Why?

I've been wanting to write this for a while now. I saw that we are getting the next hero in June, at the earliest, and that just "pushed me over the edge" ( 8-| ). This is not meant to bash on Gaz, so let me know to change stuff if you think it is worded harshly, @AgentFenixion (I would rather this not be closed until I either get a response, until I am blatantly ignored, or until someone decides to just derail this topic. Please). Honestly, I am just equally curious and letdown right now. For my own sanity and because I hate long walls of text, I will try and break this up as much as possible.

Artifact to Examine:

@Ryolnir said:
Seven heroes? Why are there less heroes than last year?

Now that we're coming up on three years of Marvel Heroes, we've added a lot of heroes to the game with a (mostly) once a month cadence. As much as we love doing this, it's definitely taken time away from lots of other important initiatives, including content, system changes, and balance changes. This year, we have a lot of new initiatives to focus on (which we'll detail soon) and a lot of content we'd like to build. In order for the quality of these things to be high and come out when we feel good about them, we decided that making less playable heroes was the right answer. Quality over quantity for this year going forward.

INTRO:

2015 was a pretty rocky year for Marvel Heroes. I think we can all agree that the game started out in a good spot and then slowly started to decline over the year. It never got to the point where I considered it bad, but it certainly was not as good as I had come to expect. With the displeasure from the players evident, Gaz decided to take a new approach: Quality over quantity! That sounded good to everyone. I even didn't mind the fact that we got reduced from 12 heroes in the year to 7 heroes. I sure as hell did not have a negative reaction to the heroes in the AP3.

However, with 1/3 of 2016 done, has anything actually changed? Green Goblin fans, I am looking at you :P . We have a slew of bugs with every patch, we have heroes that aren't getting tuned within weeks/months of their release, and we even have Test Center feedback that isn't incorporated that would have greatly helped the character in his/her release. I know bugs will always be present in the game, but it seems as if matters are getting worse. Am I alone in the feeling that MH2016 is on the same mediocre trend that the last half of MH2015 was on? Or am I just being my usual cynical Language! self 8-} ?

Meat of this thread WHERE THE S#&T GOES DOWN!

Let's look at the artifact. @Ryolnir , we were told that the number of heroes was going down because you guys want to take more time with each character, the development time was rushed, it took away time from other aspects of the game, and you just generally wanted better quality products produced.

Elektra, Black Cat, and Green Goblin were all produced in that same "1 month" period, no? I honestly can't recall, but it feels like you guys spent the same amount of time on the first three AP3 characters as you did with all of the AP2 characters. Green Goblin is a mess, right Goblin fans? Black Cat and Elektra seem to be in a good place and like they had good work done on them, and I actually really enjoyed Elektra, but they also seem like 50% copy and paste from other heroes. I understand that with 50+ characters already present in the game that it will be hard to come up with original powers and whatnot, but it feels like the creativity put into them is slipping. Also, Green Goblin hasn't gotten any work done on him. What's up with that statement I see where people say devs have said something like, "we look at our numbers over the weeks after a release and tune the hero accordingly." Is that just something players have made up? If it's a true statement, then what's up doc?

Quality of Life updates and Visual Updates. Anyone else thought we would get a boat-load of these since the number of heroes went down by almost half? How many have we gotten since 2016 began? Just Daredevil's? Almost Emma's. If you guys aren't focusing on QoLs/VUs, then what are you focusing on? Red Ax...Red Axis Raid :)) :)) ? Certainly not on releasing characters, as evidenced by quite a few factors (not getting anymore until at least June and the same rushed schedule from last year).

Wanted more time to do other things instead of creating characters? Like what, exactly? I'm not entitled to details, but you guys have built such a bad rapport with customers (or at least with me) that it's hard to believe much of what you guys say. The bad really does outshine a lot of the good you guys do. Honestly, I really do believe that you guys just cut down the number of characters released because you guys knew you were moving and didn't want the workload. I may be 100% wrong, but you guys have done nothing to reinforce the notion that I am wrong. I think you guys are using the "quality over quantity" sentiment as a scapegoat.

What we have gotten: Omega increase/rework and new node. I commend you guys on this. Good job.

You say "this year, we have a lot of new initiatives to focus on (which we'll detail soon) and a lot of content we'd like to build." Once again, I am not entitled to detail and I know this forums has a running joke about the unobtainable "soon." However, this statement is...for lack of a better term, meaningless. "We will do stuff and and you will get details soon." As far as I have seen, that "soon" is yet to come...4 months into 2016. The omega rework does not classify as "a lot of content," I don't think. Red Axis was supposed to be in the game many months ago and was even stated that it would be in the game after defense review and omega rework. Well, that didn't happen. Not even sure why I am complaining about that, as adding Red Axis really wouldn't be adding anything to the game. It really wouldn't.

The tournaments...Plain and simple, the Daredevil tournament was pretty bad. First attempt, so I guess we should give it a pass? Or nah? I'm leaning towards nah. Midtown tournament is pretty meh to me. It's on a Monday, so I just go in for 1 kill in MM and CMM for the participation trophy. The Danger Room tournament actually is pretty good and has lots of potential. Needs a few tweaks and it could be really good. However, I don't classify these tournaments as "content." Especially not MM/DD tournaments.

Not sure what else I can say before I start rambling on. Oh yea, one last thing. What's with this "make this game 'easier' for newer players," mentality. You guys are actively pushing away your vets in the hopes that you can pull in new blood. Far as I can tell, it's working against you. You should make the current playerbase happy, and then that's how you show new blood that the game is good.

CLOSING / TL;DR of sorts

-You guys have pretty bad schedule maintenance and product delivery. It's kind of a turnoff, to be honest.

-I think the quality over quantity was an escape route for you guys and had almost no substance to it.

-A third of this year is over and it feels almost exactly like last year.

-Community, Marvel IP, and the F2P model are the 3 best things about this game. If you take away that community, which is kind of what you are doing with some of these changes, you are really hurting this game, IMHO.

-I guess this is just a poorly written piece telling Gaz how I think they have not necessarily lived up to what they have said and that it feels like this game is sort of just "settling" at this mid-tier stage instead of striving for that top-tier stage.

-Should I take a break from the game to bring back the excitement? Maybe, maybe not. I still like the game when I log in. It's not like anything is going to change that will instantly make me like this game better (oh wait. Thanos or Hulk QoL would :P ).

-Yes, I see the worst in people.

-Do I want to be wrong about much of/everything I said? Yes. Do I think I am? Not in the slightest.

To those that read this in its entirety, I commend you. I didn't even reread it after writing it. Too much text :P