I've locked the original Constructive Criticism topic not just because it's HUGE, but because it's easier for us to manage. By manage, I mean, grabbing all the messages, sorting through them and routing them to the correct people on the game team.

I opened this "Volume 2" topic because we really do value your constructive criticism and hope that you'll continue to provide it here.

Thanks!

This game is going in a great direction, but I have stopped playing. I don't know what it is, but I have stopped playing. It use to be I play all the time, then I cut it down to Live Shows, now I don't play at all.

It must be something, but I can't put my finger on it.

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http://thewinbutton.com/forumz
Introduce yourself, then put this code after your first post. JOHN#0002

My critique, whatever it's worth...

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il Buono

• Holistically, the game is excellent.  While I think this is one of the worst game shows on television (aside from the Deal or no Deal), it's great fun on the Xbox.  I expected it to suck, but I'm very pleased to be proven wrong.  I never thought an MMO trivia game could work, and I'm happy to see someone pull it off.  Please give yourselves a pat on the back.
• The integration of the NXE avatars is superb.  Whomever designed the amping system deserves a raise.
• The four button simplicity ensures this is a game anyone in the family can play.
• The sets are vibrant and pleasant to look at, especially during a live game.  I like how each participant level gets its own color and design, including the shutters at the end of a round.  Seeing someone defeat The Mob and turn the entire set GOLD is a treat.
• The live host feature is very well done.  Nifty technical achievement aside, this really adds to the believability of participating in a game show.  Casting a former DJ / comedian was a smart move.  Cashman is a natural, and I hope he eventually gets an opportunity to host a televised game show.
• I'm finally able to put some of my otherwise useless video game "knowledge" to use.  The balance between classic & contemporary titles is excellent.  I'm looking forward to the first VG theme show.
  
• The changes made in the game in response to criticism / suggestions by the community has been above and beyond.  Bravo, Microsoft.

il Brutto

• The questions could be more difficult for trivia fans.  The first SUPERHARD episode was a huge letdown.
• Entertainment questions seem to be "Gen X" centric.  I don't mind this at all; and, while this is the target market for the Xbox (or at least the demographic with the highest ownership), it isn't really fair to younger / older players.
• While the theme nights are something I enjoy, there should be category centric Extended Play episodes with relevant prizes (like a $50 Amazon / Borders gift certificate for winning a literature session).  This is a cheap way to bring new players (and sponsors!) into the game, and being rewarded for doing well in EP rounds would make them more competitive.
• I hit the wrong button at least two or three times a night.  It would be nice if there were an "oopsie" feature which would allow a player to change an answer once per round.  Skips help with this to a degree, but it automatically counts as a wrong answer.  I'd like the ability to change an answer at the cost of negating all bonuses.
  
• There needs to be an option to set a group of four to invite only.  Sometimes I just want to play by myself or another person.  There's also the problem of people who send out a friend invite then join my game just to leech answers.  I'd like the option to drop out of a party without having to restart the game.
• There should be a way to change the volume levels of the music and voice overs.
• Jennifer Taylor gets annoying.  While I'm thankful she isn't doing the idiotic Cortana voice, couldn't her lines be a tad more articulate (e.g. "let's move"?!).  Please record five times the current amount of dialogue, or give us the option to mute her.
• More statistics would be nice.  Many players have asked to see how they rank out of the entire Mob.  I'd also like to see statistics for lifetime cumulative streak and highest accuracy out of the top 100 lifetime scorers.
• The One should have his notifications automatically disabled by the game.  This may go against Microsoft policy, but screvv it--I'm pretty sure a few people have dropped / been disconnected because they were inundated with invites & comments.
• It would be nice if Mob members carried over to the next round, just like the televised version.  This probably isn't going to happen ("unbeatable" Mob, gives fewer people a chance, not everyone is going to be present during the next live show, etc.), but it would prevent Mob members from being punished for having an idiot as The One who loses before any prizes are awarded.

il Cattivo

• Rent.  It has gotten better, but the final game needs a moratorium on this category.  Would someone on the writing team please explain why there are so many questions on this musical?
  
