Recent Events and The New DLC

Sabor

Greetings everyone, today I wanted to discuss the new DLC being announced this Thursday and the most recent public relations disaster that are plaguing CA. In case anyone was unaware several fanstook what an official said at CA out of context. This sparked a community uproar which eventually ignited into a sexist agenda. This is a VERY short version of what transpired and I strongly encourage anyone who has not looked into it personally to do so. What does this have to do with the new DLC announcement for Total War: Warhammer 2 though? Everything, in an act of retaliation against CA hundreds (if not thousands) of reviews in the last several weeks have been overwhelmingly negative against not just Rome 2, but all of CA games including Total War: Warhammer.

In CA's most recent announcement trailer, Total War: THREE KINGDOMS-Yellow Turban Rebellion this exact reaction was still fresh in the minds of at least several hundred fans. While thousands of fans spoke out against CA for what they believed to be one sided day one DLC practices, several hundred misquoted CA officials saying "if you do not like the game, play something else" [at the time of writing this however I went back and reviewed the comments of the video and noticed that almost all comments that had several hundred to over a thousand likes describing the matter are no longer present as the top comments]. With CA's products being review bombed coupled with people slandering their name on any new video that is posted via Youtube I am worried for the next DLC as well as future products.

If people are still sore and begin smearing the new DLC fresh out of the gate, I am worried CA will retract content even further. Many of us are still uncertain why CA has been so quiet about release schedules and why there has been such a dry spell of new content (even if they told us it was because people complained there was too much DLC in TW:W1). Though many of us here know the real story of what transpired between CA recently and will eagerly buy the new DLC, we are not the average consumer. Many people will simply go to the new trailer on Youtube, see the top comments about how CA has become EA and simply not buy the game out of retaliation rather than say the content is not worth the money. This could spell disaster for future DLC plans, funding could potentially be reallocated to other projects or they could even cut off funding to TW:W2 and push W3 out of the gate to be done with franchise. We are guaranteed at least one more DLC after this one, but I personally want as much DLC as they can crank out and am more than willing to pay for it!

What are everyone else's thoughts though? Are these valid concerns and is anyone else worried about how the new DLC will sell based upon the recent public relations downfall? Let me as I would personally love to be wrong about this one.

dge1

Moved to Chat.

Tumble

Not heard of this big melodrama. I doubt that many people really care, just a loud minority. 'Public relations disaster plaguing CA'.. Just a salty drop in the ocean tbh, barely a ripple.

KronusX

I think this is CA's fault for having a terrible PR department in their Warhammer section. There is content drought and they wait until last minute to announce a new DLC while they announce 3k DLC six months in advance. Their regard on their last DLC Q & C was that it took them 1 additional month to release a hydra re-skin. This does not spell anything on their WH2 DLCs since people will buy them regardless to complete their collection, but it might be an issue for WH3 pre-orders.

Many like me won't be buying WH3 at launch simply because of the massive screw-up CA did with WH2. Wh1 was awesome, WH2 is a freaking ****-show, so my expectations now are that WH3 will be the same as WH2, aka low amount of DLC, patches attached to DLC and some mediocre DLCs for half of them (TK was nice though).

Michael4537

Nothing's confirmed. We do not yet know if there will be an announcement Thursday.

But I think sales numbers have the biggest impact. If the DLC is good, the majority of rating will reflect that, and relatively few reviews will show otherwise.

Vanilla_Gorilla

There is no PR downfall. CA has simply been attacked by a small group of bullies and trolls.

It won't affect the DLC in the slightest.

Kelefane

Tumble said:

Not heard of this big melodrama. I doubt that many people really care, just a loud minority. 'Public relations disaster plaguing CA'.. Just a salty drop in the ocean tbh, barely a ripple.

Uhh, they care enough to smear most Total War game reviews into the "Mostly Negative" category on Steam. That looks horrible for any game and any company.

3K might be CA's first game to start out in the Negatives honestly.

