Steam Early Access

[Sandwchbull]

Why not? Steam early access lets you get your cash flow, keeps people happy and provides data. There is several games on there that big developers are letting people essentially play and enjoy the product and still squash the bugs. I think your still taking the risk when waiting everything out with a long development thinking your going to possibly squash all bugs and we all know thats not possible. Its a win win for all of us, we give Paradox all that data they need, we get to enjoy the product. There is not pressures on release at you could spend 2 or more years tweaking and tinkering the game, none of us care. There will be no more developer diaries required, just patch notes / changelog. To me and im sure many would agree, this is a no brainer?


I posted this elsewhere, but I think its been skipped. This is a very VALID question. Paradox completely wins with this and so does the community. Why wouldnt you guys at least consider this!??

 

[Hans_Schnitzel]

Because this community is already split up enough when it comes to HoI4's features, the only thing saving us from running around with torches and pitchforks is that talking about features is often still guess work.

 

[AlexNightingale]

From my open beta post, we can see majority of the people wants to wait rather than playing the game in beta. So we shall wait, even if it takes an entire year...

 

[mdw1985]

Totally for early access. We should make a petition for that!!! Many people would like to get their habds on the game. Yes, the community is divided, but the last choice will remain in the hands of the devs. It's their vision, so they paint the picture. The community can give plenty of feedback concerning bugs and so on. I would pay the full price for the game also...

 

[Elisto]

slow and steady wins the race

 

[mdw1985]

Waiting another year for a game, that has been announced in the beginning of 2014 is torture... early access is the best way to do now!!!

 

[Hans_Schnitzel]

Another arguement that has risen is that PDX certainly does ot have a funding issue after releasing a few very succesful titles, like Cities: Skylines (or whatever it's called, still gotta buy that one). We also don't have to wait an entire year, but more than half a year, but not a full year.

 

[mdw1985]

Another arguement that has risen is that PDX certainly does ot have a funding issue after releasing a few very succesful titles, like Cities: Skylines (or whatever it's called, still gotta buy that one). We also don't have to wait an entire year, but more than half a year, but not a full year.

And this is the point: it is at least 6 months, which means 6 months is the best case. If paradox would release an HOI 4, which would suck, many people would be angry, because they waited for so long and have been disappointed. None from us has played the game. None of us really know how everything works. An early access would help paradox with lots of feedback. I bought stardrive 2 in early access and the forest. Both games got better and better with the community...

Edit: it was star ruler 2

 

[Sandwchbull]

From my open beta post, we can see majority of the people wants to wait rather than playing the game in beta. So we shall wait, even if it takes an entire year...

Where do you get that information? Pretty sure you would see a LARGE amount of this community would rather go early access. Again, PDX is holding out trying to make the perfect game, but we all know, no matter what they release there will be a lot of bitching and complaining. Why not get it out to us now, where we can start the bitching and complaining and at least give them the data so they can address it now, as opposed to releasing a game thats "finished" which we all know wont be, regardless of how much in house play testing they do.

 

[Mabs]

a lot of people confuse "early access / beta " with "DEMO" then whine about it

can do more harm than good

also its usually used by smaller studios that need the revenue to finish the game, not large companies

 

[potski]

Yes, the community is divided, but the last choice will remain in the hands of the devs. It's their vision, so they paint the picture. The community can give plenty of feedback concerning bugs and so on.

I don't think this is a choice for the development team. Paradox as a company make this choice - as far as I know they have never released a game which had an open beta. And the indications are this is not going to change. Why should it? They have been very successful so far using that model.

Plus why do you suggest that a closed beta does not include people from "the community" to give feedback. Did you ever look at the list of beta testers from previous versions?

As I understand it, the company is too small to handle a formal open beta at an early stage. They feel that they would be drowned in feedback, and much of it would be misinformed and would be a waste of dev time sifting through it. Many of the people who will be chosen are well known to the developers, with contributions to the forum and previous beta testing going back years. People who understand the game mechanics and appreciate the underlying concepts of the game.

And given the commitment to day 1 and post-release patching by Paradox, you might argue that the "open" testing occurs at release. They have certainly always shown a willingness to embrace constructive feedback and fix problems for free well after a game is released. I seem to remember the stable vanilla version of HOI3 was not 1.0, but 1.3.

If other companies called the 1.0-1.3 phase as "early access" or "open beta" then the overall results are the same.

 

[mattyh1995]

I don't see a need for Early Access other than it'd allow me to play the game sooner. They don't need the money, they already make use of closed betas and as is said above a lot of people confuse Early Access for a complete game which could lead to a very negative word-of-mouth message being passed around should Paradox release a bugged build.

