The Relationship between Pixonic and the U (is over)

Fellow Commanders,

I used to be a slave to the grind ... but Sebastian Bach reminded me I couldn't be king of the world that way!

UPDATE 21 June 2019 - Pixonic stopped providing in-game items for the U at the introduction of the Greek bots, and later ceased all other communications with us.  Maybe they are busier than ever before dealing with all the tankers and cheaters ... or maybe we got a little too critical.  Hard to say.  At some point in the summer, I made the decision to continue playing as a total F2P (free to play) account.  It gets a little tougher with each update, but the total objectivity is worth the effort!


Original post: In comments here and on the various places I post, folks have inquired about my relationship with Pixonic, the company that creates War Robots. No problem!  First, however, it's important to recognize that “the U” is entertainment. Yes, it's masquerading as education. This is because I’m a teacher in real life, and I believe education should always be fun for students and teachers. With that said, the blog is meant for fun. If you get better at the game, great. I don't usually aim to be critical of Pixonic, because I don’t find that to be very entertaining. Pixonic itself isn’t fun for me to write about, I believe companies should be able to pursue profit how they want, and I doubt many readers would enjoy frequent diatribes (except maybe about tankers!).

The story begins with Pixonic’s writing contest in the late summer of 2017.  I had already begun “Winning at War Robots (Until They Change It)” as a guide for friends and Aurora Nova clanmates, and it was growing into a pretty lengthy dissertation. Figuring that it might serve both purposes, I submitted it to Pix, and it was one of the 20 or so winners. Hoorah!

The prize was 25,000 “influence points.” Readers will be pardoned if they are unfamiliar with this currency, given for new pilot recruitment on Facebook.  Then and now, the only thing you can buy with it is the “Wild West” group of weapon switching robots - Jesse, Doc, and Butch. I already had the little one, so I bought the other two and thought that would be the end.  It was quite the opposite.

Writing contest winners were soon gathered on a Discord server with Tofsla, Pixonic’s community liaison (not an official title). We learned that our pieces were to become part of a new “Iron Library” of web content for players, and that as changes became part of the game, we would be invited to write about them.

I didn’t realize at the time that the biggest game changer since the great Gepard extinction was about to hit. Tofsla announced that all the writers would receive one of the new Korean “Dash” robots. There was a great deal of excitement in the community, and rumors were flying about price.  I scoffed at the idea when a clan mate said he’d heard they would be hundreds of dollars.  Honestly, I didn’t even think that was possible. 

As for my background in gaming, I’ve always loved video games but had no experience in the world of mobile “free to play/pay to win.”  The only mobile game I had ever really played was Plants vs Zombies! I thought new Xbox titles and PlayStation consoles were expensive. 

I named Haechi as my choice of Dashes, because I knew the firepower and energy shield suited my play style.  I’ve always enjoyed Carnage and Stalker.  Having tried the Dash bots only on the test server, my sense of how strong they were was totally off the mark.  The test server has everything at the same level (8), it tests many changes at the same time, and all pilots can access almost all robots and weapons.  It may do its job for developers making sure their code works, and it is effective advertising to the internal audience of players, but it doesn’t really help one understand how an item will balance in the live server against pilots using their normal hangars.

Kumiho was my second choice because I’ve always liked fast robots.  I’m still not really sure why I named a second choice anyway, but they gave me both!  My rating at the time was probably in the middle of the Expert range, and I had just dropped 5000 gold for a second Lancelot.  My rating immediately started climbing, as I was winning more and doing a good deal more damage. 

Of course, if you were playing then, you know that the Dash pricing turned out to be even higher than the warnings. The robots immediately replaced the Lancelot as the weapon of choice among people with champion ratings. Pixonic brought in Scourge and Shocktrain. Mark 2 upgrades (double the time and resources for 20% enhancements) made the people who could immediately buy them into nearly invincible opponents. 

These changes led to very vocal complaints and criticism both among the content creators and in the broader community.  Opinion leaders like Lloyd le Mar, Blitheran, and Pheonix just walked away, saying the game wasn’t fun for them any more.  I remain torn about much of it; undoubtedly, Dash bots are too strong.  Shocktrain makes weak players strong and experienced pilots into gods. But the new maps have been amazing, and game play still holds the same gripping challenge for me.  Plus, as you know, I love to hunt whales ...

Some of the winning pieces began showing up in the game news and on Pixonic’s web page, but mine didn’t.  I offered to edit it, because I knew it was really long.  At the same time, I was having a bit of a creative surge.  I’d held a high pressure job for the past six years but was suddenly unemployed in a strange place, with time to play the game and time to think.  When I wrote Flanking Maneuvers, I finally hit pay dirt and Pixonic featured it on their page.  On the Discord server, content creators were invited to write new pieces, and Pixonic offered to provide new items for those who wanted to write about them.  These items are typically given at Mark 2 level 8 so that they are immediately useful. Seeing how my tactical piece was well received, I proposed to extend it while writing about Hover and Inquisitor, and then Ember and Tempest.

When hangar decks came out, Pixonic provided them to all the content creators.  I wrote about their usefulness to people who had a ton of gear, but this drew some negative reactions, as though Consumer Reports had made a junk car one of its "Top Picks."  Again, the U is meant for your entertainment - spend your gold how you want.  

Ironically, Pixonic never did publish my piece that won the Wild West robots and the Dashes, so it's good to have a blog of my own (this post is my 45th since mid-December!).  I have proposed to write a series entitled "Sir Shocks-A-Lot," about using the newest weapons on the British bots.  Pixonic has, for the first time, suggested a subject for an article - the new "King of the Hill" mode.  The U's study and recommendations will be coming soon!

I hope this is helpful to understand the purpose of War Robots University.  It's fun for me, and like a home-cooked meal or a rock song, it's meant to be shared.  Enjoy!

Happy Friday,
Dr. Yat

PS: The U is entertainment.  Even Nuclear Assault knows you still have to think for yourself!

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