• Update On Community Add Track

    07:13 AM
    6


    As you know, Twin Galaxies recently launched the BETA of its Community Add Track System and we are happy to report that its core functionality seems to be working well.

    However, there have been some bugs reported and we are addressing them as quickly as possible!

    We have been really thinking about the overall issue of track dilution and the idea of waiting periods and duplicates and etc. and feel that we will be able to move toward an initial permanent policy direction soon.

    This will be discussed further during the upcoming State of The Galaxies broadcast this Friday the 24th at 7pm. Be sure to tune in at www.twingalaxieslive.com

    Also there was some thinking mentioned in another thread that we would like to repeat here to help cultivate thoughts and questions for State of the Galaxies, and it was this:

    At these early stages of the launch of the Add Track system we will feel a slight aberration for a while in track creation due to the submission point build up. Hopefully it won't be too bad, but rest assurde that Twin Galaxies will manage it as best as possible. Just all part of the growing pains.

    While the general concern of track dilution and "bad track" is something to be attentive to, the fact that it essentially costs 60 SP to create a track will operate to help load balance the situation. Beyond this, there are a few things we plan to add to help fight dilution and tracks that are not particularly thoughtful:

    1.) Trackrating. Similar to thread rating, this will help members discern what tracks are considered high quality and more valuable to achieve in. Members will be able to rate tracks, and over time a track will develop a profile. This will ultimately work toward a method that will help determine who is "best" in any given area because the system will be able to consider the track weighting along with the actual achievement count.

    2.) Track investing - Simple concept. If you are a founder of a track(s) that get a lot of activity, that activity proves you have made a great track and the trackessentially "pays" you in submission points (or other rewards) on a daily/weekly/monthly basis. This will encourage thoughtful track creation, and discourage lame, dilutive, tracks.

    We will continue to update the community as we make progress!

    Thank you for your participation, support and patience!

    2. Announcements
    6
    1. Don Atreides's Avatar
      Don Atreides - 04-23-2015, 01:12 PM
      If investments are implemented, it would be possible to raise the cost of tracks to further prevent dilution/lame tracks.
    1. Barthax's Avatar
      Barthax - 04-23-2015, 06:23 PM
      If investments are implemented, it would be possible to raise the cost of tracks to further prevent dilution/lame tracks.
      The current system is in beta and needs to be kept in check until it matures and the primary teething problems are dealt with. Until then the current cost is understandable. However, I feel any notion of increasing the cost of tracks will be a detriment to the whole process. Regardless of opinions about "dilution" and the different ways of analysing the "dilution", games are only getting bigger and more diverse: the Angry Birds phenomenon is just continuing to expand; the main-stay driving simulators just keep adding more tracks; more companies want a slice of the driving sim pie and release equally large-scale games; EA's library of regular releases (FIFA, PGA, Madden, etc.) is just getting larger each year and still the massive holes in the TG database have yet to be filled for far too many old platforms and even more lack of content in more modern platform support. The TG add track process suggests people must band together to create new tracks as a requirement. While there is some minor activity showing in this aspect like-minded playing of a few regulars, the majority of the current active populace is more a suite of individuals with different aims. While this trend prevails the cost of a single variation remains a very significant barrier to any new large game to add. With a typical submission adjudication being a guestimate of around 3 minutes work, that's 9 minutes work to submit one score but 3 hours 9 minutes to create and submit one new variation with score.

      Each submission generates far more Submission Points than the three spent by the submitter, ever-increasing the total pool of available points. However, any suggestion that the silent majority of Submission Point owners will "chip in" appears unfounded and I expect will remain that way. TG has always been a scoreboard featuring large numbers of lurkers and few obvious participants. I hope that changes but even then is unlikely to fill the gap on the scoreboard of missing games on older platforms.

      Just expressing a concern that individuals who do not participate very regularly may not experience and therefore voice opinions which adversely affects other: attempting to balance the view expressed (not just in this thread).
    1. 1500points's Avatar
      1500points - 04-23-2015, 07:15 PM
      i had originally suspected it might cost 300 points or more for a track. over the course of 4 months i built points like crazy and got over 1000. Right now I'm down to around 500 after "making it rain" on the new score ideas.

      But one of my favorite titles is the Trial X series on iOS. if you add up all the track amongst the 5 releases. even at 50 tracks a title (guesstimate). it would take 15,000 points to represent all of them by user purchase. not likely to happen unless there is a cult following of trial x on iOS amongst the regulars at the new TG. as it stands i posted one single track for that title just to see if anyone else other than me was curious about it...fishing.

