Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Comments
The three-phase approach seems like a compromise to ensure we get access to the game earlier than we might have otherwise. Without these phased releases, it’s likely that Alpha 2 wouldn’t have started until May 2025. By breaking it up, the developers can focus on delivering a more polished experience with each phase while still giving us the opportunity to engage with the game sooner rather than later.
While it’s not exactly what we initially expected, this approach might help mitigate potential issues and lead to a better overall experience once the persistent phase does go live. I’m willing to wait a bit longer if it means the game will be more stable and enjoyable when the time comes.
In the end, the extended timeline could contribute to a higher-quality Alpha, making the wait worth it. Let’s hope that the final product reflects all the hard work they’re putting into it!
I mean the Expansions. I admit openly People went absolutely batshit crazy when ESO released or WoW.
✓ Occasional Roleplayer
✓ Currently no guild !! (o_o)
Every major game I have followed/tested for the last 25+ years has had delays, problems and sometimes terminations. Sometimes those projects take a complete turn and become something else entirely.
Relax, realize what you are experiencing is very normal for the industry and if it’s too stressful just step away for a little while.
I was upset just for brief moment but when you think about 5+ days is persistent enough for me.And waiting for it only 2 month is fine.
I am waiting for the moment when I will see the forums when 100k+ people try to login to 6servers on 25th and face full servers,queus,client crashes,server crashes and start blaming Intrepid not understading its an ALPA.And trust me if you pay 250$ you will want to be part of it on first days.
No, it does not seem like a "bait and switch" to me.
The servers will be up and outside of wipes will keep data, so they will be persistent in that sense. I'm not sure persistence means "continuously 24/7 available". Moreover, it will all be wiped when Beta 2 ends and launch happens (and probably a number of times before then) as part of testing. There's no way to have a test that DOESN'T do that.
So this seems more like "alpha being alpha" as far as I can tell, not some malicious deception on the part of the developers.
Steven literally said that is what he meant by persistent.
When the game is released we can hold them to the fire over stuff like this. During development it's not justifiable.
We will likely face wipes several times over the next couple years and people will make a thing of that too.
It's not a valid complaint. This is why game companies don't show you this stuff.
Yep they foold us good.
what a total bs dude ... the expectations are set by steven ... and what he presents on his webside when he adds a pricetag to something and puts word next to it ....
in Europe he will get a lot of lawsuits .... he might not now it yet .... but it will make him backpaddle soon ...
1: server persistence aka 24/7 server that player were expecting
2: character persistence aka trying to do no wipes
as a developer side of view i can i feel they would be more focused on character persistence so i can understand if they did mean that over server but who knows just a though either way kinda sucks however i do know people are not gonna enjoy phase 1 and honostly the alpha realy starts in December (which is the point i think devs originaly wanted to launch in oct but they got delays from the current testing which forced them to push it back and to maintain oct date they just adding A2 testers into current tests cycles to try and fix what causing problems (this is my assumption so take it as a grain of salt however from what ive heard amd what they shown).
As far I understand it the alpha is supposed to lost for months up to a year, someone please correct me. As testing is opened up to the large number of players, the test server costs are likely to end up quite high. On the up side the larger tester numbers, mean larger number of different PC hardware combinations, so hopefully this will expose more game client bugs, stability and performance issues during testing.
Are they going to make some profit margins on the pay to access alpha? Probably. Is Intrepid purposefully or accidently tapping into the crowd of people itching to play? Quite likely,. However if your motivation as a "tester" is to pay that money so you can "play the game early", you are going to end up even more disappointed, the game will be fair from finished at this point, unstable, and buggy.
If you don't like the idea of testing, finding and reporting bugs, then do not do it. There are other ways to contribute your gameplay feedback, as it looks like there is no NDA (?) and gameplay footage will be freely shared.
Blown past falling sands…
But Alpha 2 was always said to be a online 24/7 thats what OP is asking about. That is what Alpha 2 Testers shiuld be realy angry about.
Also, if this helps at all:
"Phase III - Starting May 1, 2025, we will be up 24/7, and our aim will be only to have small windows of downtime for game updates." as per the article here:
https://ashesofcreation.com/news/2024-08-18-alpha-two-roadmap-and-ama
Blown past falling sands…
I honestly am not too bummed out with the way Alpha 2 will be conducted now, it makes sense to me.
What I am however pretty puzzled by is the way Intrepid has handled the whole situation - by jumping on their own face for no reason whatsoever.
From the outside it seems to me that especially during the July stream Steven and the Studio in general tried to hype us up for the A2. "We are confident about Q3 despite the rumours." Dude, cmon. No offense but you know from your own history how many last minute issues can pop up, you were already on a crunch for freaks sake. There was NOTHING to gain from hyping this up in that moment but a whole lot to lose from it and lost you have. Unnecessarily.
I think that the mechanics you, Intrepid, finished look great and I am excited for it to come together and once finished I am as confident as ever that this will be a fantastic game to play. However, at this point I cant take any mentioning regarding times seriously. I'm not going to trust that there will be A2 tests ever weekend of Phase 1, I don't expect Phase 2 to start in December nor that the test times will last 5 days or that Phase 3 will start in May next year. I am 100% certain that this is what you want, but at this point I have doubts you can deliver on any on that in the projected fashion.
