Hey! I’m another Polytoria OG here. Been on the platform since mid 2021. I’m sort of making this post as a response to Ferum’s post on why he is leaving Luduvo and going back to Polytoria. You can read it here: Polytoria & The Reflection of Luduvo: Why I’m Moving .
Let me first start off with the things I agree about on his post:
- I agree that Luduvo, Polytoria, and other websites in this space should not try and be the next Roblox or a “Roblox 2.0” if you will.
- I agree that Polytoria has an advantage by being around longer to develop an identity and have history behind it.
- I agree that having money doesn’t guarantee success.
- I still like and am friends with many Polytoria OGs (though not many newgens, tho) because they are great and wonderful people, and I still have yet to establish that with Luduvo (though there has been some progress).
- I also don’t like some of the key decisions that has lead to a sort of Robloxification with Luduvo (cough the Action figure bundle cough). I very much liked the more unique and Rec Room inspired approach that Luduvo was aiming for originally.
However, I do not feel the same about wanting to return to Polytoria as a platform. That’s because there is information that I know about the site that the public doesn’t know, and that information is not public for good reasons. I truly believe if that information does become public, at the very least, most of the OG Polytoria players are never going to want to touch Polytoria again, despite the positives Ferum listed.
That information is not mine to make public. I encourage those people to find the strength to come out when they are ready. Without divulging such information, I want to go over why even though Luduvo is a newer platform and still has hurdles to accomplish, I have more faith in it’s longevity than Polytoria.
Polytoria Has A Serious Mismanagement Problem
This is my first and foremost reason why I am reluctant to continue engaging in Polytoria and continue my presence there. As much as I would love to be with the friends I got to know through Polytoria, and familiarize myself with the newgens who have persevered and continue to be a part of the community, I can’t overlook the rot that lies at the top of the website.
I have voiced criticism that Polytoria does not take itself as a platform seriously. This is a criticism that I have said for years, and both Willem and Jane are very much aware that I have said this about their site. When Polytoria was a small platform, I was willing to overlook this because it seemed more like a hobby project and something people did together for fun. However, I felt like when the major Schlep controversy occurred, that should’ve been the first sign for Polytoria that they should start taking themselves more seriously, and that there is a real possibility that people may want to search for an alternative.
When Polytoria saw a massive influx of players in February due to content creators covering them, to say they were underprepared would be an understatement. Some of it was out of their control, such as the website and game servers constantly going down, but most of what has happened since February could’ve been handled more effectively, or outright prevented. Including, but not limited to:
- Mitigating the spread of several dramas related to known community members. The slow action of staff has reflected negatively on Polytoria as a platform
- Preventing staff dramas, had there been proper screening and vetting procedures.
- Lack of appropriate compensation for staff members who have put considerable amount of hours building and maintaining Polytoria.
- Establishing proper rules and filters beforehand and slowly would’ve helped mitigate a lot of the discontent that OG members felt during and after February.
This isn’t to say that in the small amount of time that Luduvo has been out, they haven’t made mistakes. I have been more than willing to tell Isaac personally about decisions that I felt were not appropriate to make, or not well thought out and should’ve received and incorporated community feedback. The only reason why I am giving Isaac some slack regarding these decisions is because it is clear to me that these mistakes are a result of inexperience and lack of wisdom. As long as Isaac is willing to show he can learn from his mistakes and use them to improve his managerial skills and Luduvo as a whole, then I can forgive his decisions.
Polytoria, on the other hand, has had ample time to have made these improvements, and this is where I think Polytoria’s age works against them. I felt like a lot of the mismanagement that I have been witnessing from Polytoria over the past several months could’ve been prevented, had Willem and Jane listened to me early on and took themselves more seriously. Perhaps we wouldn’t have seen such as drastic of a displacement among OG members as we did. Perhaps dramas that arose would’ve been resolved promptly and with the proper care they needed. Perhaps Polytoria would’ve responded better to the growth and retained more players.
Most importantly, I feel like there wouldn’t be such dissatisfaction among staff members and we wouldn’t be seeing so many of them quitting or being poached by other sites. Baggy and Brixster work at TruWorlds. Dargy left and works here at Luduvo. Carslys (a.k.a Hungry) resigned as Head of Staff. I’ll talk more about Mawji in a bit. There are far too many disappearances of staff members for this to be a coincidence. I have a feeling that a lot of staff are also fed up with this mismanagement, too.
What started out as a small, good faith critique of the platform has unfortunately escalated into such a serious issue that I think will affect Polytoria’s future.
Polytoria’s FOSS Tech Stack: Community-driven Collaboration, or Replacing Paid Work?
I’ll admit, when I first heard the news that Polytoria was planning on making their Godot-based client open source, I was shocked and I felt optimistic. I had never seen a website decide to take not just the client, but the entire stack and make it open source. I felt like it helped contribute to the notion that Polytoria was a product of its community and it is what they choose to make of it. Also, because I am a Linux nerd and FOSS user, it felt nice to use software that was more up my alley.
The main developer who made the Godot-based client was a staff member named Mawji. Mawji is the reason why Polytoria has a Godot-based client in the first place. Shortly after Mawji finished the initial release of the new client, they resigned. I thought that was weird, because I thought Mawji was going to code review incoming changes the community would make to the repositories.
However, given the previous issue regarding mismanagement, it has given me a new perspective on why Polytoria decided to open source their stack. Sure, the community gets to participate in the development of Polytoria, which is great. However, I started seeing the newly open source stack going from a fruitful collaborative effort, to something more sinister: Willem’s way of replacing development work that would be done by Mawji or other dedicated developers on the team.
