New Branding and a New Website -Video

[HawkHawk 301]

7 hours ago, Malena said:

Here are GIF animations at 1.5 second intervals showing the before & after of how this could look. GIFs only support 256 colors, so the images are a bit rasterized I'm afraid.

Those look so good!

 

I suppose its wishful thinking since it'd be an enormous undertaking but makes me wonder what they game would look like rebuilt into a more modern engine with upgraded graphics. If it would look anything like those GIFs that'd be amazing.

[Gerbold 40]

I didn't mean to be negative. But I'm looking at it and I can't... I'm sorry.
If I didn't know the game, I wouldn't even look at it. A plastic logo that makes you think it's a children's game. A fairytale world on a website that is nice for Settlers fans. However, this is not WURM! It's not even 1% like this game.
I'm surprised. We have a brilliant (I will shout again: BRILLIANT!) community here. People with various professions and passions. We meet in the game, because it's part of our world. We have programmers and graphic designers among us. A whole group of brave people. Also editing movies. If you manage to gather such a group of people, you can enlarge it.
For my part: @Kirster - just announce a screen contest (e.g. a contest once a month!), a 30-second video (after all, players make a stream) from real or funny situations.
You've wasted your time and pissed off the community. I understand it's a business and you have to make money. But that's not the way... It's the beginning of the end. The new one won't come, and the old player will eventually get discouraged...

@Kirster Listen to the players! We really want this game to survive!

Below: a beautiful moon in the game and an evening spent playing together with my son.

Edited July 1, 2023 by Gerbold
add images

[Finnn 3,321]

8 hours ago, Malena said:

Tonight we were streaming and I was pointed to this thread. So we had a look at the webpage live on stream and I gave my first impressions. 

 

As many of you have suggested in this thread and as we discussed in the stream, it almost felt like a lot of the placeholder images were AI generated and very out of place, misrepresenting what Wurm actually looks like. 

 

When I was wrapping up my reaction, I was saying that there is nothing wrong with making a game look a bit prettier than it actually is in marketing material. Gaming companies do it all the time. (think about WoW trailers for instance)

 

But I was suggesting that what the Wurm team should do is use original Wurm Online screenshots and instead generate "prettier versions of them using " the "img to img" tools. At the end of the day, it's nice to install a "fantasy" into a players brain and then let them try to create something as close as possible to that fantasy which is totally possible with the samples below.

 

After the stream I was curious to see how that might actually look and tried some quick examples using Stable Diffusion. Here's one that I generated and scaled up since it was so pretty.

 

 

Here are GIF animations at 1.5 second intervals showing the before & after of how this could look. GIFs only support 256 colors, so the images are a bit rasterized I'm afraid.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

gg on the sd ai art.. but consider one thing.. fat ponies(when draft horses received own model) were bad looking(still are).. and the ai result for hh looks terrible.. not everybody wants "cute", "fabulous", metro, barbi-styled pony art, some things are meant to be "mean" and "scary" looking, that should remain themed appropriately imo.

Barbi sims.. probably plenty out there as it is, lets not adopt the kind of art..

 

 

[wipeout 1,355]

If i was an investor and i saw a company do this as a "rebranding" I would take my money and walk and tell EVERYONE not to invest in your company at all until those who gave the green light on this being okay are gone and management has been replaced as clearly no one at gcg knows how to make a good product at all.

I hope wurm will be let go of gcg's influence as if this is the standard of content we are going to get from who ever else is working on wurm content besides the wurm dev team that we know and love/hate then I feel like wurm wont be around in 2 years time.

No investor would look at that website and then compare it to the old one and go "oh ya gcg sounds like a good company to invest into here is 20 million"

[Dao 145]

2 hours ago, Sharkin said:

I STAND WITH KRISTER

 

 

 

Krister + Sharkin vs Wurm Online

Edited July 1, 2023 by Dao

[Idlamn 297]

8 minutes ago, Gerbold said:

I didn't mean to be negative. But I'm looking at it and I can't... I'm sorry.
If I didn't know the game, I wouldn't even look at it. A plastic logo that makes you think it's a children's game. A fairytale world on a website that is nice for Settlers fans. However, this is not WURM! It's not even 1% like this game.
I'm surprised. We have a brilliant (I will shout again: BRILLIANT!) community here. People with various professions and passions. We meet in the game, because it's part of our world. We have programmers and graphic designers among us. A whole group of brave people. Also editing movies. If you manage to gather such a group of people, you can enlarge it.
For my part: @Kirsten - just announce a screen contest (e.g. a contest once a month!), a 30-second video (after all, players make a stream) from real or funny situations.
You've wasted your time and pissed off the community. I understand it's a business and you have to make money. But that's not the way... It's the beginning of the end. The new one won't come, and the old player will eventually get discouraged...

