New Advertisement System & it's affect on businesses

[Koko]

The ad bar is good, but the position is inconvenient. I wouldn't find the ad bar invasive if it was somewhere above/below the chat box. The flow of text isn't invasive and that way you might naturally see interesting ads without having to check /ads.

 

Clubs or businesses with regular openings can still advertise via Facebrowser and have people know, but the biggest problem is for pop-up events and small, niche businesses that people are not looking for, but that they'd visit if they saw an ad.

[Vash Baldeus]

1 minute ago, Koko said:

The ad bar is good, but the position is inconvenient. I wouldn't find the ad bar invasive if it was somewhere above/below the chat box. The flow of text isn't invasive and that way you might naturally see interesting ads without having to check /ads.

 

Clubs or businesses with regular openings can still advertise via Facebrowser and have people know, but the biggest problem is for pop-up events and small, niche businesses that people are not looking for, but that they'd visit if they saw an ad.

Placing the ad-pop up below the chat would be useful too, won't clutter chat but will spark a person to notice it more as we are roleplaying in text so we are focused on chat mostly.

[Kaz]

1 hour ago, St3fan[NL] said:

This.

I chose specifically for the bottom right so its not in your face but also still noticeable.

 

Honestly people's minds are automatically filtering the green text in the chat if they dont plan on going anywhere. I never read ads with the old system unless I was looking for a car or event specifically. Now you just do /ads and look at it. The old system was simply not good enough anymore for the current playerbase. People spamming their keys to try and get an ad aired... with 800 players that took almost 30mins to an hour for some..

 

This system is more fair for everyone, sure some changes we do might now be appreciated by some but we strive to improve quality and look what's best for the server and its gameplay. 

Perhaps an ad HUD offset command so we can move it?

[Fuzzy]

I don't really see much of a problem with the new advertisement system, it's simple enough to use /ads and check through them even if you may have originally missed them.

 

I do however agree that it is disgusting that /bad is restricted to donators. Business owners really struggle without that key command to promote their business to the server, but would you really expect anything else? It's now a possibility to donate to have priority in the application queue - it's pretty clear where the priorities are for this community.

 

I do hope they make /bad a global command, not really fair that you have to pay 15 euros per month for access to a system that everyone should have. Probably see a lot more business activity this way, and counteracts the fact that advertisements are "less in your face". Most people don't buy donator for /bad anyway, it would not affect the server income AND the business side would be booming.

[Slamdance]

It's a welcome and long overdue change from the inane chatlog spam. Well done, devs.

 

Spoiler

 

[books]

The new ad system is far superior to the older one. My only request is that you keep the box there in the bottom right corner for a longer period of time, it fades very quickly.

[Smilesville]

Or come up with a better business model rather than relying on the bored "might as well" convenience mentality to get people to your venue.

 

This "problem" just seems like a step in the right direction to me.

[knppel]

2 hours ago, St3fan[NL] said:

This.

I chose specifically for the bottom right so its not in your face but also still noticeable.

 

Honestly people's minds are automatically filtering the green text in the chat if they dont plan on going anywhere. I never read ads with the old system unless I was looking for a car or event specifically. Now you just do /ads and look at it. The old system was simply not good enough anymore for the current playerbase. People spamming their keys to try and get an ad aired... with 800 players that took almost 30mins to an hour for some..

 

This system is more fair for everyone, sure some changes we do might now be appreciated by some but we strive to improve quality and look what's best for the server and its gameplay. 

What you call "fairness" is tailored to your personal demand (You do not want to read ads).

What you sadly ignored in your design is that other people's characters have other demands (namely, advertising their stuff).

 

As someone who typically stands on that other end, I was highly sceptical towards this new design to begin with.

 

The core task of an advertising system must be to allow people to advertise things.

The old system focused on that and that's why, despite being hated, it was implemented quite successfully- because it gets the job done.

The new system doesn't replace the invasive factor.

I get this was your clear intention  behind it, but I think it makes no sense for those advertising, and would go as far as to argue that it's unrealistic (advertisements irl CAN be annoying too and I won't need everything thrown my way, just my 2 cents).

 

Also the design is unclean and overlays if you also have your phone in hand in character.

While that is a simply oversight, it also displays that during whatever tests were made for this system, it was mostly assumed it'd be nice anyway and not actually tested thoroughly- anyone who had had his phone in hand while seeing an ad could have taken note of that, but it evidently did not happen and made it into the public game like this.

 

Don't mistake this as bashing, this is how feedback works, you get told what's wrong, not what's good and working.

Personally I am using the new default settings as of yet as I don't find them that bad, but certain things should be further worked on- UI overlap is a simple technical fix, how to allow people to advertise better again (something the current setup sadly does not take in account, s.a.) will need a slightly enhanced concept.

 

I don't have one at hand, though- invasive /ads were a simple text based solution to simulate the irl existence of newspapers, screen/phone pop ups, billboards, radio running in your car and in public, TV and so on.

Somewhere someone eventually created the narrative they're "their own thing" rather than what they are (the mentioned text based solution for the existence of dynamic billboards, tv commercials etc. ingame, see above), and should be banned as they interrupt their rp.

 

That this mindset made it into the game developement is concerning as it promotes an individual based playstyle opposed to an interactive one.

Which, imo, roleplaying is all about.

 

What's wrong with walking past a poster and ignoring what it tries to promote, or looking away from a running commercial spot? Sounds rather realistic to me to see ads but filter them all the time, you know.

 

Edited June 2, 2021 by knppel

[mj2002]

3 hours ago, Vash Baldeus said:

As many of you have noticed, the new advertisement system and it's new way of alerting users clearly hit the business side of things hard for a lot of bars, clubs and business in general.

I'll see if this is accurate.

[Koko]

35 minutes ago, Smilesville said:

Or come up with a better business model rather than relying on the bored "might as well" convenience mentality to get people to your venue.

This might be true for things like Clubs, but the problem is that the old ad system was also used to promote smaller niche events and meetups that would survive on "oh might as well" crowd because it's what they survive on in real life as well.

 

13 minutes ago, knppel said:

I don't have one at hand, though- invasive /ads were a simple text based solution to simulate the irl existence of newspapers, screen/phone pop ups, billboards, radio running in your car and in public, TV and so on.

I agree with this interpretation of ads, our characters don't have TVs to watch, and have no ads on their phone or read updated billboards, so the /ad system was an all-encompassing stream of things your character might get shot in their face throughout the day. And you could just toggle it off completely.

 

Now, I don't want the green text back because I think it created a very bad sort of obsession about racing for /bads, but this system just increases the advantages of people with access to /bad while also being terribly inconvenient for people who do want to see some ads and see what's going on.