Getting Western Fans a Voice with Square Enix.

[Animexcel]

Probably because it will fail like Spirits Within being a western/eastern collaboration.

 

[Cat Rage Room]

Okay, should we do this

So, I think starting with somebody like that would be the thing to do. Organize an effort to send tons of requests about this to somebody specific at IGN on a given day at a given time. Propose the idea not just here, but on GameFAQs, YouTube, maybe Facebook too.

Set the date far enough in advance that you can get enough people on board. Don't do the online petition bullshit. That crap never works. A shitton of e-mails, though, is bound to catch somebody's attention.

The added fact that it's a news site (and might publish what we're doing) would help.

My only fear is that this idea will flounder and everyone here will forget about it and not follow through and go back to the LTD debate of the week or whatever.

 

[Shademp]

So, I think starting with somebody like that would be the thing to do. Organize an effort to send tons of requests about this to somebody specific at IGN on a given day at a given time. Propose the idea not just here, but on GameFAQs, YouTube, maybe Facebook too.

Set the date far enough in advance that you can get enough people on board. Don't do the online petition bullshit. That crap never works. A shitton of e-mails, though, is bound to catch somebody's attention.

I vote YES on this idea.

 

[Lord Noctis]

Tres' idea seems like the best shot to me. I'm on board with it.

 

[Ghost X]

Square only need to hire decent writer(s), have new art direction (enough with the belts and zippers), and identify good gameplay ideas in their previous creations, and western RPGs. The fact they can't seem to do this suggests they need to hire different market researchers.

Reading message boards for several years, I get the impression the message from FF fans is pretty loud n' clear in regards to what they want. I doubt sending messages to SE will make them go "Oh, so that's what they want" =p.

 

[Cat Rage Room]

I get the impression the message from FF fans is pretty loud n' clear in regards to what they want.

Right now the present situation is that we're loud and clear but we're yelling from the inside of a boxed in room.

You're not understanding where I'm coming from; I'm not doubting the volume of our voices, I'm saying that we need to focus the direction so that our voices actually reach someone. Whether they listen or not, well, we'll see when we get there.

Also this isn't the thread for 'SE needs to do this/that', we have a million of those. This thread is for discussing and organizing a concentrated effort to get heard.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

Maybe a more old-fashioned approach would work? How about a letter? In Japanese? Posted through the mail? "We, the undersigned...." Like the Declaration of Independence, only it would be a declaration of love instead. If we make them feel loved they're more likely to listen to us. Psych.

Nobody answered my question about their markets and respective profits. Does anyone know the answer?

 

[Tetsujin]

It would be awesome if we could actually get interviewers from gaming news sites to act as the voice of the fans, ask Squex critical questions and stuff like that, so they'd actually be like "What, I didn't know they felt this way."

They didn't actually know about fans wishing for multiple voice tracks until someone asked them about it in an interview for FFXIII.

 

[X-SOLDIER]

I'm somewhat with Tres' idea, but there's a much more sophisticated way to go about this, I think.

The biggest thing is to contact the admins of other fansites and communities, find places with some weight to throw around in terms of member base. If each of them gets their Admin/s to send off a well-written mail to multiple large gaming sites on a particular date to multiple locations, we'll get attention.

The spam e-mail on X date has the possibility of being seen as mass BAWWing, and could be ignored, whereas something like this is going to be generating momentum in what's obviously going to be seen as an attempt to improve things.

If we can get a large number of S-E game-based communities to get together, and say, "Look, S-E, we like you. We like you a lot, but you could be MUCH better at knowing what sorts of things we want. The key to understanding the Western audience is to have some form of communication with them, ESPECIALLY the ones who have been greatly drawn in by your past games. As of currently, you don't have any way to do this. Let's get this happening, and EVERYONE BENEFITS." the gaming community will want to listen.

Hopefully that means that the people who HAVE these connections will then USE them to get some momentum on the issue.


That's my initial thought on the best way to get things running if you wanted to go through something like this.


X

 

[Cat Rage Room]

so we gonna do this????

It's easy to thank posts that are good ideas, but are we willing to collectively get off our asses and get this started?

 

[Dashell]

Sure I'm with you, but... the thing is I don't think bombarding anyone's email is going to do anything except annoy people. I mean I used to have the email of someone very important in the Sonic community and I was sorta like the messenger for other people. And no matter how man requests I got for his email, I never gave it out and just got more and more annoyed with each email I got.

