Hey, I am , the newest Unreal Engine Community Manager

[Kalvothe]

So, a month in, I figure I should probably introduce myself, so, enjoy!

My name is Slager, I have joined Amanda and the Engine team as their newest Community Manager. I am so excited to be a part of the talented team here at Epic, and really happy to be able to interact and engage with a diverse group of developers and fans from around the world! I join Epic Games in North Carolina from the great state of Texas where I worked at Six Foot on Grey Goo, RiME, and Dreadnought. Prior to Six Foot, I developed a website for a game called Gigantic, I was lucky enough to find some super talented and passionate people to help make the website a reality. We became an integral part of the Gigantic experience and for almost 2 years we thrived as the number one site for the game. Prior to Houston, my family and I lived in Florida, but I am originally from Michigan.

My passion for community really began in the 90s around a game called Ultima Online. I was part of a fansite called Stratics, which really fueled my passion for engaging with people and trying to bridge the gap between developers and players. I joined the Navy and did my time on the U.S.S Eisenhower. Outside of that, I helped build up gaming for a rather large brick and mortar franchise. During all of those phases of my life, I was trying to push boundaries of engagement and find new and unique ways to participate in the gaming space, from radio stations (SubSpace Radio, D&D Online Radio, etc), to websites dedicated to Star Wars lore. I live by a few simple rules as a Community Manager, and those are that positive feedback is good for moral, critical feedback is good for the product. I love to hear what people like about something, but it is what is broken that really helps move the needle. Another of my simple rules is that mistakes will happen, but if a mistake is made, I will be honest about it, I will fix it, and we’ll move forward, I ask for understanding in these situations. We’re in this together, this is a Community and, while we each fill a slightly different role in it, we should always try to remain civil.

So, that is me in a nutshell. I look forward to getting to know more of you better, and I am excited for the long journey ahead.

~ “Kalvothe” Slager.
@Kalvothe on Twitter

[BarisT]

Welcome and good luck!
Might post your twitter account as well, in case folks want to follow you there.(I would)

[anonymous_user_9a913664]

Welcome and good luck!
Might post your twitter account as well, in case folks want to follow you there.(I would)

1.Why are interested in him, are you ok?
2. Did you just assume that he has Twitter?

[BarisT]

I follow many UE4 veterans and Epic employees on twitter, what’s wrong with that?

[anonymous_user_9a913664]

Why do you do that?

[vlad.serbanescu11 (Vlad)]

Positive feedback is good for moral, critical feedback is good for the product.

This is an awesome phrase. I used to focus only on the negative feedback for the same reason you mentioned. Today was a good day. I learnt something.

[Kalvothe]

@anonymous_user_9a913664

1.Why are interested in him, are you ok?
2. Did you just assume that he has Twitter?

I am interesting
I do have a Twitter, it is @Kalvothe.

Also, thank you for jumping in to defend me.

[Kalvothe]

@vlad.serbanescu11

This is an awesome phrase. I used to focus only on the negative feedback for the same reason you mentioned. Today was a good day. I learnt something.

I am glad you like it! It is a really simple phrase to live by, but it speaks volumes for where you should focus your energy.

[jojo8026]

@Kalvothe

So, a month in, I figure I should probably introduce myself, so, enjoy!

My name is Slager, I have joined Amanda and the Engine team as their newest Community Manager. I am so excited to be a part of the talented team here at Epic, and really happy to be able to interact and engage with a diverse group of developers and fans from around the world! I join Epic Games in North Carolina from the great state of Texas where I worked at Six Foot on Grey Goo, RiME, and Dreadnought. Prior to Six Foot, I developed a website for a game called Gigantic, I was lucky enough to find some super talented and passionate people to help make the website a reality. We became an integral part of the Gigantic experience and for almost 2 years we thrived as the number one site for the game. Prior to Houston, my family and I lived in Florida, but I am originally from Michigan.

My passion for community really began in the 90s around a game called Ultima Online. I was part of a fansite called Stratics, which really fueled my passion for engaging with people and trying to bridge the gap between developers and players. I joined the Navy and did my time on the U.S.S Eisenhower. Outside of that, I helped build up gaming for a rather large brick and mortar franchise. During all of those phases of my life, I was trying to push boundaries of engagement and find new and unique ways to participate in the gaming space, from radio stations (SubSpace Radio, D&D Online Radio, etc), to websites dedicated to Star Wars lore. I live by a few simple rules as a Community Manager, and those are that positive feedback is good for moral, critical feedback is good for the product. I love to hear what people like about something, but it is what is broken that really helps move the needle. Another of my simple rules is that mistakes will happen, but if a mistake is made, I will be honest about it, I will fix it, and we’ll move forward, I ask for understanding in these situations. We’re in this together, this is a Community and, while we each fill a slightly different role in it, we should always try to remain civil.

