Because this change goes above and beyond anything Howrse have done before (since the removed the objectives).

This update has effectively killed a huge part of the game and players are very justified to be angry. Players invested huge amounts of time and money into the trophies and this new update is

a) unfit for purpose
b) riddled with issues
c) has erased years of hard work
d) is lazy, lacklustre, and unprofessional.

It's a huge slap in the face and considering Howrse haven't even addressed the issues, or even attempted to make contact with their player base, i'm not surprised its a bit tense!

I would love if they at least did that, but possibly the amount of GAs you have (there are 13k GA coats on site) plus landscapes, plus RCs are too much to store in there. Not sure.

But it doesn't justify insulting the team and some of the, quite frankly, nasty comments that I have seen aimed at them. The admins probably don't even have the final say in these changes, yet are the ones that suffer the anger from players. I'm not saying don't criticize or anything like that, but just to remember that the admins are human and have feelings as well.

Oh yeah I agree with that 100%! Maybe I missed some comments but most of them seem to just be criticising the changes and the fact that whoever is in charge seems unwilling to engage with the player base (not necessarily Admin's fault, it could be the 'big bosses' but who knows at this point!)

I believe over the years we have had a few other game killing changes that evoked a big portion of the community to pages and pages of negative comments. Many players left over those changes and some may leave due to this one. This is just the worst in recent memory.

This is a fairly regular occurrence. Think it is just when the game is over crowded. Super frustrating

I'd argue that the pass horses (and whole pass system over hall) changes got even more backlash than this. Nothing changed. That's why I'm accepting and moving on with my game, nothing will change unfortunately. Not worth wasting energy over.

But I'll disclaimer that I don't buy passes so therefore have no actual investment in this game. Harder to accept changes when it's real money lost.

I 100% agree that some of the comments towards the admin and even in some cases the mods have been misplaced. Criticism towards the change is valid, however when it turns to disparaging comments towards those who have no power in the change I personally think it is inappropriate.

I don't know how this plays into the change, if it does, however I would note that Ubisoft is having some financial issues at the moment. They have cancelled 3 games recently, pushed back development on one of their anticipated titles, redirected focus to their two major franchises (that has been seeing some franchise fatigue), among other things.

Howrse isn't just Howrse. Howrse is Owlient which is Ubisoft. If Ubisoft starts tightening its belt, it is likely to start seeing affects downward. How those will truly affect Howrse, I don't know, nor if this specific change was affected by this.

All of that to say however they came to this conclusion to make this change it is likely not the Admin of Howrse. They are the face of the company within our game, so its understandable that they would receive the criticism, but I believe it is misplaced. I think we should take them at their word when they say they are giving the team responses. But we are the players of a game that doesn't make Ubisoft as much money as others in the grand scheme of things so our complaints may not make as much of an impact as we may like. Its unfortunate, but this isn't a AAA franchise game.

Please don't take this as me bashing the game, I enjoy Howrse. Maybe I'm completely misplaced and Ubisoft's financial difficulties have nothing to do with what is going on with Howrse. I have no idea how it would specifically help financially, I don't understand anything in the back end. All I was saying was that this is what the parent company is currently going through and that it will likely be felt downward, but that should not be used as an excuse to be rude towards the admins and mods of this game.

It would just be nice to get a statement I guess! It would make us (well me anyway) feel appreciated and valued as a player and that the team are willing to engage with their player base.

I know it's just a game, but Howrse does have a great community which is missing from most games these days!

I think that a statement showing appreciation for our views would really help us understand where this update came from, and would help us feel less blindsided and ignored by whoever is in charge!

Oh I for sure agree that communication would be nice, never disputing that. Communication is important everywhere. There for sure is a great community here on Howrse, I love it.

Sure, it's not the admin's or mod's fault if they do indeed give our feedback and it's ignored, but we don't know if they actually DO do that, there hasn't been *much* proof especially considering there has been lots of player feedback over the years about many changes that was ignored.

And it's really not hard to say "We have been reviewing your comments on the recent changes and have been referring them to 'so and so', however, at this time, 'so and so' has has decided that this change is the intended direction in which they are choosing to develop the game, they are working on x y and z, not this, maybe that."

It's not even the fact we need to see a change, at this point, if they said
"the team sees your comments and doesn't have interest to make the changes suggested", well, at least we'd know why things are going in the direction they are. I am getting the sense they only reason they aren't coming out with such a statement is because the forums and Contact Us are meant to give us a sense that we have a say in changes when we don't at all, and such a statement would really alert the players to the fact the team doesn't give one and they're afraid of the repercussions of the community knowing that Ubisoft/Owlient no longer cares about their player base. Easier to make money when we're hopeful rather than 100% sure things will never change!