The best way to go about it is to have one or two people try to work their way up on the food chain at Square or basically contact people who are higher up. Those people can collect the ideas and send them off to Square and they don't have to worry about a bunch of people bothering them.

I think that'd work best anyway.

 

[Cat Rage Room]

the thing is I don't think bombarding anyone's email is going to do anything except annoy people.

Did you read anything besides the first three posts, Quex?

 

[Ghost X]

You'd think with the connections SE have to the media (which has been mentioned) they'd be well aware of the criticism. I honestly don't think harassing them with emails or whatever will help. They'll start listening when they become really desperate, which they aren't yet, even after 2 colossal failures.

 

[Cat Rage Room]

You'd think with the connections SE have to the media (which has been mentioned) they'd be well aware of the criticism. I honestly don't think harassing them with emails or whatever will help. They'll start listening when they become really desperate, which they aren't yet, even after 2 colossal failures.

Great, you can't read either, man.

 

[Ghost X]

No, I've read what you agree with, what I'm allowed to say is I don't think it'll work. I'm sorry disagreeing may offend people like yourself. Even bombarding the media outlets that SE are connected with will not work, because SE do not even listen to their criticism of them. What I'm saying will work is SE will listen to ideas when they get really desperate. That or they'll scrape the barrel of popular culture and produce more crap. You can only bring a horse to water. You can't make it drink.

 

[Cat Rage Room]

The mere fact that you threw in 'harassing them with emails or whatever' (which that idea was discarded almost...immediately) in your post sort of clues me in to the fact that you don't really seem to even understand what you seem to be disagreeing with.

No one's talking about harassing anyone, and the best ideas so far don't even have contacting SE directly as an option. It's a fact that SE at least hears popular media outlets given the fact that they commented on FF13 and language tracks after a popular gaming media called them on it.

The fact remains that the goal of this topic isn't quite to get SE to listen to specific complaints. The goal of this topic is to open that door of communication to SE in the first place, before we say anything to them. Your analogy speaks for itself (but funny enough it works against your argument). We can't make the horse (SE) drink the water, but we can bring them to it. As of right now they're nowhere fucking near the water.

Or we can sit here and complain about every single little thing they do like we always do and attempt to do nothing I mean hey whatever sinking ship rite

 

[Dashell]

Did you read anything besides the first three posts, Quex?

Uh yeah did you read this post?

http://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=288193&postcount=23

where someone suggested a petition?

Or this one:
http://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=288194&postcount=24

Where someone suggesting sending a good deal of ideas and opinions implying that a bunch of us would send our ideas and opinions??

Or this one:
http://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=288196&postcount=25

That supported the petition ideas?

Or this one:
http://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=288200&postcount=27

Where you supported the idea to send tons of requests about this to somebody specific at IGN?



Yeah I can read thanks. did you see my idea or is that no good because of some unknown reason?

 

[Cat Rage Room]

Yes, and Tres/SOLDIER's ideas of directly contacting the journalistic gaming publishing organizations who are, and more or less always have been pretty reasonable and prudent about replying/addressing the concerns and queries of the people who pay for their services and is actually pretty likely to reply/publish/do something with our voices is a hell of a lot better than your idea of long term corporate subterfuge.

so what were you saying

 

[Dashell]

Okay so my ideas sucks, got it.

 

[Dashell]

BTW how do you go about getting someone's email at IGN or whatever? I'm not even sure.

 

[Makoeyes987]

You guys wanna have a voice and give Square a powerful message they can't ignore?

Don't buy their shit.​

The almighty dollar speaks volumes. It's louder than any letter, petition, review, etc. If they see no one's buying their half assed bullshit, then guess what? They'll all cry and Wada will have to get his shit pushed in by a punch of pissed off shareholders who want to know why the fuck their profits are failing not just in Japan but in the US too.

Don't. buy. their. shit. THEN negatively review it and say how bullshit it is. And guess what?

They'll have no choice but to go to the table and say, "I'm sorry we lost your trust, what can we do?"

Seriously. Trying to reason with them and make them see the error of their ways is not gonna do shit. Unless they lose money, they won't give a damn. That's the kind of company they are right now. Treating them with respect or whatever is so 2006. They don't give a damn about fans who aren't from the land of the rising sun, so guess what?

We don't need to give a damn either.

 

[Cat Rage Room]

BTW how do you go about getting someone's email at IGN or whatever? I'm not even sure.

uh...pretty much all modern websites have a 'contact us' on the front page?

