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Taziar

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Everything posted by Taziar

  1. No, they will leave because their stuff was needlessly deleted. By your comparison to a car getting towed I think you are forgetting one very important thing. This is a video game, something people do for fun, and realism is added only where it adds fun/enjoyment. If people redeploy them then they aren't really abandoned making your point moot anyway.
  2. The people who are suggesting constructs be auto-abandoned must really must hate this game. Deleting a players stuff is a sure way to get them to quit. The solution is to despawn them after x days and allow the player or respawn them for free, at least in safe zones. Risking a smaller playerbase just so you can wag your finger at people is rather shortsighted.
  3. Some combination of A and C. Basically they are going to get the game to a final release version then just keep it breathing until it is no longer profitable. Of course, by final release I mean slap a 1.0 on the next version and call it complete, then maybe sporadically throw out small bug patches so people think it is still being worked on to keep the subs going as long as possible. Happens all the time with Steam Early Access.
  4. What promises? They would obviously have to refund active subs or continue to provide access to the game in some fashion (either the current Beta or the Alpha) for the duration of existing subs, but other than that most broken promises are not actionable when it comes to game development.
  5. The Devs simply painted themselves into a corner which is why the Beta subscription was so bad an idea. The game was nowhere near ready for release( and still isn't), soft or otherwise, so they clearly did it for financial reasons. Unfortunately, sub fees tend to come with certain expectations from players which should have been managed the moment subs were announced. Instead they decided to appease players (rather than risk losing the subs) and treat the game as live despite it being absolutely horrible from an early game development perspective and completely untenable once it reaches the actual launch and new customers find out the brand new game world is a piece of already chewed gum.
  6. 'Your Way' is actually not any different that what I said. 1. Tell people now (short term plan, remember?) that there will be a wipe when the game goes live. (Apologies and other politicking is a given) 2. Establish that this is a Beta and permanence/balance is not guaranteed. (Hence why I said 'announce possibility' of partial wipes during beta, which means as needed to facilitate development, it was all about changing expectations not arbitrary wipes.) They were both about reestablishing with players the fact that this game is a Beta and very much subject to change. Because it needs to be clear that people are Beta testers, not children given a golden ticket to become billionaires before the rest of the population joins in. Also, the Beta soft release WAS solely a way to force subscription money. People would be naïve to think otherwise. Because from a development perspective it was a horrible choice serving to create a player base of beta testers that feel entitled to be treated like live customers with character/world permanence. It also created financial risk to engaging in normal iterative game development, which will just kill innovation and slow progress to a halt. It was all about milking the Beta-tolerant players of money. The subscription absolutely shouldn't exist during beta but I don't see them changing that. Note: The fault doesn't just lie on the players, the Devs are complicit in creating and enabling that entitlement (and their blatant cash grab). But frankly, how we got here is far less important than how to fix it. Note 2: As to the 'existing player base', keeping them happy at the expense of future customers is foolish. They aren't even a fraction of the players required to keep the lights on.
  7. 1. Remove schematics. They were broken from the start. Their sole reason for existence is to slow player progression through money grind. Horrible design and useless at protecting the long term health of the economy. Remove it and think of a better way to do it. 2. Announce a full server wipe on launch. Anyone arguing against this is simply wrong. A 'player economy' game where you will have mined out planets and billionaires on launch day? Stupidest thing I have ever heard, and would be an instant turn-off to new players expecting a new game world to be, well, new. Which brings us to #3... 3. Announce possibility of occasional partial wipes (items/skills, some regions, etc) throughout the Beta (Calling it Alpha would be more accurate). Game development requires iteration. Iteration which is stifled by treating this as a live environment. They cannot move the game forward while worrying about disturbing the existing economy/balance. It is Beta, nothing should be considered permanent. Don't like it don't play an Early Beta that is two years from release. 4. Completely redo mining. It is one of the most boring and simplistic 'loot grinds' I have ever played. Those that defend it by proclaiming 'supernode' as smugly as possible, realize that making money faster doesn't make it any less boring, it just contributes to ruining the economy faster. Further using 3 territory scanners at an intersection should be considered an exploit. It's not emergent, its manipulating an in-game mechanic created to simplify gameplay (a real ore scanner would care about range not arbitrary boundary lines). 5. Implement additional game loops. 6. Implement additional game loops. 7. Implement additional game loops. 8. Reduce the lag by removing inactive vehicles. And start thinking how to address this on a larger scale because the starter planet is a lagfest despite having basically zero active population. How is that going to scale when (if) there are enough active players to keep the game alive? Every multiplayer builder game on the market has a decay mechanic for a reason. It goes against this game's vision but this game's vision goes against the laws of limited computing power. Either way, there needs to be a plan yesterday. 9. Realize #8 is unlikely to ever get solved leading to an untenable future. Update resumes.
