LOTRO - The Codemasters Years

[Neen_Eldar]

CM had their faults, but they were very active when it came to banning for exploits and PVP clubbing, something that is sorely missed.

[Nyarin]

First off: no, I didn't read the article posted by the OP; but then again, I felt I really didn't need to.

Nostalgia cannot be anything else than a distorted, rose tinted view of the past, because it is strongly biased, and thus positive events tend to stick around much stronger, while memory of negative events will fade out much faster. If anyone feels like to argue brain chemistry, be sure to consult with your amygdala first before posting.

Speaking of which, I fondly remember my interactions (or was it me watching his interactions with others on GLFF channel 'BeleSNG'?) with +Karnarion, friendly nicknamed '+Karnarionvogel', on EU-Belegaer. Now, these interactions had a much more personal note than anything else that happened ever after, and only because of this I'm still able to remember them to this day. Nothing more, nothing less. I can't even remember what specific events they entailed, only that I remember them fondly. Therefore, these remembered times must be better than today's, right? Right?!

Get a grip and be realistic, folks. Concerning your personal interactions with GMs, one profit-oriented corporation was replaced by another profit-oriented corporation, several times over. Yes, even CM exchanged hired subcontractors with others who were cheaper, on a whim. No, sorry, I'm being mean; it wasn't a whim, it was a spreadsheet calculation. +Karnarion got laid off because of it, and I remember this because I really cared, back then. Does it matter today?

No.

I'm still playing and payed for this game, although for how much longer depends entirely on my personal spreadsheet calculation concerning trait trees. All I can see is that an in-game GM ticket submitted in English gets processed and answered so much faster than a ticket in, say, German. So my advice to all the German speaking customers out there is: submit your in-game tickets in English. If you can't for whatever reason: well, though luck, you're second-class customers now by any means, so get smart, and pay accordingly.

[GoldenusG]

I for one don't miss the CodeMasters days. I started playing with free-to-play, and so missed the 'halcyon days' of GM ran events and such, but I've found that precious little has changed since, except that we no longer have weekly maintenance and we don't have to wait for up to a month for patches to come over (Though I'll admit that the lengthy delays on patches were mainly due to waiting for whatever the patch broke to be fixed).

My main remembrance of those days though was the end - As soon as they announced that Turbine were taking over the running of the EU servers, CodeMasters stopped wanting to know about anything. Support vanished, news on the game dried up, and practically the only official information we got was via the single thread of Sapiance's. They seemed more like a sulking child who'd had their toy taken away than a professional company.


... The main part of CodeMasters also didn't bother porting the remake of Dizzy: Prince of the Yolkfolk to the PC though, and thus deserve no goodwill what-so-ever. Nuh-uhh.

[couillon]

Doesn't anyone wish to discuss the topic in question?

I came away with a sense that more GM interaction with the community would be good for the game. Perhaps a dynamic event such as a large scale warband invasion of Hytbold with GM's coming in to help us turn the tide...just an idea.

[EdwardFerret]

Well, mostly in disagreement with this article.

What about the lack of early advertising ? Codemasters did only one TV ad for the UK, and completely forgotten France and Germany. The result, in France the game release got unnoticed, and this crippled the game in France for ever. Some players, Tolkien fans, learned the existence of LOTRO years later at the F2P.

Server events were rare, only at the beginning when Codemasters sub-contracting this part of the job to a Canadian company (Alchemic Dream).

Localization is much better now than ever. French localization was simply awful, voice over was &&&&, with bad accent, prononciation and acting.
And the text was not better than today. I remember Enedwaith (last content Codemasters had to localize) several quests had untranslated text, or swapped text between FR and DE, just an example, on the Codemasters forum we had a sticky topic to refer all the translation error to the team, and it was one of the longest.

The only thing we lost in the migration process, was the presence of French and German community manager.

People tend to idealize this period in the life of LOTRO, simply because at this time the game was young, brand new, and we had plenty of content in the two first years. And Codemasters was not accountable to this.
Now people have grown old, the game too, he is not as much atractive than before, but Turbine is not to blame, it is just a natural process.

