I don't get the NDA

As stated in the headline.
I studied communication design so somehow I can relate to some marketing techniques as well but I honestly don't get how the NDA (the 'rule' that testers from new CoH2 content are not allowed to share the new stuff they have seen) should increase the player base excitement.

Let's take a look at other games.
When Call of Duty is going to release a new game or a DLC they will tease it months before.
Be it gameplay teasers, trailers or simply some infos about the upcoming product.

This creates excitement because the fans know what is coming at them and they can thrill themselves thinking 'oh my gosh this is going to be so awesome, I need it!' When Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 was teased some years ago I thought 'holy shit that AC130 is coming to multiplayer I cannot believe it' just from seeing a 2 SECONDS CLIP in a trailer. For that reason I was so excited that I got the game on the day it came out.

Now back to CoH2. The NDA chokes off every single spark of excitement because you literally are not allowed to talk about it.
What is the reason behind this? Does Relic want to be 'mysterious' about their content hoping to increase the anticipation with the lack of informations?
Honestly everyone here knows it doesn't work. When League of Legends introduces a new champion there will be at least some mysterious image on the starting screen to allow the community to riddle what is going to happen.
I always think that Relic wants to create something like Area 51 or Roswell by keeping their stuff top secret.
But the sad truth is that nobody cares. The CoH franchise is too small (with about average 4.500 players online) that someone would really invest a lot of time to reveal those things.

At the moment every one knows somehow that the Observer Mode is coming to the game. But there are ZERO images out there showing the interface or functionality of this feature. How should we be excited if we have no reason to excite ourselves?

It was the same before WFA came out. Ok there was a teaser that showed some new units (that was done well, Relic) but then nothing else happened UNTIL THE GAME CAME OUT. How would someone want to preorder something he has only seen in a minute-long video?

I also was in the Alpha testing phase and I was so excited about all the new stuff that I really felt uncomfortable that I was NOT ALLOWED to share my excitement with anyone. What should happen, my god? If someone had leaked that there is a Königstiger in the add-on would it have destroyed the excitement for a upcoming release of WFA? Do you fear the critics about the decisions you made when creating a add-on for the game?
No!! That would have been the best marketing thing possible: Viral marketing. Honestly, I had to make a friend of mine come over to my place and watch me playing on my monitor to show him something about the game (did I somehow broke the NDA? Lol). Good thing was that he also plays CoH2 and was some kind of interested but other people would simply have said 'Yeah, whatever, let's play something else' because they didn't even have the chance to delight themselves because there was absolutely nothing that gave them reason to.

There is no bad marketing because even bad things make people talk about something.
The only bad marketing is no marketing at all.

You plan on an upcoming singleplayer content called 'Ardennes assault'?
Good luck selling it with those strategies.

Relic just got served.

You just won the internet for today Highfive.

Selling a product is making people want to buy your stuff. People need to pay for your content so you better get them hyped. NDA is killing the hype,killing the buzz around the content and killing the enthousiasm.
Result? Sales numbers not even close to potential profits...

"Trust us, we are working hard"

Nope, the trust has extinguished.
Playerbase is both angered and depressed because we have NOTHING to look forward to.

At least highfive is making good threads Weiter so

This kind of secrecy stuff only works if you are big as GTA or Fallout etc.

- The period hype is very small, in each release.
- I think relic should open a beta test for players with changes of balance

At least highfive is making good threads Weiter so

Just trying to keep a game with such an amazing potential alive

Just trying to keep a game with such an amazing potential alive

Me too buddy me too ^^

Nothing ever changes. Relic was approached with the NDA issue prior to the public Alpha for WFA. Relic was then approached again towards the end of the WFA Alpha. Both times it was in order to allow some hype, allow at least a few peaks and teases. After the release Relic got approached a third time to improve it for the future. Before we left the Alpha we tried one last time to make an impact and wrote a letter to Relic detailing several issues we had observed, the NDA being one of them. Relic lacks the manpower to discuss balance changes and what they are looking at publicly, but due to the NDA this is forbidden for the testers. Often it takes 2 to 3 months from an issue being noticed to being fixed, not knowing if it gets tackled at all causes unrest.

A NDA works for big companies who have a good marketing team and good post launch support. I feel the only god thing Relic has is a Design team - their game ideas are usually pretty innovative. Due to that the games are somewhat unique, which works well to cover their flaws.

Due to that the games are somewhat unique, which works well to cover their flaws.

If I had time and a few million dollars (or at least some computer programming skills) I'd be already working to create a CoH2 competitor which is set on the Eastern Front, feels like it is on the Eastern Front and is balanced like the developers actually play the game...

As stated in the headline.
I studied communication design so somehow I can relate to some marketing techniques as well but I honestly don't get how the NDA (the 'rule' that testers from new CoH2 content are not allowed to share the new stuff they have seen) should increase the player base excitement.

Let's take a look at other games.
When Call of Duty is going to release a new game or a DLC they will tease it months before.
Be it gameplay teasers, trailers or simply some infos about the upcoming product.