• There are other sports besides NASCAR, MLS, and MLB.
• There should not be a speed bonus for incorrect answers.  This was a stupid idea.
• The frequency of repeats is too high in Extended Play.  I'm hoping what we've had so far are just "beta questions," because there needs to be a much larger question database (minimum 250,000).  Questions also need to be tagged once they're used and not allowed back into play until the entire database has been cycled.  Hopefully adding more community written sessions into the mix will keep Extended Play fresh, but it's really getting boring.
• The Brain is a hazard, not a help--the accuracy is <15%.  This help should be based on the stats for the week (use the same stats for Mob / One eligibility), not who's currently the luckiest button masher.  It'd also be nice if The Brain's avatar & gamertag would appear whenever this help is used.
• There continues to be inaccuracies, malapropisms, typos, and blatant mistakes in new questions.  Yes, this happens on every game show, but never to this frequency.  Someone on the writing staff with superb editing skills needs to be appointed "fact checker."  Reference librarians are cheap.
  
• Forcing The One to stop due to time constraints is awful.  The player needs an opportunity to return on the next live episode.  This would help build suspense, just like in a real quiz show.  I realize this is not the easiest feature to implement, but it would do nothing but help the show's image.
• Any player who makes it in The Mob should win something, even if it's one hundred Microsoft points.  I would imagine this would only increase revenue, as it's more likely to be the tipping point for someone to buy a map pack / add-on.  Winning nothing because of an idiot, disconnect, or someone who's away is only going to alienate players.
• 800 points and an arcade game for being the last remaining Mob member is paltry compared to 10,000 MS points.  I realize the prize levels may not be finalized, but this doesn't seem very fair.
  
• The possibility that the game will be pay to play for gold subscribers, especially if there's a single advertisement (including "Sprint" lobby).  This really going to cut into the audience, and it brings me to my final point:
  

So Microsoft, remember how many hundreds of millions you burned on the original Xbox just to get your foot in the door?  Well, great job, you're dominating the console market.  Consider 1vs100 Live a similar opportunity for "next generation game shows." Please be generous to the earlier adopters, rather than screvving loyal customers again like when you forced us to buy new peripherals for the 360 (...I'm still waiting on an adapter for the X-arcade).

I know you're greedy, Microsoft, but you could at least phase the pay to play aspect in gradually.  It's not like you're fooling anyone with the word "microtransactions."

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Thank you to whomever takes the time to read through this post.  Overall, this is a brilliant game.  It reminds me of how much fun Xbox Live was before the 360 gayed it up.  I look forward to the next project from the team working on 1vs100 Live.

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There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, ignorance.
I know nothing except the fact of my ignorance. -- Οίστρος

Wow.  Add me to this list of replies, because I agree wil all that "A Patch of Blue: said.

First off, you guys have done an incredible job with this game. Very well put together and a lot of fun despite the bugs and no real prizes yet. Here's a few things I'd like to see to make the experience even better.

Stats:
- More comprehensive stats! Most people love stats and seeing where they rank, so the more the better.
- It'd be nice if the 5-14 group in the streak stats was separated into 5-9 and 10-14. There's a big jump from 5-14 and there's plenty of times I've had a streak of something like 13 and I wonder how many in the 5-14 group are actually above me.
- When viewing the Top 10 stats, it would be nice if it showed exactly where you ranked at the bottom of that list. For those of us who don't make it into the top 10, it'd still be cool to see exactly where you do rank.
- Either remove the quickest answer speed from the stats, or limit it only to those with something like 50%+ accuracy. That takes away the incentive for someone to constantly mash X, shows an avatar that deserves it more, and alleviates the confusion it causes for new people when they see 0 for the top answer speed. Every time I've played with a friend they've noticed the 0 speed and were confused, convinced someone was cheating, or the game was rigged.

