What Happened to Flame Notes In Rockband Blitz?????

[Epsilon82]

So you ruin the gameplay of Rock Band Blitz just so you can have an event that is only available for a percentage of your market base which is US players only? Wow..yeah I am done with this game. It was a fun ride.

Let's not jump to any conclusions quite yet. I'm going to give Harmonix the benefit of assuming that they wouldn't set a torch to their own game for such a silly reason, at least until they come out and say so themselves.

[metalkorn]

I have NO desire to mix my Facebook world and Rockband world. Not only that but I have never downloaded an App for Facebook of any kind and never will. I don't trust any of it. Blitz was my first introduction to Rock Band and I was really impressed with Harmonix. If all this is true I will have to rethink where I spend my money.

I am starting to think that they have some type of marketing deal going on here. Selling your information for those who sign up through Facebook. Make sure all of you read all terms of Service and be well aware of what they are doing with your information.

Now that is some serious paranoia right there. You are missing out on what makes Blitz great without any of the recent changes if you are not using RB World. I now take your criticisms with a grain of salt.

[cowboys282]

Now that is some serious paranoia right there. You are missing out on what makes Blitz great without any of the recent changes if you are not using RB World. I now take your criticisms with a grain of salt.

You call it Paranoia I call it common sense. Some of us work in the real business world and are well aware of the landscape that is out there. But like I said simply read any terms of service their lawyers put out. But you sound like someone who signs up for anything and does not read what they are giving up when they sign up. To each their own.

[Epsilon82]

Cowboys282, to address what you said in that other thread that got locked, let me be perfectly clear: I have no beef with what MasterMO or other legitimate Band/Flame players do. I saw MasterMo play and he is legitimately playing both lanes without dropping Blitz mode inordinately, which requires a massive amount of skill. If Harmonix buffed Blitz mode, players like him would only be further rewarded, not punished.

The potential for button mashers to do basically the same thing, though, is a different story. That's just abuse. That's the only reason I'd suggest buffing Blitz mode. But it's obvious we're on the same page here in terms of the larger picture. I would much, much rather Harmonix just roll this back to the way it was two days ago and leave well enough alone than continue with the present configuration. I was right in the middle of replacing all of my crappy Road Rage/Blast Notes scores with Jackpot/Flame now that I'm not a noob, and it's depressing beyond belief that now I have basically no chance of even matching my noob runs unless I go back to using the noob combo.

[cowboys282]

Cowboys282, to address what you said in that other thread that got locked, let me be perfectly clear: I have no beef with what MasterMO or other legitimate Band/Flame players do. I saw MasterMo play and he is legitimately playing both lanes without dropping Blitz mode inordinately, which requires a massive amount of skill. If Harmonix buffed Blitz mode, players like him would only be further rewarded, not punished.

The potential for button mashers to do basically the same thing, though, is a different story. That's just abuse. That's the only reason I'd suggest buffing Blitz mode. But it's obvious we're on the same page here in terms of the larger picture. I would much, much rather Harmonix just roll this back to the way it was two days ago and leave well enough alone than continue with the present configuration. I was right in the middle of replacing all of my crappy Road Rage/Blast Notes scores with Jackpot/Flame now that I'm not a noob, and it's depressing beyond belief that now I have basically no chance of even matching my noob runs unless I go back to using the noob combo.

I agree with what you say Epsilon. Although it was easy to beat them I understand less skilled players were achieving higher scores by just button mashing. I never got to try this to truely experience what everyone is talking about.

After reading your post it is now clear what SHOULD have happened. Like someone said yesterday you cannot nerf anything as it would render the leaderboards useless which has happened. If they buffed blitz mode that would have fixed this problem.

Instead the entire community is getting punished. Which in turn sounds like a direct result of some US only Facebook tournament. Like most things in the world today this sounds like a money grab on Harmonix part and to cover all their legal bases they compromised the integrity of a great game.

[hmxhenry]

Hey all, thanks for your patience. As you may have seen, yes, we are planning to launch a series of tournaments for Blitz via RB World. The intent was to announce both the tournaments and the flame note re balance in the same announcement, but due to a scoring bug in the tournament system that's been further delayed. But, rather than make those affected in this thread wait any longer, I wanted to post some additional clarification here. Below is an excerpt from the announcement that will go out when tournaments are officially launched:

We’ve rolled out a small, targeted Power-up rebalance in conjunction with the Tournament system that will tone down the Flame Note Power-up. We want these Tournaments to be as level a playing field as possible so you all feel compelled to join, and this is a step towards that.

