FIC Star Trek Online Style

Star Trek Online

For those not familiar with the term FIC – Feted Inner Core, it was a term coined by Second Life resident Prokofy Neva back in 2005.  It basically is a theory based upon conspiracy that argues the following:

That certain groups of players use their relationship with the staff of Linden Lab, the game providers, to obtain favors that advantage their in-game businesses at the disadvantage of others. Since businesses within Second Life can be run for real-world money – the game’s currency, Linden dollars, has a maintained exchange rate with the US dollar – this is considered a significant danger.  Source

Now whether or not you buy into this charge, all worlds have this issue of access to the game developers / managers.  Hell, this is true in the physical world.  You ever hear of lobbyists?

With the recent announcement by Cryptic Studio of the formation of an Advisory Council made up of “a group of individuals from various positions within the Star Trek and Star Trek Online community designed to provide feedback” and is intended “to complement the other feedback collection tools we use, which include the forums, our users polls, in-game data mining and so on.”

Now anyone with any experience with MMORPs worlds knows what happens next.  All hell breaks loose and doom and gloom is predicted, along with numerous troll postings. No one, especially the forum residents, likes the idea of players getting extra input in the game’s direction.  Cryptic Studios has responded to these concerns by posting a FAQ.

Now in a former life, I used to do market research.  I can tell you, that identifying lead end-users was a key research tool.  So I realize the merit and necessity of establishing this council.  The key for success for Cryptic will be a balancing act.

As the good people over at Massively put it best:

As the FAQ attempts to explain, the intent of the council is not to replace other forms of player feedback, but to use a different angle to get in touch with fans not active on the forums. Also interesting is how the council itself will have methods for removing members seen as advancing a personal agenda over the wishes of others.  Star Trek Online‘s team does seem to have their heart in the right place, but unpopular decisions can be hard to bounce back from. It remains to be seen how the community will react to Cryptic’s explanatory olive branch.