  8. For a specific game, sure, but big companies buy tech they intend to further develop and it is generally not in a perfectly modular state when they do. They do it to get a jumpstart on the market, as calendar time can sometimes matter more than labor costs. Amazon has been developing their own game engine and a showy new tech is just the kind of thing they would go for. They are trying really hard to develop the 'next great game' (having skipped the first step of learning how to successfully make a game). I am not saying it would be a good investment, just that I can see it happening.
  9. Buying tech does happen, but it is usually the larger players that do that with the intention of developing it further. So Unity, Unreal, or Amazon would be the most likely. My money would be on Amazon. Of course they are even less likely to make a successful game with the tech than Novaquark, but they have money to burn and have been trying to make a name in the gaming industry.
  10. Here's the thing... Unless JC got fired for a scandal or health/drugs issue then he got fired because they think the game is failing. So one of two things will happen. They shutter it, or they 'fix' it. Lets look at the latter. If a VC is going to fix a failing restaurant they don't just come in and change the wallpaper and add a dash more paprika to the chili. They reevaluate the entire business because whatever is there clearly isn't working. That means major changes, and since the biggest issue is lack of customer interest they will focus on appealing to more people. A broader appeal to a more mainstream audience. So anyone who uses the term 'casual' to denigrate suggestions they don't like are in for a very rude awakening. When a game is failing, you don't double down on niche appeal after firing the guy who designed it. As a newcomer it doesn't bother me but I suspect most of the people who consider themselves fans of the game will be writing a lot of angry forum posts in the near future. (The only other possibility is they are keeping JC and just giving him a boss, but I wouldn't hold my breath as it was his 'vision' that caused the subscriber count to tank in the first place)
  11. Yes, gamifying schematics would certainly be an improvement from a content perspective, giving us something else to do. It would still do little to help with the economy however. No game in existence has a functioning economy. No, not even EVE, though it is better than most. The first game that does create a functioning economy will quickly be abandoned because it not at all fun for a majority of the people. This game is not even vaguely close to having anything approximating an economy. And should stop trying. An economy requires multiple things that never exist in an MMO. Lets look at industry, for example. Someone grinds, buys a schematic. Month later they buy another with the profit from using the first. Month later they buy 2 more. Then 4, 8, 16.... Rinse and repeat and nine months later they have all the schematics and massive mega factories. They will dominate the market until they get bored and stop playing. All before the game is even released (and no wipe is planned). So before the game is even released, future players are screwed. This would never happen in the real world. Why? Expenses. Risk. Innovation. Companies can go bankrupt. The market is complex enough to accept innovation. But in MMOs, power/wealth only goes in one direction. MMO success is based solely on grind. Time spent. Also, lets look at an economy. What are 99.9% of the people participating in it? Consumers/wage-slaves. Lets look at the 'iPhone example'. In the real world, sure people don't create their own from scratch they buy it in the market. But lets look at that chain and see just how poorly it works for games. You have dirt poor miners in 3rd world countries supplying the resources (as well as miners from other places) working in miserably and dangerous conditions to feed their families. Don't want to play that in a video game. You have the people who spend a month at sea moving the materials from various places in the world to China. Not my idea of fun. You have the workers living in dorms in China doing the same repetitive task for 12+ hours per day for barely enough money to live on, at least until they (try) to kill themselves (companies literally put nets to catch them). Nope, not paying a monthly subscription for that role. Out of the 100's of thousands of people in the chain, there is less than 0.1% that don't have soul crushing tasks (CEOs, designers, etc). So less than 0.1% of people would actually get any gameplay value from it. Yay. Can't wait to have that in my game. Now lets look at the other half of the economy. Consumers. As a consumer, I just want my iPhone (or spaceship part). So I go to a market and buy one. All I care about is getting the item. It doesn't matter if 10,000 players formed a massive supply and manufacturing chain to produce it, or a Dev simply spawned it into existence. All I care about is getting that part so I can go about my day. So what gameplay value are consumers getting from it? None. It is one of those things that makes for a good article in a gaming news blog, but is basically irrelevant to people actually playing the game. (The only player driven markets that adds to a game are based upon creative resources. Such as selling ship designs, scripts, custom hairstyles, etc. Actual player created content, not digital items grinded into existence.) No real economy will (or should) exist in a video game. Only a highly gamified one. All the parts of it should be at least mildly enjoyable, not feel like jobs. You cannot expect people to spend money just to be cogs in a wheel with only a small percentage of people having access to the fun mechanics. TLDR; The entire idea of creating an economy to force people to 'work together' is flawed. What it does is restrict the already limited amount of game mechanics to people based upon their role in the economy. Aka, reduce the fun, and fun is the only economy that matters in a game. Instead, people should take part in every game mechanic they find enjoyable, and not have to grind to gain access to it.