As you probably know, we've already deployed a rebalance like this before, and it's possible we will again in the future. Doing this is all in service of keeping the game as fair and competitive as possible, but also to prevent everyone from settling on one single loadout for their Blitzing pleasure.

Before digging in any deeper, I want to highlight the beginning of that last paragraph: we have done re balances like this before and it's possible we will again. Nothing is set in stone and we are 100% ready to listen to feedback from users of all experience levels. Please keep that it mind before reading on.

So, why is this happening? We've tracked a ton of user feedback (here, on Twitter, on Facebook, in email, etc) and a ton of in game data, and it became clear that Flame notes were overpowered. Compared to other power ups, compared to scores logged using other power ups, compared to the regularity with which users selected other power ups... it wasn't as balanced as it should be.

Why is this happening now? With Tournaments planned to launch this week, we were looking at a string of leaderboard driven competitions with real world prizing with a significant cash value. It was essential to us that these tournaments were as balanced as possible for those participating. Leaderboard bragging rights are one thing, but with consistent prizing on the line as well, we wanted to ensure a more level playing field.

Why weren't other power ups raised instead? The launch date for tournaments left us with a rather narrow margin of time to implement in game changes. Add in the holiday, and that leaves significantly less time. In game changes aren't as simple as flipping a switch, and every change means additional rounds of testing, additional errors to consider, additional side effects in other areas, etc. That means implementing a re balance on 10+ power ups, versus a re balance of 1 was a huge timing issue for us to consider.

What about leaderboards? We're aware of potential leaderboard / high score / gold star / score dependent Goals side effects and we're actively discussing that with the dev team. We don't want to leave any goals unattainable / any songs un gold starrable / any Goals impossible to complete, etc. There are a number of possibilities, and as I mentioned above we are totally open to feedback.

I hope that helps shed some light on the reasoning behind this change. There's nothing sinister going on and we're not looking to ruin Blitz game play for anyone. We'll likely be posting more in the coming days once tournaments are fully online, we can track participation, and Pope is back in the office to help steer things a bit. I know that people have a lot of time and emotion invested in this game and that can lead to a lot of passionate feedback. That isn't lost on anyone here at Harmonix. But rest assure that Blitz isn't broken, and nothing is broken that can't be fixed. That's one of the advantages of having Blitz so connected on the server side, being able to react to community feedback on anything ranging from the in game economy to Goals to power ups. We'll continue to track feedback in this thread and in the usual venues for discussion, so please keep posting.

[jibjqrkl]

I am starting to think that they have some type of marketing deal going on here. Selling your information for those who sign up through Facebook. Make sure all of you read all terms of Service and be well aware of what they are doing with your information.

ever read what google does with all the info they get from you?
or pretty much any site?

[cowboys282]

Hey all, thanks for your patience. As you may have seen, yes, we are planning to launch a series of tournaments for Blitz via RB World. The intent was to announce both the tournaments and the flame note re balance in the same announcement, but due to a scoring bug in the tournament system that's been further delayed. But, rather than make those affected in this thread wait any longer, I wanted to post some additional clarification here. Below is an excerpt from the announcement that will go out when tournaments are officially launched:



Before digging in any deeper, I want to highlight the beginning of that last paragraph: we have done re balances like this before and it's possible we will again. Nothing is set in stone and we are 100% ready to listen to feedback from users of all experience levels. Please keep that it mind before reading on.

So, why is this happening? We've tracked a ton of user feedback (here, on Twitter, on Facebook, in email, etc) and a ton of in game data, and it became clear that Flame notes were overpowered. Compared to other power ups, compared to scores logged using other power ups, compared to the regularity with which users selected other power ups... it wasn't as balanced as it should be.

Why is this happening now? With Tournaments planned to launch this week, we were looking at a string of leaderboard driven competitions with real world prizing with a significant cash value. It was essential to us that these tournaments were as balanced as possible for those participating. Leaderboard bragging rights are one thing, but with consistent prizing on the line as well, we wanted to ensure a more level playing field.

