So I think this patch has come to show just how terribly prepared Nexon America's GMS staff are when it comes to updates. It's now 26 hours into the maintenance and it still has an ETA for finishing. AN ETA. What have you guys been doing for the past 6 months? Sure, it is fine if a few bugs slip through here and there because coding naturally tends to do that especially with a game as large as Maplestory, but I still think it is self-evident for what happened for this patch is unacceptable. It's hard to have sympathy for something that could've been worked on harder for 6 months in preparation for this patch instead of fixing it the LAST DAY POSSIBLE. How can you miss that people have ~13k % crit damage in the stats bar. Like how does one miss that in testing? Did anyone attack mobs at all...?
I might have sounded a bit like some salty ranter so far but let me clarify; I've been playing this game on and off for around the past 10 years so I kinda know what's up. I've never said anything before this patch because I never expected anything better from Nexon. But over time the quality of Nexon has improved from a 2.5/10 to a 6/10 (in my opinion) in recent years. Tickets are actually responded to, Nexon is actively working towards "A Better Maple" including Legacy Bugs being fixed, etc. The reason I am saying something now, however, is because the quality of the company is starting to drop again with the past year due to these superficial apologies and compensations to hide the fact that Nexon is not on the path to improving further at a critical time. Let me quote on Nexon's response to the issues of the Heroes of Maple patch v.174,
"We’d like to start off with an apology. There was an unexpected number of bugs, issues with sales, and other game-related issues that have come to light with this Heroes of Maple: Reborn update. The release of this update has not been up to the quality standards that we aim to deliver to all of you, and we are not taking this lightly. Our goal is, and has always been, to provide you with an enjoyable experience with the release of every update, and not be burdened with technical issues. We were able to address some of the issues immediately with the maintenance and minor patch last week, and have plans to address more in the upcoming weekly maintenance. More details will be available later this week," from the Maple Team (posted by Aletai) on June 28th, 2016. This apology suggests Nexon's approach to fix bugs as soon as they are noticed, which honestly I think is fine, but when you look at this in addition to the facts that these maintenances take so long, when there was 6 months to play-test it, along with the live-stream showing GM's not knowing how to use the 5th job luminous skill/equilibrium + using a mana pot trying to charge the kinesis bar (trust me, we Maplers have never tried that before) kinda leads us to believe that the GM's working on the maintenances are simply coders along with a bunch of play-testers that don't know how to physically PLAY the game. I would love to believe otherwise, but the truth can't hide over the years.
This is the Vth job update!!! People from new and old alike are coming to join the game, and how much will they be deterred when they see this and even see players on the forums supporting it? It will instantly turn them away! First impressions or first time "new" impressions (for returning vets) matter a lot. Who cares how grand the update is; we will lose player-base which makes the game less enjoyable for all and even less profits for the company who seems to not want to fix the issue.
So my question to you, Nexon, is do you really want to keep on this roller-coaster ride of maintenances and lose customer faith and support or do you want to fix these undeniable flaws in the company that have permeated throughout almost a decade? Do you want to just say sorry and hand us compensation to keep us quiet? Release a test server to a large sample of players and actively ask for their support. This patch was solely for the UI and events, anyway, so there is no reason why that couldn't have been play-tested even if it is desired to keep the 5th job and continent secret. If a test server is not released, at the very least the content could be tested more before (particularly by experienced players, as the livestream GM's were a HUGE embarrassment) it is released to the public.
