Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Alpha Two Phase II testing is currently taking place 5+ days each week. More information about testing schedule can be found here
If you have Alpha Two, you can download the game launcher here, and we encourage you to join us on our Official Discord Server for the most up to date testing news.
Alpha Two Phase II testing is currently taking place 5+ days each week. More information about testing schedule can be found here
If you have Alpha Two, you can download the game launcher here, and we encourage you to join us on our Official Discord Server for the most up to date testing news.
Is it even possible to acknowledge negative views here?
Wargasm
Member, Alpha Two, Early Alpha Two
First, let me start off by saying I have a kickstart backer account for myself, my wife has a voyager package for $250 i bought for her, and this account which will be my sons who will be old enough to play the game before launch which also has a $250 package. Yes, that is 3 packages bought by myself. Me, a staunch opponent to pre-orders and can not remember the last time i have broke down and purchased a pre-order in my almost 30 years of gaming. I think it is important to acknowledge that before continuing this discussion.
I would also like to acknowledge and give credit where it is due. Steven is living a life almost ALL of us have daydreamed. We have all imagined in our heads what our own personal video game would look like if we had the money to create it. Usually these daydreams occur shortly after quitting a game we really wanted to enjoy or have burned out of due to many various reasons. It is admirable he chose to pursue his dream of this and is making it a reality.
Now, to the meat and potatoes of this discussion. It seems to me there is a serious amount of refusing to acknowledge that people do have the right to be mad about recent events. Every discussion i read in this forum, multiple replies are just shutting down conversations and completely invalidating someone's view, of which they are entirely entitled to have. Steven goes on to brag on his livestream about how nice this community is, but that only holds true if you are heaping praise on the game and refusing to acknowledge any criticisms. For example, I had one of my discords banned from the official discord. Surely i must have done something terrible right? I wonder what it could have been? Well, let me go ahead and fill you in so you don't have to wonder anymore. I critiqued the refusing to give any deadlines and even when they do, they fail to meet them. It is simply a statement of fact that they have missed deadlines, even when for years the reason for not giving deadlines was to ensure they met them. What did the community do in response to this? A member of the discord, yes, this community, took a screenshot of a conversation in general chat of continuing discussion on how much people think their version of kickstarter bundles were actually worth to them. He then sent me a private message on discord asking to buy my account, of which i never replied. He then took those screenshots, and gave them to a discord mod while concocting a story that i was trying to sell kickstarter accounts. I was banned immediately with noone from discord reaching out, not an email stating why i was banned, no bother trying to get my side of the story, and a clear lack of logic in reaching a conclusion that is bannable from that information.
We can all acknowledge that negativity can lead to extremely toxic things. I think we fail to realize there is an opposite side, and positivity can also lead to extremely toxic things. This forum and discord seem to be a shining example of this.
There are a plethora of things that can be viewed negatively about this project recently. People have that right, as well as the right to voice their opinion and try to impact development in any developmental etc way THEY see fit. The same way YOU have the right to try to impact this development in a way you see fit.
The new keys have been a very hot button issue, and i think it is so rightfully. I see so many responses to people bringing this up claiming you get years of "play" time for free, you get cosmetics, you get launched game play time, you get x/y/z. Let me speak plainly. A larger percentage than 0 bought those packages because they wanted to be able to get into alpha / beta. The value proposition from the other things in the package are exactly $0. From skins most of us will never have the opportunity to use or dont want, to in game time pre-paid years in advance that 1: we may decide this game isnt for us after 2 months, thus overpaying, or 2: the fact that inflation has doubled the value of that monthly sub if you were to pay for it when it released. It is a fact that there are plenty of people who bought packs simply to get into the testing. For those people, the entrance to alpha testing started at $250 a key. Many of those people bought into the dream BECAUSE it was fully funded and didnt have a publisher breathing over them. I can not overstate how impactful that was to a vast majority of pre-orders they received. Still to this day that is one of the biggest selling points i personally use when talking to my friends about this game. As such, I completely disregard any use of needing to pay bills etc for development. This argument holds no merit, as was made that way from Steven claiming this hundreds of times. Also, steven adamantly stated dozens of times that alpha keys were going away, and were not going to return. This resulted in players buying the packages at $250 simply to get into testing. I would also like to point out the supporting the project argument is very weak. This "free game time" during alphas and betas are not game time. It it targeted testing with an expectation to give feedback. Last i checked that was a professional industries job. Meaning we are already signing up to do something typically they would be paying for. It is simply a statement of fact that a larger percentage than 0 of the supporter base feels like they were spit in the face by not only offering keys again, but at a price point much lower than what they fomo'd people into buying. I personally would have still kickstarted on 1 account, but i would not have purchased a $250 package for my wife and son, and would have rather opted for the cheaper bundles. I can easily say i am happy with my kickstarter purchase, but i feel taken advantage of on the other two accounts. Couple all this with the fact you are still missing deadlines? Yes, people have the right to be mad. The people in this community need to accept that. Your opinion is no more or no less valid than theirs. If you are completely content with all the recent things to have happened, then i am sincerely happy for you. I am glad you feel you are getting the value from this that you believed you would get when you purchased. That doesn't mean their isn't a decently size chunk who feel they haven't.
