Larian Studios - What’s Wrong with Early Access?

I regularly play late betas if I plan to write a review of the game for the Watch, simply so that I can get the review out quickly once the final game is released. That's simply because I'm a slow player. I've taken quick looks at some 'alphas', but I never play them for long since I have found it often ruins my enjoyment of the final (complete) game. However, that's my personal choice and if others want to play an alpha or beta to death, that's their decision. That being said, I would NEVER pay extra for the 'privilege' of playing an alpha or beta!!

Why do people talk about early access being at a higher cost when it is only 1 game (that I know of) that is at a higher cost and most games that have early access are actually at a lower cost then they are or will be at release. Stop using cost as a negative for early access since that makes you look like a fool and stick to reasonable negatives if you actually want to be taken seriously.

PS. In my opinion early access is a good thing especially for people that want a relatively bug free game at release and some people really like to beta test games and want them to be in a stable condition on release. I do agree that "Early Access" is not the right term for this but Steam is at fault for doing that and not the developers using early access.

Over the last year I used early access in these games:

Blackguards: really fun and it is a game in chapters anyway.

Divinity: OS: I checked the first town to see, if the game, in that I invested a lot of money, is on the right path … -> it is

MMX: I bought the collectors edition, early access was included, I took a sneak peek at the game (only the first area) to see if Might & Magic is back … -> it is

I've taken a look a Underrail, too.

Early access is a technique to make an early User Acceptance Test (UAT), developers all over the world do this (me too). The final product ist usually better if you make greater UATs.
Some enthusiasts will even pay money for this. I take it only if it is included in the version I want to buy anyway.
If you ask me early access should be cheaper than the final product.

greywolf00 said:

Every game you buy you risk winding up with a game that's not the game you wanted.

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Not the way it is put.
Wanting a certain game indicates nothing on the original game. Backers might want a very different game than the game originally determined. Do they back anyway? Yes, they back because they know that efficient lobbying might get them the game they want.
Players who do not manage to bend the developpment of the game their way will not get the game they want. It simply means they failed to derail the project.

Every game that is bought does not include the risk of getting a game that was derailled. Completion of developpment exists. A game released after the completion of developpment cant be derailled.

It's no different for AAA games. Marketing departments get paid to convince you that the product is worth buying, even if in hindsight, you wish you had done something else with your money.

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It is very different. Marketing departments might depict a game in a way it is not to help sales.
In the current cases, it is not about depicting a game differently, it is about loobying to get a game being made differently.

In the current cases, an original vision is decided and determined. Backers fund on that vision.
Through lobbying, the game is pushed away from the original vision that all backers agreed to back.

Now yes, you can argue as backers you're an investor and it's different but it really isn't.

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I wont certainly do that because all that crowd funding (apart from specific cases like what happens in board games) is mere spending, not investing.

When you back a game, you already accept the chance that it won't be what you expected. Allowing gamers to get a say will be to your benefit sometimes, and other times it won't. People who can't accept that shouldn't back projects imo.

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Too vague as it excludes once again the lobbying that happens.
An original vision is given. Backers that do not accept the original vision should not back.

Drithius said:

Paying extra to be a beta tester. I truly don't understand what people see in this new fad.

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Paid beta testers work differently. Usually, the lead designer hands down a contextual framework for the beta testers to report any feed back.
The way they must see the game is subordinated to the vision of the game designer.
The designer want certain features to work this or that way and beta testers are paid to confirm or infirm whether they work.
Paid beta testers work in the line of checking. They check if features work as design.
They might be provided with a degree of creative input in certain cases but it is usually limited.

When people pay to "beta test", they naturally expect to get a high degree of creative input.
They want to decide whether a certain gameplay feature makes it in a game. They want to be able to intrude on the design field.
It means they can remove a working gameplay feature because they do not like.
It means they can introduce instead a non working gameplay feature they like.

Opportunities that paid beta testers do not get.

ChienAboyeur said:

In the current cases, an original vision is decided and determined. Backers fund on that vision.
Through lobbying, the game is pushed away from the original vision that all backers agreed to back.