Kelefane

Vanilla_Gorilla said:

There is no PR downfall. CA has simply been attacked by a small group of bullies and trolls.

It won't affect the DLC in the slightest.

"Small" isn't the right word. It takes a lot to move a game thats been out for a while into the Negatives from a review standpoint on Steam. I'd say its quite a few people actually.

If anything forum posters are the minority.

AmericanViking22

Kelefane said:

Vanilla_Gorilla said:

There is no PR downfall. CA has simply been attacked by a small group of bullies and trolls.

It won't affect the DLC in the slightest.

"Small" isn't the right word. It takes a lot to move a game thats been out for a while into the Negatives from a review standpoint on Steam. I'd say its quite a few people actually.

If anything forum posters are the minority.

Except none of the total war games are in the negative, at least not overall. Obviously the 'recent reviews' rating suffered from the review bomb, but it doesn't take all that many reviews to do that. The only ones that are less than positive in the 'overall reviews' rating are ToB, which experimented with a lot of changes to the usual formula, and Rome 2, which in addition to current review bombing had a famously abysmal launch. Don't misrepresent the situation.

Vanilla_Gorilla

Kelefane said:

Vanilla_Gorilla said:

There is no PR downfall. CA has simply been attacked by a small group of bullies and trolls.

It won't affect the DLC in the slightest.

"Small" isn't the right word. It takes a lot to move a game thats been out for a while into the Negatives from a review standpoint on Steam. I'd say its quite a few people actually.

If anything forum posters are the minority.

Which game was moved to overall negative because of these bullies and trolls?

Steph_F_David

Do you realize it doesn"t have much to do with Warhammer? If I'm not mistaken, the "issue" was intiially about adding female generals in Rome 2.
And the bad PR move was done in a Rome 2 related media no ?

But CA could have avoided tis very simply: make it optional, sams as with nlood and gore!

You like femake general, play with it! You don't, tick the option off!

Problem solved, no drama...

I don't think it would have a bid impact on Warhammer. if CA starts withdrawing DLC for Warahmmer because of review intiallyu for Rome.... They can withdraw everything...

ShiroAmakusa75

steph74 said:

Do you realize it doesn"t have much to do with Warhammer? If I'm not mistaken, the "issue" was intiially about adding female generals in Rome 2.
And the bad PR move was done in a Rome 2 related media no ?

But CA could have avoided tis very simply: make it optional, sams as with nlood and gore!

You like femake general, play with it! You don't, tick the option off!

Problem solved, no drama...

I don't think it would have a bid impact on Warhammer. if CA starts withdrawing DLC for Warahmmer because of review intiallyu for Rome.... They can withdraw everything...

It's already optional as the game never forces you to pick female generals and you can remove them altogether with a mod, several in fact. The problem was solved but it didn't matter because for these guys it was never about R2 in the first place but about having an excuse to be bullies.

Debauchee

Vanilla_Gorilla said:

Which game was moved to overall negative because of these bullies and trolls?

Rome 2 has dropped to mixed reviews, which is a significant result.

ShiroAmakusa75

Debauchee said:

Vanilla_Gorilla said:

Which game was moved to overall negative because of these bullies and trolls?

Rome 2 has dropped to mixed reviews, which is a significant result.

For a five year old game, so this means nothing. Everyone this game would appeal to probably already owns at this point. Their attempts at the more popular games have completely fizzled.

drizzlynewt

Sabor said:

While thousands of fans spoke out against CA for what they believed to be one sided day one DLC practices, several hundred misquoted CA officials saying "if you do not like the game, play something else" [

I'm curious, as someone who's seen this stuff; The quote I've seen is “If having female units upsets you that much you can either mod them out or just not play. People saying they won’t buy the game because there are too many women in it is fine with us—if that’s their reason, we’d rather they didn’t anyway.” I can't find the original source of this, but the quote itself - or paraphrasing the sentiment of it - seems to be included in several articles about the subject, including a good number that I think could be considered to be entirely pro-CA.

