what I would suggest is to look at the current output and not the theory. (output being what games are in early access now, not released from)
sometimes in life the 'actuals' defy the logic. in the case of early access I think that is the case. it shouldnt work but many of the titles in the program are friggin fucking awesome sauce
I wouldn't say I'm looking at things from a theory perspective instead of the actual data. I prefer to look at things from a per-game micro level rather than a grand macro level. The development platform can't be ruled out as "poor", but the individual games sure can. Nevertheless, for general perceptions of crowdfunding, it is very easy to extrapolate general future genre expectations from past performance, especially if that performance is perceived to be sub-par. We had a few instances of E. coli and now folks are reluctant to eat the bagged spinach.
i dont think you actually are because you havent mentioned any title.
I am suggesting you open up steam, go to the top selling early access titles and look at them. games like The Forest, Kerbal Space Program (now gone from early access), Rust. Instead of not doing that and fantasying how things might be
because the logic being early acccess pretty much manidates that the games should be crap but in reality they are not.
I'm not exactly sure what you're trying to convince me to believe, and I don't think that the "logic" of early access necessarily means that a game is crap. I'm saying that one needs to be intelligent and not afraid of risk. I'm also saying that a few crappy experiences/examples can turn gamers off of crowdfunding in general. This is not how I feel about things as an individual; it's how I perceive general opinion about crowdfunding, kickstarting, pre-ordering, and pretty much any purchasing prior to seeing a finished product.
I'm not interested in any of the games you mentioned. I'm interested in crowdfunded games like Crowfall, Camelot Unchained, and Star Citizen. For at least two of these titles, there has been quite a bit of discussion regarding the games' viability. To me, that's a call to caution and intelligent decision making on the part of potential backers.
its really simple
phsycially do this right now
1. start up steam 2. go to 'early access' tab 3. go to 'top seller' tabs 4. look at those games on that list. 5. go to youtube and types those games in 6. watch video of people playing them.
that is what I am saying when I say 'look at the actuals' and not the theory
look at the ACTUAL games as in the ACTUAL games that are actually there to buy and look at the specific titles themselves and consider it an undone task until you know what the game play interaction of the games ACTUALLY are.
I dont understand why so many self proclaimed gamers spend so much time talking about things other than the ACTUAL game. and to get them to focus on the physical game and what the interaction actually is within that game is like pulling teeth. not talk about the developers, pricing models, promises, free to play or not free to play but the actual game play content itself is such a rare thing to read about on gaming fourms
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
what I would suggest is to look at the current output and not the theory. (output being what games are in early access now, not released from)
sometimes in life the 'actuals' defy the logic. in the case of early access I think that is the case. it shouldnt work but many of the titles in the program are friggin fucking awesome sauce
I wouldn't say I'm looking at things from a theory perspective instead of the actual data. I prefer to look at things from a per-game micro level rather than a grand macro level. The development platform can't be ruled out as "poor", but the individual games sure can. Nevertheless, for general perceptions of crowdfunding, it is very easy to extrapolate general future genre expectations from past performance, especially if that performance is perceived to be sub-par. We had a few instances of E. coli and now folks are reluctant to eat the bagged spinach.
i dont think you actually are because you havent mentioned any title.
I am suggesting you open up steam, go to the top selling early access titles and look at them. games like The Forest, Kerbal Space Program (now gone from early access), Rust. Instead of not doing that and fantasying how things might be
because the logic being early acccess pretty much manidates that the games should be crap but in reality they are not.
I'm not exactly sure what you're trying to convince me to believe, and I don't think that the "logic" of early access necessarily means that a game is crap. I'm saying that one needs to be intelligent and not afraid of risk. I'm also saying that a few crappy experiences/examples can turn gamers off of crowdfunding in general. This is not how I feel about things as an individual; it's how I perceive general opinion about crowdfunding, kickstarting, pre-ordering, and pretty much any purchasing prior to seeing a finished product.
I'm not interested in any of the games you mentioned. I'm interested in crowdfunded games like Crowfall, Camelot Unchained, and Star Citizen. For at least two of these titles, there has been quite a bit of discussion regarding the games' viability. To me, that's a call to caution and intelligent decision making on the part of potential backers.
its really simple
phsycially do this right now
1. start up steam 2. go to 'early access' tab 3. go to 'top seller' tabs 4. look at those games on that list. 5. go to youtube and types those games in 6. watch video of people playing them.
that is what I am saying when I say 'look at the actuals' and not the theory
look at the ACTUAL games as in the ACTUAL games that are actually there to buy and look at the specific titles themselves and consider it an undone task until you know what the game play interaction of the games ACTUALLY are.