I look forward to the day we are all sailing into the high seas together chanting some sea shanties on the way to plunder some booty!
I would also like to acknowledge and give credit where it is due. Steven is living a life almost ALL of us have daydreamed. We have all imagined in our heads what our own personal video game would look like if we had the money to create it. Usually these daydreams occur shortly after quitting a game we really wanted to enjoy or have burned out of due to many various reasons. It is admirable he chose to pursue his dream of this and is making it a reality.
Now, to the meat and potatoes of this discussion. It seems to me there is a serious amount of refusing to acknowledge that people do have the right to be mad about recent events. Every discussion i read in this forum, multiple replies are just shutting down conversations and completely invalidating someone's view, of which they are entirely entitled to have. Steven goes on to brag on his livestream about how nice this community is, but that only holds true if you are heaping praise on the game and refusing to acknowledge any criticisms. For example, I had one of my discords banned from the official discord. Surely i must have done something terrible right? I wonder what it could have been? Well, let me go ahead and fill you in so you don't have to wonder anymore. I critiqued the refusing to give any deadlines and even when they do, they fail to meet them. It is simply a statement of fact that they have missed deadlines, even when for years the reason for not giving deadlines was to ensure they met them. What did the community do in response to this? A member of the discord, yes, this community, took a screenshot of a conversation in general chat of continuing discussion on how much people think their version of kickstarter bundles were actually worth to them. He then sent me a private message on discord asking to buy my account, of which i never replied. He then took those screenshots, and gave them to a discord mod while concocting a story that i was trying to sell kickstarter accounts. I was banned immediately with noone from discord reaching out, not an email stating why i was banned, no bother trying to get my side of the story, and a clear lack of logic in reaching a conclusion that is bannable from that information.
We can all acknowledge that negativity can lead to extremely toxic things. I think we fail to realize there is an opposite side, and positivity can also lead to extremely toxic things. This forum and discord seem to be a shining example of this.
There are a plethora of things that can be viewed negatively about this project recently. People have that right, as well as the right to voice their opinion and try to impact development in any developmental etc way THEY see fit. The same way YOU have the right to try to impact this development in a way you see fit.
The new keys have been a very hot button issue, and i think it is so rightfully. I see so many responses to people bringing this up claiming you get years of "play" time for free, you get cosmetics, you get launched game play time, you get x/y/z. Let me speak plainly. A larger percentage than 0 bought those packages because they wanted to be able to get into alpha / beta. The value proposition from the other things in the package are exactly $0. From skins most of us will never have the opportunity to use or dont want, to in game time pre-paid years in advance that 1: we may decide this game isnt for us after 2 months, thus overpaying, or 2: the fact that inflation has doubled the value of that monthly sub if you were to pay for it when it released. It is a fact that there are plenty of people who bought packs simply to get into the testing. For those people, the entrance to alpha testing started at $250 a key. Many of those people bought into the dream BECAUSE it was fully funded and didnt have a publisher breathing over them. I can not overstate how impactful that was to a vast majority of pre-orders they received. Still to this day that is one of the biggest selling points i personally use when talking to my friends about this game. As such, I completely disregard any use of needing to pay bills etc for development. This argument holds no merit, as was made that way from Steven claiming this hundreds of times. Also, steven adamantly stated dozens of times that alpha keys were going away, and were not going to return. This resulted in players buying the packages at $250 simply to get into testing. I would also like to point out the supporting the project argument is very weak. This "free game time" during alphas and betas are not game time. It it targeted testing with an expectation to give feedback. Last i checked that was a professional industries job. Meaning we are already signing up to do something typically they would be paying for. It is simply a statement of fact that a larger percentage than 0 of the supporter base feels like they were spit in the face by not only offering keys again, but at a price point much lower than what they fomo'd people into buying. I personally would have still kickstarted on 1 account, but i would not have purchased a $250 package for my wife and son, and would have rather opted for the cheaper bundles. I can easily say i am happy with my kickstarter purchase, but i feel taken advantage of on the other two accounts. Couple all this with the fact you are still missing deadlines? Yes, people have the right to be mad. The people in this community need to accept that. Your opinion is no more or no less valid than theirs. If you are completely content with all the recent things to have happened, then i am sincerely happy for you. I am glad you feel you are getting the value from this that you believed you would get when you purchased. That doesn't mean their isn't a decently size chunk who feel they haven't.
I look forward to the day we are all sailing into the high seas together chanting some sea shanties on the way to plunder some booty!
0