Serious Question

[Geograd]

So I'm a game designer and I've seen the screenshots and read about the game and I've been following it for awhile now even though I just joined the forums. I've also read the newest patch updates and to me it sounds like they are just getting in the essentials for the game. Now I'm not flaming or saying this is a bad idea for a game at all, I think this is a great idea and I support it fully and I'll most likely pre-order it, but I have to ask the community and the developers are free to answer also:

Is the game ready for a wipe and release in August?

Please be honest because honesty will draw more people than if you lie and say it is ready and people pre-order and then they find out it isn't. Now I'm not asking if the game is 100% finished and polished, that's not what I'm asking. I'm asking if the game is playable and enjoyable, because that is the minimal requirements for release, or is it going to be pre-order to continue beta testing the game?

I have no problem if it is, I'd like to see this game succeed and I'd pay $40 to keep it in development. I'm just asking that simple question hoping for an honest answer.

Thanks

[REVKhA]

They have been doing good work.

The problem is not the game/content imho, it's the information.

There's a lot of tweaking/polishing to be done... but the base is there and it's working and stable.

There's 3 major things missing ingame right now, Tribes, PVE, and Construction.

Everything else seems in more or less.

Right now it's not ready... but there's still almost 7 weeks left.

[Cunk]

Only the devs can answer that and they will surely give you the optimistic side of the story.

If you're a game designer then you've obviously worked with developers and know easy it is for them to miscalculate how long a project will take. I was guilty of it myself when I was doing some developing. I would often estimate something will take x weeks when really all I'm doing is telling that person what I think they want to hear. In reality I had no idea how long something would take but a manager doesn't want to hear that. They need some sort of date.

From a player standpoint the game needs a lot of stuff before it could be considered release worthy. They claim most of this stuff (80%) was already done but we've already seen all of the unanticipated problems that can arise when introducing even the simplest (from a game play point of view) features to the masses.

Personally I just assume it will be pushed past August and it makes the waits between patches less of an issue. And frankly, the longer it gets delayed the more time I have to mess around with it for free (although given its current state I don't play all that often).

[Geograd]

I've been watching some of the videos where people are building things, is this not in the current beta of the game? If it is then I think I could have fun with it for some time. It would be a pain to lose all of that when they wipe of course heh. Yes I do know that estimates are very rough estimates, but I haven't read anything about pushing the date back, which is why I asked the question.

[Jadzia]

On the videos you saw people terraforming, and building walls and kind of houses from dirt and logs. And yes, its fun, and its a pain to loose your work when they wipe the server

About the possibility of another delay of the launch:

1) The official release is now planned for August 15th. We will reassess our progress every month and if we need to push this date further into the future we will. We do not want to force an unfinished release. Instead we are going to continue working as hard as possible until we can fully stabilize the server and finish implementing the planned game features. We're going to stick to our plan, it's just going to take longer than we hoped.

15th of August is not set in stone, if the game won't be ready by then then it will be pushed back. There is chance for the game to be ready for launch by then, but there is chance for another delay too, very hard to tell in the current state of the game.

My personal guess is that it will be delayed with 2 more months, but its good, better to release a stable and finished game.

[Xsyon]

Hello Geograd,

The answer given by Jadzia is right:

15th of August is not set in stone, if the game won't be ready by then then it will be pushed back.

We're a hard working, but small team and I am constantly re-assessing the situation. My primary goal is to be able to do a final wipe on August 15th so that players can start with their real characters. Things are looking good, but the past few months have been such an unpredictable ride I can't say anything for certain right now.

Here's an example. One crucial weekend, my main computer just stopped working. It seemed to be a hard drive failure, so I drove to the nearest Best Buy, half an hour away and replaced it. After several hours of getting my programs installed and getting our latest source on the new hard drive, it freezes up again.

It wasn't the hard drive after all.

By that time it's night and I can't do anything until the next day. The next day I buy a whole new system rather than try to figure out what's going wrong. Perfect time for a sudden snow storm and I'm stuck on the road a few miles from home for three hours due to some minor accidents.

By the time I had my system back up and running, I'd lost 2 1/2 days of working time. That was when I decided to delay the launch date.

So, I can't predict what's going to happen. We're just plugging away, doing our best, making good progress now and going to launch as soon as we possibly can.

Mid August still looks good at least for the final character wipe.

[Geograd]

See, this makes me happy. I can tell this is a good community when you don't have the random extremist fan who comes in and posts "Why don't you just not pre-order then if you think it'll fail!"

And thank you Xsyon for replying when I know you guys are in the midst of a big push and are probably working around the clock. I'm definitely interested in the game and am definitely planning to pre-order (though most of my time currently is split between my own company and another game) because I give any game at least a running chance. I've done Darkfall and Mortal Online and both have failed me so far, but that hasn't stopped my desire to find a good sandbox.

I'll see you all in game some time!

[Virtus]

Geograd wrote:

See, this makes me happy. I can tell this is a good community when you don't have the random extremist fan who comes in and posts "Why don't you just not pre-order then if you think it'll fail!"

don't worry, we have a few of them, just none of them have responded yet.

[Crunch]

WHY DONT YOU JSUT NOT PREORDER IF YOU THINK IT WILL FaIL THEN?!?!?!

GTFO NUBBY DONT QUESTION THIS AMAZING GAME THAT IS THE BEST THING TO EVER GRACE THE UNIVERSE WITH ITS PRESENCE.

[Largion]

Virtus wrote:

Geograd wrote:

See, this makes me happy. I can tell this is a good community when you don't have the random extremist fan who comes in and posts "Why don't you just not pre-order then if you think it'll fail!"

don't worry, we have a few of them, just none of them have responded yet.

Noone is that stupid!


:unsure: