I swore off early access after Phoenix Point. It sucks to already be bored with a game before it has the major kinks worked out.
Dead Cells is kind of a counterpoint, though. I’m not sure if I got it as “early access” per se, but since I bought it, they made some major balance changes that completely changed the meta, and those changes got me playing way more enthusiastically than I was before.
Very reasonable, I hope the dev sticks to his guns and keeps a manageable pace. I feel that it’s right to expect content updates coming in if the game is marked early access, but so long as you don’t pull a Valheim, people shouldn’t be mad at you
I think it’s going to be like 7 Days to Die and just never be completed. I’m hoping they’ll eventually do one big announcement or final release that will get my friends to log back in
Nothing that bad, but the updates are insanely slow and the roadmap of things they promised in 2021 took 3-4 years instead of one. At this rate the game could spend a decade in early access.
Thank you for all the free updates ConcernedApe. I hope you’re enjoying your time with your millions and if/when you release the Haunted Chocolatier I’ll get that too. You’re great and your game is great.
I don’t think it is targeted at you or me. Ofc there are some gamers out there that would be whipping the dev given the chance.
But the main issue seems to be unrealistic and poorly managed expectations. From management, devs themselves and gamers.
I think the silent majority knows what they are getting into and understand sometimes you buy a melon, but mostly devs just take longer than people want.
the silent majority knows what they are getting into
You are correct here but the headlines like these make me wonder if I am an idiot for spending money on the alpha game. I don't like the one as paying silent majority. They need to work on their PR IMHO
I don’t think we are idiots for buying certain early access games. I personally judge games based on the state they are in at the moment they are offered and take some of the promises into account. But also so far I have had relatively little issues beyond game balancing etc with many games. And usually crash issues get fixed quick.
The satisfactory devs have a good interaction with their community and manage expectations properly.
So in this case the dev could take an hour every other week and write a blog post or something. That was also a good way the dev of banished used to do it.
I don’t want the devs to kill themselves for a game, obviously. I don’t think anyone does. People just want content updates for a property they love. In an industry that lays off people after they ship a game or starts work immediately on the franchise yearly $70 sequel, I just want a game developer that does better than that. That’s why the whole world waited patiently for the follow up to the GOTY of 2022 with Shadow of the Erdtree. Elden Ring didn’t get a ton of free content updates in that time, they didn’t make it a live service or offer mtx, and they didn’t pump out their massive expansion in an unreasonable time frame. They built an incredible game and incredible world, and then they continued development on the game they had poured their hearts into for years and spent the time they needed to create the expansion the game deserved, and at a reasonable price.
The article says that comment came from a CEO of another game company, not players. Tim Bender, the CEO of the publisher for The Manor Lord, said “Players are happy, the developer is happy, and we as publisher are thrilled beyond belief.” I don’t understand where the post title that says he cited gamer expectations came from.
Basically, yeah. If your game is in a playable state, launching in early access allows devs to get feedback from the community, who help shape the game all the way to the full release. Generally EA games are discounted, with the expectation that it isn’t finished or polished, full of bugs, etc.
In almost all the EA games I play, there’s some kind of “bug report” feature, either somewhere directly on the screen while you’re playing, or in the pause menu or something.
Adding to the other reply to this: You can get natural growth of fans and wishlists, you can get free media attention so your brand/gamename grows in popularity, you can receive enthusiasm from randoms about work you have been keeping to yourself for a while, which can help motivate. I mean I’m super hyped about my own videogame project, but having other people be hyped about it is very rewarding :-). I used to shun early access until they became 1.0, because I got burnt a couple times. But If the dev(s) are transparent and communication is ok, I don’t really care anymore for the same reason as this dev is pointing out: “It’s done when it’s done” is good enough in 95% of the cases for me.
I’m dabbling in game development myself, and that’s part of why I asked the question originally- I’d be terrified to put something out there for the public if I wasn’t already confident it was ready. Early access seems like a double-edged sword. But you list some good points about the benefits of doing so.
By the way, I am interested to hear about your game project if you would like to share some details.
