"Community Debate - Would you rather a game you are following pushes an early release with many bugs and issues with the promise of regular fixes and updates or would you rather patiently wait for the game to be released in it's intended state? #MMORPG #CommunityMatters "
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Is VR looking to launch a scaled down version of Pantheon? What are your thoughts?
Comments
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
You will never find all the bugs on the first day anyway.
There will always be someone complaining no matter what
So you might as well launch that buggy ass boat, with the promise of "We are working on it"
Because real faith in the company does not come from day, it comes from if they kept their word and... Kept Working On It.
If it is minor bugs then it is not a big deal. Who cares if a few npcs clip through doors or chairs or a text window has <insert text>.
If it is hey in this dungeon do not go to that rock or you fall through the world and get warped out of the zone and have to wait for a gm. Or hey you can buy an apple from that npc for 10 silver and sell it for 1 gold. Then you have big issues.
Basically if the bugs and issues are not game breaking it gets some points off but can still be a really great game. If they are game breaking well they can kill it.
if you are at, say Beta, just slapping "Open Beta, play at own risk" on the door.. rock on.
If it's like Alpha Build 1.07a, and you're still trying to figure out how to make the fighter swing their sword in a way that does not make them look like they are castrating themselves.. you might want to wait till you have at least a Beta in the works.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
I say alpha now is fine if they're ready but that's not the same as release early.
I would love to play even in a buggy state if it meant I could help move things along a positive path, but I would understand if there is some reservation from the dev team on showing their unfinished product. The mmo community is brutal and unforgiving.
Or even if they release EA, will they still close shop if they do not hit X amount of revenue?
That 2nd one is the real problem, what amount of revenue do they even need to have the game running and continue to operate?
Ask again in another five or six years when you get to "post-beta-7" or something.
Err we are promoting the game to shop for a publisher so we can fund finishing the game and launch
So, we slap a price sticker on it and ship as is?
Only people surprised are those who glued the rose colored glasses directly to their faces and wore the "fantheon" name without cringing
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
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Im not saying release in alpha state but there is a time where the client is stable no wipes are to be expected and most of the major bugs are squashed
This is a good time to launch the game is in acceptable condition and you can still ride the hype
Proud MMORPG.com member since March 2004! Make PvE GREAT Again!
Be it a 1 in a thousand cases bug, a bug which breaks other things when fixing it, or a bug which cannot be resolved because of technical/engine/language reasons.
You can however lower the amount of bugs. But my experience is that this is best done by letting as many people as possible play (test) the game.
The issue is that this also needs a lot of server resources and costs a lot of money.
That's where early access came in place.
Sadly people see early access as release and if a game is buggy at this point in time it mostly cannot recover until release.
I also believe that for the management early access counts as release. That's why so many games stay there forever or even close before release
1997 Meridian 59 'til 2019 ESO
Waiting for Camelot Unchained & Pantheon
I backed Crowfall when they said they had a playable game. They said "The game is in a playable state" and true to their word, I could log in a play the game at any time, with no connection issues, no being shut off regularly like other test servers and games, it was about as stable as any other MMO I could play at the time.
Ok, so I log in, and.. Ok.. the game is raw and rough. The first thing I notice is that some classes and races are not complete, so I can't access them, but, It's Alpha, I'm cool with this. I make what I can, and move onward with that.
Moving on, I get through the starter area, where the tool tips are non existent, there is no in game guides, advice, or anything that can tell me what it going on, and there are no 3rd party guides, Wiki's, or things I can look up to get an easy walkthrough or hold my hand.. I am loving this! This feels like some old school shit, where I was flying blind my first few hours.
Here is a half baked world.. go screw around!
Ok.. so I blunder my way out of the Tutorial area to the real game, this Main Hall, that of course was missing their graphics, with a ton of placeholders, and a bunch of newbs like myself mulling about trying to figure out how things worked.
On top of this, as I look over my character, there was a slew of features that were just placeholders, I find the crafting area and a bunch of stuff that has no info on them, no tool tips, a bunch of placebo's in place to show how the system might work, but again no info to tell me what I should be doing here.
So here I am, playing this Throne War World vs World game, where Massive Graphics are missing, Animations are Missing, it's crude to say the least, but I could feel that the game was there, and what was going down, and on top of all this, I knew a wipe was coming.
But.. I could Play it, not only could I play it, I was playing it.
That was the ultimate faith maker for me, because legit, even with all that was left to do, they could have said "yah, we're not gonna wipe, game is going live now" and it would be playable.
Still needing work, but playable none the less, and it was Amazing to watch the progress, see graphics get put in, see features get filled out, watch placeholders and placebo's get swapped over to full working systems, and seeing, witnessing, watching that world unfold around me.. well that was 100% faith maker, this game was on the track and going to rock, and everyone crying about how Crowfall was going to fail, or never launch, or turn to vaporware, can wipe their tears in a extra thick hanky, wad that sucker in a ball and shove it up their ass.
Sadly however, it was not my vibe of a game. As amazing as the journey was, and I have Zero regrets backing them, knowing what I know today about how I feel about the game, I still would have given them, that same $200 to be a backer, and I have nothing but made respect for all their work and effort.
It reminds me of a line from Iron Chef America where one judge said "This may very well be the best the example of this dish that was ever made, but it does not agree with my palate"
Now, If Panthon took the same path, and even if it was in Alpha, and they make it known that it is in Alpha, but, put the game out as in a playable state, perhaps without the Sub active, because the game is still in Alpha/Beta, but if they did that, I would be glad to back them too.