Now, obviously anyone who had just said "If you do not like the game, play something else" would have technically misquoted as that isn't the exact wording, but that obviously has the same essential meaning as the quote. I'm gonna assume good faith here and that you're not just taking people using slightly different wording to the same effect and you saying they're "misquoting" while intentionally failing to mention that something basically the same had been said.

So the question I'm asking is, did the quote I listed - “If having female units upsets you that much you can either mod them out or just not play. People saying they won’t buy the game because there are too many women in it is fine with us—if that’s their reason, we’d rather they didn’t anyway.” - not exist at all? Because I haven't seen anyone say anything indicating that their objection to this is based on sexism (although my not having seen it myself doesn't mean noone has done it) but I have seen many people who have taken the view that a company changing the content of a game long after it has been bought and paid for then implying that people who are unhappy with the changes should not play any more if it bothers them is wrong. If that quote itself didn't exist at all, I don't think they'd have any reason to be upset at all?

davedave1124

Don't worry, all the manufactured offence in the world will have minimal affect on sales.

ShiroAmakusa75

drizzlynewt said:

Sabor said:

While thousands of fans spoke out against CA for what they believed to be one sided day one DLC practices, several hundred misquoted CA officials saying "if you do not like the game, play something else" [

I'm curious, as someone who's seen this stuff; The quote I've seen is “If having female units upsets you that much you can either mod them out or just not play. People saying they won’t buy the game because there are too many women in it is fine with us—if that’s their reason, we’d rather they didn’t anyway.” I can't find the original source of this, but the quote itself - or paraphrasing the sentiment of it - seems to be included in several articles about the subject, including a good number that I think could be considered to be entirely pro-CA.

Now, obviously anyone who had just said "If you do not like the game, play something else" would have technically misquoted as that isn't the exact wording, but that obviously has the same essential meaning as the quote. I'm gonna assume good faith here and that you're not just taking people using slightly different wording to the same effect and you saying they're "misquoting" while intentionally failing to mention that something basically the same had been said.

So the question I'm asking is, did the quote I listed - “If having female units upsets you that much you can either mod them out or just not play. People saying they won’t buy the game because there are too many women in it is fine with us—if that’s their reason, we’d rather they didn’t anyway.” - not exist at all? Because I haven't seen anyone say anything indicating that their objection to this is based on sexism (although my not having seen it myself doesn't mean noone has done it) but I have seen many people who have taken the view that a company changing the content of a game long after it has been bought and paid for then implying that people who are unhappy with the changes should not play any more if it bothers them is wrong. If that quote itself didn't exist at all, I don't think they'd have any reason to be upset at all?

There's no reason to be upset. Removing female generals requires nothing more than a mouseclick and for people that find this to be already an unsurmountable task, not playing a strategy title in the first place is the better option.

But as I said above, it isn't about R2, it's about the Daily Stormer pushing its regressive agenda.

drizzlynewt

Ephraim_Dalton said:

There's no reason to be upset. Removing female generals requires nothing more than a mouseclick and for people that find this to be already an unsurmountable task, not playing a strategy title in the first place is the better option.

But as I said above, it isn't about R2, it's about the Daily Stormer pushing its regressive agenda.

I don't read the Daily Stormer and I don't believe for a second the people that I've seen having issues with this read it either.

Unless I'm completely misunderstanding something, you're suggesting that the only reason people would object to a company changing the content of a game long after it had been bought and paid for and suggesting anyone who doesn't like it shouldn't play or buy any future games is if they subscribe to the belief systems of a website that promotes white supremacy and the genocide of Jews? Don't you think that's a bit of a leap?

davedave1124

Unless I'm completely misunderstanding something, you're suggesting that the only reason people would object to a company changing the content of a game long after it had been bought and paid for and suggesting anyone who doesn't like it shouldn't play or buy any future games is if they subscribe to the belief systems of a website that promotes white supremacy and the genocide of Jews? Don't you think that's a bit of a leap?