I dont understand why so many self proclaimed gamers spend so much time talking about things other than the ACTUAL game. and to get them to focus on the physical game and what the interaction actually is within that game is like pulling teeth
I don't understand what you think this action will accomplish. You seem to be convinced that I think crowdfunding is bad when that is wholly not the case.
what I would suggest is to look at the current output and not the theory. (output being what games are in early access now, not released from)
sometimes in life the 'actuals' defy the logic. in the case of early access I think that is the case. it shouldnt work but many of the titles in the program are friggin fucking awesome sauce
I wouldn't say I'm looking at things from a theory perspective instead of the actual data. I prefer to look at things from a per-game micro level rather than a grand macro level. The development platform can't be ruled out as "poor", but the individual games sure can. Nevertheless, for general perceptions of crowdfunding, it is very easy to extrapolate general future genre expectations from past performance, especially if that performance is perceived to be sub-par. We had a few instances of E. coli and now folks are reluctant to eat the bagged spinach.
i dont think you actually are because you havent mentioned any title.
I am suggesting you open up steam, go to the top selling early access titles and look at them. games like The Forest, Kerbal Space Program (now gone from early access), Rust. Instead of not doing that and fantasying how things might be
because the logic being early acccess pretty much manidates that the games should be crap but in reality they are not.
I'm not exactly sure what you're trying to convince me to believe, and I don't think that the "logic" of early access necessarily means that a game is crap. I'm saying that one needs to be intelligent and not afraid of risk. I'm also saying that a few crappy experiences/examples can turn gamers off of crowdfunding in general. This is not how I feel about things as an individual; it's how I perceive general opinion about crowdfunding, kickstarting, pre-ordering, and pretty much any purchasing prior to seeing a finished product.
I'm not interested in any of the games you mentioned. I'm interested in crowdfunded games like Crowfall, Camelot Unchained, and Star Citizen. For at least two of these titles, there has been quite a bit of discussion regarding the games' viability. To me, that's a call to caution and intelligent decision making on the part of potential backers.
its really simple
phsycially do this right now
1. start up steam 2. go to 'early access' tab 3. go to 'top seller' tabs 4. look at those games on that list. 5. go to youtube and types those games in 6. watch video of people playing them.
that is what I am saying when I say 'look at the actuals' and not the theory
look at the ACTUAL games as in the ACTUAL games that are actually there to buy and look at the specific titles themselves and consider it an undone task until you know what the game play interaction of the games ACTUALLY are.
I dont understand why so many self proclaimed gamers spend so much time talking about things other than the ACTUAL game. and to get them to focus on the physical game and what the interaction actually is within that game is like pulling teeth
I don't understand what you think this action will accomplish. You seem to be convinced that I think crowdfunding is bad when that is wholly not the case.
what it will accomplish is in distinguishing 'actual' from 'theory'
see critical thinking skills suggest that yes its good to think about how things might be but its also good to see the actual results (meaning the actual games themselves).
so despite logic that I agree with the ACTUAL result has been very outstanding games that put many non-early access games to complete shame. if you are into the type of games I am into like building games.
if not then its all mute point
and please for the love of god do not confuse the developer, what develolpers say, pricing models, distrubution models as 'the game' because its not
second Edit: The most important thing in games is not what developers say, its not the pricing model, its not the distrubution model, its not the developer code version, its not about theoretics, its not about economic models, its about the actual game and the actual interaction with that game when the game is loaded into memory. that little universe where your character is interacting with a world because of WSAD. that experience and if its fun or not is the single most important thing in the topic of gaming.
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
There are alot of great ideas for mmos out there... but funding is not so easy to get. Especially if you try to sell something that is not Mainstream to a backer.
Kickstarting makes those possible. Without it more the likely 90+% of those game would have 0 chance to come into existence.
Now the problem comes is from people not able to pull off what they are promising. But this is more or less a do your homework thing as others have said. If you put your money into another investment promising impossible returns... well you will get screwed as well.
My problem with kickstart is most are like a few hundred thousand dollars... the average mmo cost what a few million at the min and upwards of 100+million to make a solid modern AAA title. And sorry but AA quality mmos are Dead on Arrival in this market so yea has to be AAA quality without the huge AAA budget. So kickstarter can get it started but it is not enough to finish... so we end up with either A) something that gets scrapped, B ) Something that gets horribly watered down, or C) something that gets rushed and is crap at launch.
So double edge sword... I will say one thing most the MMOs that are in development using kickstarters that are followed by this site concept wise are much better then mmos being backed by huge development studios/publishers. Issue is all about money. Kick started mmos cannot get enough to finish their vision many times, and big game companies only care about money period... they just regurgitated crap that sold well in a prior games because the shareholders want to get a cut of the WoW pie. Aka why the genre is in the mess it is in.
