David Edery, CEO of Spry Fox Games, developer of Realm of the Mad God, spoke about the fear that sometimes casues companies to be afraid to make changes and take risks with their games. Edery spoke at GDC about the process behind the game, and some of the tweaks and changesthat fixed the game, even while making some of the vocal crowd angry. "Everyone's afraid of being the next Star Wars Galaxies," he said, talking about change and perhaps an overemphasis on trying to cater to everyone. Tweaks to Realm of the Mad God came down hard, with nerfs to range and slowed attacks because a lot of players weren't playing it as intended. Since the game features permadeath, players were playing it as safely as they could, in other words. Edery summed up the experience this way, "As a company, I feel like we've gotten really good at saying 'screw it, let's change it and see what happens.' That's kind of the takeaway -- remember to tell yourself, it's okay if it doesn't work, we'll just change it back". Source: Gamasutra
