5 Comments:

• REECEYBABY

  May 10th, 2012 at 12:58 pm When i am all sorted, i will be making a snowstorm tutorial video, i would also like to bring to your attention this letter that has been sent to many staff members, it highlights fixes and missing features from snowstorm: THE ISSUE OF SNOWSTORM Dear paul lafontaine, I would like to start this letter by thanking members of your staff for directing me to you, they were very helpful, to name names; juho, alex, hilipatihei, yurre and hp81$. I would also like to mention Deegers, who, even though she is not staff, helped direct me to the appropriate people. To each one of these people i gave my original bulk letter that was comprised of three letters sent at various times of snowstorms return, they found my ideas interesting and told me to talk to you. I have decided to pick out key points from the previous letters, and make a fresh letter. I will warn you now, this letter is long, but i believe every word is appropriate for putting points across regarding snowstorm. Secondly i would like to thank all staff that were involved in the “restoration” of snowstorm, not only me, but alot of the community were waiting for its return, you could not begin to understand the joy that was felt when we heard snowstorm was returning, it really made everyones christmas, i saw so many people returning to see this brand new remake. The concept is the same, knock your opponent down with snowballs, but the game is not the same, there are quite a few things i noticed in game that i thought i would bring to your attention and some possible fixes: Snowballs travel about 10 blocks before disintegrating, this is obviously a design flaw, as this makes long ranged shifting impossible, and takes alot of skill away from the game. I have been told to use shift+alt for mid range lobs, and alt for long range lobs, but this really is not effective in a battlefield situation, original “shifting” was a fast technique, and it was hard to dodge if placed correctly, both of these “lobs” are easy to dodge. I can show you many examples in classic snowstorm where snowballs were not restricted. Another flaw i found is that this version seems to be slower than the last, the game speed itself seems to have been reduced just a tad. I could be mistaken, but it seems all the in-game features: moving, shifting, picking up snowballs, throwing them are just in general, slower. Angled shots (usually shots thrown at diagonals to a player) may pass through the other side of a player (the shot hasn’t registered that it has hit the player). As it is, players that are knocked down still retain their snowballs, i believe this is a mistake as it makes actually getting k’oed all the more acceptable, i believe a player that gets knocked down should be stripped of all the snowballs he was carrying, this would make defensive tactics all the more important (dodging) as well as a clear penalty for not being quick enough on your feet. The playing area size has stayed the same, but you seem to have added scenery around the edges of the arenas , this would be great if it did not impede upon the gameplay itself. But it does, it makes your character even smaller than classic version, and this in turn, makes placing snowballs hard, and trying to spot yourself even harder. This extra scenery may have something to do with the extra lag some players receive in-game. Another bug sometimes happens when you have knocked down an opponent, if they had been previously firing at you, they will still throw a few snowballs at you even though they are lying on the ground. Friendly fire should be turned on (being able to hit your own team) it makes the game more realistic and if i know someone on my team has one hit left before they are k’oed, i would rather take that person down myself than let the other team have those extra points (killing your own team does not award any points whatsoever). The reload button that was originally down the bottom of the display, has been moved up towards the left, with the button being here, a player could accidently minimize the screen (pretty deadly if theyre in a big game) you might want to think about making a hotkey like you do for shift and alt, maybe \ to reload, as it is close to both shift and alt, and would add another level of skill to snowstorm. You could also move the button back to its original place next to the chat bar, both options seem viable. Trees seem to have been upgraded, they now take real time damage; i like this, one of the only things i found to be an improvement, adds another level of strategy to the game. The player may glitch at the start of the game and cannot move, the solution is to click yourself and you will be able to move. Another in game feature that is missing (although not as important as the rest) are visible squares on the battlefield. I understand you removed these to make the pitch itself smoother, but this makes shifting for competitive players harder, and