The original article with the screenshot of multiple female characters originated from Daily Stormer and got a loud minority hot under the collar. To correct you, Ella was talking to a minority who felt the need to get that excited they decided to consistently break forum rules.

Vanilla_Gorilla

Debauchee said:

Vanilla_Gorilla said:

Which game was moved to overall negative because of these bullies and trolls?

Rome 2 has dropped to mixed reviews, which is a significant result.

Not really. It's not exactly got a whole lot of earning potential left in terms of new buyers, and the fake reviews will probably be slowly deleted anyway. Even if they aren't they'll hardly impact sales.

steph74 said:

Do you realize it doesn"t have much to do with Warhammer? If I'm not mistaken, the "issue" was intiially about adding female generals in Rome 2.
And the bad PR move was done in a Rome 2 related media no ?

But CA could have avoided tis very simply: make it optional, sams as with nlood and gore!

You like femake general, play with it! You don't, tick the option off!

Problem solved, no drama...

I don't think it would have a bid impact on Warhammer. if CA starts withdrawing DLC for Warahmmer because of review intiallyu for Rome.... They can withdraw everything...

Slight correction here there was no controversy when they added female generals. The controversy originated over a lie that they increased female general spawn rate. Then the controversy moved to the lie that CA told people to mod it out or not play.

At a 10-15% spawn rate it's already optional as is. This is all a non issue based on lies.

drizzlynewt

davedave1124 said:

Unless I'm completely misunderstanding something, you're suggesting that the only reason people would object to a company changing the content of a game long after it had been bought and paid for and suggesting anyone who doesn't like it shouldn't play or buy any future games is if they subscribe to the belief systems of a website that promotes white supremacy and the genocide of Jews? Don't you think that's a bit of a leap?

The original article with the screenshot of multiple female characters originated from Daily Stormer and got a loud minority hot under the collar. To correct you, Ella was talking to a minority who felt the need to get that excited they decided to consistently break forum rules.

It's a flawed logic though... Think about newspapers, for example. I dunno where you're from, but here in England we have a newspaper called the Daily Mail. Horribly unreliable, usually extremely inaccurate and agenda laden. But they have, on occasion, been the first people to break a story which has turned out to be true (or, more likely, been the first paper to bring it to mass attention).

In instances like that, if the story turns out to be true, it will later be reported by other outlets also. At a point where the veracity of the story is proven to be accurate, it wouldn't be fair to imply that anyone who believes and reacts to the story is not reacting to the story, just reacting to an agenda pushed by the Daily Mail. Just like here, even if the Daily Stormer was the original source of complaints about this issue, it doesn't mean that everyone who has objections has them because they personally read or support the Daily Stormer.

That's beside the point though, because the majority of people I've seen with objections haven't objected to the inclusion of women generals, they've objected to the quote they saw, which I gather wasn't part of this original article.

Anyway, it's not correcting me; I'm not the person who originated this quote and as I said before, I can't find where it came from anywhere, I can just find people referencing it. You seem to have a better idea about it though; When you say it was an admonishment for breaking forum rules, can you provide any further context? The precise wording of it seems to indicate that it was a response to an objection to game content... I'm not really sure how it would be applicable as a response to breaking forum rules. Can you shed any light on this?

Vanilla_Gorilla

drizzlynewt said:

davedave1124 said:

Unless I'm completely misunderstanding something, you're suggesting that the only reason people would object to a company changing the content of a game long after it had been bought and paid for and suggesting anyone who doesn't like it shouldn't play or buy any future games is if they subscribe to the belief systems of a website that promotes white supremacy and the genocide of Jews? Don't you think that's a bit of a leap?

The original article with the screenshot of multiple female characters originated from Daily Stormer and got a loud minority hot under the collar. To correct you, Ella was talking to a minority who felt the need to get that excited they decided to consistently break forum rules.

It's a flawed logic though... Think about newspapers, for example. I dunno where you're from, but here in England we have a newspaper called the Daily Mail. Horribly unreliable, usually extremely inaccurate and agenda laden. But they have, on occasion, been the first people to break a story which has turned out to be true (or, more likely, been the first paper to bring it to mass attention).