Below: a beautiful moon in the game and an evening spent playing together with my son.

 

Now that I think more about it it's an old problem of Wurm. They don't do full justice to their own game. Just put in some screenshots with distant rendering, the sky, some room full of items, etc. They went for some generic fantasy art. There are literally 3D renderings of a farmhouse that is not Wurm.

I haven't read the text. I am curious if it's an accurate showcase of the game that can lure enthusiasts in.

 

16 minutes ago, Gerbold said:

For my part: @Kirsten - just announce a screen contest (e.g. a contest once a month!), a 30-second video (after all, players make a stream) from real or funny situations.

This is what Mortal Online 1 did (called a machinima contest back then, haven't heard this word anymore) and from what I remember they had something similar for the second.

[Blazecraze 462]

i am very sad that what should be current website preview being worked on slowly is actually current website live 

if this was placeholder for current project, will be released in next month or so..0 issue...but its current live representation of the game

 

releasing the website live in its current 10% completed state is silly......but its for the investors, not for us

 

pleasing the invenstors is twisting the playerbases ankles hard 

[Malena 2,854]

5 hours ago, Emoo said:

Thanks for your insights as a professional graphic artist!

 

Thanks. Watched your break down video as well. If there is any feedback in this thread they need to look at, it's that. 

[Berms 154]

I'm kinda glad now that I don't have own deed to pay for and have enough in-game money to pay for nice things and of course premium because after this latest joke, I'm obviously NOT going to invest another euro in this game until I see a clear road map that actually get things done instead of rebranding with AI.

 

We got a lovely community full of artists, programmers etc but that seems not to be a priority for the new management.

 

I love Wurm but if it turns into something like this in the future, I may have to say goodbye eventually.

Edited July 1, 2023 by Berms

[wipeout 1,355]

Another thing i just noticed

The ingame silver store does not sell personal merchant contracts on chaos nor twig and stones or res stones, 3 of these 4 things are pretty much exclusively used on PVP only yet can not be brought?

I can see disabling shop usage outside of friendly deeds as a good pvp mechanic but taking away merchants and twigs and stones and res stones is garbage why are they even missing? what purpose does it serve to disable the purchase of these items when the store itself already is disabled when not in friendly territory??

Everything about this shop and the website and this whole weekend just smells like "oh we gave it 5 minutes of work"

[Archaed 2,284]

On the topic of the new web site, I notice there’s new gnomes. 
 

last time there was website drama (player auctions) Rolf used gnomes then too.

 

im not saying it’s the illumignometi, but I’m not not saying it’s the illumignometi 

 

I think we need to Lo-

[wipeout 1,355]

1 minute ago, Archaed said:

On the topic of the new web site, I notice there’s new gnomes. 
 

last time there was website drama (player auctions) Rolf used gnomes then too.

 

im not saying it’s the illumignometi, but I’m not not saying it’s the illumignometi 

 

I think we need to Lo-

Gnomes do always seem to appear whenever who ever is in charge of wurm does something horribly bad for the game

[Zexos 468]

Something I just noticed was that the new wurm website actually looks the best layout wise on mobile phones. Even has a pop up menu.  It seems that the website might of been redesigned to more so fit the modern mobile market.

[Beewolf 254]

4 minutes ago, Zexos said:

Something I just noticed was that the new wurm website actually looks the best layout wise on mobile phones. Even has a pop up menu.  It seems that the website might of been redesigned to more so fit the modern mobile market.

 

Thats most likely due to the fact, that the only thing the GCG employees may have a slight experience with is selling mobile games (not very successful obviously, but still).

On the Safari browser it looks like someone took the seperate assets and shat them into a bucket.

Edited July 1, 2023 by Beewolf

[Beewolf 254]

2 hours ago, Sharkin said:

I don't really care about anything...

 

 

Yea, so does he obviously.

[HawkHawk 301]

18 minutes ago, Beewolf said:

On the Safari browser it looks like someone took the seperate assets and shat them into a bucket.

Haha, that one properly caught me off guard lol.

[Locath 533]

I no longer feel bad for how the affinity generator looks like. Thanks, i needed that confidence boost.

