Will, this nonsense has been going on since I was QA on Live man. Its doesn't matter which devs you have in place, they're just playing musical chairs with the same dang issues/complaints. I'm talking all the way back to when Live was in Burnaby BC. I used to live in North Van. Had buddies working there, invited me there & used to tell me stuff all the time, knowing that I was going into game ani/design (Capilano/DigiP).
It doesn't matter the (our)input, they're going to do it their way, and sprinkle in buzzwords for renamed tech from the past, call it new, etc.. You've seen my letter to EA, and now reading that even you had to be adamant in 2016 about things the community wants is a slap in the face. What was the purpose of these yearly surveys and questionnaires if you even have to do that in the present? Its like they don't get it.
Wouldn't surprise me that we'll just be waiting sometime years from now for Sean Obrien Jr's apology letter, and Andrew Wilson II talking about EA's 2nd generation of higher up saying that 2020 version of Live will be the fully fledged version that Live 17/18 was supposed to be. How in the world do you have a delay to a delay? That's why I don't buy they're products new. Get them used, if that. Live's been a 2nd rate NBA game to me I can only stomach the demos. Outside of Live 10 which was decent, it took a 2k guy to get them somewhat on track, but they go right back to derailing themselves...
They need new GC's too. They need to find people who will sit down and point the issues out like what you, myself and a few hardcore others have done. Don't get these yes men. When you read their blogs and vlogs, they seem bewildered to the reactions of gamers. That right there tells you they don't get it, and the GC's(SLA's) aren't helping. Just a mess of a franchise man, I haven't seen anything like this in all my years of gaming.
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