How goes Project Crunchy?

[Grapplehoeker]

Project Crunchy has been running for 5 days now and there still hasn't been a single word about it yet.
In fact, the once regular Word of the Week has been absent for months.
When will there be news of this year's DLC?
Will we have to wait until October to coincide with this year's PDXCon or can we expect a May release?

 

[Meesmoth]

I expect it to be released on May, with the dev diaries starting to be released on end of April.

Remember Industries, the dev diaries were released only two weeks before release. The current time for a DLC release is still too early.

I'm giving a possible timeframe of the DLC announcment (but I could be wrong), but it may be announced from April 26 to May 10.

EDIT: First Industries dev diary released October 10, DLC released on October 23. That's only 13 days.

 

[dj97]

I've made a comment about this elsewhere, but I really dislike this new marketing scheme of not releasing any news or information about what they're working on until just before the release date. I get that they don't want to reveal too much too soon, but this is getting ridiculous. Whatever happened to those "Word of the Week" posts? What good is this method going to do other than create unnecessary hype?

 

[Meesmoth]

I've made a comment about this elsewhere, but I really dislike this new marketing scheme of not releasing any news or information about what they're working on until just before the release date. I get that they don't want to reveal too much too soon, but this is getting ridiculous. Whatever happened to those "Word of the Week" posts? What good is this method going to do other than create unnecessary hype?

Yeah, I also hate this new marketing scheme. I remember good old days where DLCs are announced months before release. Now it's only weeks before release.

EDIT: Thanks @metacritical and @Whiplash7x for the disagrees. I checked @metacritical's profile > recent activity and I keep seeing mass disagree ratings there.

 

[muttonnoir]

I couldn't care less about the marketing, I'd rather the time and effort was devoted to producing a quality product!

 

[metacritical]

EDIT: Thanks @metacritical for the disagree. I checked your profile > recent activity and I keep seeing mass disagree ratings there.

you're welcome

 

[dj97]

I couldn't care less about the marketing, I'd rather the time and effort was devoted to producing a quality product!

I agree, but I would like a little more transparency, as well.

 

[Grapplehoeker]

I agree, but I would like a little more transparency, as well.

In the absence of any news from CO, be it from Mariina or Emmi, or from anyone currently using/abusing the title of Paradox Community Manager, then the only transparency we as players can look for is to monitor the Steam database for this game,
https://steamdb.info/app/255710/depots/
Scroll down to Branches

 

[Meesmoth]

I checked it for myself, and I saw there on the website some upcoming things for the new DLC and patch such as "Trailer creation", I guess this is the announcement trailer, last updated 23 days ago, but it'll be released very soon.

Then there's two testing sessions I have seen, one for vanilla and the other one for the modders.

Other entry contains the actual patch, I don't know how large it is and if it includes the DLC itself, but I think it's the free patch only.

The last and most recent one, I guess, is the developer gameplay sessions, where they do Dev diaries or gameplay trailers.

All we need to do is wait, not complain, they know what they are doing to the game since they made it. Rushing development time can make the DLC bad (as proven on other rushed media), so no rush and let them have the time they need.

 

[Grapplehoeker]

I checked it for myself...

Congratulations, you can read. So can everybody else.

All we need to do is wait, not complain, they know what they are doing to the game since they made it. Rushing development time can make the DLC bad (as proven on other rushed media), so no rush and let them have the time they need.

What on Earth are you defending?
Nobody is complaining.
Nobody is rushing them.
Asking for a little news and transparency is neither a complaint nor a request for a speedier delivery.

 

[jcitron]

I belong to another game developer forum the community was saying similar things as are being said here, in fact, they are almost word for word. Then after everyone thought nothing was going to happen, the CEO came into the thread and said we've been busy getting stuff done on the upcoming service packs. He went on to say that if you see the programmers and staff members hanging around the forums, it means they're not working on the upcoming products!

so in the end, it maybe that the developers are getting ready for PDXCon coming up in May. They have a lot of work to do to button down things not only for an upcoming release but also the tradeshow.

 

[Beer Fiend]

May 9th, announcement stream at 4pm BST.

Possible new DLC?

 

[Grapplehoeker]

so in the end, it maybe that the developers are getting ready for PDXCon coming up in May. They have a lot of work to do to button down things not only for an upcoming release but also the tradeshow.

In May? Don't you mean this year's PDXCon in Berlin that is 18-20 October?
Tickets went on sale yesterday...
https://pdxcon.paradoxplaza.com/?ut...deo&utm_campaign=pc19_pdxcon_20190507_rel_all

 

[Meesmoth]

May 9th, announcement stream at 4pm BST.

Possible new DLC?

Yep, that's the new DLC. So official announcement on May 9, then we can expect a May 22, May 23, or a May 24 release.

 

[MarkJohnson]

All we need to do is wait, not complain, they know what they are doing to the game since they made it. Rushing development time can make the DLC bad (as proven on other rushed media), so no rush and let them have the time they need.

I think it's already too late. They are a month behind schedule, so I'm sure there are still things needing patching/fixing. We may get more than usual workshop breakage.

Praying for a smooth release.

 

[Mazisky]

Don't forget that CO give modders the DLC beta to test and make their mods compatible with.

 

[MarkJohnson]

Don't forget that CO give modders the DLC beta to test and make their mods compatible with.

It's not forgotten, it's just that there is no time to test every part of a mod nor all mods for an individual modder, plus compatibility with other mods. Not to mentions mods that aren't being updated at all. Then there is the mods breaking during patches of beta and some modders won't try to fix as they will just keep breaking all of the time. even after beta closes and the game releases with yet a newer patch that hasn't been tested at all.

It's quite a job these modders have. I applaud their dedication. It would derive me nuts with all of these complication. I'd feel like I'm doing the same job twice, let alone 10, 50, or 100 times. lol

 

[Meesmoth]

For me I won't call it "too late", like what I have been telling to everyone for months, all DLCs for Q1 in the past two years saw a May release, so it's still on time. Plus if you remember Industries, it was announced only two weeks before release. So this announcement on May 9 is on time for the release on either May 23 or 24.

 

[MarkJohnson]

For me I won't call it "too late", like what I have been telling to everyone for months, all DLCs for Q1 in the past two years saw a May release, so it's still on time. Plus if you remember Industries, it was announced only two weeks before release. So this announcement on May 9 is on time for the release on either May 23 or 24.

I call it late, as in they are making two DLC per year, or 6-month interval. This will be month 7 for this DLC. Not a huge deal, but this leaves time to make up because if a 7-month patters stays, they will have to skip a quarter eventually, and shareholders won't let that happen and cause too early of release with either smaller/trivial DLC or buggy DLC.

For example, Snow fall was released early (5-months after AD) and seasons didn't work. If given extra time, they could have possibly made seasons work?

 

[Meesmoth]

The DLCs released in the past two years has a pattern that it always get released on May or October. Mass Transit was released May 2017, Green Cities October 2017, Parklife May 2018, then Industries October 2018, so if following this pattern here, all DLCs since Mass Transit saw 7-month intervals.