Thanks for the offer... I guess.
shinhoudken
Member
I really don't know where to stand with the gaming industry anymore. Its like everyone is indie now days. I got an email "offer" to pay at the least $75 and up to $500 (lol) to "pre-order" (shutters at the thought after so many failed titles in recent years) while its in alpha? What? Guys come on. The gaming industry has taken wild advances since sonic and mario, that's for sure. Never the less, I am interested in this game, when its done and fully released. Does anyone know, when this releases, will it be at the least $75? Or is this for all the weird birds and keys that I have no idea of their value because the game isn't made? Also, is this being released to steam as well?
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Comments
2-3 years seems to be the general consensus of the community
While a $20/50 request seems reasonable, it's hard to fault Intrepid Studios on their $75 price for Beta 2 or even their $500 price for Alpha 1 access. I say that primarily because the general public is not exactly good at understanding how game development works, nor are they very good at changing opinions that have already been formed. So creating that high bar of entry by monetary means it is most likely trying to limit the lower echelons of the public from gaining access too early while still getting the benefits of mass public testing from the early stages.
Think of it a little more like give and take. You give them data, but someone on their side has to analyze and aggregate that data and interpret it.
The more data they have, the more that person or team needs to be paid. Also, it's possible that a person could just 'take the time and play, and give no data at all'.
By having a cost, Intrepid ensures that you are both 'invested in giving the data', and 'the people whose job it is to look at your data, are paid well'.
Make no mistake, the Community Team are almost-overworked-angels at this point, and the data collators can't be too far off;
Hm... Kind of. Everyone has their own reasons for joining in the alpha. $500 varies from person to person, so some it may be a small amount and others it's an unreasonably high amount. Essentially you are investing in the game. You are not paying for the right to play the game and this is where the discrepancy begins.
Intrepid has been very open about this and pretty much all the community outlets agree. If you're buying a package JUST to play the alpha, you're going to be disappointed. Especially if you've never participated in an alpha test before. I recommend anyone who is thinking about dropping money on it just for the sole purpose of having exclusive access to the alpha just wait and play something else.
For me personally, I enjoy testing and seeing how different systems change over time. I've worked in UE3/UE4 before and work on web services/servers for my job. For me the lifetime sub was enough to justify my braver of worlds package, but even without it. I probably would've invested anyways just to see the feat that is building a server architecture from scratch to interface with Unreal Engine. I don't think people understand the degree of complexity and utter insanity that is required to not only build an MMO server architecture from scratch to interface with an existing engine, but make it support hundreds of players on screen.
That's the benefit that I personally see myself getting from investing early, but as I said, everyone has their own reasons. And if you're really that on the fence about buying a package, don't. Once you've invested money in something then it becomes an expectation and you will probably grow frustrated at some point in the development cycle and get burned out early.
My 2 cents
Addon Developer
OG Backer
Obviously there is some risk of it being not what I wanted. Some people are willing to put forward some risk for the reward of 'finally everything I needed in an mmo'.
Some people find testing fun on top of that (or just reeeeally like costumes and have enough faith it will turn out well.) This the general mindset of the people who spend 500$ (if they have the money.)
It's only 'work' if you consider going for a fitting 'work.'
you donate a non-refundable donation buy purchasing the monthly package to gain access to the tests and to support the company.
You get what is in the packages you pay for with your non-refundable donation.
1) You pledged $75 without looking at the package info
2) You created a forum account to talk shit
3) You think that testing is "paying the to work for you"
What do you want?
I strongly dislike calling it a donation. This isn't a charity. It's a business. They are making a sellable product. There is some expectation of a product delivered. If they do not deliver /any/ product it means something very different than if this was a 'donation'. If you are uncomfortable with the more accurate term investment I would have to ask why.
You can call it whatever you want. It's a donation.
Donations can be given to all sorts of different organisations including charities.
That's unfortunate I was hoping to actually increase my understanding of your perspective. Oh well.
I honestly didn't think I needed to spell it out for you.
Considering there is no actual finished product, it would be classified as donations. You can still get extra's tacked on to your donations value which allows the individual in this case to get cosmetics, access to tests and game time when the product is potentially finished. This allows the donator to increase their donations value for incentive of items in a finished product.
Considering there is no box price for the game and only a monthly sub, it is still a donation because there is no finished product to subscribe to yet.
Donations are also generally non-refundable, not to get confused with terms and conditions of sales for actual products.
You see where I am going with this?
You are donating your money for support of the company to finish their product. Your donation gives you bonuses to this products development for both early development and post development.
That's sort of a fair definition for most tiers. I disagree with the higher tiers but that's for reasons that involve a long esoteric conversation I am too tired to have rn.
Cheers.
you're welcome
lol
Also, why do people have some weird disdain for steam?
No disdain on my part, but they take 30% of the game price (graduated over time based on units sold).
Oh, well that is a good point
Though one could also argue that it being on steam increases visibility an accessibility of the game leading to more sales
Also, the game has no box cost lol
anyone can move a file onto their personal steam directory, it's just a spot to launch the game from.
What business doesn't create a profit from selling an item at their store?
Imagine if a Walmart sold everything at the price they got it for.
I've gotten better deals on steam than epic, and better deals on epic than steam. Most of the time, it's the same price unless they are having a special publisher sale, seasonal event, or something exclusive to them
I find new games I didn't know about all the time while browsing the steam store, or even a specific tag like "Single player" or "sandbox".
Games that people attach to their own libraries aren't going to show up in those lists.
I'm not arguing whether Intrepid should put the game on Steam or not, as I'm sure they know what's best for their game.
There's plenty of free to play games on Steam, and even some no-box-cost subscription-based games too.
I'm just curious why OP and others are against steam
oh no worries, I figured that's what you meant.
I just wanted to point out anyone could add something to steam or things similar to it.
They're probably better off doing their own application which would be really cool as it could be a custom launcher to house their store, profiles, friends lists and future features from.
But if it went to steam or something like epic. It probably wouldn't make much of a difference for me.
While this is true, Steam did basically kill the piracy market for games.
Back in the 90's, there were more pirated games than movies. As has been proven (and ignored by both the music and movie industry), piracy is more about ease of access to content than it is about price. When Steam came along, they gave people that had previously pirated games an easier (not even factoring in safer) way to get the games they want, when they wanted them.
Realistically, for most game developers, the additional exposure they get from Steam, in conjunction with the lower rate of piracy, more than makes up that 30% fee that Steam take (not that I am defending that rate).
apparently what I'm reading about the 30% is an industry standard. but I do not know the full details on why or who originally decided that amount. But there some exceptions for smaller developers etc.
Additionally the 30% is based on the initial launch of the game and not older games.
It's also a great platform for indie companies as publishing fee is only $100. A lot of small indie companies have made some really good profit from it.
And as you've said, it does provide a lot of exposure. There are games I never have heard of or would have gotten. Some games go to console first unfortunately but eventually come to steam which is a really cool feature but now many of those console developers aim to publish on apps like steam as well for additional sales on that platform.
Apple has done it, amazon has done it, android has done it etc