Disconnects:
- There's been at least once or twice during Live shows that "the one" has been disconnected before seeing a single question. I was in the mob for one that round and felt a bit "cheated" out of my chance to play (granted I couldn't be that upset since there's no prizes, but I wouldn't be happy if there were). It would be nice if "the one" gets disconnected before it starts, a new "one" is picked instead of kicking the mob as well.
- Extended Play disconnects can be annoying. It would be nice if the points you had accumulated before getting disconnected would still be there if you re-join that same round before it's over. Just missing 2-3 questions while trying to reconnect would be a lot better than starting over at 0 in the middle of the round.

Feature Requests:
- An option to turn off the "buzzer" sound so you can't hear when others in your group are answering would be nice. I've started muting the TV during some rounds since I'd rather not hear how/when others are answering, but it'd be nice if I could mute just them.
- I'm not sure how "regrouping" works when people leave your group or even when starting out a new game in Extended Play, but it seems inconsistent. There's times when people leave and they're replaced within a few seconds, and there's times when people leave and they're not replaced until well into the next round. It would be nice if a check was made at least every round (or more often if possible) to combine/fill in groups of less than 4. That is, of course, if your options aren't set to "invite only" as suggested above.

i pretty much agree with everything a patch of blue said. good post.


i also agree with removing the buzzer that shows when you buzzed cause it helps people who dont know the question.


my two absolute biggest pet peeves are the speed bonus for wrong answers, and not being able to change an answer once it is locked. it should be the last button pressed before the time runs out is the one you have chosen.

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TKA

Below are a few comments I've made in past threads that I'll reiterate here.  I'll place separate comments in separate posts for clarity.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

RE: Prize Structure for The Crowd

Awarding prizes to only the Top 3 players, regardless of the size of The Crowd, is inane.  The Crowd can easily be 100,000+ people in size.  In turn, reaching the Top 3 will necessitate not only a perfect streak of correct answers but almost superhuman reaction time in inputting them.

Prizes should instead be given to a top percentage of players so that the number of prizes awarded scales with the size of The Crowd.  It should also be a large enough percentage that simply doing very, very well would be sufficient to win - bordering on the superhuman should not be necessary.

I would think something like the Top 1% or Top 0.1% would be reasonable - one prize per 100 or 1000 players.

RE: Groups and Privacy

You should be able to set your four-person group to Friends Only (only people on your Friends List can join your group) and Invite Only (only people you specifically invite can join your group).

I might want to reserve spaces for Friends who join the game; and besides, I shouldn't be forced to group with strangers if I don't wish to.

RE: Statistics

1. You should be able to view your personal stats at all times.  During "Stat Breaks" you can look at the big board of statistics - e.g. the Top 10 players - but for some reason you can't call up your own personal statistics at this time.


2. Your statistics should tell you how many questions have been asked, how many you've answered correctly, how many you've answered incorrectly, and, during Extended Play, how many you've skipped.  They do already give you a percentage of accuracy for the current session; but that's not as informative as the number of questions.  Telling me I have 81% accuracy, especially when I'm not even sure how many questions have been asked so far, is not as informative as telling me that I have 25 correct, 4 incorrect, and have skipped 2 out of a total of 31.


3.  (a) Your statistics should tell you what your current ranking is, as well as the current rankings of those in your four-person group.  I couldn't care less which faceless stranger is in first place - he has nothing to do with me and I have no hope of catching him anyway.  I want to know where I rank and where my friends rank.  If there are 122,000 people playing, am I ranked at #8,500?  #46,200?  What?

(b) Moreover, a percentile ranking for you and your friends would be a nice touch in additional to the ordinal ranking.  e.g.  If I'm told that my current (ordinal) rank is #34,229 out of 122,000 people, it would be helpful if it was also indicated that this is the 71.9th percentile.


4.  In fact, there really ought to be a percentile ranking for every statistic they give you - your percentage of accurate answers, your longest streak, your average answer speed, etcetera.  Such percentile rankings are necessary in order to make most of these numbers in any way meaningful.

