Managing The Culling community – “they felt they had no choice but to be toxic”

Shortly after The Culling: Origins launched its free-to-play version, we spoke with Josh Van Veld, director of operations at developer Xaviant. He was generous with his time, and in a wide-ranging interview, we covered The Culling’s conception, evolution, failed reincarnation as The Culling 2, and eventual relaunch. One of the key themes in that story has been the game’s passionate community, to which Van Veld admitted that Xaviant “literally didn’t know how to listen.” The Culling was the first built-from-scratch battle royale, launching after PlayerUnknown’s Arma mods but before his standalone battle royale sensation, PUBG. Consider the kind of discussion this genre generates: for a small developer of only 20 people, whose previous games were far more discrete experiences, dealing with even a fraction of this kind of feedback must have been overwhelming. In the final part of our interview with Van Veld, we discuss Xaviant’s baptism in the fire of community toxicity, how the studio is handling it now, how even the most bad-tempered individuals can seemingly be brought round, and the role of streamers in promoting battle royale games. You can read the first part of our interview, on The Culling’s journey and the awful moment he realised The Culling 2 had failed, here.

from PCGamesN https://ift.tt/2pzDXDA