[Mithgalad]

Best thing about Codemasters vs Turbine: CM ping was 45, Turbine has 154. And barely no lag happening. This is huge in an MMO, and it's killing my lotro enjoyment.

[KitCaboodle]

I've been in since the start. Codemasters wasn't bad - but I think the general customer service is better under Turbine. Most of my quibbles with the game as it stands are to do with the overall direction it's taking - everything being in the store and requiring payment - even if you're a VIP player. Different playstyles no longer being equally rewarded, etc.

Codemasters pros (in my opinion):

- Cracking down on griefing, and protecting immersion on roleplaying servers. If we'd still been there, I don't think people would have got away with the forced emote griefing that went on here prior to the toggle. (N.B. I mean the people who deliberately used the emotes to grief - following people around, etc.)

- More freedom of speech on forum - though that may have had something to do with the lack of anyone with the power to tell us anything.


Codemasters cons (again, in my opinion):

- Trying to get answers or information under Codemasters was near impossible. People used to sign up for US accounts just to try to find out information to pass on to the rest of the playerbase. There were community reps, but they either didn't know or weren't allowed to tell us anything, so we were always in the dark.

- I'm a soloer - but people were always complaining that GMs said they weren't allowed to advance bugged instances when US GMs were doing it for Turbine players.

- A distinct feeling of being a second class community. No lotteries, most competitions not open to us, game and updates launching much later, etc.


In general - Codemasters were all right, but so is Turbine (if they can only be persuaded to let a few things out of the store and remember that not everybody who plays is a raider. Can't we have equivalent gear with cool soloing bonuses? Or crafting bonuses? Or quests that unlock roleplaying gear?)

[Cillion]

The only thing we lost in the migration process, was the presence of French and German community manager.

If you think so... Exploiting,cheating or whatever you want to call it didnt go by without punishment under CM... Turbine does not care about it,dont know if they did before the migration as i didnt play on US servers before..

As for the rest im biased cause i really had a good time with GMs and CMs there..
Whereas here the military rules the Forum and i have to be carefull to not say anything wrong.. So im not going to say much more

[Oldwiley]

I'm yet to pick up an infraction or ban for anything and try to give credit where its due, despite my aversion for the general direction and evolution of the game being contrary to what i would like: that said;

Codemasters: Helpful, personal contact for issues. Careful responsive reactions to reports. Events that blew your mind.

Lordy I miss codies :P

[The_Bruce]

If you think so... Exploiting,cheating or whatever you want to call it didnt go by without punishment under CM... Turbine does not care about it,dont know if they did before the migration as i didnt play on US servers before..

As for the rest im biased cause i really had a good time with GMs and CMs there..
Whereas here the military rules the Forum and i have to be carefull to not say anything wrong.. So im not going to say much more

CM were very good about handling exploiters and cheaters compared to Turbine. One only has to look at the many posts about clubbing in Ettenmoors to see that Turbine does not care. No action taken can only mean that Turbine approves of this behaviour.

As for the forums here, well what can I say, just logging in here and seeing something in your inbox is getting predictable . Straight talking, speaking your mind, tell it as it is, like everything else in today's world all must be "pc". I tend to forget how thin skinned and uncharitable some posters here are.....................

[Rosiebelle]

Nyrion I am a member of that forum and I don't recognise the picture you paint at all of it or it's members.

For many European players there are very significant differences in our customer experiences in the Codemasters and Turbine eras.

I think there is a lot Turbine could and should learn from this.

All we all want at the end of the day is an enjoyable game with a strong, long-term future. Whilst the player council may (or may not) help to get us to that point there are lessons to be learnt from the past six years and it isn't as if the playerbase has been quiet about what they would like to see and what they fear.

Turbine just have to open their ears and listen. They seem to have a real problem with doing that though.

[Gripn]

The customer service under Codemasters was vastly superior compared to that under Turbine. As the article quite rightly points out that was due to cultural and legal differences between Europe and the US. How I miss those days...