Though these delays have started to take the piss now. They announced HoI IV way too early imo.

 

[Johan]

We currently have no urgent need of increasing cashflow, so no need because of that.

Early access is one of the worst concepts ever conceieved of in the industry, and I would never use it on one of the games I work on unless it was the only way we could go without going belly up.

- it forces you to make a cruder game, as you need to have shorter dev process before first time the customers plays the game.
- alpha and beta is not a finished game, nor even playable. This forces development to focus on the wrong thibgs at the wrong time.
- it creates worse first impressions, and makes for a worse gameexperience.

 

[FOARP]

Will people please grow up and realize that, no, open beta =/= "playing the game early"? Beta is a stage in the development of the game that occurs before it is complete and properly playable. It is the part in which people COMPREHENSIVELY test the game - no, people playing it and then moaning about issues on the forum is not proper testing. Sure, some game dev companies have found a way of soaking money out of people with more money than sense (Day Z, Star Citizen etc.), but I really hope Paradox doesn't go that route, not least because it doesn't make any sense for the kind of games that they make, which (unlike, say, KSP) require a high degree of completion before they are really playable.

EDIT: Johan'd

 

[Sandwchbull]

We currently have no urgent need of increasing cashflow, so no need because of that.

Early access is one of the worst concepts ever conceieved of in the industry, and I would never use it on one of the games I work on unless it was the only way we could go without going belly up.

- it forces you to make a cruder game, as you need to have shorter dev process before first time the customers plays the game.
- alpha and beta is not a finished game, nor even playable. This forces development to focus on the wrong thibgs at the wrong time.
- it creates worse first impressions, and makes for a worse gameexperience.

Damn, I guess that settles that. The man has spoken. Really though Johan, would it have to be those shortcomings you mentioned? There is a lot of positives out there with this approach. Not suggesting you guys need it for cash flow, but look at it from a data collection perspective? The beta will be closed no doubt, so u will no doubt still only have a small number in beta that can give you a list of issues, whether that's technical performance related or balancing. Why not open the flood gates. Give a dog a bone.

 

[FOARP]

Damn, I guess that settles that. The man has spoken. Really though Johan, would it have to be those shortcomings you mentioned? There is a lot of positives out there with this approach. Not suggesting you guys need it for cash flow, but look at it from a data collection perspective? The beta will be closed no doubt, so u will no doubt still only have a small number in beta that can give you a list of issues, whether that's technical performance related or balancing. Why not open the flood gates. Give a dog a bone.

I don't want to put words in the guy's mouth, but he seemed pretty clear that he believes these advantages don't really exist:

1) Beta testers need to actually know what they are talking about and be prepared to test a game at a stage where it is essentially not playable. 99% of open Beta testers don't and won't.

2) Beta players need to actually be willing to do the work to comprehensively test the game, which means doing it under directions, not just randomly bashing around.

Basically, if Paradox ran an open, paid-for beta for this game 99% of the reports would be "WTF Paradox I paid real money for this and its unplayable! And where the $%^& are the NATO counters etc.etc.etc.". Any useful feedback would be drowned out by this kind of moaning, rendering it useless.

 

[henzington]

I have to agree with him given the number of early access games that never get finished.

 

[FOARP]

I have to agree with him given the number of early access games that never get finished.

How much has Star Citizen received so far? 84 million US Dollars? All before they've actually released anything that resembles an actual game? Day Z remains unfinished even after most of the people who paid for it have played it long enough to get bored with it and the game engine is starting to look dated.

Basically, KSP is the only game I know of that actually did early access right, and that was because of the special nature of the game - all that really needed to work for you to be able to play the game was the physics engine. By contrast pretty much everything in a grand-strategy game needs to work properly otherwise you can't play it, meaning early access just won't work.

 

[VampiRos]

and again such a post... early access is nothing good for games like HoI (Game series)...

 

[Sandwchbull]

I don't want to put words in the guy's mouth, but he seemed pretty clear that he believes these advantages don't really exist:

1) Beta testers need to actually know what they are talking about and be prepared to test a game at a stage where it is essentially not playable. 99% of open Beta testers don't and won't.

2) Beta players need to actually be willing to do the work to comprehensively test the game, which means doing it under directions, not just randomly bashing around.

Basically, if Paradox ran an open, paid-for beta for this game 99% of the reports would be "WTF Paradox I paid real money for this and its unplayable! And where the $%^& are the NATO counters etc.etc.etc.". Any useful feedback would be drowned out by this kind of moaning, rendering it useless.

I agree with you. Hey, can't blame a guy for trying. Just want to get my grubbers on this game.