Legend of Grimrock 2 - No Early Access

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According to Rock, Paper, Shotgun Almost Human has issued a new statement that Legend of Grimrock 2 will not be released on Steam Early Access.

“We are kind of old-fashioned and want to release the game in a polished condition, so Steam Early Access is not planned. We are going to have preorders though.”
Good news to me but what about the rest of you?

More information.
 
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The first game was good enough for me to instapreorder the sequel when available.
If it was early access or KS, I'd also back it, although wouldn't play till it's finished.
 
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It's kind of a nice change, I think....early access can ruin the fun of a game for some people.
 
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Imho good press out of a bad thing. Now people have to wait until after release to get any feedback on how good the game actually is.
 
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having to pay for the game or preorder the game to get access to beta testing the game has been around for a very long time and just having a different name for it doesn't make it a different thing so it is likely to stay around.
 
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Good for them! But will have to finish MMX first, after Armored Princess OrkUpgrade.
 
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I have no problem with Early Access, unless - of course - it's abused and used to exploit the audience. But the concept is fine - and I don't go around assuming every game released in that state is a scam. But that's me.

As for LoG2, I don't have much interest in it, as I didn't care much for the first game.

That said, if they've spent more time developing the story and exploration, and mixed up the puzzles instead of making it another "fantasy Portal" - it could be great.

They're a very talented team, so there's a lot of potential there.
 
Imho good press out of a bad thing. Now people have to wait until after release to get any feedback on how good the game actually is.

Considering that an Early Access game isn't a finished product anyways, that statement doesn't make sense. :)
 
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The Grimrock team continue to set high standards. I have more respect these days for companies who don't do the early access thing. I get tired off all these developers who want money for an incomplete product as if it was the norm when purchasing an item in the real world.
 
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I avoid early access/beta but I have no problem with people who like this method. Nothing wrong with giving the players the option of playing early access if that is what they want.
 
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Considering that an Early Access game isn't a finished product anyways, that statement doesn't make sense. :)

Indeed. Kornador, you're playing MMX now, and as someone who preordered the game and was active in the forum, I can tell you that the early access version was pretty poorly recieved. People were attacking Limbic and Ubisoft and saying the game was going to be cheap crap. I didn't play any of the early access versions, though I could have. I played it a month after release, and at that point it was a super game. One reason it was a super game is because of a lot of the complaints from early access. I'm really happy that there are people who want to beta test, because they make games better. If they are fans enough to buy an early access version, then they can probably give better feedback than professional beta testers. Still early access is just that. You can'T judge the finish product by it.
 
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Another reason why Legend of Grimrock was my rpg of '12. It just seems these guys can do no wrong, and I totally respect their decision to not pre-whore their product. Well done, folks!
 
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As many say above, early access has its strengths and weaknesses. I rarely play early access titles, but I don't think it's all bad or anything either. It's just another decision that developers make causing randoms on the internet to overreact.
 
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Considering that an Early Access game isn't a finished product anyways, that statement doesn't make sense.

Let's take Divinity Original Sin for example, which is in early access at the moment. I could ask around and I am pretty sure that there are a lot of people which could already tell me what the games strengths and weaknesses are and if you can expect that the game will be a total bugfest at release or not.

Same with Xenonauts. I played Xenonauts in early Access for quite a while now. I could give you a detailed review now, you don't need to wait until the game is officially release next week.

Without Early Access we are back at the "Release-Surprise": Besides of a few press people nobody will be able to tell you if the game is any good or not until release. Which helps creating games like Aliens: Colonial Marines. Sure, you can say that you should never buy a game at release and always wait for reviews.
All I am saying is that Early Access gives the Advantage of having big amount of feedback much earlier and it helps a lot to have a good picture of the game before it releases.

Personally I didn't like Grimrock 1 much. It was great on the tech side and the riddles were nices. But as DArtagnan already mentioned it was a disappointment on the story and exploration side. In addition I found the combat being too arcady.
So until it releases I guess I will have no idea if this is a game I should look forward to.


@forgottenlor
I don't think that MMX is a particularily good example as they did not do a good job with their early access and also not with communicating.
The content shown in the Early Access version was a limited Demo. And this Demo did show the most simplest dungeons and no intelligent riddles at all. That's two things which made the release thing great.
In addition they did a bad job in communicating: They stopped updating their Early Access Demo several months before release and did not think they should mention that they improved the movement right away. Or the change in ranged attacks, in animation speed and whatnot.
That said, the Early Access gave me a good impression of the game anyways. Not the best - which was their fault and not the fault of the EA model - but I could already tell, how combat works, how the general mechanics and feel is of the game. It didn't change too much regarding core game mechanics.


Same as Limbic Entertainment I don't get why there is all the hate for Early Access. It almost only brings advantages for players and developers. The only disadvantages are that you might get Story Spoilers before the game is even released and that a bad version of the game and bad communication can cause a negative word of mouth snowball-effect which can't be stopped anymore even if the game improves a lot afterwards.
 
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Sure, there are positives of early access, no one is denying that, but you don't need it to determine whether or not a game is right for you.
 
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Early access might work for some games, especially something random like Minecraft or a city builder, but the majority of RPGs I just play through a single time so I want to play with the finished product.

I will preorder this, though this time through their site. Last time I preordered the DRM free version through GoG. If you ordered through the developer, you got a DRM free version and a Steam key. I played a lot of Grimrock and went through several of the user-created levels. The Dungeon Master recreation "Back Into The Dungeon" was very good.
 
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