u/Emotional_Fill6974

(I'm not sure if I picked the right tag, but I hope so. I originally wanted to use the "appreciation" tag, but honestly, I ended up venting about so many of my anxieties here that I changed it to "venting." That being said, this is still a post meant to express my gratitude to the creators and members of this subreddit.)

Seriously, thank you 🩷.

The last two weeks (especially this past week) have been absolutely awful. Personally, I already started stressing out back when the movie multi-banner dropped—almost nobody was expecting it, and it immediately made me worry and question what Infold's future plans were. Turns out, my gut feeling wasn't wrong.

I didn't really want a new LI after playing for almost a year and a half (maybe earlier on I would have, but right now, not so much), but I had kind of accepted it. "Oh well. I'll just read the new story and the myth banner, maybe check out the cards. I'll clear as many Orbit stages as I can," I thought to myself. Ultimately, adding a 6th LI would mean an end to all the endless arguments and tension over whether he would actually be added or not. I could finally breathe a sigh of relief. They definitely wouldn't add anyone else after that. Well, or so I thought...

Honestly, I never liked the rumors that Infold was planning to introduce 9 or even 12 LIs. To me, that made zero sense. While 6 LIs lined up with certain lore theories, 9... in a game like LaDS? A game that is incredibly expensive to develop, has a brutal schedule, and so on? LaDS isn't like Japanese otome games, which are structured completely differently...

To be honest, despite how attached I am to the game, I probably would have quit if they added a 7th LI. For me, that would just be a dead end. Both old and new characters would get development at a absolute snail's pace, making the vicious cycle even more vicious. And honestly... how long would the game even survive? It's expensive to develop. More LIs mean more resources. For a game like LaDS, that's practically a death sentence. That's why I don't understand the people who reacted to Infold's announcement of "We will not be adding any more new LIs in the future" by shouting, "The game will die without new characters!" For me, it's the exact opposite, which I briefly touched upon above. I actually wanted to write a separate, more detailed post about this topic later, but maybe some other time.

Anyway, going back to the main topic. I had already mentally prepared myself for the release of the new LI, and then... Infold announced they were canceling him, even though they had just stated the exact opposite shortly before. This completely opened the floodgates of hell on the global server. I understand why global players are disappointed. Going back on your word, pulling a character after publicly announcing him just recently, deleting him after showing off so much marketing... Well, that heavily damages player trust.

However, Infold brought this entire situation upon themselves. And I completely understand the Chinese players and their boycott. Infold can be so foolish; they absolutely refuse to learn from their mistakes, and it’s deeply frustrating. I'll leave a link to a post I published here earlier. To sum it up briefly: I shared my thoughts on why exactly Infold is the one to blame for everything. If you're interested, you can check it out (or maybe you've already read it): https://www.reddit.com/r/LADS_OG/comments/1utsky5/infold_has_caused_absolute_chaos/

I'll also attach a link to a comment by an MLQC player, which does an amazing job explaining the situation regarding Shaw, Valko, and the Chinese playerbase's reaction to Valko (Please, regardless of your personal feelings, let's not spread negativity—especially to other fandoms. Please respect one another. I know the majority of people here are incredibly reasonable, but you never know who might be reading this post. With all due respect, I really don't mean to offend anyone): https://www.reddit.com/r/MrLove/comments/1ulhfxp/comment/ov5ba3f/?context=3

Long story short, the problem isn’t Valko himself; the problem is what this whole situation devolved into—sheer, toxic chaos, including on the global side. All these posts, comments, accusations, bashing, and misinformation... It's just deeply upsetting and stressful. The official Reddit was only making things worse. YouTube and Twitter... so many people were judging the situation based on one-sided takes, not to mention the standard clout-chasers where everyone and their mother jumped on the drama train, usually without even understanding what actually happened.

"The game is ruined without the new character."

"The lore and main story are completely broken!" (Which might be true, but I assume only partially. We don't know how long Valko was in development, what his exact role was, or if he was even planned from the very beginning. Honestly, it's a good thing the LI branches are separated in the main story—at least this way, the impact of removing Valko will be minimal, if any. And even then, it would only affect the main story. Plus, in my opinion, there are plenty of other characters who can give us whatever information we were supposed to get from Valko).

"How can you guys keep playing this game? Have some self-respect!"

"That's it, now all future cards will be rewritten or censored! There won't be any more spicy cards or morally gray themes!" (Okay, I confess, censorship is my biggest fear).

"Boycott the new myth banner!"