So I suppose, then, it seems like the Howrse team is content with letting admins take abuse for things they can't control and aren't their fault, instead of taking responsibility for their own actions. Y i k e s.

The devaluation of Rays and Iris Coats is still extremely depressing to me.

But I agree with Bellus; they're not gonna do anything about it. I pretty much complain so vehemently BECAUSE I know no one's reading it except the other players.

I can remember a lot of times they made bad decisions that made the players angry but I can't remember even ONE instance where they A). Fixed it or B). Responded with anything other than canned messages or occasionally mentioning stuff over Discord, where no one can see it.

I take offense at the implication that mods and admin are somehow dishonest in our communications with players. That is simply not the case. If we say that we are passing along your feedback, then be assured that we are.

We are not privy as to who makes what decisions about how the game changes and/or progresses. Howrse is an Owlient game owned by Ubisoft. Do you know how many layers of management and development teams that may involve? I sure don't. But I can tell you, mods and admin are low in the hierarchy of the company. We only know what we are told and strive to give players the most accurate information that we have available, which often isn't a whole lot. We had no input in the change if the trophy system, just like we had no input in the removal of pass horses.

You may think we don't hear you but we do. You might think we don't listen but we do. You might think we don't care but we do. We simply do not have the power that players think we have. That is not our function on the game. We pass info, complaints, etc. on to those directly above us and they do the same. What the powers that be decide to do with that information is not in our control.

So while it is perfectly OK for players to voice thier opinions about changes that happen on the game, it is not ok to take your frustrations out on others. Calm, rational criticism of changes and offered solutions to improve on changes are more than welcome and appreciated.

So I have not been taking care of my horses since the update and I really didn't expect it to snuff out my wish to play this game this much ... I don't think it's coming back at this point so I don‘t know what that means for my account. I'll continue to log in to see if changes are applied but I think this is it for me. The fun is gone

I couldn't be bothered to do anything with the game either. I'm just logging in to read this page and to watch all my EC boxes go into disrepair.

We have lost 358 players since January 6th.
I have no way of knowing how many were autodeleted. But to me it looks like at least some of those accounts were people who decided to leave.

I hope I am wrong, but the numbers speak.


Regarding the trophy change I no longer believe anything will be changed. If I'm wrong and we get the trophy's back I'll be extremely happy, but with such a long time of silence, all I believe is that howrse are waiting for the upset players to calm down.

Well, they sure took the fun out of the desktop experience.

Taking the fun out of it does not mean they've gained a mobile supporter, though.

We're not getting the trophies back. Best bet is that they'll add a collections display to our page, edit the collections to be a LITTLE closer to the old trophy format and less confusing and glitchy, and clarify exactly how and how much collecting affects our ranking.

Worst case scenario, they'll just leave everything as is and take the loss in terms of playerbase.

In any case, we're never getting back the Rays, the GAs, and I'm doubtful about the Iris Coats as well.

So if the Iris coat isn't anywhere in the collections now, does it also not count for the "apply a special coat" medal?

And am I correct in understanding that all the 5th Element coats that used to have multiple species categories has now just been condensed down into one?? So people who paid thousands of passes collecting 4 versions of the metal element or a divine that drops the metal element just spent all that for nothing now? Ouch

Correct. Iris Coat does not count as a Special Coat. Having collected all the Iris Coats does nothing anymore in terms of game progress, and adding them to a horse will not make your trophy progress further.

The same is true for Vintage Apples, although there IS still a collection for those.

And yes, the 4 5th Element trophies are now gone and there is no point anymore in owning multiple Metal element horses. Which, I suppose is good for newer players who now only need to get lucky one time to get the trophy, but it certainly stings for players like me who spent well over 1000 passes for the Pegasus one.

I got the trophy using only iris coats, so they counted as a special coats a few days ago at least, i'd imagine they still do

I've just come on here to voice my complaint again, Sorry i know this has been said before.

I don't think i can sigh hard enough about this Trophy page. The more i look at it the more it annoys me. I can't work toward trophies if i don't know what they are. I can't effectively use a trophy page that doesn't explain itself well.

I can't tell if the meter means i have that level of trophy or I'm working toward that level, I'm supposed to have won 3 gold levels, what are they? How far from Platinum am i?

I don't know.

Please add some explanations or fix this Howrse. i don't think i can sigh any harder.

Came here to say this...

@MsArine
Its snuffed me out as well currently giving my stuff away as we speak