Stefan Gagne (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} twoflower) wrote,@ 2008-04-25 09:39:00 |
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The Customer Service Tango
...is being danced by someone else now.
We've moved almost all CS duties to "7Seas Sass", a support account. Frankly, yesterday's post of woes was apparently a spike -- things have dulled down considerably since that one bad day... but it can't hurt to get this stuff off the shoulders of your lead software developer and onto someone with some PR skills. So, any broken rods or other needs I forward along, then I get back to work. So far it's played out nicely.
The upshot of this is I have time to devote to new features, to expand beyond the fishing basics we launched with. For instance, collaborating with the 7Seas Social Chat group, I came up with an entirely new contest mode -- Team Fishing Challenges, where teams of 3 can add their scores together on the board. Included in the fishing area kit (and a board update) will be four clusters of sittable crates, Red, Green, Blue, and Yellow Team based.
That by itself would only be "okay" but let's add this to those motorboats I've been coding... now we have a purchasable boat that seats three which acts as a team! You can rename your team, and give it a logo to put on a flag on the back of the boat, too. So instead of being Team Blue, you can be Team Skullcrush. (There's a 10 character limit.) Plus you can sail anywhere within the sim and fish, and still be in the contest, since the boat's got a built in fish server!
I think things like this -- as well as our nameable, wearable pet fish, our arcade game integration, our 1-prim fish based aquariums, our insta-franchisable fishing areas, our casual baitless fishing rods, and catchable clothing items (to be expanding) really set is apart from the competition. Not in a "WE RULE" way, but in a "We're different" way. We focus on different areas. For instance, the other systems have more emphasis oncash tournaments networked across all of SL -- we aren't doing that, and have no problems coughing up that marketshare because it's not something we're interested in. Same goes for a more "hardcore" leveling curve with dozens of levels, it's not something we want to do, even though we know there's certainly customer interest in it. Just not our style.
(Edit: Someone in an earlier comment pointed out that NR doesn't actually have a built in cash option. I didn't know that. My only experience with NR was three hours of rod fishing a few months ago. Any similarities are, as I've pointed out, due to how all fishing games are kinda the same at a conceptual level. If anything we WANT to be different, for reasons noted above.)
Of course, my life is not all SL, no matter what this blog seems to look like at the moment. I'm also keenly awaiting the Teamfortress 2 and City of Heroes updates, but not much to say about them until I can get my greasy little paws on 'em and play. So stay tuned for rants about Crab Spiders and Kritzkreigs in the future.
...is being danced by someone else now.
We've moved almost all CS duties to "7Seas Sass", a support account. Frankly, yesterday's post of woes was apparently a spike -- things have dulled down considerably since that one bad day... but it can't hurt to get this stuff off the shoulders of your lead software developer and onto someone with some PR skills. So, any broken rods or other needs I forward along, then I get back to work. So far it's played out nicely.
The upshot of this is I have time to devote to new features, to expand beyond the fishing basics we launched with. For instance, collaborating with the 7Seas Social Chat group, I came up with an entirely new contest mode -- Team Fishing Challenges, where teams of 3 can add their scores together on the board. Included in the fishing area kit (and a board update) will be four clusters of sittable crates, Red, Green, Blue, and Yellow Team based.
That by itself would only be "okay" but let's add this to those motorboats I've been coding... now we have a purchasable boat that seats three which acts as a team! You can rename your team, and give it a logo to put on a flag on the back of the boat, too. So instead of being Team Blue, you can be Team Skullcrush. (There's a 10 character limit.) Plus you can sail anywhere within the sim and fish, and still be in the contest, since the boat's got a built in fish server!
I think things like this -- as well as our nameable, wearable pet fish, our arcade game integration, our 1-prim fish based aquariums, our insta-franchisable fishing areas, our casual baitless fishing rods, and catchable clothing items (to be expanding) really set is apart from the competition. Not in a "WE RULE" way, but in a "We're different" way. We focus on different areas. For instance, the other systems have more emphasis on
(Edit: Someone in an earlier comment pointed out that NR doesn't actually have a built in cash option. I didn't know that. My only experience with NR was three hours of rod fishing a few months ago. Any similarities are, as I've pointed out, due to how all fishing games are kinda the same at a conceptual level. If anything we WANT to be different, for reasons noted above.)
Of course, my life is not all SL, no matter what this blog seems to look like at the moment. I'm also keenly awaiting the Teamfortress 2 and City of Heroes updates, but not much to say about them until I can get my greasy little paws on 'em and play. So stay tuned for rants about Crab Spiders and Kritzkreigs in the future.
