#RestoreCANVAS

Larry is god lol lol wrote:

dude whats canvas

freezy wrote:

Hey guys, to be completely honest with you: There is basically a 0% chance that the old Canvas mode will return, sorry

#RestoreCANVAS

The old graphics were easier to play, more attractive/enjoyable. If they dont revert to allow the option they will lose me and probably many other players. 1980's 8bit graphics belong in thee annals of history, not in modern gaming.

@El_franco I know you don't care about being banned, but mind your language.

freezy wrote:

Hey guys, to be completely honest with you: There is basically a 0% chance that the old Canvas mode will return, sorry.

But there is a good chance that we will keep improving the new WebGL mode further. Your feedback will help in that regard.

By the way, the WebGL version was available for nearly 2 years now and we had already many feedback cycles with many players, and also you had the chance already to chime in before Canvas was turned off. But of course it is never too late for good feedback, so we will still listen now and will consider it when we do our next changes.

Just do me one favor: Please play with the new mode for a day or two and try to get accustomed to it. This will help to focus the feedback on real issues that are really important because it will be impossible to accomodate for all opinions that are basically just "I dont like it because it is different".

In that sense, if you want to give feedback after you played it for a while, please try to be specific and show exact situations (with a screenshot) and a description what should be improved about it. We will collect such examples for further improvement rounds in the future.

To give you some more reasoning:

We always planned to do this at some point after introducing the WebGL mode ~2 years ago, and we kept supporting Canvas for these 2 years even though we wanted to shut it down eventually. From a code standpoint supporting Canvas is just slowing us down too much, it makes feature implementation slower, QA testing slower and increases the number of potential bugs. The old mode is also not how we ourselves envision the game in today's day and age. We rather want to focus on improving the new technology and keep Call of War state of the art.

We also run QA tests on the new version all the time and it is even playable on weaker devices. Most problems stem from either really old ones or not-up-to-date software&drivers. But if you experience problems in this regard, our support team can help you with troubleshooting.

From a usage standpoint Canvas users were a small minority nowadays, the vast majority already plays in WebGL (we tracked this and we wouldnt have done this step if this wasnt the case). I know it might feel different because long time players tend to favor canvas as they are used to it, and those players also tend to be more active in forums/chats and be vocal about their opinion.

It always hurts to take something away from some players, we rather want to focus on the vast version that the majority uses.

TL;DR: Canvas won't come back, we want to improve the new version instead with your help.

We have TRIED the version and SERIOUSLY DISLIKED it. That counts even if newer players don't know it even exists.

THE LEAST you could have done is give us a warning, we wouldn't have bothered starting any new games then.

You say there is 0% chance it will return; so this is like saying goodbye to an old lover. Bye, CoW, we had good times together. I hope these other guys make you happy.

Last Salut for ourself

K.Rokossovski wrote:

Unbelievable. OF COURSE most people use it, that's because you give it to them as a default. ANY ONE I have talked to and said "hey there's a better looking version as well" switched to it and liked it better.

We have TRIED the version and SERIOUSLY DISLIKED it. That counts even if newer players don't know it even exists.

THE LEAST you could have done is give us a warning, we wouldn't have bothered starting any new games then.

You say there is 0% chance it will return; so this is like saying goodbye to an old lover. Bye, CoW, we had good times together. I hope these other guys make you happy.

Sad to see you leave Hope to still see you back one day when you are ready to give the new mode a try.

You have the chance to shape it with your feedback, we already did some changes just because single players argued very well for them. So if there is particular stuff that you don't like aout thee new mode, don't be shy about asking for them.

But if we won't read from eachother again: Thanks for all the feedback throughout the years and of course thanks for playing!

(this post is also adressed to all other players who will quit)

FREEZY,

1) washed out countries look the same in some cases;

2) you constantly have to zoom in/out to see different views eg max zoom out to see who is AI, 4x zoom in to see provinces;

3) i cant see where my troops are going, 16 zooms in from province level to see the the city name tags, troop lists obscure the view;

4) its plain ugly, you have ruined the experience with pig ugly graphics.

Summary play on a world map with 1,000+points and you will spend your life zooming in and out, its unmanageable.

To your point that only a few users used canvas, you may well have under estimated where your revenue comes from, its not the casual play rather the hard core, and sticking your finger up at us may hurt your revenue streams more than you think. I get it that multiple coding is a pain but you really messed this one up, fix your mistakes fast or lose valued participators.

Can other players recommend similar games that are not spoilt by clunky game play?

freezy wrote:

Sad to see you leave Hope to still see you back one day when you are ready to give the new mode a try.