Couldn't agree more. Satine and her team did a really good job.

[The_Bruce]

Couldn't agree more. Satine and her team did a really good job.

Although I was no fan of Codemasters, the one dealing I had with Satine was very professional. It wasn't just the managerial but the people skills that she easily utilised. She certainly never lowered herself by calling the community names.
I can't remember all the names of the people at Codies but I do remember Maneki being introduced to the community, Dnote as well. My memory isn't so good now but didn't Dnote replace someone?

[Korrigan]

The codemaster team was not up to the task. It's people who should never have managed a game the size of a MMORPG. Proof being that every MMORPG they touched ended either as a failure, or taken back from them.
The community management team was just as incompetent as the rest. They had no clue about how to manage the official forum of a MMORPG, notably they fell for every troll bait maneuver and punished the victim instead of the troll. Post history was an unknown word for them. I tried to work with them when the game was released to advertise the EU community (I was working for LOTRO Vault back then, I managed the site). I won't give names, but the community manager was totally incompetent, totally unable to give me anything I could use to advertise that European community. The Vault/IGN was one of the major MMORPG hubs back then though, even for Europe... but no, nothing. I gave up after a while to focus on the American community.

So no, I don't miss Codemasters. They should stick to car games, they made semi decent ones, but stay away from MMORPGs. And they should try recruiting competent people.

[cossieuk]

Although I was no fan of Codemasters, the one dealing I had with Satine was very professional. It wasn't just the managerial but the people skills that she easily utilised. She certainly never lowered herself by calling the community names.
I can't remember all the names of the people at Codies but I do remember Maneki being introduced to the community, Dnote as well. My memory isn't so good now but didn't Dnote replace someone?

Not sure if Dnote replaced anyone, but the other main member of the community team was Faya.

[Ailedra]

Doesn't anyone wish to discuss the topic in question?

What exactly IS the topic in question? The OP posted a link to an article, with no further discussion and making no additional point for discussion. The article itself claims neutrality, and therefore (if taken at face value) is little better than a history lesson of variable bias and relevance.

...so, ok, thanks for the article?

What do you think its the point of discussion?

[Lothirieth]

The codemaster team was not up to the task. It's people who should never have managed a game the size of a MMORPG. Proof being that every MMORPG they touched ended either as a failure, or taken back from them.

To say Lotro was taken back from them due to their handling isn't correct. I mean with Turbine wanting to buy CM's online department, it would seem they were definitely doing some things right. It would seem Turbine wanted the money, not to stop their product from being mismanaged.

I mainly miss their GMs. Sincilbanks told us that he actively encouraged them to be problem solvers (none of this, too bad the raid chest bugged, no we won't open it type junk) and this syncs with my experiences. CM GM's were much more proactive and helpful as a whole, whether that be due to better training or simply being allowed to do more.. well, we can't know.

[Sapience]

As this is more of a 'I remember CM" thread and less of a true LOTRO thread, it's being moved to off-topic.

I'll just add that if the back and forth over various 3rd party sites continues, this thread will be short lived. People go where they go for whatever reasons they go there. Name calling and insults (thinly veiled and other wise) won't be tolerated.

[Gladgilrian]

As this is more of a 'I remember CM" thread and less of a true LOTRO thread, it's being moved to off-topic.

I'll just add that if the back and forth over various 3rd party sites continues, this thread will be short lived. People go where they go for whatever reasons they go there. Name calling and insults (thinly veiled and other wise) won't be tolerated.

I don't remember CM because I've always been a NA player. That being said, I disagree that Turbine never took exploiters, cheaters, botters, and gold sellers seriously. They use to take it very seriously, use to being the operative word. Now botting and exploiting are wide spread and it doesn't appear that management cares any longer. No, there aren't active goldsellers in game, but a quick google search will net you various links to goldsellers and third party programs that allow players to speed hack and track hack (find every player, stealthed or not over the entire moors.) Anything being done about that?

[Rainothon]

I'm an EU player on a US account. Don't know the Codemasters, so this was an interesting read. Weren't the Codemasters always late with updates (for good or for bad)?