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I think you're being extremely cynical. I'm noy saying what you're saying is wrong, but it's nowhere near what I've experienced in beta tests and/or early access. I would say for example that WL2 gets closer to the vision document with every patch, and the general feedback (or in your case, the lobby) helps push the game in that direction, not the other way.

We all back a vision when we pledge to a Kickstarter, that's true. But we all back the SAME vision, your imaginary lobby pushing the games in the "wrong" direction won't attend the forums of a game they never backed in the first place. At least that's what I believe, since so far I'm extremely positive in general in regards to released Kickstarter products. I'll be the optimist, you can stay cynical.

Kickstarter and Early Access have started to make me less interested in the industry overall. It's starting to becoming quite a bit more rare to see actual completed games on the Steam New Release page.

It seems like it is more of a challenge for the average user to ferret out news on completed games with Kickstarter and Early Access news all over the place.

Do we have a new industry standard for some sort of meta game for incomplete games to be marketable as playable games? Maybe we need another new industry standard of early access reviews.

The only Early Access games I have at the moment are some KSed ones, like War for the Overworld, Divinity: Original Sin, Maia, Stonehearth, Grim Dawn...

Early Access is or can be imho like spoiling oneself. No more surprises (story-wise etc.) afterwards.

I have yet to see a Kickstarter suffer from the absurd lobbying you're claiming happens. The only situation that comes to mind that you could possibly make an argument for would be TB vs RTwP in T:ToN. Other than that, I can't think of a major mechanic being altered significantly/pulled due to lobbying.

The only mindbogling thing is that you guys are arguing about something which is a matter of personal choice. Early access is not compulsory so anyone can love or lump it as they see fit. What's there to argue?
I don't go for EA but I think that it can be helpful in the development of the game.

tomasp3n said:

We all back a vision when we pledge to a Kickstarter, that's true. But we all back the SAME vision, your imaginary lobby pushing the games in the "wrong" direction won't attend the forums of a game they never backed in the first place. At least that's what I believe, since so far I'm extremely positive in general in regards to released Kickstarter products. I'll be the optimist, you can stay cynical.

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A KS like Sui Generis does not back the same vision and do not back the vision as it is given.
Various backers expressed their priorities in a number of outlets and it shows that they do not put forward the way the game is supposed to get a self generating gameworld.

The lobbying is nothing imaginatory. Or if it is, it means that feedback is not taken into account. Because developpers do not take into account feedback on an individual basis. If they take it, they take it through groups.

Wait, isn't the entire point of "Early Access" that the game is still in Alpha or Beta?? That's like buying milk then taking it back and complaining "Hey, this milk came from a cow's boob, how DARE you sell this to me!" You are a grown up, then act like a grown up. Take responsibility for your actions. As for Steam being DRM and blah blah. I'm officially an old timer in the PC gaming sphere so understand when I say the fight against DRM was never a fight against easy to use, non invasive stuff like Steam. It was against malware level shit like StarForce that could and would destroy your PC given half a chance. DRM that made games harder, if not impossible to play. Hell, the best example of modern DRM that reminds me of the olden stuff is Ubisoft draconic always-on malarkey.

So, once again, Steam is not draconian DRM like those that started the anti-DRM movement. If you don't believe me, do some research before attacking all forms of DRM. Hell, Steam makes it easier to play games, the exact opposite of DRM of old.

Lastly, for those still against Early Access, isn't the real issue that you have no self control and will buy a game despite knowing it's not feature-complete? Is that the developer's fault? Really? And is it the developers fault that the industry is difficult without a publisher that ends up owning everything you make, and that things like Greenlight, Early Access, Kickstarter etc are sometimes the only way for a struggling dev to make it, it being all those games you complain never get made anymore?? Shouldn't you be supporting these devs that make the old school RPGs that you love, instead of nit-picking every-tiny-last choice they make? Is it any wonder the industry ignores you when you act like entitled, spoiled brats when half the world's population (minimum) have much larger issues than a game going on Early Access???

zahratustra said:

The only mindbogling thing is that you guys are arguing about something which is a matter of personal choice. Early access is not compulsory so anyone can love or lump it as they see fit. What's there to argue?