Considering that morale for staff is already dwindling, showcasing that they are replaceable is certainly going to help that /s. But in all seriousness, Polytoria is a commercial product that needs to generate revenue. Sure, plenty of that pays off necessary expenses, such as infrastructure costs (i.e. hosting servers). However, I can’t help but imagine that there is plenty of money that would be left over to help fund labor being done on Polytoria.
Let me make this clear: Open Source culture is primarily a product of willing volunteers. If you want to help support Polytoria’s development by voluntarily choosing to contribute code, you are more than welcome to do so. On top of that, it is not wrong for Polytoria to make money despite the open source tech stack. However, open source does not imply that all work is unpaid; there are businesses that will often employ people to help maintain open-source projects, especially if those projects make them money. So my main concern here: is Polytoria, a commercial platform, choosing to use their community’s willingness to contribute as a substitute for development work that would otherwise be funded by the company itself**?**
I’ll let you make your own judgement for this.
Luduvo has made it clear to me that they are going to be keeping most of the stack closed-source. It is a bummer, but I understand their reasoning for doing this. That being said, I hope they are willing to embrace FOSS for future projects and willing to introduce components that are open source to the project. Igor and the rest of the team already got a lot of work on their hands, and hopefully they don’t burn out. In the limited time that I have gotten to speak to Igor, whether it was talking about the engine’s development, reporting bugs, and even just the small bits of casual conversation, I can sense that Igor is incredibly passionate about the work that he has been putting into the engine.
My main concern with Luduvo’s software development is that I hope that Igor isn’t biting off more than he can chew. And as much as I love to see new features come to Luduvo, it is soured and can be overshadowed by the bugs that still fester in Luduvo. And don’t think this is an advantage towards Polytoria, because they also suffer from huge issues regarding stability as well, even with the Godot client.
Polytoria Doesn’t Have the Courage to Compete
Remember the whole Pauly controversy that happened about a month after Polytoria blew up? Well, that didn’t happen because Polytoria wanted to ruin the goodwill they just earned or wanted to make themselves unique for no reason. That’s because Roblox had reached out to them and threatened them to change their avatar, or they would’ve faced litigation. I can say this because Willem later came out to say this publicly.
I don’t want Polytoria or Luduvo to try to become another Roblox, either. That’s something I agree on, but it shouldn’t have gotten to creating Pauly to realize this. I was hoping that Polytoria would do so on their own terms, but it seems like they didn’t do so and ended up having to perform a kneejerk reaction. I do put part of the blame on Roblox being an oppressive billion dollar corpo, but I also have to give some of the blame to Polytoria for not seeing this coming. This isn’t even counting the first time they changed their default avatars before Pauly arrived, either.
With the previous two issues, I have confidence that Polytoria is not going to be a worthy competitor to the likes of Roblox or any notable sandbox game. With their development surviving on contributions, the terrible management of the company, their foolish decision making, and plus the other things I know about them, they are not going to be the worthwhile competitor or alternative that everyone is looking for, nor should they be a platform that anybody should continue dedicating their time to.
With what I like to call the “Robloxification” of Luduvo, I am absolutely worried that Luduvo is setting themselves up to make the same mistakes that Polytoria did and they will end up being forced to either undo some of the changes they’ve been making, or just completely rush to rebrand what they do have, much to the dismay of Luduvo’s community. Isaac has told me in private that he is much more courageous and is willing to stand up to Roblox for the default avatar bundle, but with things like the Avatar Figurine Bundle, which is basically a copy of the Robloxian 2.0 bundle that is much more visually unique and distinct, I don’t think Isaac has much of a fighting chance and I think he is going to be stupid enough to get Luduvo completely sued out of existence, and screw himself and all of his teammates over.
To Conclude
I was friends with Willem and Jane, and I have had dozens of convos with them, both Polytoria and not Polytoria related. Willem can reach out to me to discuss these critiques I have for him and Polytoria. In fact, I have previously tried to reach out to him to discuss stuff like this. However, he has ghosted me multiple times once Polytoria blew up. I remember joining back in January, about a month before Polytoria blew up, and Willem wasn’t afraid to welcome me back or even say hi.
And I sort of get it. I imagine if Luduvo becomes a large platform or experiences the same type of growth that Polytoria did, Isaac isn’t gonna have the time to hear everyone or get to spend 1-on-1 time with everyone. I’m perfectly okay with that. However, at least when I want to talk with isaac about something that matters, he is willing to listen and take my feedback into consideration.
The only person I was able to speak with after Polytoria’s blowup was with Jane. Jane is a wonderful person to get to know, despite her rare appearances at best. However, whenever I want to talk serious business with Jane about some of the things that go on with Polytoria, she all of a sudden becomes evasive and defensive, which I have never seen from her before. Where has the trust gone?
Isaac is someone who is new to managing a business, and I can very much tell with the mistakes that Luduvo has made both during the Alpha period, and a couple of things since launch. From speaking to him and other staff, I know they want the best for Luduvo and he wants it to succeed. For him, his team, for me, and the rest of the community.
However, it is worrying how Isaac doesn’t seem to plan what is necessary to help accomplish the goals he has set out for Luduvo (if he has any). I am really hoping that he looks back on the Alpha period and what is happening now to be an opportunity for him to learn the skills that he needs to succeed, and to come up with a solid, concrete game plan on how he and his team will create an amazing product that people are willing to support.