Anyway I think many of the differences between Codemasters and Turbine stem from cultural differences between European businesses and US businesses. And EU and US in a more general sense. We're not as alike as half of us think and not as different as half of us would want us to be.

Typically, both try to make money of their customers.

Typically, the US businesses have a stronger, more calculated (spreadsheet management) attitude towards costs. Are very much legally aware (lawsuits). And are much stricter in enforcing the rules they set.

There's a paradox there, concerning the rule enforcement. Codemasters has the reputation to have been more proactive against several kinds of in-game conducts. While this may be true, it's easy to forget that Turbine does not need to enforce a rule they have not set. Rules Turbine do set are firmly enforced. In game, and in forum. This noone can deny.

Interestingly it is brought up that Codemaster GM's had more liberty to improvice and interact with the players, with the risk of lagging the server and/or player favoritism (concieved or real - result's the same).

Do Turbine employees have no liberties then? The GM's don't, their task is to solve player's problems and they do this efficiently and adequately (in my experience). But Turbine devs can have 'pet projects', so there's liberty in Turbine as well.

In the end I think Turbine's degree of freedom serves potentially all players, while Codemaster's degree of freedom served was always limited to those recieving the GM's attention.

Finally: I do wonder what made the former Codemaster employee seek the stage at this time. Nostalgia? Oh yes, I can see how being a GM responsible for this great game in it's subscription era, without having the weight of being responsible for development, and serving a fanbase that's perhaps unrivalled in it's gaming and fantasy passion (looking at you, German LOTR fans), must have been an amazing time.

[Thorwyn99]

"During Codemasters stewardship of LOTRO, the highest player to ticket ratio was generated by German customers."

This one kinda stuck out to me lol. We germans like our tickets.

[Sapience]

If name calling and insults are to be the order of the day, we're going to close this. Last time I'll mention it. Next time it will be closed.

[Edrogar]

I mainly miss their GMs. Sincilbanks told us that he actively encouraged them to be problem solvers (none of this, too bad the raid chest bugged, no we won't open it type junk) and this syncs with my experiences. CM GM's were much more proactive and helpful as a whole, whether that be due to better training or simply being allowed to do more.. well, we can't know.

The only issue i really had with CM GM's was inconsistency, one would do something to help you, then a week later the bug would hit you again and a different GM would tell you it can't be dealt with, even after explaining to him/her step by step what the previous GM had done.

That's the problem with giving the support staff leeway to be problem solvers, some have the smarts for it and some don't so you get an inconstant support system that can be as frustrating as having a bad support system.

[LordVoronturEU]

<snip as not relevant to the reply I am making>

So no, I don't miss Codemasters. They should stick to car games, they made semi decent ones, but stay away from MMORPGs. And they should try recruiting competent people instead of chicks who spend more time talking about cookies than about the game they are in charge of.

Korrigan, I'm not sure you've noticed, but there is still talk of Cookies from Community staff/Devs, and not to mention talk of Bacon, whether it's during dev chats or just random forum posts. No, there's no difference whatsoever in that regard, between Turbine staff and Codemasters staff, if what you allege is true.

Sadly, because the Codemasters old LOTRO forums are now down, I don't see how you'll be able to back up those allegations with proof, unless you've managed to screenshot every instance of them talking about cookies.

If anything, it's more prevalent on these forums. (Not saying it's a bad thing, I like cookies)

[cossieuk]

Korrigan, I'm not sure you've noticed, but there is still talk of Cookies from Community staff/Devs, and not to mention talk of Bacon, whether it's during dev chats or just random forum posts. No, there's no difference whatsoever in that regard, between Turbine staff and Codemasters staff, if what you allege is true.

Sadly, because the Codemasters old LOTRO forums are now down, I don't see how you'll be able to back up those allegations with proof, unless you've managed to screenshot every instance of them talking about cookies.

If anything, it's more prevalent on these forums. (Not saying it's a bad thing, I like cookies)

Not to hard to find all the old posts from the Codemasters forum since they are archived and available for all to see