In instances like that, if the story turns out to be true, it will later be reported by other outlets also. At a point where the veracity of the story is proven to be accurate, it wouldn't be fair to imply that anyone who believes and reacts to the story is not reacting to the story, just reacting to an agenda pushed by the Daily Mail. Just like here, even if the Daily Stormer was the original source of complaints about this issue, it doesn't mean that everyone who has objections has them because they personally read or support the Daily Stormer.

That's beside the point though, because the majority of people I've seen with objections haven't objected to the inclusion of women generals, they've objected to the quote they saw, which I gather wasn't part of this original article.

Anyway, it's not correcting me; I'm not the person who originated this quote and as I said before, I can't find where it came from anywhere, I can just find people referencing it. You seem to have a better idea about it though; When you say it was an admonishment for breaking forum rules, can you provide any further context? The precise wording of it seems to indicate that it was a response to an objection to game content... I'm not really sure how it would be applicable as a response to breaking forum rules. Can you shed any light on this?

https://forums.totalwar.com/discussion/226387/steam-nonsense-review-bombing-strikes-wh1-wh2-honest-reaction/p8

You'll find it in this thread.

The way Ella's comment is presented is as if she made an announcement thread and stated it. Rather it was when she closed a thread and was speaking to the thread which was full of people spewing abuse.

Mind you, even if her comment was to the masses (it wasn't) it's really not that bad.

davedave1124

What I find interesting is those who 'objected' to this comment didn't have much to say about the threats Ella received or the general poor behaviour of some 'fans' towards both Ella and Grace. Weird.

Vanilla_Gorilla

davedave1124 said:

What I find interesting is those who 'objected' to this comment didn't have much to say about the threats Ella received or the general poor behaviour of some 'fans' towards both Ella and Grace. Weird.

It's almost like they're using Ella's comment as an excuse to continue their outrage. Surely if they cared about wanting polite communication they wouldn't be supporting such abhorrent behaviour.

davedave1124

It's almost like they're using Ella's comment as an excuse to continue their outrage. Surely if they cared about wanting polite communication they wouldn't be supporting such abhorrent behaviour.

I find it hilarious when they have little to say about the threats yet give excuses like "she's a representative" those people abusing her aren't (so that's fine).

I'm getting pretty bored with it now, I really don't know where people find the energy to be angry about something for so long, that really has so real impact on their lives. I can only assume they're still living with their parents and have no problems to worry about.

drizzlynewt

Vanilla_Gorilla said:

https://forums.totalwar.com/discussion/226387/steam-nonsense-review-bombing-strikes-wh1-wh2-honest-reaction/p8

You'll find it in this thread.

The way Ella's comment is presented is as if she made an announcement thread and stated it. Rather it was when she closed a thread and was speaking to the thread which was full of people spewing abuse.

Mind you, even if her comment was to the masses (it wasn't) it's really not that bad.

Thanks!

So the bit about not buying games and if they don't like it they're not the sort of people CA want buying the games doesn't seem to actually be part of the quote at all (unless it was a separate quote and the two are just placed together with poor grammar). I think that's a large part of what the people I've seen are objecting to.

I think it's probably unfortunate that this quote bears a resemblance to the recent quote from EA about Battlefield. Regardless of views on the importance of historical accuracy, I think it's obvious to people that EA are a pretty scummy, blood sucking company who are always out to make a quick buck off people and that if they're inserting a political agenda into a game it's a cynical attempt to market to the people that agenda will appeal to, rather than a case of legitimately caring about that agenda. In an instance where a morally reprehensible company like EA makes a transparent attempt to cast themselves as the good guys by engaging in moral grandstanding against their consumers and acting like they're dirt if they don't follow EA's narrative, you can see why people get so annoyed.

As a result it seems like the superficial similarity of the quotes has resulted in this getting caught up in part of the same, ongoing backlash.