Why weren't other power ups raised instead? The launch date for tournaments left us with a rather narrow margin of time to implement in game changes. Add in the holiday, and that leaves significantly less time. In game changes aren't as simple as flipping a switch, and every change means additional rounds of testing, additional errors to consider, additional side effects in other areas, etc. That means implementing a re balance on 10+ power ups, versus a re balance of 1 was a huge timing issue for us to consider.

What about leaderboards? We're aware of potential leaderboard / high score / gold star / score dependent Goals side effects and we're actively discussing that with the dev team. We don't want to leave any goals unattainable / any songs un gold starrable / any Goals impossible to complete, etc. There are a number of possibilities, and as I mentioned above we are totally open to feedback.

I hope that helps shed some light on the reasoning behind this change. There's nothing sinister going on and we're not looking to ruin Blitz game play for anyone. We'll likely be posting more in the coming days once tournaments are fully online, we can track participation, and Pope is back in the office to help steer things a bit. I know that people have a lot of time and emotion invested in this game and that can lead to a lot of passionate feedback. That isn't lost on anyone here at Harmonix. But rest assure that Blitz isn't broken, and nothing is broken that can't be fixed. That's one of the advantages of having Blitz so connected on the server side, being able to react to community feedback on anything ranging from the in game economy to Goals to power ups. We'll continue to track feedback in this thread and in the usual venues for discussion, so please keep posting.

Thank you for a response. It is nice to see responses on a forum from developers as not all games have this. Your post was detailed and explained everything from Harmonix point of view.

That being said it seems to me this move to nerf flame notes was rushed and not all the possibilities were considered. Why launch this change without first having a solution to the leaderboard issue.

And the idea of tournaments is great. If it was in the game I bought I would love it. but its not. the tournaments will be on Facebook. Although I don't have the number i am sure there is a large population in the game that do not use your Facebook App. So this tournament feature will not enhance i=the game for that group who does not use the Facebook App.

There is no question that Flame notes were the best power up in the game. But they also required the most skilled. Similar to Jackpot. It is only as good as the player using it. The harder the power up the greater the reward.

I might be wrong and I don't have the analytics to look at as you do but my guess is this. The majority of unique users to the game come from the ability to compete with friends and others on the top of in game leaderboards. Not because of Rockband world.

There are 6,000 users joined in Rockband world. I know there are at least 160k users on Xbox alone who have played Blitz. Lets be conservative and say PS3 has 140k users for 300k total users. Rockband world makes up 2% of all Rockband Blitz players.

Now I am sure your marketing people are going to use this whole tournament thing to increase your user count on the Facebook App. But like when any marketing decision is made the rest of us are rarely considered. I have no reason to play your game now since I will not be using your Facebook App. I am only one person but I am sure there are many others.

Will see in the long run if this was the right move. And maybe it was the right move economically. I will be happy to come back when the in game leaderboards matter again. Until than I will spend my time and money on the plenty of other games that are out there.

Thanks as always for your time and hard work.

[Mircosoft93]

Why weren't other power ups raised instead? The launch date for tournaments left us with a rather narrow margin of time to implement in game changes. Add in the holiday, and that leaves significantly less time. In game changes aren't as simple as flipping a switch, and every change means additional rounds of testing, additional errors to consider, additional side effects in other areas, etc. That means implementing a re balance on 10+ power ups, versus a re balance of 1 was a huge timing issue for us to consider.

I'd rather have a fully balanced game (to some point because characteristics of a song and luck can't be considered) than a tournament half of the competitive Blitz players can't take part in, but I'm open to any change of the game and thankful for the time you guys put in Blitz. I'm just hoping the leaderboards will be reset

[cowboys282]

ever read what google does with all the info they get from you?
or pretty much any site?

I don't use Google. And that is exactly why I only register on a site that I want to. Think of the difference between registering here at rockband.com and Facebook. They are very different. On Rockband.com they ask for your birthdate and email address.

Now think of the information about yourself on Facebook. A lot more than your Birthdate and email address right? You are comparing Apples and Oranges. Which is why I simply told people to stay informed and read the Terms of Service the Harmonix lawyers release.