And while I am aware and fine with your statement at the bottom of each slide "Development is a moving train and subject to change" and treat this as the core message to everything you put out, the hyping up has obviously for YEARS at this point brought in unnecessary drama and criticism.
I am no expert on public relations, but from my perspective it seems that you could have done way better by dialing back the hype, avoid the unnecessary criticism of your wavering on announced plans, or just plainly saying "look guys, Stevens investment into the company has exceeded all the funding through kickstarter supporters and package purchases by 5... 10 times (whatever the actual number is) and we would appreciate your continued support through [product XYZ]." You got a very committed community here that does not require insane hype, nor rosey promises or sugar coated studio updates. So far it seems to me that while people are a bit bummed out because of the development speed, just like Steven said "the quality of the product can speak for itself". Please start believing your own words on this one and keep it straight with us. That's what we are here for after all and that's why we are still here.
But on the other hand, I do understand why they are doing this. So I will accept it and just test all I can on the weekends.
Problem is most people have no frame of reference and they expected this to be an early access. Even though they have said time and time again it is not people still refuse to believe them.
The only misstep I see is the idea they released keys again instead of staying quiet and leaving it alone. I get why they did it but if they had left it alone we would not have 20 threads crying about this same topic over and over.
lol what a ridiculous take. People are 100% allowed to be disappointed by this news given the past communication on what Alpha 2 would be. Being disappointed by such a major change in plans doesn't make anyone "unfit" to help test either, that's just a stupid thing to say.
Yep, some people are now just white-knighting this whole fk up.
It's not a video game. It's a software project. 1.0 will be a video game that you can play and hold accountable.
Also just so you know, the odds of that entire road map they showed us happening on time, without any delays, is almost zero.
This is what it looks like to create something complex.
Other companies don't show you this stuff because they know this is how people react. They do us the favor of looking under the hood, and we reward them with this. It's one of the reasons we can't have nice things.
None of this really has any relevance to what I said lol they're not trying to do anyone any favors except for themselves either. Just because they're letting people pay to help test the game (something plenty of other studios have done, by the way, this isn't new or unprecedented in any way) doesn't mean those people can't be allowed to be disappointed when plans change or deadlines are missed. Especially when that change is as significant as this one is. They 100% should be held accountable for things they publicly announce. It doesn't matter if you consider this to be a "game" or a "software project." That arbitrary definition doesn't exclude them from being held accountable for things they've publicly announced and charged money for people to be able to access.
I also take Steven seriously, especially when he repeatedly informs us that this is not some fancy "early access" situation, so my expectations are tempered very well.
With that said... I am just glad I get a hands-on to see something of my investment from 8 years ago lol
What are you talking about? It was Steven who literally said that alpha 2 would be up all the time, day and night. These are his words. That is despite the fact that it implies it on the alpha packs..
We really shouldn't want that until the Betas.
Devs trying to keep testers reasonably happy 24/7 means they will very likely be too distracted from adding more features as they focus on perfecting the current features... which is a fairly quuck path to becoming vaporware.
Rather, I'm happy that the NDA will be lifted Oct 25th.
They shouldn't be trying to keep testers happy 24/7 and they know that. If they stick to their internal development plans and goals while being transparent about doing so while also showing that they're at least cataloging feedback then there shouldn't be any issue with the servers being up 24/7 as long as they're stable enough (which I suspect is the primary reason that they're doing weekend only tests at first, there are going to be a lot of crashes and the servers are going to be very unstable).
Steven literally told us that Alpha 2 would be up 24/7 (see direct video evidence in the top post) and that's no longer the case unless "Alpha 2" really starts in May 2025...
I have to say, I find it curious so many people get upset they have a chance to take part in the project at this stage at all. Unless the company fails all together, they will let you know when they are ready. Any testing dates are tied to the dev team being on schedule. In dev hardly anything ever runs on time. Also majority game dev studios don't allow the public to participate with game development at this stage. What happens here is highly unusual. Still, damned if you do and damned if you don't?
Blown past falling sands…
Its clear you also think this is early access, you are giving off vibes you really don't understand how anything works. And Why you think they are changing their "plans"
They have already stated in the past that there will be times when the server goes down in steams, their plans are also no changing you just were shown their plans. The same way they are building up to alpha 2 with a smaller amount of testing they are going to be doing the same thing and letting a larger amount of people in to also TEST and fix issues in october.
ALL of you keep talking about this like its a full game release, not like its a alpha where they need to test their system, fix things and work on it to improve the experience that will most likely feel extremely rough, or unplayable at worse.
When you hear persistent alpha that doesn't mean that ALPHA starts at the best point, work needs to be done as its a long process and a major chuck of the content creation and fixes to the overall game in a lot of elements.
The most i see post like this the more it goes back to people really can not handle open development. And should be behind more closed doors since post like these is a waste of time and space. Doesn't matter how many times IS tells you and explains things (even again saying it won't be 24/7 right away) people will ignore everything and think early access. Also don't give me the bs you are not saying early access because your entire complaint in akin to expectations for an early access game and not an alpha.
Overtime I'm convinced they should have kept more behind closed doors, while still releasing video's every few months on some element of progress but being very selective of it. Though some of the feedback has helped, and i suppose you can just ignore post like these as they aren't relevant to understanding how things work.