Just release a beta version and let the true/core fans shape the final version of game.

I’m talking to you Hello Games (No man’s sky), just don’t mess it up with upcoming ‘Light no fire’.

Edit: Blueprint (not footprint)

  • bridge_too_close@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    A lot of devs already do this. That’s what Steam Early Access is for. Now, whether or not the devs actually listen to feedback is a different story…

    • Carighan Maconar@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Early Access is just “release”. Only the devs openly admit ahead of time the game is buggy and unfinished, and promise - as always - to fix it up and add the missing parts.

      Often they do. Sometimes they don’t.

      TBH it’s ultimately nothing but a shitty buggy release, but the honesty of making that known ahead of time buys a whole lot of goodwill. It should be the default, that any publisher releasing a game that is not finished - so most AAA nowadays - marks it as Early Access, openly declaring the unfinished part.

      It’s also very different from a beta version, which is usually feature and content complete (otherwise it’s generally called an alpha). Early Access versions are often very early in the development process, they’re feature-complete-ish, but never or rarely content complete, usually just starting out on that. This works exceedingly well for games that need “just more stuff”, but can miss the mark on games that need underlying systems reworked as this ires the existing playerbase and splits it.

      • yamanii@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        I disagree, big publishers do not deserve early access, they have money to pay for QA, it’s a gross misuse of the feature.

      • bridge_too_close@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        Early access isn’t necessarily different from a beta version, it’s just the name of the program used by devs to generate some revenue and get feedback during development. The game can be in alpha or beta or whatever.

        Personally, I avoid games in early access on principle (with a couple exceptions) as I would rather play them once they are completed.

        • Carighan Maconar@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Same, I got little enough gaming time, might as well play it once it’s in its best state and play something else before that.

  • Carighan Maconar@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I’m talking to you Hello Games (No man’s sky), just don’t mess it up with upcoming ‘Light no fire’.

    What messed up NMS was overpromise to a basically criminal degree. If this were a B2B-transaction, they’d have been sued to hell and back. There’s absolutely 0 chance LNF won’t suffer exactly the same fate.

  • Bleeping Lobster@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I’m cautiously optimistic for Light No Fire. The main thing I learned from the NMS initial launch experience (am a day 1 player) is not to allow myself to get too hyped for games (this knowledge was cemented by the launch of CP2077 haha). And, you’d hope that Sean / HG learned also not to overpromise in terms of feature set… would hope they learned a hell of a lot from the long cycle of updating NMS.

    • Rikudou_Sage@lemmings.world
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      1 year ago

      Well, there’s no redemption arc bigger than NMS in gaming history, being optimistic about NMS is ok and has been for a few years.

  • Vipsu@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    That approach works for some studios and some game projects but it’s no silver bullet. A lot of times gamers don’t know what they want until it’s handed on them on a silver platter which can make taking the correct kind of feedback really difficult. Sometimes outside influence may also stray the developers from their original vision.

    That being said, developing game in complete secrecy for years and expecting it to become a success has pretty much the same chance as winning in a lottery. Getting MVP out there asap to see if the game will receive any sort of traction and feedback is generally the best approach unless it already has an audience (sequel or well known developer). It can be prototype, demo or early access as long as it’s something.

    [edit] Removed some repetition

    • GutsBerserk@lemmy.worldOP
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      1 year ago

      But BG2’ dev and BG3’s dev are different. The moment Larian (BG3’s dev) got rights to develop BG3, they started immediately.