 

[Dashell]

Usually it's just fill out a form and send it to someone who doesn't matter.

Though the IGN page is a little more specific:
http://corp.ign.com/contact/

EDIT
actually:

Seriously. Trying to reason with them and make them see the error of their ways is not gonna do shit. Unless they lose money, they won't give a damn. That's the kind of company they are right now. Treating them with respect or whatever is so 2006. They don't give a damn about fans who aren't from the land of the rising sun, so guess what?

I like this idea the best

 

[Cat Rage Room]

You guys wanna have a voice and give Square a powerful message they can't ignore?

Don't buy their shit.​

The almighty dollar speaks volumes. It's louder than any letter, petition, review, etc. If they see no one's buying their half assed bullshit, then guess what? They'll all cry and Wada will have to get his shit pushed in by a punch of pissed off shareholders who want to know why the fuck their profits are failing not just in Japan but in the US too.

Don't buy their shit. THEN negatively review it and say how bullshit it is. And guess what?

They'll have no choice but to go to the table and say, "I'm sorry we lost your trust, what can we do?"

Seriously. Trying to reason with them and make them see the error of their ways is not gonna do shit. Unless they lose money, they won't give a damn. That's the kind of company they are right now.

This is 100% true, but not feasible to organize from any viewpoint whatsoever.

I mean, don't get me wrong, you're right on all standpoints and theories from a capitalistic business standpoint, but we could literally get every single solitary person we know to not buy Square Enix products ever and it still won't make a dent in their profit margin. They're losing a lot of money, but their business is still big enough to not notice some punkass boycott from a few thousand people at most.

However, a few thousand voices, directed at the right person is going to get us somewhere.

It's one thing if we already tried this before and it didn't work, but this is worth a try, I mean god damn; from an individual standpoint it really won't be much work at all; just sending an email. The real work from our viewpoint comes from organizing this whole thing; but once it gets going its going to be self propagating.

Give me this much, guys. We all like to complain about SE but we won't get together and send IGN/kotaku (who will SURELY notice a well concentrated effort) a few emails? Come on.

If absolutely nothing else, SE won't be contacted at all, but imagine the impact that it'll have if kotaku published an article about a whole bunch of SE fans sending them correspondence insisting SE to open up channels of communication. Do you guys realize how fast ideas and the written word spreads?

I want to say again; this idea isn't so we can complain about SE and what they're not doing. This idea is to open up the channel of communication to Western gamers.

 

[Makoeyes987]

This is 100% true, but not feasible to organize from any viewpoint whatsoever.

I mean, don't get me wrong, you're right on all standpoints and theories from a capitalistic business standpoint, but we could literally get every single solitary person we know to not buy Square Enix products ever and it still won't make a dent in their profit margin. They're losing a lot of money, but their business is still big enough to not notice some punkass boycott from a few thousand people at most.

Yeah it will! Just look at FFXIV, FF The Four Warriors of Light, and how they've basically struggled to keep their head above water.

Seriously, people are fed up with their nonsense. The days of them selling out millions and crap are done and they're declining bit by bit. Won't take any real organization or whatever. Just tell people that if they want things to change, they need to either buy the games used so the company doesn't get any of the money from the purchase, or just not buy anything.

It's still big enough now, but they've had to decrease their projected profits for next year by over half. They're in the red. If they're smart they wouldn't just ignore anymore negative publicity coming their way.
However, a few thousand voices, directed at the right person is going to get us somewhere.

It's one thing if we already tried this before and it didn't work, but this is worth a try, I mean god damn; from an individual standpoint it really won't be much work at all; just sending an email. The real work from our viewpoint comes from organizing this whole thing; but once it gets going its going to be self propagating.

I guess I'm just bitter and jaded.

Give me this much, guys. We all like to complain about SE but we won't get together and send IGN/kotaku (who will SURELY notice a well concentrated effort) a few emails? Come on.

LOL Kotaku ridicules the fuck out of S-E these days. They might be interested in this, that's for sure. IGN is kinda in the middle.

If absolutely nothing else, SE won't be contacted at all, but imagine the impact that it'll have if kotaku published an article about a whole bunch of SE fans sending them correspondence insisting SE to open up channels of communication. Do you guys realize how fast ideas and the written word spreads?

It could do some serious good. That's true. I'm not saying its not worth trying, I'm just saying more likely, the lack of money will hurt them more.

I want to say again; this idea isn't so we can complain about SE and what they're not doing. This idea is to open up the channel of communication to Western gamers.

My...my ears...