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Sandy: “our customer support is terrible”

Sandy Duncan CEO of YoYo Games has admitted that their “customer support is terrible” and that “the DRM sucks”.

“If it helps I think some parts of the site suck, I think, at times, that the DRM sucks and I think, always, that our customer support is terrible.I spend most of my time and energy raising finance to sort some of these issues and to create lots of eciting [sic] new things both in the site and for Game Maker. We’re pretty close to getting it closed down and we will address hopefully invest a LOT of money over the next 3 to 18 months to make YoYo Games and the GMC one of the best and most exciting games websites in the world….whether it’s Web 1/2 or 3 is not important…but we ARE a community, not just a bunch of web pages with information. YOU create the games, you review them, you play them….it’s YOUR community !

Also note that some things take time as well as money, so everything won’t just change overnight because Mr Venture Capitalist gives us a cheque for $5Million !

Overall though, I think we’ve come a LONG way in about 12 months. I think the Game Maker community is in a much better and different place than it was and it will continue to improve. Today’s update to this software is continuing proof of that.

Nobody should be embarrassed by their “anti” stance or lack of support 12 months ago…we made a lot of mistakes, but I like to think that we listened to you, corrected some things and continue to listen to you.

SO…thank you for your support and giving us a chance. If you still don’t like us, then all I ask is you continue to keep an open mind, that’s all !!”

I must admit I am confused with his analogies comparing the hard work of YoYo with an update of the IPB software and a new skin. But finally at least we know the man at the top realises how many Game Maker users feel.

What do you think?

11 Comments

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  1. “I think sandy is a pretty cool guy. eh admits customer support sucks and doesn’t afraid of anything.”

    Yes, honesty in business is refreshing, you cant knock him for that…Though I ask you, on the basis of that statement would you risk an investment?

    I dont think you’ll find many sucessful companies who have built their business in this way…

    Anyway I digress, I presume there has been no investor so far…If, as I stated on another post on this blog Yoyo are turning to educational establishments for the investment, what is happening?

    Speaking as a graduate in software engineering, I cant see any university taking up this software…If I had applied for my job with GM on my CV, I wouldnt have got it..simple as…What company would want a graduate with GM experience? Bungie? Sega? Microsoft? I doubt it… and before any GM fanatics go down the line of “its good experience for other languages”, let me remind you that by the time you have graduated, a wouldbe employer is not expecting to teach its employee’s how to code in a proper language…it expects (and rightfully so) that they already have the skills.

    Why do some people get so fanatical over GM? Yes its a good little program, but its meant as a FUN HOBBY tool…youre not going to create Halo 4 with it, youre not going to be the next David Braben with it, and its certainly not going to be taken seriously in the professional world…Get over it…

    and Mathew_H, we live in a free world, people including yourself have a right to express their opinions…

    It is very strange the type of people GM seems to attract, as I say above, some users of GM support it to the level of fanatics. I have noticed that many users of GM have “issues” and whilst its great that GM feeds their imagination, it cant be healthy to get so passionate over a piece of software….can it?

  2. Btw I forgot mention:
    Sandy should realise that the easy game development market it only so big and while there is more and more people wanting to make games, Gamemaker inset there first chose

  3. Ok, now I don’t know if i am the only one, but i am starting to get tired of Phil’s criticism, i have not found at lest more than 4 posts of constructive criticism.
    Phil do you just hate everyone and have to take it out on them with witting carcases and hurtful pieces?
    i know that it is your site but please write something good.
    Now that may just sound like im wining but it is how i feel.

    now on too yoyo.
    I think that they are the besting to happen to Gamemaker and i can see all the very hard work they have done across these 12 months.
    GOOD JOB YOYOGAMES KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK

  4. Is the C++ runner even being made? It was reported on the GMC forum that someone has found an advert asking for C++ coders for the Gamemaker project…

    With all these “difficulties” and “problems” what incentive does anyone have to invest 5m? – Even yoyo themselves say the customer service “is terrible”…how would that sound to a potential investor when such a pivotal part of the business is not up to standard?

    That post, although honest, will destroy any confidence a wouldbe investor has in yoyo…how unprofessional…wouldnt it have been better to have said

    “We are aware some users are experiencing difficulties when dealing with our customer services, rest assured we are working on the problem and appreciate any feedback in respect of this.”

  5. I disagree with you on that.

    I fully agree that the market for the Game Maker editor is quite small and that the €15,- is insufficient for such large investments. (although the registration still generates quite a large sum of money)
    I think the idea of YoYo Games is not to get rich of Game Maker but to get rich of there website. There’s countless sites on the web for flash games and other browser games. With Game Maker and the game maker community they generate a very large quantity of games. And with a sufficient large quantity and smart algorithms you can find the quality games as well.

    With there idea of advertisement within the games and advertisement on the site they can earn a decent income if they get the traffic and if they get the instant play plugin to the public. While there still are some hurdles to overcome I think they have a good chance of succeeding.

    PS: my comment wasn’t really directed to you specifically Robin but more regarding the last paragraph of the news post and the general negative attitude towards YoYo Games.

  6. YoYo Games also made a site with free hosting and bandwidth to showcase your games.
    YoYo Games also made the plugin to play games from the browser. Something that I think encourages people to play games easier as it takes less time to start a game.
    They’ve got a better server for the GMC which improves the usability of the GMC.
    They’ve paid programmers to fix all incompatibilities between the IPB versions to get the GMC updated.
    They’ve made registration of Game Maker virtually instantaneous instead of several weeks.
    In my experience they’ve made the Game Maker Company easier to reach with shorter waiting times for messages.

    And they’ve got lots of new things in the tubes. I’m very much looking forward to Mac compatibility for games and a rewrite of Game Maker will likely improve the program as well. Things like an easy to use online highscore table will also improve the program and I know of plenty more interesting things to come.

    Whatever people may think about YoYo Games, they’ve done a whole lot of work already. While most of the hard work isn’t yet visible, that doesn’t mean YoYo Games doesn’t do anything. Yes they’ve made mistakes, but they do there best to fix them as well. When things change there will always be parts that go wrong.

    Mark Overmars released a version of Game Maker at some point in which all games crashed after 30 minutes. After it being reported he fixed the issue and everyone stayed happy. I’m sure that if YoYo Games makes the same mistake the GMC will start to riot and demand there resignation.

    There where problems in the past just like there have been with YoYo Games and will be in the future. That doesn’t mean that YoYo Games is very hard at work and doing an excellent job with Game Maker.

  7. I’m not bashing YoYo, they’ve done good things. I just think they have a proverbial lemon in Game Maker. I don’t believe it has the market potential to justify further investment; mainly because their target audience are mainly youth with little to no money. And, it’s not a physical product that their parents can run to the store and pick up for them.

  8. Game Maker just isn’t commercializable enough to justify that large an investment. In fact, YoYo games probably got a bad deal to begin with 🙁

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New look YoYo-ized GMC

I bought GameMaker School