This thread is a little overdue, so I apologize for that. We've been a tad busy trying to prepare some new stuff to be released this upcoming Friday. =)

As to the Winter Festival, thank you all so much for participating! We had a blast and, despite the sluggish release of content throughout, thoroughly enjoyed everything. We have definitely learned our lesson of having the Fall and Winter Festivals so close together, so next year we will be sure to space them out better to give players more of a rest between festivals and to allow us ample time to get everything prepared.

Anyway, we would love to hear everyone's feedback on the Winter Festival! It helps us to know what you enjoyed most, enjoyed least, and what you think we can do for the next festival to make it even better. Here are a few things we've already decided:


-The "Door to Door" Feature (AKA, Holiday Caroling). Holiday Caroling was a bit rushed and was pretty simple. We are aware of this and will attempt to make it much more interesting next year (rather than just literally clicking a button to all users). So keep that in mind when providing feedback on Holiday Caroling.

-The Wheel of Festive Cheer. Overall, we were really pleased with how popular this was. Unfortunately, part of its popularity came as a result of the frustration of players from not receiving good rewards. In the future, we are going to have multiple variations of Holiday Themed pets available, such as 1 visibles, 2 visibles, and 3 visibles. This way, Holiday pets can be more common from the Wheel, but the 3 visibles will still retain their rarity. We will also try to come up with better rewards so that every spin's reward can be useful.

-The Exploration Zone. I think overall we were pretty happy with everything from the zone (once it was fully implemented). I think the Dynamic Event was much improved and seemed to be well liked by all players (or, just ignored by those who didn't want to participate).


That pretty much sums up our major changes. Let us know what you think by replying! Also, you can start looking forward to our next festival, the Week of Love! It will begin February 10th and run through the 16th!

I really liked the festival, in general.

I felt that the boss fight, though definitely winnable was a little too drawn out, so battling her each round admittedly got a little "stale" feeling, but her prizes were great, especially with the chance at another spin on of the wheel. And I loved that if you just didn't feel like participating in the overall battle portion, you could stick to an area where you didn't need to worry about it.

The wheel was.. awesome. I loved it. And loved to hate it. I like the idea of implementing more ways for people to see pet wins on the wheel, even if the carries/visibles vary.. because some people seemed to have all the luck (or money haha) and others, well... we just saw more pet dyes than any person should ever be subjected to haha. Oh and test kits. My word.. I thought those would be growing from my ears =P

The door to door element, definitely needs some spice to it, a little more incentive to actually want to do it. I really haven't participated much in things like the caroling, or the trick or treating, because I'm more of a battler/pet hoarder and spend more time in the event zone, but I think if the door to door feature had more spice to it, maybe it would feel less like a job to click through everyone and answer requests lol.

All in all though, I really liked the festival. LOVED the new pet releases, the Arctic Griffi and Festive Griffi pulled at my heartstrings like wild. And all the stuff I mentioned up above you already mentioned you'll be touching upon to alter, so I guess this is my feedback post xD

For the week of love, I offer my services.

Black's kissing booth.

I thought the festival went extremely well (in spite of not getting to hand in those reindeer I collected at the end like I had been planning to XD). My one complaint is that the drop rate on the boss's items seemed a bit skewed in favor of one of her items, rather than spread across the items of the same rarity level.

Perhaps something to consider for the Week of Love is something similar to the caroling: a choice between two good outcomes (say, between a card or a flower and a box of chocolate).

Love the door to door. Especially with the change from every 6 hours to once a day, gave everyone more of a chance.

The wheel of cheer. Loved it except for the genetic scanners and test kits. I was thinking maybe that could become a daily game here.Once a day you could spin the wheel. Prizes could vary(not scanners or test kits) from gold to maybe dyes or whatever.

The boss fight took a bit too long, but was winnable. The area its self was awecome. Just wish I would have come across a few more griffis lol.

Im gonna be saving every penny for the next event, just wish it would be so short. But do hope we will have something for St Patricks day as well, as I find it a tad boring without an event going on.

It was so much fun! ^u^ I was glad to have been able to partake in it!

And now I can actually look forward to Valentines Day!!!

....

I really loved the door to door ^^ I still have 50 frost tokens. Very much looking forward to the week of love! <3

The whole thing was great despite the long 10-20 minutes it took me to defeat The Ice Queen, and I did get a little frustrated when I got scanners in the wheel of cheer, and I would have to suggest that going door to door could have something added to spark it up a bit. :P
All in all it was a great load of fun! I really appreciate you guys putting so much work into the festival, and I had a blast. It went by way to fast for me!!! Can't wait for the upcoming festival, and I can't wait to do some forum games contests in the festival!

(I wrote this before the feedback thread where Krin posted some intended changes so I'm modifying this somewhat to reflect that.)

I wanted to go into detail what improvements I felt were made with the Winter Festival and what I feel still needs improved upon. I admit that a lot of this is personal opinion. I do keep in mind that there was a lot of hard work that went into this festival despite there not being much time. I appreciate the work that went into it.