"Imagine how Zayne/Sylus/Rafayel/Caleb/Xavier would feel/how they would support this/remember when they said 'xyz' back then..."

And so on and so forth. Well, you already know how it goes. Obviously, not all Valko fans are acting like this, but the ones who are... man, it's just exhausting. Even though I tried to look at all this information logically and critically, it was tough, and I was genuinely stressing over certain things. Especially censorship and a potential EoS (though the latter is highly unlikely considering how much revenue this game pulls in even from the global side, plus companies give advance notice for EoS. But that's just me realizing it now; back then, I was terrified).

While I could survive a lack of spicy cards (though it depends on just how heavily Infold would censor the romance— "Friendship and Deepspace" is cute and all, but let's be real, that's not why we're here), what I couldn't stand is if them changing the characters' personalities, flattening the plot, or removing more complex, mature themes from the story, World Underneath, myths, and memory cards... I have to admit, I absolutely love banners like Catch-22 and Throne of Eros. We don't have many cards like that, and I really wanted to see more of them in the future. If censorship hits, well... I can kiss those dreams goodbye, right?..

In short, there was so much to worry about that it was keeping me up at night (some people aren't sleeping because Valko was canceled, but here I am losing sleep over anxieties about the game's future...). Infold's silence only made me more nervous. I get why they're staying quiet right now—objectively speaking, it's their best move. But knowing that didn't do anything to calm my mind. I just wanted to know what Infold ultimately decided. I wanted final confirmation: are they permanently scrapping Valko, or is there a chance they might bring him back in some capacity down the line?

Regarding that last point, there are some hints that he could return (like the fact that they archived his trailers), but honestly? Aren't they currently telling Chinese fans through customer support that Valko has been permanently removed and will absolutely never be added in the future? If they do end up adding him later, they will just be lying to the CN fanbase all over again, and this entire mess (or at least most of it) started precisely because of Infold's dishonesty. It boggles my mind to think they might fall into the same trap again, again, again and again...

Just to clarify: the issue will no longer be whether they bring Valko back or not; the issue will be that if they lie to the players again, it will lead to even worse consequences than what we are seeing now.

So.

Thank you for creating this little island of stability. And a special thank you for the "venting" tag. Sometimes people really just need to get things off their chest and maybe receive some support. It really helps clear your head.

Thank you to everyone who read all the way through! Please feel free to share your thoughts if you'd like.

Edit: I managed to skip two or three paragraphs, so I edited the post and added them in 😑

I’ve just joined and wanted to share my thoughts. Thanks for reading, and a huge thank you to the creators of this subreddit.

Lately, the official subreddit has become completely unbearable—it's nothing but negativity, and almost every single post is about Valko. Wherever it’s not about Valko, people are mostly getting downvoted, though the situation seems to have started improving slightly just recently. Haha, surprisingly, I’ve actually started spending more time on Twitter (isn’t that ironic?) than on Reddit, even though I used to love Reddit so much before. It really feels like the official subreddit has turned into a Valko subreddit, which is wild considering Infold supposedly canceled him. The official subreddit is actively promoting a canceled character... isn't that a bit suspicious?

Well, listen to this conspiracy theory. I think someone else might have written about this too, but still: either the moderators of the official subreddit are heavily biased, or they are directly connected to Infold (which makes sense, honestly). Do you see the irony? Initially, the official subreddit really disliked theories about the 6th LI—those posts would barely get any likes or just get downvoted. And now... everything is covered in Valko. If a post is negative or even neutral but might trigger a backlash from Valko fans, it gets deleted too.

To be honest, I can understand the Chinese players to some extent—even though some of them have gone way too far with funeral wreaths/banners, threats, knife attacks (if that's true), and arrogant or racist remarks. But the situation with the number 701, and then another number that wasn't any better, plus the highly questionable phrases in the new character’s release materials, and the constant ignoring of the player base... it all piled up.

Actually, I want to discuss a few of these points.

I don't know if competitors simply seized the opportunity, or if Infold is pulling some bizarre hype tactic (the black PR theory is interesting, but it sounds way too insane, though who really knows with Infold? They make so many weird decisions in general). But it all boils down to one thing: this entire situation would never have happened if it weren't for Infold's stupid decisions.