I think the crucial part is natural fanbase growth… As a solo dev, your marketing budget is gonna be so extremely tiny, and releasing with 0 marketing is setting yourself up for disappointment so, it has got to come from somewhere. Maybe EA is not a necessity, but having a steam page is. Confidently typing this while not having a steam page to show for it, but you know what the Dutch say: the best captain is ashore (de beste stuurlui staan aan wal)
AFAIK u get a half release before to get some attention and media/youtubers coverage and people to test your game and make suggestions.
Then you get another release when exiting EA (notifies whishlist and steam gives boosts visibility to released games for a short while and it gets extended if it goes well)
PC/Console games take massive amounts of man hours to make and as I see it the point of Early Access is to give smaller Indie Developers the funds to hire more people and get the entire game made in an achievable time frame (though some of these things still take almost a decade to get there).
It’s a bit like Kickstart, but for Early Access there needs to be enough of a product to appeal to gamers (and hence quite some time invested into creating it up to that point, plus a decent idea and an actual game play which is deep enough and has at least a good enough basis of gameplay design that it’s actually fun to play), which also means scams are far less likely because just getting the game all the way to a level that qualifies it for Early Access is already quite the investment in time and possibly money plus worse comes to worse and the developer stops development immediately after caching in with Early Access, buyers still got themselves immediatelly a small game at a cheap price, though not the “dream” full game they were promised they would eventually get.
Gamers are not asking devs to work until burnout on social media or forums, that’s management and usually in person or department/company policy and procedure.
Edit: more specifically to the article for solo devs they are talking about critics complaining they should have made something bigger which is not a bad problem to have for securing funding for future games if people like your art enough to request more and doesn’t require working burnout hours.
I don’t know if this recaps the situation accurately, to be honest.
Sounds like the publisher is complaining about some article that’s trying to use the game as a reference on why early access can be a bad thing.
I don’t see how the gamers are an issue though. They will expect what you tell them to expect, this is something for the publisher to manage, and I don’t even think this is a problem for Manor Lords.
All of it just seems like news sites trying to come up with their clicks.
If someone complains about buying a finished game and not getting more of it later, they’re idiots and there’s nothing you can do but ignore them.
Publishers that do ultra-early access/roadmaps/live services with promises of content/bug fixes/trust me we’re making the rest of the game later, are clearly to blame for the mess too. They’re the ones poisoning the well.
But plenty of games release in a final state and that’s okay. They have to be firm about it though.
It’s a tough line to walk. You want to create reasonable hype and you have an idea where you want to go, but as you correctly point out, it’s really easy to over promise and under deliver.
It depends on the game. If I buy a game from a smaller publisher I expect it to be a complete work with full story line. Unfortunately… When I buy from a large publisher I expect to be getting a ¾ complete game that will give me expansion packs.
This isn’t the case with Nintendo games though. I feel like and Nintendo game is just done and any extras are… Extra.
I’m not saying anyone should work without pay. I’m saying that with the way publishers release games I expect AAA releases to be unfinished works at this point.
Excellent write up by the publisher and good that they warned Greg of the shit storm ahead.
I bought it, played it. It was already fun. The patches fixed some of the issues that made playing it not fun… so good choices there. I left him some small feedback on the game and some words of encouragement in the hopes that helps.
I hope he can continue his development to deliver his vision for the game. I feel like I got my moneys worth already and I’ll spin it up when the next series of updates are done.
Till that time I just saw Timberborn (another one of these jewels) had a cool update so I’ll go and try that or one of the mysiad of other cool Early Access games that still receive a lot of love.
I felt this way about Back 4 Blood. The game came out, it was genuinely fun and had a good amount of content, and they added DLC that expanded the game while also not ruining things for anyone who hasn’t installed it.
But there was an unending cry from gamers that it was getting “abandoned”. You can still gather 4 players, or fewer with bots, and have a good time. It’s a different appeal from Left 4 Dead with the card system, and that was fine to me.
Agreed. I think it was an OK game but that doesn’t mean that the devs should work to their death to make it totally what I or other people think it should be.
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