Maedrethnir

drizzlynewt said:

Vanilla_Gorilla said:

https://forums.totalwar.com/discussion/226387/steam-nonsense-review-bombing-strikes-wh1-wh2-honest-reaction/p8

You'll find it in this thread.

The way Ella's comment is presented is as if she made an announcement thread and stated it. Rather it was when she closed a thread and was speaking to the thread which was full of people spewing abuse.

Mind you, even if her comment was to the masses (it wasn't) it's really not that bad.

Thanks!

So the bit about not buying games and if they don't like it they're not the sort of people CA want buying the games doesn't seem to actually be part of the quote at all (unless it was a separate quote and the two are just placed together with poor grammar). I think that's a large part of what the people I've seen are objecting to.

I think it's probably unfortunate that this quote bears a resemblance to the recent quote from EA about Battlefield. Regardless of views on the importance of historical accuracy, I think it's obvious to people that EA are a pretty scummy, blood sucking company who are always out to make a quick buck off people and that if they're inserting a political agenda into a game it's a cynical attempt to market to the people that agenda will appeal to, rather than a case of legitimately caring about that agenda. In an instance where a morally reprehensible company like EA makes a transparent attempt to cast themselves as the good guys by engaging in moral grandstanding against their consumers and acting like they're dirt if they don't follow EA's narrative, you can see why people get so annoyed.

As a result it seems like the superficial similarity of the quotes has resulted in this getting caught up in part of the same, ongoing backlash.

Initial CA_Ella response looked like this, it was an answer leading to thread being locked: https://steamcommunity.com/app/214950/discussions/0/1698293068433895118/?ctp=3

Then it evolved into this, here you will find quote you have been searching for, this CA_Ella comment on the other hand has not led to thread's termination: https://steamcommunity.com/app/214950/discussions/0/1746720717346294901?ctp=15

Also people claiming that the original article with screenshot of multiple female characters originated from Daly Stormer are either wrong or have a dog in this fight: https://www.oneangrygamer.net/2018/09/total-war-rome-2-dev-defends-female-generals-says-if-gamers-dont-like-it-dont-play/69806/

davedave1124

Also people claiming that the original article with screenshot of multiple female characters originated from Daly Stormer are either wrong or have a dog in this fight: https://www.oneangrygamer.net/2018/09/total-war-rome-2-dev-defends-female-generals-says-if-gamers-dont-like-it-dont-play/69806/

So they used the pic from the Daily Stormer site? Your point? Plus they also said there was a 50% chance of getting a female general which you know isn't true.

Are you still all angry? I'd see a doctor..

Maedrethnir

davedave1124 said:

Also people claiming that the original article with screenshot of multiple female characters originated from Daly Stormer are either wrong or have a dog in this fight: https://www.oneangrygamer.net/2018/09/total-war-rome-2-dev-defends-female-generals-says-if-gamers-dont-like-it-dont-play/69806/

So they used the pic from the Daily Stormer site? Your point? Plus they also said there was a 50% chance of getting a female general which you know isn't true.

Are you still all angry? I'd see a doctor..

For obvious reason I won't link Daily Stormer article here. Anyone interested can ask me for link in PM.

That being said, Daily Stormer article came out on 23th of September.

One Angry Gamer article came out on 21th of September.

Please, don't try to move goalpost again, I'm not discussing whether it is true or not but chronological order of the events.

davedave1124

You're not discussing whether it's true? Right.

The fact is it isn't true, even Republic of Game, who isn't exactly a fan of CA said that the picture was bull and you'd have to try very hard to make it happen.

I'm sorry that this is 'upsetting' you so much.

drizzlynewt

Yharshaarj said:

Then it evolved into this, here you will find quote you have been searching for, this CA_Ella comment on the other hand has not led to thread's termination: https://steamcommunity.com/app/214950/discussions/0/1746720717346294901?ctp=15

Ah, well, thank you!

I'm struggling to understand how people think this is, in any way, a misquote. It's exactly what people are saying was said.