Yeah but we all know that $i has been useless for quite a while now...All you need is the small amount to level your skill trees which is easily made running missions/ archives...Noone I know has bought gear (clothing, abilities, weapons, bit/frags etc...) for a very long time. the only thing info is used for now is to buy rare things from past events ...rewards..documents etc...and that is a very small market. I mean the only reason anyone really data tapped after the spawns and such were added was to get the bits to make the overdrive etc...Not for the money. There is no real market present as absoultly everything can be character made.. except for boss drops which are easily surpassed by regular loot drops. And the pvp ...not really a "stoppage" to to inflation, you can bypass that easily by loading up Master Shadow and avoid the pvp all together.



V

Nerfing Datamine numbers was a pointless kneejerk reaction, you have to HAVE an economy before inflation can affect it.  The only reason it's possible to have hundreds of millions or billions in info collecting dust in your inventory is because there's a giant black hole filled with info that any user can draw from 24/7.  A MMO's 'economy' is the equivalent of scouring the planet for leaves and calling it money.

You know... players could always have been animating live events. For example, the rescue of Niobe from the pocket construct. Players just never really had an incentive until now.

I'm very excited by the prospect of players getting together to create animated recaps of some of the more interesting Live Events and making them accessible in that way for other players. I mean, why just have one cinematic showing stuff you can't participate in when you could have lots of cinematics that document things that players are achieving every day in the game. Why not a cinematic for that one Cypherite who blew up Old Zion? These things would also make a strong advertisement for MxO. Player videos documenting the big effects players have had on the story.

Unfortunately, I'm no good at drawing or using flash and I don't have a mic or any audio software, so I'm of no use to this cinematic production.

Walrus: It just occured to me, at least in so many words, that you haven't told us anything about the production of MxO.  You didn't tell us about what is coming, only what we have and what we're losing.  That's why this doesn't qualify as a 'Producer's Letter'. 

After reading the whole 17 pages of this topic carefully (took me about 2 hours lol), i see a few facts that can undoubtedly be stated:

1.Concerning Mxo's budget

Regardless of newcomers we get almost everyday (I often go to Uriah to help and answer questions), our player database is on a steady downfall rate, that would probably explain the budget cuts unless some of the people that posted are right about SoE getting all the cash in one spot and deciding where to spend it.
There is the option of making expansions instead of updates ( i'm not talking monthly - bug fixes etc) but new areas like the DM and new (not re-hashed) items.This has its downsides but it could help increase MxO's budget and it will also boost the marketing since magazines and sites like gamespot , IGN ,etc. would definetly advertise it.

2.Cinematics

I understand Rarebit's statement about the leak risk, property laws, rights , etc. but as others have suggested before me,(i think odj), the cinematics could be made after the update, thus leaking being harmless, since we already know the content.There is of course the problem of using 3d likenesses , which would definetly have to be supervised by the devs, but i believe that if a good screenplay is written in advance (i.e.: Hal turns, does this ,says that and explodes - specific character gesturing), the devs' time consumption would be greatly decreased, the rest being up to the editing team (video +audio).All of those volunteers involved in these production would simply need to sign a contract stating their obligations and consequences in case they do not obey what's stated within, kind of like EULA.The difference being, those volunteers would need to provide SoE with verrified personal information (name, location, etc.) to ensure no abuse is made.

 3.Things we lost

 Someone (sry for not remebering who), stated that we've lost alot of things since beta to now.First, i must admit that i wasn't in here for that long, but i am theoretically up to date to most of the things that happened.As far as I know from the people that were here that long, CG was a good thing , since glitchy , ugly, combat animations aren't something people want for their $15. As far as i'm concerned, Rarebit did a great job tweaking them.
Also, from what i've heard, the Voice Actors Union or whatever it is, wanted more money for the provided ressources so they had to let most of the unique voices go.Yes, the Sentinel wasn't updated for a long time now, but i think Paul, however others would consider him, did his best to make the MxO universe enjoyable by all.One has to remember we are only human.Sure, we can all be critics of the devs' work, but this should be done in a more constructive way, throwing dirt at people won't fix anything and besides, most of us couldn't have done a better job (those that could were polite as far as this topic goes).

4.Player involvement.

I agree with Tsusai, MMOs usually don't have this player involvement like we do (LESIG, etc.), but if SoE doesn't give a *CENSORED* about MxO, we do.And if we want this game to stay alive we will do our best to keep it healthy.I think speak for many Matrix and MxO fans out there that feel the same way.Hell, i'd even go do a fund raising to buy MxO from Sony  .If we can gather 1000 people they'll recognize us as a new religion "

I've seen a user's signature saying vote for MxO on an SoE forums poll.Went there, 15% MxO and a few others, 50% or more Vanguard.PoBS had 1%, rest had 0%.I do believe the low percentage on our side is alot more due to the fact that alot of people hate SoE's way of ruining games and don't even go on their forums, besides our player base.As for Vanguard...i guess they didn't have enough time to "fix" that one as well "

Last, but not least, I hope the devs will consider these...bold suggestions that me and the others (e.g. odj) made to help them help this great and unique game stay alive if not making it glorious ".What other game has this community involvement and love MxO does?Which MMO out there has the RP quality and powerful storyline we do?Who has devs that make the storyline in their holidays instead of "/mexico"? Perhaps i can't go around being proud i've seen a hobbit inside the Matrix (lol), or that i'm wielding a glowing stick, but I sure know what the people inside it make out of it and its events, and from my experience with MMOs, nothing compares to it.

Because I choose to.
NeoExcidious

Ok, heres how you stop bitching and moaning about the lack of cinematics, and just get on with it. Recreate one of the pre-exhisting cinematics but in a new format. Take that bloody godawful wireframe bloke one coming out of ascensionfor example. Create a storyboard for shots, long shots wide shots, profile shots etc, plan plan plan.

Then film the in-game environments and put the raw footage into a composition program like AE. Get your crap together, get a great artist onboard to act as a mock animator, create moveable characters that can be easily positioned, create breakdown poses for each character, and basically sling it all together and show the dev team you can create something 10x as better than the original shower of *poop* they put out for the consumer.

End of.

(Post edited for minor language -Jury)

I just have one little question about player made cinematic, if it's going to be in game or 3D, how are y'all going to do the main characters like Niobe, Veil, Merovingian, etc?

Well they would have to be offically sanctioned...Then I'm sure disguise masks would be given to the cinematic team...As most of the main characters are just disguises over generic redpill bodies. As for doing the voice work for them there would be no way to get them to sound like they did.

Before all that we need to get the devs' approval which would mean them getting the approval from SoE (if that's ever gonna happen) and it would mean they're willing to make this sort of...effort.Until that, Mona's right, no cinematics.

NeoExcidious wrote:

Before all that we need to get the devs' approval which would mean them getting the approval from SoE (if that's ever gonna happen) and it would mean they're willing to make this sort of...effort.Until that, Mona's right, no cinematics.

We don't need 'permission' from anyone, we can go out and start making the cinematics right away its just they wouldn't be official.