Now on the Early Access. I see no problem giving your backers access to the product... But To many company use it for a marketing tool or way to make a quick buck. Aka Alpha/Beta being nothing more then a Early Launch and Demo version of the game. SEE Archeage... $150 early access to a game that already launched, seriously wtf. Was nothing but a cash grab. If the game is actually in development and people backing the development with alot of money want access to see the product they are supporting I have no problem with that. I mean if I dropped $2k-5k into development I would want access as well to see the progress being made. Early access should be limited to testing, if it is good enough to give to the masses move to Beta/launch... and all progression must be wiped at launch.
what I would suggest is to look at the current output and not the theory. (output being what games are in early access now, not released from)
sometimes in life the 'actuals' defy the logic. in the case of early access I think that is the case. it shouldnt work but many of the titles in the program are friggin fucking awesome sauce
I wouldn't say I'm looking at things from a theory perspective instead of the actual data. I prefer to look at things from a per-game micro level rather than a grand macro level. The development platform can't be ruled out as "poor", but the individual games sure can. Nevertheless, for general perceptions of crowdfunding, it is very easy to extrapolate general future genre expectations from past performance, especially if that performance is perceived to be sub-par. We had a few instances of E. coli and now folks are reluctant to eat the bagged spinach.
i dont think you actually are because you havent mentioned any title.
I am suggesting you open up steam, go to the top selling early access titles and look at them. games like The Forest, Kerbal Space Program (now gone from early access), Rust. Instead of not doing that and fantasying how things might be
because the logic being early acccess pretty much manidates that the games should be crap but in reality they are not.
I'm not exactly sure what you're trying to convince me to believe, and I don't think that the "logic" of early access necessarily means that a game is crap. I'm saying that one needs to be intelligent and not afraid of risk. I'm also saying that a few crappy experiences/examples can turn gamers off of crowdfunding in general. This is not how I feel about things as an individual; it's how I perceive general opinion about crowdfunding, kickstarting, pre-ordering, and pretty much any purchasing prior to seeing a finished product.
I'm not interested in any of the games you mentioned. I'm interested in crowdfunded games like Crowfall, Camelot Unchained, and Star Citizen. For at least two of these titles, there has been quite a bit of discussion regarding the games' viability. To me, that's a call to caution and intelligent decision making on the part of potential backers.
its really simple
phsycially do this right now
1. start up steam 2. go to 'early access' tab 3. go to 'top seller' tabs 4. look at those games on that list. 5. go to youtube and types those games in 6. watch video of people playing them.
that is what I am saying when I say 'look at the actuals' and not the theory
look at the ACTUAL games as in the ACTUAL games that are actually there to buy and look at the specific titles themselves and consider it an undone task until you know what the game play interaction of the games ACTUALLY are.
I dont understand why so many self proclaimed gamers spend so much time talking about things other than the ACTUAL game. and to get them to focus on the physical game and what the interaction actually is within that game is like pulling teeth
I don't understand what you think this action will accomplish. You seem to be convinced that I think crowdfunding is bad when that is wholly not the case.
what it will accomplish is in distinguishing 'actual' from 'theory'
see critical thinking skills suggest that yes its good to think about how things might be but its also good to see the actual results (meaning the actual games themselves).
so despite logic that I agree with the ACTUAL result has been very outstanding games that put many non-early access games to complete shame. if you are into the type of games I am into like building games.
if not then its all mute point
and please for the love of god do not confuse the developer, what develolpers say, pricing models, distrubution models as 'the game' because its not
second Edit: The most important thing in games is not what developers say, its not the pricing model, its not the distrubution model, its not the developer code version, its not about theoretics, its not about economic models, its about the actual game and the actual interaction with that game when the game is loaded into memory. that little universe where your character is interacting with a world because of WSAD. that experience and if its fun or not is the single most important thing in the topic of gaming.
Of course, if it looks fun, maybe I'll try it.
I am not making the claim that it is impossible for good, fun games to come from crowdfunding, but I feel like you're trying so hard to convince me of this. To the contrary, I think good games can and do come from crowdfunding. Nevertheless, I'm not going to throw money at Star Citizen without doing a thorough evaluation, including the factors you mentioned in your second edit.