may also make it harder for players new to the game that are trying to move around the battlefield. Classic snowstorm had a special feature called “spectator mode” if this Feature were to return, you should set it as one of the options in a private game, like an On/Off button. You could also make it an option for those that are not playing the game to have a list of games playing, and to be able to select one to watch (If the host of the game allows spectating). As it stands, there are three maps available: arctic island, dragon top and fight night. in classic there were up to seven: arctic island, algid river, polar labyrinth, frosty forest, glacial fort, skull lake and grand siege. Both fight night and dragon top are new maps, arctic island being a classic (a much loved map for its equal playing ground). Graphics in the game have been improved and the game looks alot smoother. The snowstorm lobby itself is a great feature, a good sense of community is found there, but i think there is a person missing from this community: ingemar, ingemar was much like julia, a bot who helped new habbos with snowstorm by giving them tips. Although ingemar was a barman, and was quite suited to the job, there are a few people who would like to see him returned (no need to get rid of julia). At the time, i was told snowstorm was in beta and was an unfinished product, so i let alot of these things slide while i waited. The months rolled by, and not a single post was made on the homepage to inform the community of snowstorm’s progress, alot of players began to leave as they thought habbo had given up on snowstorm, and with snowstorm half done, they had no other option than to abandon their favourite game. I knew at least ten of those that left, which i know was a small portion that did decide to leave, there was alot of hype towards snowstorm, and habbo failed to monopolise on it, if staff had decided to actually complete snowstorm (possibly given more time, instead of being forced onto other projects) we would be seeing alot more players playing and enjoying themselves, while paying for V.I.P. This remake was expected to be superior to its predecessor, people hoping it would leave them in awe at all the new features that were added to bring a new experience to the game, but as it turned out, what we were given was a half finished game that dwindled in comparison to its classic version. If snowstorm is left untouched, more and more people will leave and then you will wonder why you bothered remaking the game in the first place. It is not over though, i understand habbo staff are very busy, and have certain deadlines, which is why i am creating this letter to make you aware of what should be done to get snowstorm back on track. As you may have seen from the uservoice idea forum, the main feature people want to see returned is player created games, and they do not mean “build your own” they mean classic, and multi optional games, if you look at the success of the classic “private game engine” you could either host or join another game, you would have a list of games, this would include all team colours (red, blue, green and yellow) and game types: 1v1s 2v2s 2v2v2v2s etc all the way up to all v all games, with multiple time limits (minimum of 2, maximum of 5 minutes) the host of the game was able to choose what players he wanted in his/her game. If private games were to make a return, i believe scores generated from these games should be unranked from the leaderboard system, this would prevent baiters using these games as a quick way to cheat their way up the leaderboard. While speaking with hp81$, i found there were many different statistics for snowstorm, it might be interesting to make a separate leaderboard containing all these statistics for players to view at any time, this would add another competitive edge to snowstorm (something that is lacking in this version at the moment). Another thing i would like to talk about is the reintroduction of tickets, tickets used to be used in classic snowstorm before habbo made the game free to play for everyone. As it is, v.i.p’s get unlimited games and norms get 10 games and that’s it (they have to buy v.i.p to continue to play) i do not believe this is right. I think norms should be given an option to buy more games if they want, and not have to fork out 25c to have them unlimited for a month. I still think v.i.p’s should keep their unlimited games (of course this is up to you, you could use a reduced ticket price for them) but for norms, these are my proposed prices: 2c for 20 games or 1c and 300 pixels for 20 games 5c for 50 games or 3c and 600 pixels for 50 games 8c for 100 games or 5c and 1000 pixels for 100 games These prices are just a draft, and you could change them accordingly, the reason i included pixels is to give that extra deal if norms dont have that many spare credits, but do have spare pixels. Onto a big matter concerning snowstorm at the moment:    0 likes Reply