The Winter Festival Zone

The zone was a bit confusing at first since the paths interconnected more than before, but I soon realized how practical it was and very much enjoyed the flexibility it gave players. If I wanted to look for reindeer in addition to fighting bosses, I could go to each and completely avoid the Christmas tree area. Regarding the Christmas tree area, I liked that the bandits only showed up there. I felt this was a huge improvement over the Fall Festival event. People who wanted to participate in the event could opt out simply by not going there. I also figured out with my own pacing that, so long as I hit every suspicious snowman and crate/present along a certain path, they were about ready to respawn if they hadn't already as I came back to where I started. I dont know if there was any planning involved in that or a happy coincidence but it helped set little goals for myself while fighting bandits. The angel design for the area was very cute, btw.

The one thing I thought was needed and was missing was that there wasn't an npc to buy nets from during this event. This was something very useful to people who were newer to the game during the last event that wouldn't otherwise have access to rare or epic nets, and was a great convenience to those who had progressed that far. I think that next year there should be an npc somewhere convenient but just outside of where the bandits would spawn during the event. I wouldn't have the npc sell presents though. Also, about the bandits, as nice as it was for the bandits to drop the Nightfall Marauder's Outfit, it would be nice if they have a warmer outfit for themselves next year that dropped instead.

Oh, I was also happy that there werent any water sprites in the river this time.


Winter Festival Themed Pets

The Winter Festival themed pets were lovely but it felt that the odds of seeing them were a bit too low. I was happy to see the Reindeer Qitari back for those who weren't with us last time. Also, I thought it was a great surprise to see the triple-vis fabled pets as prizes on the wheel. Personally, I do hope we see the same themed pets again next year from both the zone and the wheel to give people another opportunity.


The Wheel of Cheer

I think the Wheel of Cheer was quite interesting. I'd like to see it for future festivals if there is the same odds of finding tickets in the festival zone as there was this time. I think that made things pretty fair. I also liked being able to convert leftover tokens into tickets. And like I mentioned under Winter Festival Themed Pets, I hope well see the same pets next Winter Festival. I would like to suggest though that that the odds for winning particular prizes should be mentioned in a table someplace so people do realize how rare some of the prizes are before walking away disappointed. I do appreciate the idea of expanding the rewards in the future. Would the other levels of pets be the same theme or different?


Caroling and the Leaderboard

Despite saying that the carolling feature was rushed, I felt that the caroling this time was a great improvement over the trick or treating of the Fall Festival. There were two main problems I felt with trick or treating. One was the negativity it brought out amongst fellow players. It felt like the leaderboard during the trick or treating led to a lot of resentment and anger. I didn't see any of that myself this time around. I think it helped that the prizes were tickets to the Wheel of Cheer since these could also be found in other ways such as the guaranteed drop by Tyrielle, the Snow Queen. At the same time, I think that the tickets were nice prizes as well. I think that caroling only having two positive options (gifting or singing) also helped. I honestly hope we never again have something set up where we either trick or treat as separate options.

The second problem I found with trick or treating was how tedious it was. This is a problem I feel that caroling still has but only being able to visit others once a day is a great improvement. I honestly felt really lonely while trying to compete on the leaderboard during the Fall Festival. I didn't get to talk as much to friends. I didn't get to hang out as much with my husband and watch as many scary movies as I would have liked. I realize that this was my own choice in the end to do so but the competitive part of me that wanted a 3-vis generated pet got the better of me. The holidays are when people want to spend time with their loved ones and friends so anything to reduce the time taken by caroling/trick or treating/or whatever it'll be called in other events is something I would greatly appreciate. And with the Fall Festival, it felt that I had to put even more time into trick or treating to compensate for not putting money into it.

You mentioned that there's plans so that caroling isn't just pressing a button in the future. I'm really curious what the plans are. I just would like it to be something that wouldn't breed resentment against fellow players and something that's not too time consuming. I'd like still point out Yukihoshika' suggestion to opt in and out of events like caroling. You can read her suggestion here.

While I greatly appreciate that the title earned by being on the leaderboard was expanded to 40 positions, I feel that anyone who puts in a certain amount of caroling should get a title because caroling, even at once a day, I find to still be tedious. If nothing else, I hope that as the population of players grows, the amount of positions that would give the title would be increased as well. This would be like how eggs have been added to the eggling auctions. By the way, I remember it being said that the trick or treating was popular. It may have been used often by a large number of players. But that doesn't necessarily mean it's fun. It can also mean that the prizes were enticing enough that players put up with it.



So to sum things up I found the Winter Festival to be quite fun. Caroling was better than trick or treating. Could still use improvement but it looks like there's already ideas for the future. I'd like to see the leaderboard title slowly expanded for the growing community or given for a certain amount of visiting. The zone layout was great. (And no water sprites!) I loved the festival pets but wished there were slightly better odds of finding them. I like the wheel, and I see you're already planning improvements for it as well.

It looks like you've already thought of pretty much all the feedback I would've given! The wheel prize alteration with the more common holiday pets is a great idea which I wholeheartedly support.

The advent calendar was also a really great idea, I thought, although it would've been more fun if it'd been a proper 25-day advent calendar. That or run for the whole festival instead of just the first few days up through Christmas. As it was, it felt a little short and forgotten - especially with the bulk of the festival happening afterwards.