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While whether or not you personally play an Early Access (or other form of alpha/beta) game is obviously personal choice, their existence still create a lot of other "issues", many of them hard to avoid. Some of your friends have already played the game, info on the game is already all over the internet, news sites (like this one) spam information on the game years before it's even out, etc etc.

Back in the day, a new game would come out, and you wouldn't know anything about it yet unless, maybe, you subscribed to one of the gaming magazines. You'd go buy it, get it home, and have absolutely no clue what to expect, it was actually quite nice. Granted, there were sometimes some unpleasant surprises too. But surely you can see the difference here. Now it feels like you're buying something that's already old news.

Partaking of shallow gameplay made all the more prevalent by F2P is also a personal choice Just because something is a "choice", doesn't mean it won't gradually have a negative effect in the greater scheme of things.

In this case, exploiting the impatience of people with paid-for beta testing is the next logical step in an industry already set up to release products requiring launch day patches.

Ok, fine, fine. You are a freedom fighter, fighting to change the world. Why choose to fight indie developers making old school RPGs?! Of all the people to attack and maim, why those that supposedly are making your fav type of game? Are RPG gamers so full of self hate that they want to destroy the few turn based RPGs we are getting, just BECAUSE? If you guys are actually concerned about corporations abusing consumers, there are much bigger and obvious targets. Why not start with Bank of America?

PegasusOrgans said:

Is it any wonder the industry ignores you when you act like entitled, spoiled brats

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Is the World black and white only? Why do you divide us into anti Ea, anti Steam and the pro counterparts? There's 1000s of aspects and we're not kids here, Ok?

Don't even know who or what (s)he's referencing in half of that obviously pent-up, single-minded, self-righteous dross.

zahratustra said:

The only mindbogling thing is that you guys are arguing about something which is a matter of personal choice. Early access is not compulsory so anyone can love or lump it as they see fit. What's there to argue?
I don't go for EA but I think that it can be helpful in the development of the game.

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Early access is mandatory. That is what makes the previous comment about safe sex digusting.

On one hand, for some reason, players who like to put themselves in the developpers'shoes, keep pushing forward that developpers can finance their games thanks to SEA (or KS) but this only happens if some players put their money in the project. Without SEA/KS, no game.

The situation is very different from the classical situation when the game is released anyway.

PegasusOrgans said:

Lastly, for those still against Early Access, isn't the real issue that you have no self control and will buy a game despite knowing it's not feature-complete?

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I am pleading guilty. My game log is full of games I've not played or tried for one hour or less. I dont know how to stop. I cant simply resist. I have no other interest but owning loads of game. I am stockpiling. Might be the end of the world effect? Or sharing same gene stock as squirrels? I tried rehab. It did not work.
I cant control myself, for truth.

Is that the developer's fault? Really?

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It is my fault for sure. I cant take responsibility for my own actions. So I must imagine that developpers create a framework, an environment that comes with consequences and drive certain behaviours. You know, stuff like putting people in a pit with some food around and see if they are going to steal that food or if they can die out of starvation, things like that. But that does not exist. Personal choices and all.

And is it the developers fault that the industry is difficult without a publisher that ends up owning everything you make, and that things like Greenlight, Early Access, Kickstarter etc are sometimes the only way for a struggling dev to make it, it being all those games you complain never get made anymore??

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No, no, it is not their fault. That's the fault of the big, bad publishers that created a system where they end up everything developpers make.

Shouldn't you be supporting these devs that make the old school RPGs that you love, instead of nit-picking every-tiny-last choice they make?

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Ummm, more old school rpgs, I cant resist them. I must play them as soon as they are available, finished, unfinished, I cant simply resist.

Is it any wonder the industry ignores you when you act like entitled, spoiled brats when half the world's population (minimum) have much larger issues than a game going on Early Access???

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Thanks, thank you so much. What enlightening words. They lay out the path to help half the world's population (minimum): Early Access should be left alone.
How luck that half the world's population (minimum) is that the improvement of their existence is as easy as not writing words on EA on a forum that wont influence anything anyway, to preserve a system like SEA that half the world's population (minimum) would be better off if it did not exist.
That is wonderful.