At present, all they tell you is your current value (with no context) and the value of the #1 leading person in that category.  For instance, they'll tell you that your average answer speed is 1.91 seconds and that the fastest player (who is doubtlessly cheating in some way) has an average answer speed of 0.02 seconds.  This is utterly meaningless since it gives you no idea whether your speed is good or bad or anything at all.  What you want to know is how your speed compares to that of the people in your four-man group and to all other players in general.  i.e. You want to know, for example, that your 1.91-second-speed places you at the 68th percentile for quick answers and that the others in your party are at the 81st, 55th, and 49th percentiles.  You would then know that you're slower than your first friend, faster than the other two, and significantly faster than average overall.  This is meaningful and informative.  The numbers you're presently given are not.

RE: Lack of Involvement for The Crowd

Let's be realistic for a moment: The overwhelming majority of 1 vs. 100 players will spend all of their time in The Crowd.  The normal player will, most likely, never, ever be in The Mob, let alone be The One.  Not even once.

Unfortunately, though, this is just a sad and unavoidable side-effect of the "one-GIANT-game" structure the designers have chosen to adopt, and there's likely nothing that can be done about it now.

When 1 vs. 100 was first announced, I assumed it would group players into sets of 101 people - 1 One and 100 Mob members - and each group would be playing its own game.  In other words, I assumed that you would either be The One or be in The Mob at all times.

Instead, as we now know, every single person is grouped into one GIGANTIC show, out of which a miniscule fraction are selected to actually play the game, while everybody else sits by as an uninvolved spectator.

The problem with this is that The Crowd (where a player will probably spend 100% of his time) is not a very interesting or engaging place to be.  Sure a Crowd member can still answer the questions; but none of his answers matter.  Members of The Crowd never "win" or "lose", and nothing hinges on their performance.  And before anyone says otherwise, no, the potential to win a prize for being among the Top 3 players (an essentially IMPOSSIBLE feat for 99+% of participants) doesn't count.

This is the general issue - that there needs to be something that hinges on a player's performance, even when he's only in The Crowd.  Whether he does well or poorly needs to matter, even for a lowly Crowd member.

A larger number of prizes - such as arcade games for the Top 1% of all players, as I mentioned above - are one good way to increase interest among the masses.  However, even this won't matter to the majority of players, since they'll never be able to perform well enough to have a shot at winning, regardless of the number of prizes.

A cheap, but fairly easy to win "participation" prize might be a good compromise.  Unique clothing items for avatars could be such a possibility.  Anyone who ranks in the top 10% of all Crowd members at the end of a round in live weekend shows, for example, could be given a unique clothing item never available anywhere else.  A new item could be winnable each weekend.

And another small but important thing which I mentioned in the posts above is that the game needs to show you, the ordinary Crowd member, what the hell your rank is.  Simply knowing that your current rank is, say, #29,144 out of 100,000 and watching it go up or down depending on your next answer will go a long way toward making Crowd members at least feel like they have something on the line.

I love this game. Really. I play it on my little brother's gamertag because I don't use xbox live enough to justify a gold account. The only thing I want to see is this game coming out for Windows Live. It would be just perfect, IMO. I would run windows using boot Camp on my mac. But I think it's worth it!

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I don't ask questions, I just do what I'm told...

When this game came out, my girlfriend and I played it a lot. Now it has lost some of it's charm, due in part I think to the fact that we most likely will never be in the mob or be the one, because we can't devote to time necessary to rack up the points you seem to need to be picked. Add that to the repeating questions and same old sayings I.E. "one...you only got one?!?" and the game just gets old. Things need to change and be refreshed to keep the magic alive.

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Give a man a fish and he'll eat for a day.

Give that same man a cow, and that sucker will last a month or so.

I think Jen should sound a lot more enthusiastic when the One defeats the Mob. She sounds quite unexcited when this rare event occurs, as if she expected it to happen. Otherwise, the voicework seems quite fine. Maybe have some more recorded dialogue for many events. Ten or so different phrases for all aspects might be a little bit better. Rather than two or three (knocking out only one mob member, etc.).