Edit: Please keep in mind that there is a clear distinction between early access titles and other crowdfunded titles that are asking for funding but are quite a long way from having a play-ready product.
what it will accomplish is in distinguishing 'actual' from 'theory'
see critical thinking skills suggest that yes its good to think about how things might be but its also good to see the actual results (meaning the actual games themselves).
so despite logic that I agree with the ACTUAL result has been very outstanding games that put many non-early access games to complete shame. if you are into the type of games I am into like building games.
if not then its all mute point
and please for the love of god do not confuse the developer, what develolpers say, pricing models, distrubution models as 'the game' because its not
second Edit: The most important thing in games is not what developers say, its not the pricing model, its not the distrubution model, its not the developer code version, its not about theoretics, its not about economic models, its about the actual game and the actual interaction with that game when the game is loaded into memory. that little universe where your character is interacting with a world because of WSAD. that experience and if its fun or not is the single most important thing in the topic of gaming.
Of course, if it looks fun, maybe I'll try it.
I am not making the claim that it is impossible for good, fun games to come from crowdfunding...
not 'impossible' but 'common'
is the more correct stance.
additionally, the quality difference by comparison to non-early access games is not small but rather LARGE. Granted that does depend greatly on the types of games you enjoy.
the bottom line is this:
Early Access should not work, but the games they create are fucking fan frigginstastic and there is a fuck ton of them and it appears the market numbers agree with me.
that is the bottom line of my point. (in bold)
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Early Access should not work, but the games they create are fucking fan frigginstastic and there is a fuck ton of them and it appears the market numbers agree with me.
that is the bottom line of my point. (in bold)
Why should it not work? You put your half finished game on steam, add some nice trumped up screenshots and a list of features you may never even get around to putting into the game and BAM, sales! How can you say Early Access should not work?
What market numbers are you seeing? Care to share those numbers that show how many good games are on EA as opposed to bad games?
Apparently you have not had much experience with EA games because for every "Frigginstastic" title, there is a "FrigginEpicFlopTastic" title.
While I agree with you that when done correctly, EA is an awesome thing and Kerbal Space Program is a great example, there are also bad examples like War-Z, Godus, SpaceBase DF-9, Towns, The Stomping Lands, StarForge and Atajrubah to name but a few.
"Sean (Murray) saying MP will be in the game is not remotely close to evidence that at the point of purchase people thought there was MP in the game." - SEANMCAD
As some others have indicated, Early Access and crowd source funding (e.g., Kickstarter) are not the same thing, and shouldn't be used interchangeably. Sometimes the two are paired, but one approach does not require the other. As such, I'm abstaining from voting. With that said I think crowd source funding provides indie developers an alternative funding source than mainstream publishers. They directly pitch their ideas to the consumers, which in turn promotes more freedom and creativity. The products are often innovative and relatively successful games (e.g., The Banner Saga, Risk of Rain, and Hyper Light Drifter), and I'd like to think that this innovation and success encourages competition, hopefully down the road drives AAA publishers to think beyond annualized IP's, such as CoD or Assassin's Creed.
As far as Early Access goes, I'm a little less sold on this concept. Paying specifically to being an alpha or beta tester is certainly risky, and often appears to be a not so clever monetization of the development process.
However, I do think it is important to mention that both Early Access and crowd source funding should merit a buyer beware disclaimer. Do your homework before investing your hard earn money in an unfinished product. Familiarize yourself with the development staff and their past successes/failures. Make sure the dev's vision aligns with yours, and engage them whenever you can to ensure that vision continues to move forward together.
Depends on the developing company. Rimworld is still an Early Access game on Steam and it is bloody awesome. Prison Architect was EA too, and its a gem of a game. But I also saw the total disasters and abandoned projects. So I guess you just have to be careful not to jump in too early if you care about your money.
Ive been lucky so far; 3/4 early access games I've bought turned out excellent. Planet Explorers, X-Rebirth, Elite Dangerous, and Pantheon is looking good. I've been quite judicious with my purchases though, passing on several possibilities.
Comments
phsycially do this right now
1. start up steam
2. go to 'early access' tab
3. go to 'top seller' tabs
4. look at those games on that list.
5. go to youtube and types those games in
6. watch video of people playing them.
that is what I am saying when I say 'look at the actuals' and not the theory
look at the ACTUAL games as in the ACTUAL games that are actually there to buy and look at the specific titles themselves and consider it an undone task until you know what the game play interaction of the games ACTUALLY are.