  12. Schematics just need to be removed from the game or be changed to only apply to large scale production, allowing players to craft their own items. Having to grind ore to sell so you can buy the ability to craft something in a game where creating is its strongest feature, is going to be the death knell. I don't want to play a mining and shopping simulator. Especially when the Market in a sci-fi game is more primitive than Amazon today. You want me to go to a brick and mortar building to get my purchases? Are you insane? I don't do that today. How are there not drones immediately not bringing my purchases? Do you just want to force me into the horribly dull flying to the market across a bland planet (while alt-tabbed watching YouTube videos)? And no, expecting players to create the logistical behemoth that companies like Fedex require for global shipping is NOT an answer. I get that the Devs want to create an player economy, that is their 'vision'. My 'vision' is to play a game I enjoy, and like most people, I enjoy crafting my own stuff. Forcing people into a poorly designed economy is going to kill the game. The Devs clearly don't understand economics, and especially don't understand MMO economics. The schematics prove that. They are heavily balanced against new players (permanently, not just while they are starting out). People today will buy schematics and then use them to make money. This will drive down the cost of the products, which means future players would take far, far longer to break even on schematics. You could lower the schematic price in the future but then you encounter the very problem you are trying to 'solve' with them. Or don't lower the price and keep most new players locked out of industry gameplay. Further, economies tend to create a small number of magnates and a very large number of peons. I can accept being a peon in the real world, but I am not about to pay a monthly fee for the privilege to be one in a virtual world. And no, 'git good' is not an answer because economies require most people to be peons. So schematics fail at what they are intending to do. They also screw over players who don't want to play how you feel they should play. I want to build and create my own stuff, not mine for hours for pretend money, especially when mining in this game is pathetically bad. Space Engineers at least has fun and creative gameplay attached to mining. I can tolerate some grind to get the materials I need to build what I want, but not to grind out virtual currency to spend in an archaic market. The popularity of survival/crafting games, and lack of economy simulators shows the population at large agrees with me. You have a voxel world that screams creative environment, not economic simulation. Change your 'creative vision', or watch your game turn to dust. But I suspect the latter will happen because 'creative visions' usually come with arrogance and inability to adapt once reality has set in. But we shall see. Well, not me. I already canceled my subscription and will not be back unless things change. But good luck to everyone else.
  13. "The right approach to set such a price would be to evaluate how much time it takes to recoup your investment by selling the products that the schematics allow to produce. It should be a few months so that the investment is a real commitment and it makes sense to plan for it." Yea, no. Grind for money to buy a schematic then use that schematic for MONTHS to break even? Nope. Not my idea of fun. I want to build and craft and enjoy all the systems implemented in the game. Further, schematics do not protect the economy they just delay the inevitable. They are only an initial cost, not an incremental expense which means the market will eventually be flooded with people owning them as a subset of players grind their way to wealth. The reality is, no video game is going to have an actual functioning economy. Partly because it is too complex and requires numerous motivators only the real world provides for most people, but mostly because functioning economies SUCK. Why? Because for every industrial giant like Rockefeller, you have 100,000 low-level peons swinging a pickaxe. People expect to be special in video games. The CEO, not the janitor. You cannot have an economy filled with CEOs, but you cannot have an enjoyable game when most people are stuck playing janitors (or in this case, miners). This game is doomed to a VERY niche audience. (If you really want to keep parts from flooding the market you would be better off with a licensing system which incurs a reoccurring cost. Still not what I want in a game, however.)
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