WolfTeam Classic as it SHOULD have been

This blog aims to discuss fundamental problems about "WolfTeam Classic" both in-name and its content inside the game, also providing some suggestions or ideas that could be put back or implemented. Also criticizing the direction the game has taken.

When Softnyx released the proclaimed "WolfTeam Classic", to many, including me, got some form of hope about possibly returning to the game that was very enjoyable during its peak. At least, in the global version back in the days the population was roughly peaking 1,1 million which spoke volumes of how good the game was, despite having its flaws in certain areas. WolfTeam was something like a hybrid of a standard MMOFPS and Counter Strike. 

Instead what we got from WolfTeam Classic is basically just a 'refreshed' WolfTeam that aims to bring some of the old but retain the same featurettes of the current ones. Softnyx also introduced some 'balancing' to the items in WolfTeam Classic, as in the items such as armor and the special edition characters wouldn't be so massively overpowered, but that isn't the answer to the problem the game is still facing. The team failed to understand one thing...

What good is WolfTeam Classic in a rather nostalgic fashion if you've still introduced the same principles from previous versions? This isn't pure "classic" in both name and gameplay. It is a lie that frustrates older players that have played the game. The video below shows what WolfTeam was during its best. Everything in it felt very fair and the dynamic between human vs wolves was fun and challenging.

WolfTeam trailer from 2009. Video by WolfTeam.

There are many things currently wrong with WolfTeam Classic and I am here to go in-depth of the areas I think are misaligned with the ideal version of WolfTeam from the past.

To start off, let's talk the clash of the actual 2009 WolfTeam and what "WolfTeam Classic" is and some core subjects.

Characters, weapons and tattoos

• Fundamentally, if you wanted to re-create the 2009-era WolfTeam you definitely could have introduced these characters, for sure if you wanted to keep some of the newer content in-game. However, just repeating the same problem of giving the players the option to get armor or characters with already innate armor stats is a terrible choice. 
• Even if the armor was rebalanced to fit the gameplay better, it still entices people to buy these due to the fact that they want to live longer and survive hits better. This is something that can be a turn-off for many.

• What solutions could we offer? For instance, let the characters be cosmetic. For example, the regular free-to-play players could buy these 1st-4th gen. characters with gold, but they will only give out either 10% gold or gp boost, depending on the character you buy. All the customized characters, like special editions, seasonal characters, combat edition characters, etc. should also be purely cosmetic, not having any armor stats, but include the gold/gp boost normally. 

proposed changes for characters(subjective)

• Characters can be bought to suit player's visual appeal in-game for, say, if they like to support a football team during the world's football championships, etc. The characters never needed to have these armor stats included in them, they just not needed to look appealing and interesting for players to buy them.

• By now, since there are so many different kinds of characters just added in the game, players should have the option to get generations 1st to 4th characters with gold, which is already a step in the right direction since they currently are both in classic and in the other versions of WolfTeam and assuming the development team wants to keep some of the additions in game.

• Don't immediately release all the newer guns that have been added to the game. Start off with the weapons that were available in the beginning. You can eventually, however, have weapons with different skins, but they should NOT HAVE any special statistics attached to them. They should be purely cosmetics only.

• Reasoning being is the fact that a lot of the weapons currently available haven't been playtested in terms of their stats. Not to mention weapons that have a lot of different skins tend to have some form of hidden statistics. Same weapon with different skins should function the same no matter what. YOU BUY THESE WEAPONS FOR COSMETICS LOOK. The point for having weapon skins is for players to sport their favorite looks of a gun, not to edge out on hidden or overtuned stats. Cosmetics can sell - You can purchase them for x amount of days with a reasonable pricing.

• Each weapon should feel special or fit player's need/level of play in the game. not be solution to the issue of having dominant weapon be X instead of having a variety of weapons ABCDEFG...etc.

• Wolf Tattoos - While nice, are heavily dictating how the wolf modes are played out. The tankiest tattoos makes the match rather bland and is just a matter about flexing their jacked wolf.

• There are currently god knows how many tattoo variants in the game for wolves. Some are okay, some are so strong that it's realistically possible to think that wolves could be considered tanks that just laugh at your bullets. Because of this, a lot of previously fun game modes in WolfTeam have become uninteresting to play - Ex-conquest and Humans vs Wolves conquest/destruction come to mind.

• Tattoos should be a representation of both cosmetics, but also provide at least a little bit of safety in in these human v wolf modes. But the tattoos' stats shouldn't be set so high that killing the wolves become impossible. There shouldn't be so many different tattoos available for players to just buy right away since it can possibly alienate some players.

Gameplay

If you watched the gameplay trailer and the gameplay video above, you'd most likely understand what is the problem currently with WolfTeam - It's not even fun to play nowadays, whereas back in 2009 to 2011 the game was very manageable and definitely enjoyable. I only started to play the game when my friend was poking me to try to get to play the game because of its sci-fi themed background at the time(and his passion for having wolves).

WolfTeam is, and should have always been about having fair and enjoyable gameplay where everyone was on equal level and only thing that would the players is their skill-set and tenacity to think outside the box. It was never supposed to become the pile of mess it is now. All that old-fashioned players like me are requesting is a fair gameplay that doesn't require you to throw in money to become the "best". That's no definition of fair or competitive and it hurts to watch.