I dont understand why so many self proclaimed gamers spend so much time talking about things other than the ACTUAL game. and to get them to focus on the physical game and what the interaction actually is within that game is like pulling teeth. not talk about the developers, pricing models, promises, free to play or not free to play but the actual game play content itself is such a rare thing to read about on gaming fourms
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Please do not respond to me
Current game: Pillars of Eternity
Played: UO, AC, Eve, Fallen Earth, Aion, GW, GW2
Tried: WOW, Rift, SWTOR, ESO
Future: Camelot Unchained? Crowfall? Bless?
see critical thinking skills suggest that yes its good to think about how things might be but its also good to see the actual results (meaning the actual games themselves).
so despite logic that I agree with the ACTUAL result has been very outstanding games that put many non-early access games to complete shame. if you are into the type of games I am into like building games.
if not then its all mute point
and please for the love of god do not confuse the developer, what develolpers say, pricing models, distrubution models as 'the game' because its not
second Edit:
The most important thing in games is not what developers say, its not the pricing model, its not the distrubution model, its not the developer code version, its not about theoretics, its not about economic models, its about the actual game and the actual interaction with that game when the game is loaded into memory. that little universe where your character is interacting with a world because of WSAD. that experience and if its fun or not is the single most important thing in the topic of gaming.
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Please do not respond to me
There are alot of great ideas for mmos out there... but funding is not so easy to get. Especially if you try to sell something that is not Mainstream to a backer.
Kickstarting makes those possible. Without it more the likely 90+% of those game would have 0 chance to come into existence.
Now the problem comes is from people not able to pull off what they are promising. But this is more or less a do your homework thing as others have said. If you put your money into another investment promising impossible returns... well you will get screwed as well.
My problem with kickstart is most are like a few hundred thousand dollars... the average mmo cost what a few million at the min and upwards of 100+million to make a solid modern AAA title. And sorry but AA quality mmos are Dead on Arrival in this market so yea has to be AAA quality without the huge AAA budget. So kickstarter can get it started but it is not enough to finish... so we end up with either A) something that gets scrapped, B ) Something that gets horribly watered down, or C) something that gets rushed and is crap at launch.
So double edge sword... I will say one thing most the MMOs that are in development using kickstarters that are followed by this site concept wise are much better then mmos being backed by huge development studios/publishers. Issue is all about money. Kick started mmos cannot get enough to finish their vision many times, and big game companies only care about money period... they just regurgitated crap that sold well in a prior games because the shareholders want to get a cut of the WoW pie. Aka why the genre is in the mess it is in.
Now on the Early Access. I see no problem giving your backers access to the product... But To many company use it for a marketing tool or way to make a quick buck. Aka Alpha/Beta being nothing more then a Early Launch and Demo version of the game. SEE Archeage... $150 early access to a game that already launched, seriously wtf. Was nothing but a cash grab. If the game is actually in development and people backing the development with alot of money want access to see the product they are supporting I have no problem with that. I mean if I dropped $2k-5k into development I would want access as well to see the progress being made. Early access should be limited to testing, if it is good enough to give to the masses move to Beta/launch... and all progression must be wiped at launch.
I am not making the claim that it is impossible for good, fun games to come from crowdfunding, but I feel like you're trying so hard to convince me of this. To the contrary, I think good games can and do come from crowdfunding. Nevertheless, I'm not going to throw money at Star Citizen without doing a thorough evaluation, including the factors you mentioned in your second edit.
Edit: Please keep in mind that there is a clear distinction between early access titles and other crowdfunded titles that are asking for funding but are quite a long way from having a play-ready product.
Current game: Pillars of Eternity
Played: UO, AC, Eve, Fallen Earth, Aion, GW, GW2
Tried: WOW, Rift, SWTOR, ESO
Future: Camelot Unchained? Crowfall? Bless?
additionally, the quality difference by comparison to non-early access games is not small but rather LARGE. Granted that does depend greatly on the types of games you enjoy.
the bottom line is this:
Early Access should not work, but the games they create are fucking fan frigginstastic and there is a fuck ton of them and it appears the market numbers agree with me.
that is the bottom line of my point. (in bold)
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Please do not respond to me
What market numbers are you seeing? Care to share those numbers that show how many good games are on EA as opposed to bad games?
Apparently you have not had much experience with EA games because for every "Frigginstastic" title, there is a "FrigginEpicFlopTastic" title.
While I agree with you that when done correctly, EA is an awesome thing and Kerbal Space Program is a great example, there are also bad examples like War-Z, Godus, SpaceBase DF-9, Towns, The Stomping Lands, StarForge and Atajrubah to name but a few.
As far as Early Access goes, I'm a little less sold on this concept. Paying specifically to being an alpha or beta tester is certainly risky, and often appears to be a not so clever monetization of the development process.
However, I do think it is important to mention that both Early Access and crowd source funding should merit a buyer beware disclaimer. Do your homework before investing your hard earn money in an unfinished product. Familiarize yourself with the development staff and their past successes/failures. Make sure the dev's vision aligns with yours, and engage them whenever you can to ensure that vision continues to move forward together.