A review: Gaia's user experience- lrn2Gaia, Staff. (v1)

[Lady Apsara]

What a wonderful post! I've been skimming through several similar threads, but this thread is just perfect. I only hope that more people look at it smile Thank you!

[best ace in space]

That was a wonderful, if slightly disheartening, read.
You put everything so well. So honestly. If only the staff would look at it.
Unfortunately, let's be honest, I'm pretty sure they don't spend any time in the SF at all.
Very impressively written though~ c:

[Ebania]

This is golden, OP.

[I Shiyami I]

OP you have my support on this post //claps and sheads manry tears.

[Celestii Star]

Oh woah that must have took some time.
You have my respect for that.
C:

[Alice Allusion]

I joined this site in late 2006 and I never imagined that things on this site would get as bad as they have now.

[Minty-MANZANA]

I'm glad I read this.

I joined in 2007 and I will never buy GC because I'm still a student with a very low income. But hell even the advertisement Gaia events were better than just Cash related announcements and nothing else.

Man you deserve a big applause for putting all of the problems in something witty and holding more truth than anything else on this site

[Spicy Chai]

OP needs to teach the trolls of SF a thing are two about what a site feedback thread is!

[josiv]

beautiful post, five stars, covers a lot of what is going wrong.

[q2k]

this is easily the most on-point collection of gaia's flaws holy crap.

[Melomar]

Sakura Latte

Why Lanzer? He's not in charge of Gaia anymore. Not since they've gotten a string of CEOs to run their company.

He was one of the ones sitting at the panel while they were saying that the economy is just fine. I have a hard time with that, that's all. :<

[Kc.EXE]

I joined in 04 and have been very on and off since then. My experience has been declining also, everything I've read, I absolutely agree with. Unfortunately, for me I've spent far FAR more on the site despite having nearly no more money. I've spent upwards of 1.5k on the site, supporting it before there was a 'cash shop' as La Victoire. The monthly letters I've continued to buy until this month. There have been several items that I bought because I thought they looked nice, I liked the story behind them and so forth. Then the gold generators continued, and continued.

As an artist, and someone who likes to buy art, it became impossible to continue working because the price you agreed on has suddenly become spare change to the other and now when you want to buy more art, you can't because it's 1b per piece or something. THe economy has gone to trash. i agree completely, something needs to be done about it, but nothing can be done about it.

I had a D-tail, HotD, all sorts of rare old stuff that was worth questing for and I loved them to bits, I quested for them when they were still rare, when 1m was a lot to have. Now? They're basically worthless, and items that I'd like to have because they look good, are out of my price range. I can't afford the 56b pair of shoes or whatnot, because even though I'm a long time user, I only just managed to hit 10b recently and then bought an item off the MP and can now only afford crap all.

Getting gold is pretty much impossible, for new users and old alike. Unless you buy gold gens, then you're fine, or items to sell from failed generators or CIs.

I have a little quest for myself, I want to collect all the purple items and hair items. That's now absolutely impossible to do. I love the Rosamund story and I'd love to buy the new Rose Saga, but... I can't. I am not made of gold.

Gaia really needs to address things. I don't even bother doing more than checking my 10 announcements when I log in anymore, to see if there's anything about addressing these Gaia killing issues. Games aren't fun. Forums aren't interesting. Art has become impossible to keep up with, and there's just nothing to keep me around anymore. It's saddening, there are so many of us that have loved Gaia for such a long time, it's been a big part of our lives and now it's ... I can't even think of what it is. It just wants money. Gaia is dying and it needs attention from the higher ups, and it needs it NOW.

[the people watcher]

I just have a few things to say... cat_3nodding
I have grown so tired of this Gaiacash debacle, and I love this thread~ heart

Thank you, OP, and to everyone else that agrees with the majority,
-that we have literally been messed with thus far.
And that's not something that we should take lightly.
I believe we are a community worth fixing~
And we deserve It because we've been striving for the truth for so long.

[mc2]

Samanthai

That was quite spot on.
I do like that you also considered the other skin tones, Gaia seems to forget there are other ethnic groups apart from white and Japanese.

Such a great post though. Took a while to read, but it was not a bother.
Thank you.

And the fact that white people come in really pale options too. And where are freckles! Seriously, though, I use the white body dye because it is about as pale as I am in actuality (I like my avatar to share some resemblance to me) and I find it a bit frustrating to find compatible arms or legs items-but I looked at some other diverse skin tones out there (like the lovely darker skin tones for avatars that are used often) and the color compatibility is just as bad if not WORSE.

I figure if I want to make my avatar's skin to reflect my own skin tone others should as well. I use a BODY DYE to get the skin tone I desire and have as easy if not easier time finding items that work than base skin colors available on the site. It is bad-really bad.

----

As for everything else: yep, yep, yep, and more yep. Even current regular GC spenders voice this stuff often enough. I say everyone push those who don't consider their GC purchases carefully (seriously why do we have gambling for gold options on an under 18 site-it is contributing to dangerous addictions where they can cement for the rest of their life, which will negatively impact their achievement in life?) and just shove them in a cool-down corner for a month or two. If I see another kid complaining about not hitting it big on one of the gold generators and arguing tooth and nail just like any gambling addict will on it being a conspiracy and that they state they keep spending on these things I'll scream. It isn't like you can't use GC to make a fortune in guaranteed gold easy enough.

[taxidermy jesus]

OP for president of everything 2014.