So, that is me in a nutshell. I look forward to getting to know more of you better, and I am excited for the long journey ahead.

~ “Kalvothe” Slager.
@Kalvothe on Twitter

Hopefully, you can get stuff done around here, the forums and Epic in general have gone downhill since [USER=“978823”]Unreal alexander[/USER] left so let’s hope you can pick up the slack

[MaximeDupart]

Welcome !

[Kalvothe]

@jojo8026

Hopefully, you can get stuff done around here, the forums and Epic in general have gone downhill since [USER=“978823”]Unreal alexander[/USER] left so let’s hope you can pick up the slack

There is a lot of great things happening, and some momentum we need to pick up on. But, generally speaking, we’re all in this together, so improvements and changes are going to come!

[Filly_The_Owl]

You may speak about RIME now. I wanna know about the artstyle and how you guys came up with it.

Owl sees you welcome.

[BrUnO_XaVIeR]

@Kalvothe

I am interesting

u sure? ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

[Kalvothe]

@Filly_The_Owl

You may speak about RIME now. I wanna know about the artstyle and how you guys came up with it.

Owl sees you welcome.

There was a lot of inspiration that the team at Tequila Works used, the artists were amazing and did a great job creating the environment. Some of the art followed the style of a name that evades me right now. I’ll get back to you. There are some dev diaries out there that have a ton of great information on them too!

Edit: Joaquín Sorolla

[Kalvothe]

@BrUnO_XaVIeR

u sure? ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

Well, now I am questioning everything I know.

[TriNityGER]

Welcome, !

[jojo8026]

@franktech

Welcome @Kalvothe…

One of the things lacking a little at the moment imho is transparency. We get to hear phrases like this a lot:

But what does it mean? - Who can guess! For example every 6 mths, we hear the UE4 Docs are going to be radically improved.
However, it rarely happens. Its also very unclear what kind of medium / longer term plans or Roadmap Epic has for UE4 anymore.

Please consider the feedback here…

I don’t think its unfair to say there’s been some despair / frustration recently. So much so, some devs started looking to Lumberyard.
For ~8 months there’s been almost no direct contact in the forums. During this time the New-Forums were fubar / accounts hacked! :eek:
Whereas between 2014-2016 and early 2017, this was one of the most vibrant/alive development forums game tech has ever seen.

So forgive the bluntness, but are you here to fill AlexP shoes? If so that’d be great. If not then what will your Community role look like?
BTW: If you’re not in a position to offer info / can’t release it. Maybe its better to play things down for a while, just mention what is real…
But if Epic feels none of this is a big deal, and the ‘New’ Bug-submission-form is a step in the right direction, then time to be worried…

Overall it sounds like you have experience in the trenches or rough seas maybe. So none of this will be new to you - Good luck …

I do not think anyone will be able to Alex’s shoes, he was extremely good at what he did

[anonymous_user_dceb25d5]

I believe any attempt to improve and make this community better is a win for my book. I started using the engine when they released it for free and love it so far. It has been one of the greatest tools I have used in order to create the kinds of worlds I want to explore. I will be curious to see how it progresses because if my games do start generating a decent income thats money in their pocket as well. My one worry is that it just becomes one giant bloatware fest and the core features of the engine just get buried in the process, If they have enough coders to navigate it all then its okay but I have seen parts of the engine where comments are not correct or certain booleans/inputs don’t do anything because they were disabled for now.

EDIT: Just remembered, where is the night mode for the forums? this was removed and they said it was going to be re-added but I don’t see the option anymore, please bring that back.

[TriNityGER]

@anonymous_user_dceb25d5

I believe any attempt to improve and make this community better is a win for my book. I started using the engine when they released it for free and love it so far. It has been one of the greatest tools I have used in order to create the kinds of worlds I want to explore. I will be curious to see how it progresses because if my games do start generating a decent income thats money in their pocket as well. My one worry is that it just becomes one giant bloatware fest and the core features of the engine just get buried in the process, If they have enough coders to navigate it all then its okay but I have seen parts of the engine where comments are not correct or certain booleans/inputs don’t do anything because they were disabled for now.

EDIT: Just remembered, where is the night mode for the forums? this was removed and they said it was going to be re-added but I don’t see the option anymore, please bring that back.

Right here

[Kalvothe]

Sorry I have not gotten back to you guys here! We had a convention last week, and this week has been catch up! I’ve read through the posts here and will get a response out today.