Dota 2 News: Valve Institutes Placating Manuevers

After public outcry over the on-again, off-again DotA Game Coordinator, Valve makes a small gesture of goodwill.

Finally! Some news about the Game Coordinator. It only took games being interrupted worldwide and the Battle Cup devolving into a thoroughly frustrating experience, but I guess that’s what needs to happen for Valve to pull their head out of… the clouds.

"SEA Battle cup resumed with no warning from DotA2"

Beyond the time spent waiting for the Coordinator and the Battle Cup tickets that were lost, there’s the important matter of customer service that needs to be addressed. See, I do a lot of freelance work. When something goes wrong or a deadline needs to be pushed back, it’s my responsibility to inform clients of the change. I think that’s pretty standard.

Should we expect any less from Valve?

A step in the right direction, but only a baby step

Administrator DanielJ posted on dev.dota the other day that Valve is super sorry about their Game Coordinator not working like it should. He even says they want to make up for the lost time and tickets with gifts. Tickets and treasures – whoopee!

Yeah, Valve. That's going to make me less salty about the 1+ hour I spent waiting.

Yeah, Valve. That’s going to make me less salty about the 1.5 hours I spent waiting. /

Never mind the fact that this “small” hiccup made it impossible to play the game we bought for the purpose of playing. Never mind the server issues got in the way of the Battle Cup many people have been waiting for!

Making promises you can’t deliver is a surefire way of making customers lose faith in you. And I have to say, after all the issues cropping up this TI6 season, I’m beginning to doubt Valve’s ability to deliver even these small, placating gestures. And judging by the following Reddit post, I’m not the only one.

Gimme my digital merch! /

Focus on what’s really important

Valve, there’s nothing wrong with focusing your efforts on game development and hiring a third party to coordinate things like, I don’t know, The International. You do games very well. That’s why we give you our money and play them.

But when the servers we need can’t stay afloat, we got beef. And it doesn’t make me any happier having to wait days to hear word about what exactly is going on. All we ask is to be treated with some decency. We are, after all, your customers.

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