The answering mechanic works quite well, though I'm not so sure the alert for a locked in answer is helpful during live events. This sometimes can trick others into picking an answer that may detriment the One's playing by choosing a help (mostly Trust The Crowd). You could say that this was intended, and I can see that. Just a thought, however.

I'm not so sure I enjoy how the Mob is chosen. It seems to be that speedy answers, correct or incorrect, give you a much better chance then actually getting more correct answers. I also like A Patch of Blue's idea about keeping the mob members from the previous round going into the next one.

Still love the game.

For me, I agree with pretty much everything Patch of Blue said.

I think my main complaint, however, is Jen. They should have at least had her record "It's 1 vs ..." each of the numbers between 1 and 100. You can always hear the pause between "It's 1 vs" and the number, which doesn't sound natural, and really makes you remember she's not real. Also, she needs more lines. She seems to constantly be repeating the same. "Only 3, friend". "One? You only got one?", etc.

There are still some technical difficulties with Chris in the live show. I was playing last night, and he said he would be making an announcement at 8pm (btw, Chris should always mention time zone, because for me it was 11pm). At 8pm there was a pause in the action where no question was presented for a while, but it wasn't a stats break - but could not hear Chris talking. Then later on he said he was being asked to repeat his announcement - so clearly it happened at 8 but didn't come through. I don't know if when this happens it happens to everyone, or only some people.

 TheHakku wrote:

I think Jen should sound a lot more enthusiastic when the One defeats the Mob. She sounds quite unexcited when this rare event occurs, as if she expected it to happen.

To second this comment, feel free to listen to this clip. (My apologies for whoever was shouting in the original Youtube video I cut the first sample from.) The first "This is amazing" is in reference to the One and the entire Mob being knocked out (it was 1vs1 and they were both wrong). The second one is from The One defeating the Mob. Maybe those two clips should be swapped? :)

Here's a problem that might want to be addressed: "Service Error There are no questions available for this game of 1 vs. 100." This happened on 7/4 8:00 pm show. Who fell  asleep at the wheel on this one?

I got kicked out with the "no questions available" message a couple of times tonight too.

Fix your freaking  errors. I have more than 5 tonight and I was very disapointed to see this happen.

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Suspensions from Xbox.com = 2.

 Lestat573 wrote:

I got kicked out with the "no questions available" message a couple of times tonight too.

Yeah alot of people have had that.

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Suspensions from Xbox.com = 2.

How about a pop up that simply explains a question & answer. There have been a few questions that I have had no idea what was being asked. I would look it up but we are already moving on to another question. So after the question when we are already being paused for a few seconds for the calculation, why not add in a sentence explaining the answer. That would be cool and probably pretty easy to employ in to the game.

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USAF Explosive Ordnance Disposal

Can the adds, can all the stupid moronic talk about diddly squat, ask more than one question before taking a break, let us interact with the other people we're on screen with. Does Cashman get paid for this? If he does, tell him to get his own gamertag-I did. I play the game but it's not going to be much fun for the people who aren't as learned as others. Pick randomly, not by how fast and how often and how smart a body is. Then it will only be played by the supersmart nerd who lives for this. I.E., not me. It's some fun but overall but I'm loosing interest.

I've heard of loose morals but never loose interest; sorry if your investments aren't panning out.  Stay away from mutual funds!

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There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, ignorance.
I know nothing except the fact of my ignorance. -- Οίστρος

have useful questions!!!! please things i could use in life, or at least less about celebrities and useless crap

agree with patch of blue. but i do have my own suggestion

SUGGESTION: so many people become discouraged when put into the crowd during a live show.  i agree. it can stink sometimes. but what about this: in order to keep the game competetive and to keep people coming, how about awarding like 10-20MP to the winner b/w your group for each round.  this way everybody in the group is still competeing and is having fun. but if microsoft doesn't agree because there are a lot of 4 person groups, extend it to 10 or 20 people.  this would still be fun and would still give everybody a great chance to win some MP.  the 10 or 20 erson group could be put back down to 4 during extended play but for the live show i believe this could work.  also, i have a lot of friends who play 1v100 and it gets kinda annoying when you can only see 4 of your friends stats and the other friends are left out.  so, by expanding the group, you can have all your friends play and competeing.

