Exactly. Instead of complaining on the forums, people should provide real reason for PDX to change: stop giving them money.
That has high risk of hurting the bottom line. Not going to happen.
Disappointed with Quality Control for 2.2
- Thread starter Braxtil
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You don't have to update to newest and shiniest version. If dev diaries / let's plays / whatever overhype you -- stop consuming them. That's what I did, anyway.The problem with Stellaris (and all of PDX games in fact) is that even if they fix all the bugs and make 2.2 playable, they will soon add another DLC and the game will be a bugfest and unplayable again... So you only have a little margin to play the game between a stable version with few bugs and the next version with tons of bugs
Tell that to those who paid 20 dollars for a DLC that doesn't work, and could be probably made truly playable in 2019, when maybe people who have waited (probably me) would be able to buy it for less.
The problem, to me, isn't Le Guin. It's Megacorp DLC.
Lol this. I tried to remove the mod, I got my economy messed up.
Yeah but I don't have the time to do the beta (alpha?) tester, so they shouldn't update the game, charge 20€ for a DLC of that version of the game and pretend that it isn't a beta. The game is unplayable in this state and I just wasted my time.
However there is plenty of people who would be happy to test the game, so chose 2000-3000 beta testers and let them test the game for a month before releasing the update.
Then why play the beta? Just stick with the freely available stable 2.0 branch and wait for the 2.2.whatever version?
If you don't like them charging 20 bucks for that at that point, then don't but it on release, but only once you feel the forum confirms you that the release is stable enough, if you do consider it unplayable (which is a subjective opinion I'll respect, albeit not agree on).
Was suggested a couple times, Jamor/Wiz said a couple times that they tried that and it didn't work out because the percentage of testers participating that would actually provide decent feedback was too low to justify the organization overhead from running the beta in first place.
(Which apparently doesn't apply to just doing an Open Beta with the main release? Got to admit this doesn't make too much sense, and I personally think a Closed Beta program running long enough, weeding out players that do not contribute and allowing new players in, would definitely become efficient... but then again I'm not a dev that has ever ran a Closed Beta.)
Imagine marketing materials for such case. I doubt that "Buy our open beta DLC!", "Preorder beta version of DLC!" going to sell well.
@alteration
That's simply not true. While the game doesn't work as intended you can't with a good conscience say that you're barred from playing the game. There's a lot of bugs that sour the experience but ultimately the choice to play despite the bugs is up to you.
Also this argument about purchasing a product. Games and DLCs aren't exactly products legally. What they are is a debate where game developers arguing that they're licenses and customers arguing it's a good. For all intents and purposes games act more like licenses. A license is the company merely selling you the right to use the software so the software doesn't have the same consumer protection as goods have.
If you're buying a Paradox game you have to understand the terms that arise from this system. They don't just work on their games once and then leave it to its fate like other games publishers but they update it and when you update bugs will be introduced. It seems like most would say that the update added significant improvements to the game, but yet you'll still complain over the update only for the fact that it didn't work as intended on launch. You have to take a stance: Would you be more happy that we had no free updates at all and the limited content in the DLC was the only thing you got? It isn't much that's actually in the DLCs most of the time neither so I can't see why you'd want that.
That's simply not true. While the game doesn't work as intended you can't with a good conscience say that you're barred from playing the game. There's a lot of bugs that sour the experience but ultimately the choice to play despite the bugs is up to you.
Also this argument about purchasing a product. Games and DLCs aren't exactly products legally. What they are is a debate where game developers arguing that they're licenses and customers arguing it's a good. For all intents and purposes games act more like licenses. A license is the company merely selling you the right to use the software so the software doesn't have the same consumer protection as goods have.
If you're buying a Paradox game you have to understand the terms that arise from this system. They don't just work on their games once and then leave it to its fate like other games publishers but they update it and when you update bugs will be introduced. It seems like most would say that the update added significant improvements to the game, but yet you'll still complain over the update only for the fact that it didn't work as intended on launch. You have to take a stance: Would you be more happy that we had no free updates at all and the limited content in the DLC was the only thing you got? It isn't much that's actually in the DLCs most of the time neither so I can't see why you'd want that.
I read some reviews before buyng and they were positive. I mean I realized soon that the game was bugged, but too late that it was completly broken. I tried the mod galvinus AI that is great, solves a lot of issues, however the mid game crashes and I can't continue to play.
Well idk, they can select at each beta pool the users that provide the best feedbacks and keep them for the next beta.