  • REECEYBABY

    May 10th, 2012 at 12:59 pm baiting/boosting by definition: the act of two players entering a game to hit each other to boost their scores significantly. This is one of the most important threats to snowstorm at the moment, not only does it give baiters an unfair advantage over players that hit others legitimately, it also spoils the game. The longer this continues unpunished, the more other players will pick up on this and think this sort of action is acceptable, i for one, will not let anyone bait if i can help it. I personally do not care for the point leaderboard, but i want snowstorm to be an enjoyable game, not a game where someone can manipulate to get an easy badge. i can understand the amount of work your team has made to restore snowstorm and bring it back to us, i believe baiting to be an insult to your hard work. proposed actions: This idea was created by Jaycen(from his words) and would surely rid snowstorm of baiting: Hey guys, I’m Jaycen – And I sent the following to Habbo staff in the hopes that they’ll fix the boosting BS: Lately, there have been MASS complaints about Habbos “boosting” in SnowStorm. Majority of players are very competitive and take great pride in their scores. Unfortunately, a small (and growing) percentage of players are cheating the system and “boosting” – Where basically, they just stand beside one another and allow free hits with the shared imperative of obtaining dual high scores. So, how do we fix this problem? Easy. And here’s my solution: As it stands, SnowStorm is only tracking points based on the damage a Habbo delivers. However, it’s not taking into account the damage that aforementioned Habbo TAKES! I’ll give you an example of your current model first so you can easily understand the gist when I introduce the change my proposition will have: *For example: Hypnot!c & Jaycen are playing SnowStorm. Each have 0 points. Hypnot!c hits him five times in a row, at the same time as Jaycen hits her five times in a row. Hypnot!c & Jaycen each get 10 points. (knockdown counts as five points each) Now let’s see it with my idea kicked into effect: **For example: Hypnot!c & Jaycen are playing SnowStorm. Each have 0 points. Hypnot!c hits him five times in a row, at the same time as Jaycen hits her five times in a row. Hypnot!c gains 10 points, but immediately loses them and goes back to 0. Jaycen gains 10 points, but immediately loses them and goes back to 0, as well. Here’s another example of change in effect: If I racked up 65 points in damage delivered, but 40 points were scored at my expense, then my end score would be 25 points. 65 – 40 = 25. Get it? Points earned – Points let up = Final score. See how boosting gets demolished with this idea in effect? And it makes the game more interesting. It’s kind of like in basketball, back in the 50′s when Steals & Blocks weren’t recorded stats. Then Bill Russell came along, and all of that changed. The game got real interesting via the introduction of a little thing called DEFENSE! At the end of a game, all players with negative scores will be reset to 0. So far, I’ve shared my idea with 3 of the all-time top ranked SS players: Airtime. Hypnot!c REECEYBABY They each strongly support this idea, and we speak for the majority when we ask you, the hard-working staff to keep the spirit of competition alive in the game responsible for keeping us around on Habbo altogether. Sincerely, Jaycen Airtime. Hypnot!c REECEYBABY & Many more to come <3 I would like to know what you think of this paul, i know this would make it very harsh for "new players" but it would also make the game super competitive and make players use more strategy in game. Snowstorm moderation is another idea that came to mind, although instead of using normal "mods" you should use habbo players that are experienced with snowstorm and know what to look for, i have seen this habboCm idea, you could probably implement this system into snowstorm moderation somehow, but my idea would be to keep hotel moderation and snowstorm moderation separate. My idea would involve: A spectator view so that snowstorm moderators can view games without players knowledge. (like what i discussed before regarding the classic spectator view) A game list that shows all games that are playing at the time, and an option to spectate that game. A player list that includes all players in that specific game, with interactable names that bring down a list of commands. Commands that include: Warning: a whispered text in game to a certain player to ask them to stop a certain action. Game ban: bans a player from the game of snowstorm for set periods of time, from 2-10 hours. Kick: Kicks a player from the game (useful for a second warning or an unresponsive player) The whole point of this moderation is not to rid snowstorm of baiting completely, but rather make it known that this act is not acceptable and punishments will be handed out if people participate in it. I need to make it clear again that all these commands will only be available to snowstorm moderators while spectating snowstorm, this will separate a snowstorm moderator from a hotel moderator. I believe three snowstorm moderators would be enough to cover snowstorm at all times during a week. With a hotel moderator to supervise these three, the hotel moderator could check on the snowstorm moderation when he is free of duties so as not to intrude upon hotel moderation, this would ensure that a snowstorm moderator is not abusing his powers. I would like to recommend myself, (REECEYBABY) Jaycen and Redemption for the positions of snowstorm moderators. I am from .co.uk, Jaycen is .com and Redemption is .au, this would cover snowstorm with moderation almost all hours of the day. You may ask why i would recommend myself and my "friends" for this? Well as you have seen, i am devoted whole heartedly and enjoy snowstorm, and i want others to enjoy it as much as i do, i have spoken to both Jaycen and Redemption regarding snowstorm many times, and they agree that things need to change to bring people back to the community. They are both just as passionate as me and i think you would be able to trust them and me with these positions. All three of us are above the age of 18 and have played snowstorm since the beginning (christmas 2007) and our experience with snowstorm would prove invaluable. Well, that's it for now, i think i have covered everything, Thanks for reading through all this, and if some of these ideas get implemented, then that is great! Just remember that alot of us enjoy snowstorm, and we all want it to be the game it used to be, and greater. I look forward to speaking to you in the future. REECEYBABY    0 likes Reply

• Yabble

  May 10th, 2012 at 1:01 pm o wow! I defo want to do a video… anyone know any good screen recorders (for mac computers?) that are free! xD    0 likes Reply

  • REECEYBABY

    May 10th, 2012 at 2:43 pm I have no idea yabble, ill have to look into it myself!    0 likes Reply

• Deege

  May 10th, 2012 at 8:13 pm Thanks for posting your letter here Reece. Yabble.. not sure, maybe a Google search will help? All I know is that I wish I had a Mac!    0 likes Reply

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