It’s no secret that this game has a lot of issues. The main story updates are incredibly rare with barely any cutscenes; there's no permanent diamond farming except for SHC (in all other modes, you either get stuck or you've already cleared everything and there's nothing left to do); the leveling system is brutal (too few resources, or rather, way too many resources required to upgrade cards); the lack of standard content for Sylus and Caleb; the banner rotations where the exact same character can appear multiple times in a row, not to mention the short duration of the banners. In short, it’s either an overabundance of one LI or a complete drought. Given that there is almost nothing to do in this game except pull for cards, read them, and play new events, this is exactly where the problem lies. Why are people bored with this game? Because it almost completely lacks permanently updating endgame content, like the main story, combat modes, or other things they could have introduced (new mini-games, for example, but that's just my personal wish). Once you get stuck or clear the Orbits, modes like Unicorn Operations, and Abyss Chaos, and once you read the cards, WU, and main story, all that's left is temporary event content. Plus, some people only main one character and don't care about the others at all, making the available content even scarcer for them.

Of course, this is purely my opinion, and you are welcome to disagree—I'm just expressing my thoughts. And yes, you don't need to play this game 24/7, but on the other hand, shouldn't a game give you a motivation to log in?

Back to Infold’s blunders. So, the content issues. First and foremost, it was precisely because of all this and Infold’s disregard and radio silence that the whole uproar over Valko started in the first place.

On top of that, there's Infold's lying. Okay, maybe this is fake, but there is information circulating online that Infold explicitly told CN players that there wouldn't be a 6th LI and that it was just rumors (even on the day they announced the Valko livestream?!). And that, ultimately, they don't have enough production capacity, which is why content for all LIs and the main story is so scarce... and then they suddenly drop a brand-new character? I really want to ask Infold what on earth they were hoping for when making these decisions.

Speaking of Valko's promotion itself. First, we had that livestream where we stared at the moon for half an hour, only for a new character to appear at the very last minute literally. Well, that was... an interesting experience, but it definitely left a feeling of wasted time. Though I was mostly shocked that we were actually getting a new character, and a werewolf at that (there were werewolves in Linkon, and we never heard a single thing or even a hint about them?). Then came the horror-themed trailers. There’s nothing wrong with that, but as it turned out, that’s where the trouble started, and it only intensified with that barely-there special livestream.

I used to really love LaDS livestreams, but this one was... deeply disappointing. Nothing but the feature where you can cook with them, Valko, the AR mode, and widgets. All of that is cool, but it felt like they could have added so much more, considering this is literally a major version update. A half-anniversary, basically. Don't get me wrong, the widgets are very cute and useful, and I like the house feature too, but it overheats the device like crazy, lags, and takes up almost 4 GB. The problem is that not everyone likes this mode, not everyone's device can even handle it, and hiding 60,000+ diamonds behind this mode... is just devilish. If your phone can't run this mode, you basically get what, 7 pulls? How generous, thanks, Infold 🙄.

Not to mention that they have neglected one of the key modes of the game—combat—for a whole year. Where is the update, Infold? Where is at least a reward reset for Unicorn Operations and Abyss Chaos, which could have put out at least some of the players' frustration? Fine, you didn't add a lot of what players asked for (though thanks at least for the option to ban certain outfits), but you could have at least updated the baseline content...

Sigh, fine, it was a terrible stream, but how could they mess up so badly with the marketing of the new guy? No early foreshadowing (except for the interface and the recent WU; everything else was just player theories), a complete lack of proper development (way too many already existing tropes and animations were recycled for the RELEASE of a BRAND-NEW character), and then those bizarre expressions (about letting the wolf into the house and the cooking pot) that Infold, being Chinese themselves, somehow overlooked? Or did it intentionally—I honestly don’t know which is worse.

As for the 731 issue... This is either a terrible failure of quality control, AI usage (even though they swore not long ago that they would never use AI), an insider sabotage (which again points back to terrible quality control), or they literally have a corporate death wish, considering how seriously that number is taken in China.

Thank you to everyone who read through all of this. There was so much more I wanted to say, but this post turned out way too long anyway 😅. I just had so much pent-up frustration. Apologies for the negativity.

I just really hope the situation gets resolved soon, the anger dies down, and Infold actually works on improving the game, fulfills their promises, and fixes the bugs (some of them are funny, but still, Infold, you literally broke the game 😶‍🌫️) and return Xavier's WU (even if modified) and Catch-22 outfits (even though I understand why they did it, it still hurts to watch) someday.

Thanks again for your attention! Please share your thoughts.

So, the livestream is over, and there’s no new combat content... I mean, I'm not even a battle girl, but not updating it for a whole year?.. Seriously? Of course, we can check the announcements over the next few days, maybe they’ll add something else new, but it’s unlikely to be a new combat system, new Orbits, or new modes. Long story short, I don't have much hope.