Also, choosing maps and the game mode to them is something that has been a nice thing, but some maps just do not fit as either conquest or as destruction mode, mainly conquest is the biggest offender in some maps. I think it's important to try to keep in mind how the map plays and what game mode is suitable to it.

This is basically what WolfTeam is currently. 

The video, while sarcastic and humorous in nature,

still accurately depicts what problems WolfTeam has.

The biggest takeaway is that p2w > f2p.

Video by Oag.

Events

It probably is no surprise that WolfTeam currently has lacked a lot of seasonal events that would show in the game. At best there have been mostly snowman/halloween themed items, such as knives or grenades but as of late, there haven't been in-game related visual fidelities. It is shame that the development team has dropped these fun events off. The team has to restart doing these kinds of events again. There's no reason to just say that implementing these christmas/halloween themed masks is a problem. They're only cosmetics after all and you can just alter the game files(?) so that every player automatically has them equipped during the seasonal period.

Below are some examples of both Christmas & Halloween themed WolfTeam gameplay, latter being an in-game event video while former is a gameplay.

WolfTeam has had events such as christmas event where players have their wolf wear a santa hat. Humans have had worn snowman masks at some point. Video by MMOHuts.  

Not to mention a Halloween themed event where the players are equipped with pumpkin masks. The event here was about players using knives and pistols, as shown in the video.

Communication 

A blue team marine communicating
with his teammates about
a moving target that they have been
pursuing.

One of the biggest issues mainly with Softnyx has been their lack of listening to player feedback on a lot of things. I think the companies that have licensed WolfTeam have done at least somewhat okay, although not ideally at times. I feel like a lot of communities are left out on giving their feedback and they are just waiting until some form of content update comes out and then feel utterly confused as to what has transpired when a) suddenly there's massive balance problem on weapons or other items or b) players have no idea why the x changes came through when the poll about it was that they be against having that in the game.

Back in the days when AeriaGames were given the license for WolfTeam, they were fairly open about communicating with their community and answering some of the player's questions in the forums. Their priority was to have the game be "fun, fair and competitive". Currently if you'd take a look at the state of the game, it isn't exactly fun, fair and competitive anymore. It is the exact opposite - unfun, unfair and uncompetitive.

What I also found rather disappointing is when I was looking for how often the staff behind WolfTeam has these community posts on their websites. There's practically not enough of that happening. For example, gamigo's website is doing almost regularly posts of their MMO games, but WolfTeam has near to non-existent posts written. Even on discord that now is the gamers platform for joining a community of their game, has practically very little of posts.

With this, I leave a message - Please ask feedback from your community, always. Try to make the game fair to all the other players and fun so that people wouldn't get frustrated with many aspects of the game. Have the game represent just balance and overall show competitiveness in it. People tend to get frustrated when their beloved game gets treated poorly in terms of how it feels to play. That's something you as developers should be responsible to look into. 

Advertisement of WolfTeam Classic

I think it is very funny how the development team decided to use their old WolfTeam trailer for Classic's launch, yet the gameplay is just totally different from the perceived image. Not to mention the biggest gripe players currently have with Classic is the fact that there still exists armor. There has been debate about it whether there should be armor in WolfTeam classic, or in general, but nerfed so they don't provide overwhelming advantage like in Reboot or International, etc.

What do I think about armor in-game? Personally I am against armor stuff in general since it gives an edge to survive a lot of things. In 2009 obviously getting grenaded may have been frustrating, especially on human vs human mode. However, there are people who may have differing opinions about it, which aren't necessarily a bad thing. People have the right to be passionate for their favourite games.

This video goes in on how the WolfTeam Classic currently feels and what is in it so far.

A review of WolfTeam Classic by MrStrongBro. 

Link to his channel.

I appreciate his perspective of Classic WolfTeam and his overall thoughts about it. Everyone has different opinions about what should be in the game and what's good/bad. Perhaps merging some of the old with new can be nice but for that to make people happy, it has to align well and suit the game. 

Final thoughts

While WolfTeam Classic isn't exactly what players probably expected, but the developers should still try to make it very similar to what 2009 WolfTeam was like. Armor is still the biggest question mark whether it should stay in classic or be just aesthetic. Weapons diversity is also something that is missing on their sandbox as people mainly need only M6A2 SL (and even this weapon shouldn't be a basic weapon accessible for players at the start). The only reason it ever became a basic weapon for players is simply because WolfTeam was heading to really unbalanced area where the f2p people didn't have access to a strong enough weapon.

That being said, the ball is given to development team behind WolfTeam to make either a remake of 2009 WolfTeam or try to improve WolfTeam Classic to the point it is satisfactory and reminiscent of the 2009 era. There are a lot areas WolfTeam classic specifically needs to work on at it NEEDS to appeal to older veteran players if they want to get people playing the game again as well as try to create a solid foundation to attract newer players. As it is now, veterans and people who have played WolfTeam in the past will definitely deter newer players from ever trying the game and giving it a chance, including me.

To make the WolfTeam Classic a succesful rebirth of 2009 WolfTeam it needs strong principles and foundations already laid out in the past.

Keywords for that are - Fun, fair and competitive.

Until then, may we wishfully hope that there will be a day for WolfTeam community where we can play in harmony. 

This will most likely be my final WolfTeam related blog for a while as I've kind of given up on my quest to try to make WolfTeam return to its former glory.