- last post: 01.01.0001 12:00 AM PDT
The thing you have to ask yourself is, do you want Halo3 to be the best they can make it and to be released as soon as possible. Or do you want to sit around on a forum complaining and trying to get/hold the interest of a staff member just to feel "special", nursing wounded pride and claiming that the staff is "inpersonal" now just because they are busy and really can't comment on half the questions and statements about halo3 and the movie thrown their way since they are all signed into non-disclosure agreements. I personally think Frank Oconnor has a great sense of humor and he, as well as many of the other staff members, try to engage themselves with the community as much as possible. They had fun at Comic Con mingling with the fans, they have fun playing various clans and groups and reporting on them, they post contests, they update information and research weekly, and I don't see what more you could want from them. Obviously the larger a community grows, the less personal it becomes. This doesn't mean the moderators and staff have become impartial to their peers, it simply means they cant engage with every possible member of this obscenely large community individually like they may have been able to do in the past.
Something I enjoy doing every day is talking to Eric Nylund via his Blog/website http://www.ericnylund.net/ It has been around for less than a month and it's been great being able to have daily feedback from him about halo and other projects he is working on. There are only about 10 of us that currently talk to him on a regular basis, but already his site is getting recognition and advertisement on everything from GameSpot to bungie.org and WikiPedia. Does this mean when his community grows larger and he doesnt leave individual comments or necessarily answer every question we ask, that he has in some way detatched himself from his fans? I think not. It just means that he, like everyone else, has a life, and while he is not trying to dodge out of his responsibilities or job (though it is not his job to even host this site while moderators are provided to do just that), he won't be able to keep up with the overwhelming amount of attention/ feedback he will be getting as the community begins to grow.
"Look at yourself Bungie.net. You've gone from a tight knit gaming community to a mass of spam topics, elitism, and random hate. The forum used to be well moderated with only 5 or 6 moderators. Now we have close to 15 and we're still losing ground. It had to be said."
That is his complaint, and the fact is, even with the moderation staff more than doubling to appease the members and fans, there is still not enough time for these people to engage with every possible member that directs a question at them or asks them to be in their group or clan (and vice versa). Perhaps they need even more moderators? Or perhaps they shouldn't have been so informal to begin with since apparently now its something the original members (dare i say "elitists" as this writer in particular pointed the finger to others said) now seem to EXPECT. These people aren't on the website or working for bungie because they need or want to make friends. They do what they do because it is their job and they enjoy doing it. Do we really need to ask our moderators/bungie staff for formal appologies every time they are too busy to comment or involve themselves in topic discussions on forums and whatnot? Do we really have to take things so personally and grumble that it was "better" before the game became so popular and more members besides yourself and the original few have imposed on some of your "quality time" with some of the bungie staff?
Come on guys! Lighten up.
[Edited on 8/2/2006]