Except Paradox mention nowhere that this is a beta. The DLC is advertised as a finished product. The release date was stated as the 6th, nothing there about a beta. When you buy the DLC, there is no notice that it is an open beta.
Assuming this is a beta, the average user has no way of knowing this when they spend their money. Again, I don't see why you support Paradox when according to your narrative, they outright lied about the state of the game, knowing full well that honesty would cost them money. At the very least, come up with a better explanation.
And first line in guide for new players should start with "to opt out from unstable version, switch to previous version of the game. You can do it through steam beta branches. Recommended version is 1.8". Even more interesting it'll become when Stellaris'll inherit changes from CK2, where you must have a pdx account to switch branches
I just cried a little.
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Even more interesting it'll become when Stellaris'll inherit changes from CK2, where you must have a pdx account to switch branches
My understanding is that's simply to force you to accept an extended EULA (as the earlier versions of CK2 don't conform to the GDPR, and it wasn't economic to change them to be so.)
Yeah that would not be good for their marketing. "Help us fixing the new, completly broken economy system for just 20 bucks!"
Man did you even play this? It IS unplayable. In the current playthrough I'm an hive mind, I got -700 to energy production and +800 to food, and the food stock is full. All the freaking food districts are fulled on all the planets, while the energy ones are empty. The pops are all the same, so they are not assigned based on traits. Galvinus mod fixes this (how a modder in 2 days in his spare time did better than paradox is a mistery) but crashes around the mid game.
The AI is just idiotic and all empires are pathetic before reaching mid game.
It's not like the game doesn't work as I intentended, doesn't work at all. This is a beta publicized as finished product.
And first line in guide for new players should start with "to opt out from unstable version, switch to previous version of the game. You can do it through steam beta branches. Recommended version is 1.8". Even more interesting it'll become when Stellaris'll inherit changes from CK2, where you must have a pdx account to switch branches
I just cried a little.
yeah, I actually looked up how to load old versions on steam just due to 2.2 AI.
Ye, that's exactly the point I made. Which of course you didn't read, given this is a forum thread.
Again, already answered that: It's an issue, but the issue is, to me, not significant enough to stop supporting the game over. But that's a choice everyone got to make for himself.
Note that the account link change are a super-clever way of avoiding the buerocratic mess that is the GDPR legislation passed in Europe.
Since you seem unaware of that, here the brief version: Any entity (.f.e Paradox) is entirely forbidden to store or use any of your (if you are within Europe, which at least some players of Stellaris are) data (f.e. user account, which is used to unlock DLCs, store savegames int he cloud or enable ironman/achievements), unless you explicitely agree to their policies by clicking a button. They can easily add that prompt (and did) to the current version of Stellaris. However, they cannot retroactively change f.e. the 1.8 version to contain that prompt. Therefore, by law, they would have to remove all older versions from being available at Steam. What they did is put those older versions behind a password, which you 'legitimately' can only obtain by linking your account, which in turn requires you to click that accept eula button in the forums. This way, they can leave the old branches up, because you have clicked that button prior to the game using your data.
GDPR is basically a kind of well-intended attempt to protect user privacy, that is however a huge pain in the ass to anyone working with any sort of data, because it was written by people who don't understand how digital media function.
So please don't make statements like the one above, which imply that Paradox is doing 'stupid things' by introducing weird account switch branch limits 'like CKII did', it's really not on them.
I'm glad Stellaris not gonna face that problem. At least yet. Until some new kind of law will force it. *sigh* Also I didn't say it's stupid, but it doesn't make it any less annoying.
Heartily agree with OP. Patch 2.2 is an interesting update with innovative changes but is simply too buggy and imbalanced to be considered proper for release. It was probably pushed out early to promote the Megacorp DLC, which is a pretty dick move to be honest. At least we can roll back to a previous version if we want a more stable, more balanced version of the game. I just hope the devs keep plugging away at the problems so that the Megacorp DLC will end up being actually useful.
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Nothing is going to change because customers will keep buying bad products. How many will change their "buying policy" after this? 1 in 10? 1 in 20? I stopped preordering and byuing games on release day a few years ago and thanks to that i saved well over 1000$ because most games i was interested in turned out to be bad(for many reasons like bad gameplay, false advertising, bad optimization, features not working etc.). And year to year it is getting worse. Gamers want to pay to play beta or even alpha versions so why should companies change their release policies? I don't blame the devs, i don't care who is responsible. I blame the company. I'm a paying customer and when i buy a product i expect it to work properly or i refund my purchase.