      The elephant in the room is not title cost, which led to this discussion. It was specifically the fact that the first DK entry caused an emotional stir. If the original title entry had stages it would have been ok. stage 1- crowd sourcing the sponsor points. stage 2- draft rewrites of the community decided rules. with a nice clean write-up. a simple rule list and a deeper explanation. stage 3- time for any other input then goes to TG admin for final write and approval. Much like a news story getting submitted to a newspaper for final publication in the newspaper. (i'm picturing...Peter Parker submitting a Spiderman story to J. Jonah Jameson....)

      PS- and the new tracks that I personally submitted. Please can we have edit access awhile so I can rewrite them for clarity/simplicity and typos. Didn't realize the first entry was the final entry....draft stage please, please, please.
    1. Barthax's Avatar
      Barthax - 04-23-2015, 07:51 PM
      i had originally suspected it might cost 300 points or more for a track. over the course of 4 months i built points like crazy and got over 1000. Right now I'm down to around 500 after "making it rain" on the new score ideas.

      But one of my favorite titles is the Trial X series on iOS. if you add up all the track amongst the 5 releases. even at 50 tracks a title (guesstimate). it would take 15,000 points to represent all of them by user purchase. not likely to happen unless there is a cult following of trial x on iOS amongst the regulars at the new TG. as it stands i posted one single track for that title just to see if anyone else other than me was curious about it...fishing.
      It is mind boggling when you think of the cost that the average "multi-level/stage" game will cost but as for the big stuff like Gran Turismos, Forza Motorsports, Project Gotham Racings, Need for Speeds + Burnouts + Midnight Clubs on numerous platforms each, Angry Birds [original/Rio/Seasons/Space/Star Wars/Star Wars II/Stella] on up to six platforms each (Android, iOS, PS3 and Xbox 360 in "Trilogy", PC Standard and Windows 8 app store version have differences): ugh! Perhaps some discounted methods for larger quantities of "same" variations might arise.

      The elephant in the room is not title cost, which led to this discussion. It was specifically the fact that the first DK entry caused an emotional stir. If the original title entry had stages it would have been ok. stage 1- crowd sourcing the sponsor points. stage 2- draft rewrites of the community decided rules. with a nice clean write-up. a simple rule list and a deeper explanation. stage 3- time for any other input then goes to TG admin for final write and approval. Much like a news story getting submitted to a newspaper for final publication in the newspaper. (i'm picturing...Peter Parker submitting a Spiderman story to J. Jonah Jameson....)

      PS- and the new tracks that I personally submitted. Please can we have edit access awhile so I can rewrite them for clarity/simplicity and typos. Didn't realize the first entry was the final entry....draft stage please, please, please.
      Let me be clear that I support this process going slow at first: it needs to be ironed out and a "one-hit process" like it currently stands is a good start but not a long-term solution.
    1. 1500points's Avatar
      1500points - 04-23-2015, 08:42 PM
      How about something like this...

      1- open thread with edit to discuss and tweak the rule list
      2- vote phase where folks decide if the suggestion has validity/credibility/etc.
      3- if vote successful, crowd sourcing/sponsorship phase. so folks aren't blowing money on invalid ideas.
      4- after vote, then it goes to TG administration to finalize and post up in scoreboard?

    1. Barthax's Avatar
      Barthax - 04-23-2015, 08:47 PM
      How about something like this...

      1- open thread with edit to discuss and tweak the rule list
      2- vote phase where folks decide if the suggestion has validity/credibility/etc.
      3- if vote successful, crowd sourcing/sponsorship phase. so folks aren't blowing money on invalid ideas.
      All good bar #4: TG should only be involved in disputes - the same way they are only involved in the TGSAP when things go awry (other than their obvious behind-the-scenes work). I would definitely give more votes than points: I'm (relatively) time-rich but SP-poor.

      [Edit 20150427] In the "State of the Galaxies", Jace indicated that the system will not be changed. My interpretation of what I heard: getting the community to "vote" on the creation of variations imposes a method for one set of users to block another set of users using Twin Galaxies for how they wish to game their game. Instead, TG will be implementing a "weighting" system for the community to support the variations the individuals enjoy and the web site will present "more popular" variations before "less popular" ones on the scoreboard.
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