State of the Game

[cwg9]

This is actually quite funny if we compare the business models.

1. Release unfinished game after promising a full retail version and then use the customer money to patch it to acceptable state, like was done with this game.
2. Tell people to pay for beta and give a promise to release the full game. Good examples are Minecraft and Mount & Blade.

As you see in both approaches it is the same thing: customers pay for an unfinished product and thus funding the company to finish it. However in the first approach you have angry customers wanting their money back, in the second approach customers are loving supporting fans.

What should Kerberox and Paradox done in this case? Postpone the entire game until it is finished, but give the pre-order customers a "privilege" to an early "beta" access (which is the current released game). That psychological approach would make us feel privileged for "exclusive access", that we wouldn't even complain about the lack of features, but instead give feedback on many problems. Everyone is happy, developers get funding. It's a win-win situation.

Damn, I should apply for the marketing department at Paradox...

This. Good god, why don't you do this? Everyone would have been supportive instead of understandably angry at the current mess.

[ArmchairMagpie]

Well I am not blaming anyone else than me for buying the game so early. The damage has been done and it's now time for damage control. I'd simply make sure to offer gestures of more honesty: No more pre-orders. Playable demos/trials of every product. After that you could easily have everyone deciding for himself before buying while also still taking responsibility for screw-ups. I think alot people can deal with the latter alot better than with the absence of former. As I said, I blame myself for not being resistant enough of the early temptations, but many others are not, at least not initially.

[Robrecht]

I share your frustration and will talk to the devs asking for an update so we can get the game into the state it should be.

Yeah, well...

The thing is...

Everyone who hasn't yet asked for a refund at this point wants this fixed. However I'm inclined to believe that for most of us, it is more important that it is fixed well than that is fixed fast. A Publisher approaching the Devs with the message 'Hey guys, crowd's getting restless better release a patch or something fast, even if it isn't 100% what you want' is not going to help achieve that. In fact, it's exactly that kind of attitude that got us into this situation.

What modern Publishers and Developers, and especially their PR departments, need to realise is that we, the customers, prefer a direct 'sorry, it's not done yet, please wait a little longer' to an incomplete release and a bunch of PR-spin damage control BS.

So yeah, don't tell us 'I'll get right on it and poke the Devs some more.'

And learn from a certain Starfleet Engineer, the very fictional Mister Montgomery Scott: If you're sure it the game will be in playable state on sunday morning, tell us 'We'll certainly have it ready by the end of Monday.' If you think it's going to take an hour, tell us 'We're confident we can be done by the end of the day.' In short, leave yourself some room to work with so that you can finish before your stated time even if you run into unexpected trouble. Will we grumble a bit if we think the stated time 'takes too long'? Sure, but we'll be thrilled when it's done before that time. And ultimately it's more honest to overstate the time you'll need than it is to understate it.

[Khurn]

Ha, point defence didn't fire on missiles/fighters and the racial diplomacy stuff wasn't hooked up, just off the top of my head.

Thanks for the counter battery there. Many remember the last time played, even then the harsh edges worn down by time.

ohhh them sweet sweet memories.

Folks forget how quickly things can be corrected now than the months wait we had in the old ages. Sure I am a bit bummed because the inner kid in me wanted to geek out. I do have to much work to do on my own little project from hell, that went from support to solution provider. So come Monday my work might actually be done instead of me blabbering about the hiver horde attacking me everywhere. Ugg.


Long time customer, nothing changed yet. Rather work with a group who steps up, acknowledges what has occurred and pushes forward. Not just shooting around the blame game and all. (I am sure dreaded AAR's or RCA's will be done and all that fun stuff, when it comes down to "FUN" contract junk.)

Well back to work

[Regina]

Yeah, well...
The thing is...
Everyone who hasn't yet asked for a refund at this point wants this fixed. However I'm inclined to believe that for most of us, it is more important that it is fixed well than that is fixed fast. A Publisher approaching the Devs with the message 'Hey guys, crowd's getting restless better release a patch or something fast, even if it isn't 100% what you want' is not going to help achieve that. In fact, it's exactly that kind of attitude that got us into this situation.

What modern Publishers and Developers, and especially their PR departments, need to realise is that we, the customers, prefer a direct 'sorry, it's not done yet, please wait a little longer' to an incomplete release and a bunch of PR-spin damage control BS.

So yeah, don't tell us 'I'll get right on it and poke the Devs some more.'

And learn from a certain Starfleet Engineer, the very fictional Mister Montgomery Scott: If you're sure it the game will be in playable state on sunday morning, tell us 'We'll certainly have it ready by the end of Monday.' If you think it's going to take an hour, tell us 'We're confident we can be done by the end of the day.' In short, leave yourself some room to work with so that you can finish before your stated time even if you run into unexpected trouble. Will we grumble a bit if we think the stated time 'takes too long'? Sure, but we'll be thrilled when it's done before that time. And ultimately it's more honest to overstate the time you'll need than it is to understate it.

I believe we all agree that we want the game fixed well - Paradox, Kerberos and all our gamers!

And Kerberos doesn´t have to be poked to update the game,
they love the game and want it to be as good as it possibly can be.

We will release smaller updates and fixes along the way,
but our goal is absolutely to release larger updates on a regular basis.
Of course we will take our time to get it done well and we will do our best to keep you informed of the updates along the way.

[Xmasbeer]

So... that means I am not getting that marketing job?

jokes aside, I really wonder what you folks at paradox think about my suggestion.

I mean, it seems to work for many smaller dev studios.

