Lionhead with Microsoft in their back.

Imagine that Bethesda in some weeks from now would close down the forums.
Well that is what Lionhead did.

Sometimes you may be able to comment things in the comment field on their blog but not always, sometimes the comment page is disabled.

So I ask myself, what kind of gaming company removes their official forum and ways of fans to communicate to them and among themselves?
I guess profit, making money, turning people over to the Xbox 360 is more important than making good games for all the fans despite platform, no?

What do you think..

A gaming company wants to make a profit! No way!

As for shutting down the forums, IDK but I'd assume they merged them ala Doom.

Worst company in the industry because the close down their forums? There are far more serious issues.

I've never visited the Lionhead forums, but if it's as bad as... some others, and considering how much I see people complain about they're games I can't blame them. Regardless, I fail to see how shutting down their official forums would make a profit and convert people to the 360. For them it could only lead to less headaches. They can make games on whatever platform they want, if that decision is influenced by greed, so be it.

Not maintaining a forum - while pretty lazy imo - isn't enough of a reason to label them that.

No, they told the community to go to Xbox.com and use the forums there.

It's quite possible they're still getting that feedback, just through other means: fan forums, social media, e-mails, et cetera.

While I'm clearly biased towards the value of an official forum, they are not the sole means of a company interacting with its fans, or gathering information from them.

Well there you go. In your OP, you said this was bad because the fans can't communicate with them, but as it turns out, they can. You can go to that site without owning a 360 after all, you can't play their games without one, but like I said it's up to them what platform they develop their games for.

Lionhead's best and most under-appreciated game will always be The Movies.

Everything else they made was either mediocre or total pants. Ambitious maybe, but still pants.

Closing forums is pretty much inevitable for a creatively-bankrupt company.

Well, they are, but they are limiting what the Fans get to talk about. They can only comment on images and blogs and such that the company puts up. To me, this is too much of a limit on communication. As much as I don't like some of the threads around here, I am glad they are here so that folks can express their opinions and views. Also, I for sure would not want to be limited to what I can talk about in the game.

All the time we have to spend on our forums, is time our (small) online team are unable to bring you media, screenshots and other exciting exclusives. Therefore, we have implemented a brand new comment system on each page that allows you to continue your discussions, reply to each other, upload images and much more while at the same time making it easier for us to moderate. If you still wish to discuss all things Lionhead outside of this comment system, please use our Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/Fablegame or join in at http://forums.xbox.com/.

If they are having so many problems moderating the site, all they have to do is what Bethesda does. Kidnap, I mean recruit some members to be Moderators, give them clear direction and let them take care of the forums. Gstaff does not have to do much on these boards because we do so much of it. This leaves him free to integrate the social web with the companies marketing efforts which is what he is paid to do, among other things. He takes care of the strategy of the boards, while we take care of the tactics.

I think this sums up my opinion on that matter. I will have to mention though that the demographic that goes onto a forum is very different than the ones that use social media. So in some aspect they will lose out on a unique voice, but if that's what they feel.

Agree about The Movies. Massively under-rated game, still has pride of place on my hard drive, but I raise you Black and White (The first) Wonderful game, though Black and White 2 was good, it just wasn't as good.

Not played any of the Fable series, so Ill take your word on them

If only Black and White didn't have the godawful unskippable tutorial, I might agree. And at the end of the day, as impressive as the tech in it was, it was never much good as a game. Not in the same way as Dungeon Keeper or Theme Hospital.

And Fable: The Lost Chapters wasn't bad per se... just very average overall as an adventure, and a far cry from the "trees growing in real time" pipedream of Moleneux's unrealistic ambitions. The sequels, however, got progressively worse.

I loved that game, it's still on my shelf somewhere. I think I'll reinstall it for old times sake at some point.

This, I would buy a sequel in a second. Because even if it was just a graphics update it would be fun.

You're right. They could always use clients like Origin (ala EA) to collect data, or outsource to an expensive marketing research firm. With the latter you can offset the costs with weak development and reusing a lot of previous assets (ala 2K Sports).

So they merged forums...

I have The Movies, bought it cheap a while ago, but I never installed it and played it. Maybe I should

Also, their forum was shut down years ago, wasn't it? I mean, back around when Fable III was new, or maybe even before it was released.

I had to look up what games Lionhead made. As for closing the forum. what percentage of their game players use the forum?

huh i actually thought fable 2 was way better than the original, Actually i really didin't like fable 1 or 3, but fable 2 is one of my favorite games for the 360.

svcks their fourm is shutting down i guess

This seems really lazy on their part.

Typically, the publisher of a game provides all of the support, which includes the community team. It's even true of Bethesda Softworks and these very forums.

Shutting down a forum is still disappointing, but I think you were overly harsh in your opening post.

Even with the new limitations on their page, people can freely post on their FB and the Xbox forums, so I don't think the developers are limiting themselves as much.

It is a shame there aren't more official forums that have managed to set up such successful volunteer moderation.

This is very true, and even if you had the same people on both channels the difference in structure affects what is talked about. However, hopefully they already keep tabs on major fan forums.

A minority, but forums tend to attract several key groups - very dedicated fans, very social fans, and people reporting problems. This is all useful information, and if they aren't getting it from an official developer forum they'll need to get it through other means. Admittedly, none of these are unique to official forums, or even forums themselves.

(Also, while these groups may not be a direct representation of the fanbase or customer base as a whole, they are still representative.)

No game developer, or publisher, should limit themselves to one channel to get player feedback - but forums are an excellent way to develop a community, so I certainly understand why members of that community would be upset to see their forum closed and the people there dispersed.