on the wikis (and searching for that info on tumblr or reddit is hell). So to me it really doesn't make sense to only keep that information available for 2 more months. Why not keep an archive.bioware.com site in the air for a few more years, instead of only until October 25, 2016?
 

Alternatively, maybe someone from the community can make a full backup of this website, and keep that backup available after this one is shut down? (I hope Bioware would approve of something like that)

[Cheiron the Centaur]

RIP BioWare. I will never forget the countless hours I spent totally absorbed in KotOR, Jade Empire, Dragon Age Origins, Mass Effect 1 and 2, and SWtOR's 8 class stories nor do I think I will ever find another game company that makes me feel the way I felt during that phase of your games.

 

I've been thinking for a few years now that it might be time to give up video games all together but I don't know what I'd do with myself. I'm thinking within the next few years I won't really have a choice and there will be zero games I like.

 

Yeah, it appears that Bioware is as good as dead. For me that started when they were taken over by EA (that's when things really started to go downhill)... and closing their own forums is just another nail in their coffin.

Fortunately there are companies like Larian, inXile and Obsidian (edit: and how could I forget CD Projekt here!) who still invest heavily in making RPG's the way I like them, so I don't think I'll be retiring from RPG's anytime soon...

 

I just regret that all the useful information posted by fellow gamers on this forum, will soon be gone...

[AngryFrozenWater]

 

Because we know there is a lot of information on there you may want to keep, the public boards will remain in a read-only state until October 25, 2016. After that date, they will be taken down.

 

 

I never posted much on these forums, but I visit them on a regular basis as a source of information. I didn't visit these forums to talk to developers, I visited to read through the information posted by other gamers. So the reasoning given for closing down these forums, is just plain crap.

And there is so much information here that isn't on the wikis (and searching for that info on tumblr or reddit is hell). So to me it really doesn't make sense to only keep that information available for 2 more months. Why not keep an archive.bioware.com site in the air for a few more years, instead of only until October 25, 2016?
 

Alternatively, maybe someone from the community can make a full backup of this website, and keep that backup available after this one is shut down? (I hope Bioware would approve of something like that)

 

That backup by the community is being made. Follow the link in my sig.

[Cheiron the Centaur]

That backup by the community is being made. Follow the link in my sig.

 

Awesome, thanks for the info. I'll go and create an account right away (how about people who are long gone from here or who don't create an account on your forum... will their posts be gone forever, or will all their posts be saved onto some generic archive account?)

[shodiswe]

Tbh, it's always seemed like it's been more of a place for the fans to hang out, rather than to meet the devs.

Even if people might have hoped that some devs might have visited the place from time to time, it's never been something that people expected since it evidently wasn't used for that. Except for announcements that is.

 

They could have made some of the more "excellent" non-warned people on these forums mods, if they feel it needed more monitoring and they wern't up to it.

[AngryFrozenWater]

Awesome, thanks for the info. I'll go and create an account right away (how about people who are long gone from here or who don't create an account on your forum... will their posts be gone forever, or will all their posts be saved onto some generic archive account?)

No problem. All posts will be preserved. The link provides a way to merge your account with the posts that are backed up.