[Mivo]

So, what about the Steam download size? Is it going to stay at 8.6 GB? (vs. the 2 GB that were mentioned a few days ago by Kerberos people on their forum, and that are listed in the game's Steam description) It still looks like an error to me, but if you could provide some insight here, or get some information from the devs, I'd really appreciate it. (Also, still no CD keys on Steam.)

[NurAbSal]

The ammount of bugs in the game can really irritate any player, but... this game has potential... I really like most of the new options i found in it, and i will await fixes, so i can happily play this game without breaking anything in my room...

And yes, your customer support roxx, keep up the good work... I will stay with You guys (and gals)...

[D Rod]

S.P.A.Z is godly compared to this right now also a shoutout to distant worlds / star ruler also another indie game that can accomplish a great feat of competency.

On a purely aesthetic reqest, it was a bit of a tease to see a decent main menu gui, and then be slapped in the face

[Wolfe1759]

What should Kerberox and Paradox done in this case? Postpone the entire game until it is finished, but give the pre-order customers a "privilege" to an early "beta" access (which is the current released game). That psychological approach would make us feel privileged for "exclusive access", that we wouldn't even complain about the lack of features, but instead give feedback on many problems. Everyone is happy, developers get funding. It's a win-win situation.

Totally agree.

If this had been what happened I'd probably have spent the last 24hrs (well my game time part of it anyway) smugly enjoying playing around with (as opposed to actually playing) SOTS2, posting bug spots and ideas for improvements.

I think it is also possible that those that didn't pre-order might in some proportion have literally bought into the beta phase rather than keeping theior money firmly in their wallets / purses.

As it is I've requested a refund with the intent of re-purchasing if and when it is fixed.

[Tiny Turtle]

So, what about the Steam download size? Is it going to stay at 8.6 GB? (vs. the 2 GB that were mentioned a few days ago by Kerberos people on their forum, and that are listed in the game's Steam description) It still looks like an error to me, but if you could provide some insight here, or get some information from the devs, I'd really appreciate it. (Also, still no CD keys on Steam.)

Hey buddy! The download should only be 4 to 5 gbs now, and that's the final size. That's the game + all the DLC. I don't really get why we need ALL the DLC since unless we buy it, we can't see it (even if the opponent is using it, or so they said before the release) but that's how it is. I believe it's safe now to start downloading, but you can expect patches to keep rolling in. I think we've had one so far, that was 13mbs.

Also sucks about your internet, and I know your pain! I was stuck with 36k just a couple of years ago.

[MachineCode]

The ammount of bugs in the game can really irritate any player, but... this game has potential... I really like most of the new options i found in it, and i will await fixes, so i can happily play this game without breaking anything in my room...

Its unfortunate though, the game has great potential yes. It looks like it will hopefully shape up to be everything we wanted; a bigger, better, expanded game over SOTS1 but there are many design decisions mainly with the UI that are not bugged but just bad. So even when the bugs are fixed we will have to hope for more patches to fix those issues too.

[Kangaxx33]

While I do believe that this game has the potential to be great (I've seen a few great concepts in there), it does need to grow up first. And it should NOT have been released in this state (talking about the "release" version, not the beta-mixup). I'd have gladly waited for another few months sitting on my preorder, rather than suffer the disappointment.

As a Kerberos fan from the early days of SOTS Prime my faith in the company definately has suffered, I sincerely hope that you'll regain it in the coming months. And as a general rule: Please do not believe that its ok to release half-finished games, you'll only hurt yourselves in the long run: Got quite a few friends excited for SOTS...having to do a 180 and telling them not to buy it yet had to be the worst possible publicity you could've gotten...

[Omnax]

I do not undestand where people get 2GB size of the game. I know there was a topic about it on forum, but seriously guys. Its textures and audio which do take space. You did not download close to 9gb if you were downloading once. Game is downloaded compressed and complete download is about 4,5gb which is not much in today standarts. So what is the problem?

[Omnax]

Hey buddy! The download should only be 4 to 5 gbs now, and that's the final size. That's the game + all the DLC. I don't really get why we need ALL the DLC since unless we buy it, we can't see it (even if the opponent is using it, or so they said before the release) but that's how it is. I believe it's safe now to start downloading, but you can expect patches to keep rolling in. I think we've had one so far, that was 13mbs.

Also sucks about your internet, and I know your pain! I was stuck with 36k just a couple of years ago.

Actually right before release they have said, that you will be able to see it in MP, even if you do not own it. That is the reason why it does download it.

[Mivo]

Also sucks about your internet, and I know your pain! I was stuck with 36k just a couple of years ago.

It's just a temporary situation (384kbit DSL), which should hopefully get fixed on December 23rd, or so the guys from the local phone company tell me. So the download is now 4-5 GB? *goes to test* Nope. Steam claims the download will be 4.4 GB, grabs the preparation files, then starts to download 8.6 GB. Is the 8.6 GB an error then and it only actually downloads 4.4 GB?

[Nabobalis]

Are the Kerberos forums down?

[Kangaxx33]

Are the Kerberos forums down?

Yes, the DAGI-Attack (Distributed Attempt to Gain Information) by the fans was too much for the server...

[dskod1]

well thank you for the sorry. However apologizing is only half the solution now it is time to get those patches out. Of which I fully trust in paradox and kerberos to do.

[Vidalaac]

Thanks, Fred... it is a great relief to see that the problem is not being ignored and to see that the errors are being acknowledged by Paradox... and hopefully will be resolved by Kerberos... will be waiting anxiously.