You have the chance to shape it with your feedback,

Erm, I'm sorry to have to say this on leaving, but you're really not very good at listening to feedback. On the 1.5 introduction, I gave you some feedback and you only argued your own view without really listening. For example, the game now has the problem that there are too many offensive units (those with higher attack stats than def stats); and we also have the frankly ridiculous situation that the best rush unit is motorized infantry. I can imagine all those trucks full of soldiers driving into unknown roads and ambushes))) I addressed both issues with you and you basically said "well we're going to do it anyway", so that's not very encouraging to spend time writing feedback posts))) Cause those are just the most recent examples; there have been many, many cases over the years where feedback was just ignored or shoved aside. I know I'm just one guy and I don't have the eternal source of wisdom either; but honestly, do you remember even a single time where you actually acted on my feedback? Yeah, exactly.

I hate being overly critical when developers try to make significant improvements. However, as a very longtime player, I really dislike the change. It's not just personal preference, you've made it much more difficult to look at the screen and quickly see important, basic things - like unit counts, type of units. The screen is so busy and just not clear - it's not clear at all.

I'm not going to threaten to leave or anything drastic, but it's just not enjoyable.

Sorry folks.

FREEZY

Given you have ruined the experience for us, without warning and without apology, why dont you let us cash in our gold?

Seems the most honourable thing for you to do right now.

Eh, it's hard ... For now, the new changes do not make me delight, but rather throw me away from the game. For now, I am staying, but I know many from the environment who just have enough - that's why I took this action

If I am going to give Feedback to WebGL, make the background of the countries darker, something like the picture below (colors from Hoi4)

[/img]

I know how you all feel. When WebGL graphics came out, I hated it too. But as I played with it, I realized it wasn't that bad. I'm not saying this is or will be the case for everyone, but for those of you who haven't tried it much, you might find that you like it too.

Remember, CoW will never get any better if it remains the same. Updates are what let the game improve. Of course, people have opinions, and may not agree with the updates, but those updates allow for the evolution and growth of the game, as opposed to a stagnant, boring game.

By contrast, my argument as to why Canvas was better than WebGL:

Low WebGL Graphics - the map without relations looks too bright, while the neutral states that are included in us have a color similar to shh ... so maybe recolor them gray?

Second thing - the number of units is hidden under the unit's texture.

Third - the plane patrol interferes with the operation of ground units - you click on the units and selects the planes'

Forth - Colors merge - this is a problem for color blinders

[/img]

#RestoreCANVAS

I have tried to like the WebGL graphics but they are ugly and make it much more difficult to see critical information on the map. The colors seem "cheap" ie bright and plasticky (I quite loathe the pulsing pink bands for territory in danger of rebellion).

Why on earth did you guys not do a WebGL mode that emulated the Canvas mode then most of this angst could have been avoided

When it comes down to it, for a game that can absorb hours each day, the players really need to feel comfortable with the screen they are looking at and the WebGL mode you guys have designed is not for a lot of players

But again, feedback from some veterans here will be completely ignored and Call of War will continue to evolve to be a game with more and more of its subtle play removed to please the masses.

I will (have to) give the mode a go to finish off games in progress but will have to re-evaluate my commitment to the game (again). I have supported Call of War by taking High Command for years but I guess it is just not enough for the guys in charge to take any notice (as usual)

Freezy and Doctor,

The frustrating part of this is many of us have talked about the colors being too bright and have shown like the examples that Ydstriker has supplied and as far as I can tell we haven't been heard/listened to in the past. Yes, I know you ask 100 people you would get 100 different answers. Another 100 would most likely say they are too dim.

Not once in over 2 years have I seen the colors get any softer (I have tried a few times to like it)...so with many users coming up for air and again attempting to discuss the reasons we find it far inferior there doesn't seem to be any real reason or incentive for Bytro to listen and fix our issues.

I would suspect that the slide rule of customers/usage/length of play/etc has been calculated along with making the inferior version the default graphics package for these past 2 years have allowed Bytro to now have great confidence that this will go away in 48-72 hours and your customer revenue/loss will be minimal. Pretty smart actually. You have gotten the vast majority of users to get used to playing with an inferior graphics program while pretending to care that some of us are down right pissed at this.

At this point you would be crazy not to weather the storm, keep the cartoon looking interface and bright colors and take your PR 'hit'. It is your toy and you can play with it the way you want. But I do have options.

freezy wrote:

Hey guys, to be completely honest....

hi, your statement is best example of arrogance, we did it, we know better, this is our company’s way, fine, but you forget about something: beauty of “canvas”, strategy game, with many passionate players who fell in love with its simpleness, diplomacy, and bit old school pattern, game for men, now you going into plastic nowhere, counting on legion of newcomers, fine, thats says a lot about future, ours (customers) and yours (designers)

#RestoreCANVAS

jprd

#restorecanvas I can't play on the low-res screen and I can't load the hi-res screen

Know your customer!

If we could afford higher end machines, we would be playing higher end games...duh!