[Malena 2,854]

7 hours ago, Archaed said:

Exactly this! The use of AI artwork isn't a damning factor,

 

Yep, and in general AI doesn't have to be an evil or bad choice. Using AI generated artwork gets a lot of negative press because people feel it "steals from other artists" (AI doesn't technically work like that btw). But in this particular case of the Wurm screenshots, the BASE MATERIAL is Wurm Online original content. You will never find artwork made by anyone that looks similar to those "enhanced" screenshots because it's Wurm Online . AI has simply analyzed what it sees and has filled in details to make the images more beautiful. This is the perfect example of when you can use AI safely and with good conscience. 

 

Of course, to avoid being deceptive on the website, images like these should be presented as being "concept art" rather than actual screenshots of the game. It would be important to also have actual genuine, untouched footage/shots of Wurm in the form of an image gallery or something like that somewhere on the site. 

[Xagru 431]

As someone said before, just make a thematic competition among current players - blacksmithing, farming, fighting, woodcutting, masonry etc, whatever is needed. That could make b4 start new webpage. We had a time. Still have.

Also, the game media subpage - I always look for images and videos on game pages from the game itself, taken by players. That say me more than marketing on webpage.

 

Shop in game, that is good idea in all of this. I wish same trade (WTS, WTB, auctions) between players.

 

About new logo - is a part of new branding, so I believe will be hard to convince author of idea that he is wrong.

[Xagru 431]

5 hours ago, Sharkin said:

I don't really care about anything, but I will show some support for the new CEO

I STAND WITH KRISTER

 

My favorite post in this topic. Especialy "I don't really care about anything". Should be new motto of new webpage? And small * with link to bottom page with small small font "except your money".

Edited July 1, 2023 by Xagru

[elentari 2,660]

Dunno about you guys but atm kinda not feeling it logging into wurm...

 

Maybe if things improve, but at this point I am not even cautiously optimistic, I am just straight up pessimistic.

 

Can't muster the energy to play. Sad days.

[polarbear 284]

I like it. 

[Docterchese 1,570]

7 minutes ago, elentari said:

Dunno about you guys but atm kinda not feeling it logging into wurm...

 

Maybe if things improve, but at this point I am not even cautiously optimistic, I am just straight up pessimistic.

 

Can't muster the energy to play. Sad days.

 

I'm the same. I was planning on spending €300 on silver to buy the remaining scale I need to make a set to celebrate 12 years of playing Wurm.

 

Now, I don't think I'll even renew the premium on my accounts unless I see clear evidence that Wurm is not about to crash and burn.

 

*Everything* I have seen here convinces me that Wurm is in big, big trouble. There's the horrendous new website; the sudden departure of two highly experienced team members (Keenan and Enki); the focus on profits and 'corporate speak'; and the terrible financials that Game Chest Group has behind the scenes based on their publically available financial reports (i.e. lots of debt and never making a profit.)

 

I have no idea what @Krister is doing, but I know it isn't what's right for this game and its target audience.

[Xagru 431]

What would make me want to visit the website regularly?

 

Among others:

*Content as Wurmnode and Niarja had (harvest seasons, slays, deed info, rites, upcoming rifts, holy sites, goblin's camps etc)

*Best of last shortcuts of streams and screenshots ingame

*Current community maps (yaga's, Albia Inde etc), in general, the option that wurmnode currently has, i.e. the ability to co-create maps

*Announcements about events, both: big (impalongs, holidays) and small (current hunts, secret hunts, challenges), I miss competitive games, tournaments, also seasonal games like Jackal (other moons optional)

[Damascus 381]

19 minutes ago, Docterchese said:

 

I'm the same. I was planning on spending €300 on silver to buy the remaining scale I need to make a set to celebrate 12 years of playing Wurm.

 

Now, I don't think I'll even renew the premium on my accounts unless I see clear evidence that Wurm is not about to crash and burn.

 

*Everything* I have seen here convinces me that Wurm is in big, big trouble. There's the horrendous new website; the sudden departure of two highly experienced team members (Keenan and Enki); the focus on profits and 'corporate speak'; and the terrible financials that Game Chest Group has behind the scenes based on their publically available financial reports (i.e. lots of debt and never making a profit.)

 

I have no idea what @Krister is doing, but I know it isn't what's right for this game and its target audience.

 

I feel the same way , i been keeping tabs on the financial reports also .

It is so easy to google the info on them and the constant lost for GCG .

 

I have over 2 years upkeep on 3 deeds and will leave it at that for now .

Maybe they are looking at selling Wurm assets and made a fast BS intro for it  , who knows .

 

I just hope for the best ...