Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Alpha Two Phase III testing has begun! During this phase, our realms will be open every day, and we'll only have downtime for updates and maintenance. We'll keep everyone up-to-date about downtimes in Discord.
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 III testing has begun! During this phase, our realms will be open every day, and we'll only have downtime for updates and maintenance. We'll keep everyone up-to-date about downtimes in Discord.
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.
Comments
i agree with this, but its also strange because, basically no one is testing anymore, they said they are marketing to bring in new testers but the feedback they will bring will be just like the feedback they are basically ignoring at the moment, also i am really confused as to who they are going to even bring in that does not already know about the game, the state of the game right now is in no shape or form ready for marketing and yeah if nov 18th fails the rest of the people will probably quit, player retention was suppose to be a goal of phase 3
Also, the most ironic thing about that devstream was Steven saying "well, we need more testers so we need to reach a broader audience" and then just a few minutes later he said smth along the lines of "Ashes is one of the most well-known mmos at this stage of development". So he knows full well that they've already hit as big of an audience as a game of this type could, but he somehow thinks that ads will bring in more people
Yeah, imo he should just bring back the cash shop, and take a step back and let the team cook, and come back when it's ready lol
The only piece of feedback Steven needs to take on board is that the game "Steven the Gamer" wants to make is not the same as the game "Steven the Owner" of Intrepid wants to make.
Steven the Owner wants more players for the alpha, yet is making a game that specifically targets a very small niche - the niche that Steven the Gamer happens to fall in.
These two things can not co-exist. Either Steven the Gamer needs to admit that the game he wants will never exist, or Steven the Owner needs to realize they are not going to get the population to properly test the game (let alone maintain it as a live game).
Steven does not even play the game he is making which is by far the worst part
Oh, so no one at Intrepid plays it?
Says a LOT about the gsme, tbh.
I don't know about no one, I know they use to in phase 1, but Steven said he does not play it or has not had time, and that in its self is a red flag, I know he is busy but the systems being so grindy that you can't play the game casually really sucks and I feel will be the number one reason this game fails, due to player retention
So, Steven is creating a needlessly time consuming game that he doesn't have the time to play - as someone whom has become independently wealthy and doesn't actually need to work or concern himself with money.
Yet he assumes the rest of us all have the time to play, and to test.
I just reconnected with a fairly large group of people that I used to raid with over 15 years ago. Where the topics of discussion used to be things like nights out, study, complaints about bosses, flatmate issues etc, it is now about mortgage rates and the housing market, how well children are doing at sort/other activities, problems finding competent staff and being over worked as a result, talking about spouses and giving each other suggestions to avoid aggro in that area.
Put simply, this is a group of people that played MMO's back during the period that Steven is trying to recreate - as much the target audience for this game as any group of people - and they simply do not have the time to even look at Ashes, let alone play it.
Before we get ANY. MORE. pissed. off. - and ultimately at some Point lose enough Patience to blow and send this Game into the Wind and leave forever,
let's just do Please what "i" am doing since last November of 2024 -> and "keep. waiting." until more Stuff we actually want to test are finally patched into the Alpha 2 now matter how long it takes.
* siiiiigh *
Wow.
WHO WOULD HAVE thought -> that my until now most valuable Contribution to this Game - would be "waiting" and not giving up ? Hell - i am not even sarcastic at this point. I just see no value to try something i do not even want to test right now.
Hahahahahaha. I was so naive. I believed last Year before and around Christmas, that "MY" Archetype the Summoner would truly arrive at May first half a Year from there.
Damn.
I can fully understand why so many People are fed up with this eternal waiting Game. This Game is not Star Citizen. At least it's not supposed to be. At least with Verra there is an End in sight when in the ingame World is supposed to be complete and all the different Contents/Systems the Game is supposed to have.
✓ Occasional Roleplayer
I am in the guildless Guild so to say, lol. But i won't give up. I will find my fitting Guild "one Day".
I feel like they are putting a lot of focus into the endgame mechanics, but are just glossing over the progression ones. So people are getting disinterested. I stick to the PTR, production is just a waste of my time.
Without instanced dungeons I don't see how we're going to get meaningful bosses. If you can just zerg it then no mechanics are meaningful. I think the lack of instanced dungeons is a HUGE miss opportunity. Have PvP in these instanced dungeons too, a race to finish, a battle, or a coop to kill the boss faster. SO meaning things can be done, be balanced, and be meaningful.
The loot change was a knee jerk reaction. The intent I guess was to give more value to crafters, but crafting progression is 1/10 the speed or less of the leveling progression. So you end up getting suck swing a wet noodle then are burdened with grinding tedious tasks to get a weapon. Crafting just wasn't ready for the loot table to be dropped. So they upped the loot table, reasonable answer to keep people progressing.
I'd argue that we level WAY to quickly. If a causal player can make it to "cap" in two days it's too fast. You should be gearing as you level, with crafted items and very rare drops. You should be working with a team to craft items as they are needed. ect. ect. Yeah it's broke right now. PvP loops are lacking and I think they are missing the target on them. The pseudo faction system is a big problem, then leaving things like instance dungeon pvp off the table is a big mistake.
Zoom in. Most players play zoomed out all the way. Zoom in, there's tons of detail. I do agree it needs work and filling. Some more tree types and foilage in general would help, but mostly to me the thing that really make it's feel 'cheap' is the Mob NPCs, they are so robotic, or just lazily placed, path over tents or into mountains. Those are so boring to kill.
I've played on a 3070, no issues. It looks pretty good. It does need optimization, it'll get better.
I completely disagree with the idea that the travel time between biomes is "insane". Its a fairly quick run from Anvils to Riverlands. I'd be okay if it took an hour, it's not a trip I'd be making without a good reason. Also there are some faster travel options coming. Airships, faster mounts, ships. Playing AA one of the fastest ways to get around was sail the coastline. They could implement faster basic mounts to easy the travel until those things are in.
If they are not using AI they are hurting themselves as professionals. From code to art AI is going to be a corner stone of game development. I'm sure the team is adjusting and finding new ways to do things better and faster, if not then they won't be in the field for long.
They aren't ignoring feedback. I don't think they care if a group has an advantage over another, more so because it's still testing. But they got bigger things to work on. You being able to compete gear wise isn't the concern. It's more the reason of why can't you compete. Was it a rollback? It's testing so oh well. Was it a bug? report it. Was an exploit? report it. Rollbacks are going to happen, wipes could happen. Maybe don't treat the testing phase like a season.
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Most your points aren't really valid because it's testing and you seem to be judging it like it's a release. Some are valid. I do think they are focusing on the wrong things. It feels like they're focusing on endgame features, but progression is so off I don't see how focusing on endgame is fruitful, the progression changes can affect endgame, which means they'll be chancing problems in circles. The test is probably not going to be fun, if you are having fun great. I'd really like the test to respect my time more. And that probably won't change, which is okay. I'll stick to the PTR where I can test what I want and focus in specifically on those things. If enough people stop playing in the production they'll change it, for better or worse.
Blown past falling sands…
Also I would like to point to anyone still delusional enough to think that, grind doesn't make a game hard. It just makes it dull, especially if it offers zero genuine engaging gameplay on the top of it. I won't get into the whole delayed gratification / "today players want instant gratification" narratives. Ashes at higher levels is delaying the gratification for so long, that I need a note to remind myself what I was looking forward to in the first place.
Steven stated many things, including that they hate grind
Blown past falling sands…
That’s my biggest gripe. Intrepid seems to be actively ignoring all feedback they get, so what’s the point of bringing in more feedback?
Use what you’ve been given before you expose any more people to the mess the game is currently in.