please tell me what you guys think b/c i Really believe this can work

1. they should award Microsft Points in the extended Play live the top 10 players get 400 MS points and every player that have a score of 100,000 or higher should get 100 MS points that way everyone is happy. Also giving away MS points isn't going cost Microsoft any money. If they do that, Isure this would increase the number of players in the Extended Play Show and maybe the Live show too. 2. I love to see what my rank is if I not in the top 10 3. I think it would be better if they show the mulitple choice answer all at the same time instead one-by-one. 4. They should do a theme night for a live show. for example simpsons night where every question is related to the tv show the simpsons. or any other theme live movies, musics, sports, ect. 5. They shouldn't let the 1 choose the brian on the first question. because how can they deternmine who the brain is if nobody hace score yet.

i think having more than one day off pr week is in order this is ridiculous and to have 6 hrs of extended play is way too  much especially two days in a row, for those people trying to keep up their lifetime score to be in the mob or the one feel compelled to play but enough is enough it is getting boring at this point we need more of a break in between games PLEASE!!!!!

problems with game

1. if i am on a team with people i dont know, its annoying when I press X and than someone who might not know  the question just will press X b/c he heard me pressing X.  get rid of the sounds for the answers.

2. make all three answers not obivious.  If you ask a question like," Which rapper stars in Law and Order.." i want three answers that seem real and will reward the person who actually knows the question. 

Which rapper has a role in Law and Order?

ex of good answers: Ice-T, Dr.Dre, Jay-Z
ex of bad answers:  Ice-T, Black Tea, Spencer Pratt

thats about it.

I still don't understand what they were thinking with the microsoft point levels for the one. I do get the concept, but i do not get the rational for the higher tiers. 30 mob left: 3,000 MS points 20 mob left: 5,000 MS points 10 mob left 6,000 MS points (what the hell? It only goes up 1,000, but the other one went up 2,000) 0 mob left 10,000 MS points (so it goes from jumping 2,000 to 1,000 to 4,000? who can't do math at MS?) Is this going to be fixed? Maybe 30 mob left: 3,000 MS points 20 mob left: 4,500 MS points 10 mob left 7,000 MS points (what the hell? It only goes up 1,000, but the other one went up 2,000) 0 mob left 10,000 MS points (so it goes from jumping 2,000 to 1,000 to 4,000? who can't do math at MS?) Let me know if anyone else sees the same issue. Not sure if the server is buggy or if this forum just doesn't like Chrome, I swear it is easier to read how I typed it and how it looks edited. Not so easy to read when they get rid of the spacing.

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Xbox 360 histroy:
1st: Feb 2006 - March 2007
2nd: April 2007 - Jan 2008
3rd: Feb 2008 - Nov 2008
4th Dec 2008 - Present

I agree with most of the previous suggestions, in addition I'd suggest the following:

It would be nice if there was some opportunity to play a "for fun" 1 vs 100 outside of the live shows.  Extended play is ok, but it gets boring after awhile. 

Eventually, there is going to have to be some incentive to play beyond the minute chance of making it into the mob.  Achievments, better stats or perhaps prizes in extended play would probably help some, but the main thing I think most people want is to actually get to play a real game and odds are most people never will get to under the current format.

To that note, I think there definitely needs to be a balance between choosing players based on "performance" and perhaps just choosing some people randomly. 

Most of us can't devote six hours a day of extended play 3 or 4 days a week in order to try and qualify for the mob, so it would be nice to at least feel like you have some shot of getting in the mob even if you can't play non-stop and don't have jedi reflexes on the button mashing.

I've had a lot of fun playing, but the more impossible it seems to get in the mob or the one (particularly as others have mentioned when you see them bombing out on easy questions), the more I lose interest.

Pop up all answers at the same time. It's more fair, and just more fun. I stopped playing one night because it annoyed me that it wasn't like that. I'm begging you to fix it please. Thanks.