Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Comments
Many have said this is just KS peeps being "elitist" or what not, and that's fine. It doesn't change the fact they doubled down on the thesaurus to make what seemed like pretty straight forward statements more broad. They have done this a few times, there is usually a slight upheaval from those that feel like they took the bait and got switched. However, it is usually over shadowed by the response from those benefiting.
There are several threads about this. So if you care enough to ask what types of things, I will refer you to looking. Otherwise take it or leave it.
APOC has a season pass
It does? That's news to me.
As for Intrepid in general, I gave them the benefit of the doubt regarding the initial release date, chalking it up to Steven's enthusiasm and inexperience in the game industry getting ahead of him, making him say things which were never going to happen.
I don't have any experience with my.com so I can't comment on that.
APOC is completely free
There is no currently no season pass available for purchase, if there is please link it.
The only one I could find any mention of was a pass that would allow you to earn cosmetics and minor bonuses for playing a whole hell of a lot to reach high levels. And as mentioned before, these cosmetics are all transferring to the MMO.
This link "There will be an optional Legendary Path that players can purchase."
And this one (second dot).
Come take a look at ashesofcreation.wiki!
Yes I saw that one, but given even the least expensive MMO pre-order packs include the APOC pass (Compendium Season 1 - The Exodus), that hardly seems like monetizing the testing platform. By now I'd guess most people would have purchased at least one pack of cosmetics for AoC. I can accept if someone wants to call the future passes another method of further funding development for the MMO, because it is, however those who toss out accusations that it's just to rake in more money are simply paranoid. We've already gotten a ton of confirmation that APOC rewards transfer to the MMO.
I agree the gaming industry hasn't done much to inspire confidence lately, but it'd be nice if people could just give IS a chance without throwing out "woo boy another EA" the second they mention putting a cost on a portion of cosmetic products.
Since IS is going to be part of that industry, when they start doing things others have done before them, it speaks less to their originality and more to them following the industry standard.
I try to refrain from those comparisons and tend to be weary of most opinions that use those types of comparisons as facts. However, using those comparisons to form opinions makes sense.
the fact is they put a season pass in a testing ground I dont care if you say it fine its still monetizing a test
Yeah, when you put it like that it does seem pretty shady. I've been thinking about this whole situation a lot recently and it doesn't sit well with me at all. I'm perfectly fine with financially supporting the development of the game (I wouldn't have backed the kickstarter otherwise), but this seems a bit too greedy.
I'd love to give Intrepid the benefit of the doubt on this and believe them when they say they need the extra money to stay on schedule, but it's so hard when you see what the rest of the gaming industry is doing.
I'm honestly sick of the gaming industry right now. It used to be so simple: You bought a full game with no strings attached and played it. When you were done with that game you bought a new one. The only exception to this were the subscription-based mmorpgs but even they were very easy to understand. Your subscription paid to keep the servers running and that's it.
Now..... Now I don't know half the time what I'm paying for when I buy a new game. I wish we could go back to those simpler times, when developers actually released completed games instead of this "release it half-finished and patch it later" bullshit.
Sorry, I'm ranting now but it's just so frustrating to feel that every company only seems to care about getting as much money from the players as possible.
That the same way I feel
I have perhaps a different stance on this whole thing to everyone else.
To me, the reason to buy Legendary access here is not to get any more out of Apoc at all - it is to get what will no doubt be exclusive cosmetics in the MMO when it launches.
To me, the whole thing is nothing more than a different path by which to get cosmetics in the MMO - buying them outright is one path, and earning them in Apoc (including the $10 to get Legendary access if you want even more cosmetics) is another.
Put another way, to me, this is nothing more than the continuation of selling cosmetics for the MMO, they have just tied Apoc participation in to it.
Edit to add; I admit it's borderline in terms of their statement to not monetize Apoc, but to me it is on the acceptable side of that line.
I dont really see any reason why you should think that they are "greedy"...
They are an independent studio, with expanding costs. Do they force you to buy all that? No. No they do not force you to buy anything. Do they give out skins if you buy sh*t? Yes. Yes they do. Is that a problem for you? No. No, it is not a problem for you specifically...
The "old times", where you knew what you where getting, are still there. Many developers just put extra stuff in other versions of the same game to get even more money.
The problem with the current gaming industry lies not with the developers (okay, yes there are also bad developers), but rather with the publishers. Look at Bungie, they didnt want Destiny 2 to develop that way, but where "forced" by Activision to go a bad route.
Publishers want the devlopers to push out games as fast as possible, even though many games are only half finished. Look at WoD for example. They had to cut 3/4 of content out, because the publisher relocated tons of resources to the NEXT EXPANSION.
In general, I've always looked at it as the developer of a game being the people that actually give a shit, and the publisher of the game being faceless suits that care about nothing at all other than the bottom line - I mean; why would you be a publisher otherwise?
From the player's point of view it really doesn't matter if the fault lies with the developer, the publisher or the investors behind the scenes. The result is the same. And no, you absolutely DON'T know what you are getting half the time. There are so many options, from paid DLC to season passes to entirely different versions of the same game. And none of it is consistent. Sometimes a season pass gives you free access to all the DLC produced in that year, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes a different version of the game has different content included in it, sometimes not. It's all a complete mess, and for those with the tin foil hats in place, it is specifically designed to confuse the players as much as possible.
When I bought Super Smash Bros on the N64, I went to the store, bought the game, went home, put the cartridge into my console and played it. Simple as that. No patching or updates required, no need to log in to check my identity, no being bombarded with adverts for microtransactions, nothing. And of course, absolutely nothing locked behind a pay-wall. In Super Smash Bros I had full access to all the characters programmed into the game, assuming I had the skill/dedication to unlock them.
That's what I mean by knowing exactly what you are buying. In Mortal Kombat X there were a bunch of fully functional characters that were either locked behind a pay-wall or locked off completely.
The only way I could see them remotely justifying it would be going F2P, but that would also be a f*ing mess.
I don't think IS plans this for Ashes, as things like this have been treated as bad mojo by IS in the past. But all that damn word smithery...
they already have its called embers
I thought it was more of an in game way of earning 'credits' for the store. Which, last I checked, was cosmetics only.
embers are intrepid in-game cash currency with it you can buy cosmetics, levels in the battle pass in the BR and the battle pass its self. All of which is classed as micro-transactions
@Nagash think you for the clarification.
You and me both ^^
All these months while they worked on fixes.
And it would still be live right now.
While true, that doesn't mean they won't later transition Embers into that role. But also, if they needed to focus on Ashes and they were having back end issues, maybe they couldn't keep it up. Maybe the cash flow in from the BR couldn't out pace the cost of servers and server fixes.
Not that I expect IS would do that.