This creates excitement because the fans know what is coming at them and they can thrill themselves thinking 'oh my gosh this is going to be so awesome, I need it!' When Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 was teased some years ago I thought 'holy shit that AC130 is coming to multiplayer I cannot believe it' just from seeing a 2 SECONDS CLIP in a trailer. For that reason I was so excited that I got the game on the day it came out.

Now back to CoH2. The NDA chokes off every single spark of excitement because you literally are not allowed to talk about it.
What is the reason behind this? Does Relic want to be 'mysterious' about their content hoping to increase the anticipation with the lack of informations?
Honestly everyone here knows it doesn't work. When League of Legends introduces a new champion there will be at least some mysterious image on the starting screen to allow the community to riddle what is going to happen.
I always think that Relic wants to create something like Area 51 or Roswell by keeping their stuff top secret.
But the sad truth is that nobody cares. The CoH franchise is too small (with about average 4.500 players online) that someone would really invest a lot of time to reveal those things.

At the moment every one knows somehow that the Observer Mode is coming to the game. But there are ZERO images out there showing the interface or functionality of this feature. How should we be excited if we have no reason to excite ourselves?

It was the same before WFA came out. Ok there was a teaser that showed some new units (that was done well, Relic) but then nothing else happened UNTIL THE GAME CAME OUT. How would someone want to preorder something he has only seen in a minute-long video?

I also was in the Alpha testing phase and I was so excited about all the new stuff that I really felt uncomfortable that I was NOT ALLOWED to share my excitement with anyone. What should happen, my god? If someone had leaked that there is a Königstiger in the add-on would it have destroyed the excitement for a upcoming release of WFA? Do you fear the critics about the decisions you made when creating a add-on for the game?
No!! That would have been the best marketing thing possible: Viral marketing. Honestly, I had to make a friend of mine come over to my place and watch me playing on my monitor to show him something about the game (did I somehow broke the NDA? Lol). Good thing was that he also plays CoH2 and was some kind of interested but other people would simply have said 'Yeah, whatever, let's play something else' because they didn't even have the chance to delight themselves because there was absolutely nothing that gave them reason to.

There is no bad marketing because even bad things make people talk about something.
The only bad marketing is no marketing at all.

You plan on an upcoming singleplayer content called 'Ardennes assault'?
Good luck selling it with those strategies.

Oh, Canada, why, why they even you make a country?????

+1 to OP

Disclaimer not disagreeing with anyone. NDA is often done excecuted wrong, this being the case I just hope to explain WHY companies in general do it.

Companies are often secretive about the wrong things. (and sometimes not secretive enough about the right things.)

In marketing it is an effort for the marketing team to keep full control of how the product is portrayed and at what time. Makes it easier to make strategies and study the success of marketing.
As such, new features, sales and campaigns are the most protected things ever.

Isnt there a big support för the NDA here? I just remenber when someone broke it before and he was thrown to the wolves. But things change I guess.

We always enforce the NDA here but that doesn't mean that we agree with it. We do it because Relic asked us.

That's what I've always been saying around here.

Agree 100%.

I agree to some extent: Relics way of using the nda is overly strict.

However, I do not think that the NDA is useless or entirely bad for the community:

Alpha and Beta testers shouldnt be allowed to share everything, >but they should be allowed to share something from time to time<.

The community isnt ready for receiving certain key information without being able to see the thing in action/test it themselves.

Imagine the outrage and theorycraftig that would happen if a alpha/beta tester posts one balance change, or one new unit from an expansion pack, one new mechanic.

Lets take WFA as an example "WHAT BUILDABLE KINGTIGER AT T0? OMG RELIC NAZI FANBOY I WONT BUY".

The NDA is an important factor to keep some kind of control for Relic, unfortunately Relic missuses that control by not telling anything to the public at all.

Lets take WFA as an example "WHAT BUILDABLE KINGTIGER AT T0? OMG RELIC NAZI FANBOY I WONT BUY".

If this happened 10 times more people would even have heard about WFA.
The one guy who rages about it doesn't matter. He probably would have bought it nevertheless.

Relic does not need the control you mentioned.
They do the worst thing you could imagine for ages now because they absolutely have no idea how to thrill their audience.

If this happened 10 times more people would even have heard about WFA.
The one guy who rages about it doesn't matter. He probably would have bought it nevertheless.

That was just an extreme example, but it would probably create negative publicity.

The same applies to possible upcoming changes. Lets say Relic tests something that sounds great at first but doesent prove to be a good change. Someone posts that change and people will be mad when it doesent get implemented.

A unit that sounds extremely overpowered, but clearly isnt when you actually play with it -> people will get mad.

A feature that is in development, but then becomes discontinued for a while, because other areas are more important and require more attention -> people will get mad.

If there is one thing I learned from the CoH community, then thats that people get mad at just about anything. Having control over that is important for a game developer. Creating madness by not revealing anything obviously is not the right way to go either though.

Let testers talk about some areas from time to time, allow some transparency, but getting rid of the nda completely is not a good idea.