Sword of the Stars 2: Trust ye not the space dolphin.

[boolybooly]

way foul... their word is worthless and broken, their reputation stained and their good intentions no longer credible!

What will they do next? Lets face it noone knows, because they are crim now, they could do anything.

[n0z3k1ll3r]

Could you tone down the melodrama a bit?

They've released a game in an awful state, but whilst it's one of the worst releases I've ever seen it's still not THAT much worse than a lot of others, and it's getting better support than a lot of them do (which is to say it's getting some support). And the actual core of what they're trying to do with the game is solid and ambitious, and as I've always said I'll take ambition over polish any day. Bugs get fixed, conservative game design doesn't.

[Paladin]

booly: If you say so. They haven't done anything that harmed me in the slightest, so it's of no consequence to me.

And I'm actually having fun with the game already, making maps, modding, and yes, even playing it. I can see myself playing it for years to come. I bought something like 3 games over this entire year, that's how tight my household budget is right now, and I don't have the slightest regret that this was one of them.

Hell, according to Steam I've already logged 90 hours on it.

[Ammon Ra]

you know what would really make them scumbags booly? NOT giving refunds. NOT giving free dlc, and/or selling dlc for a broken game. NOT patching the game into a less broken state. NOT caring about customers.

Oh wait, they are giving refunds. they are giving free dlc. they are patching the game, and all that leads me to believe that they care about their customers.

The release was a royal screw-up, no doubt about that. Yet, various publishers/developers get away with parts of what i described in my first paragraph on a regular basis.

[FriendlyFire]

This sounds like Elemental all over again...

[boolybooly]

Guys you fail to appreciate that a metaphorical night in the slammer is a very mild rebuke for what they pulled. Its better than a grand jury enditement and better by far than a lynch mob with pitchforks and torches.

I dont see how in all honesty you can sit there and say it was OK. It wasnt. That doesnt mean I hate them or want to destroy them. The world of show biz is not black and white, it is an ever shifting kaleidoscope of chaos. But they have been bad, deserve censure and I am not going to say otherwise because it would be a delusional fanboy lie.

They deserve at least an hours detention and tell their moms. They have all been very naughty.

[Gorb]

booly: If you say so. They haven't done anything that harmed me in the slightest, so it's of no consequence to me.

And I'm actually having fun with the game already, making maps, modding, and yes, even playing it. I can see myself playing it for years to come. I bought something like 3 games over this entire year, that's how tight my household budget is right now, and I don't have the slightest regret that this was one of them.

Hell, according to Steam I've already logged 90 hours on it.

And this right here, Paladin, is an example of how far people will go to defend those developers they are biased in favour of. Any other game, any other developer, and you would be on one of your finer rants right now

[overmind2000]

This sounds like Elemental all over again...

Nearly, in the Elemental situation though the developer actually released what they considered to be a finished version of the game (Kerberos have been very clear that whilst what was released was the final version at the time of release, it was most certainly not the finished product they wanted to deliver).
However there is the risk that this game could go the same way Elemental did - lots of updates, not getting very far and then being mostly dropped/forgotten about a year later.

I think a lot of fans are in line behind the game because they want to enjoy and play it and are hoping that 4 years of supporting Sword of the Stars will translate to a similar level of commitment to supporting Sword of the Stars 2. Personally I have confidence in the developer team, my worry would be the simple lack of finances problem; where if they run out of operating and publisher funding they are cut loose and the project ended.

[Paladin]

And this right here, Paladin, is an example of how far people will go to defend those developers they are biased in favour of. Any other game, any other developer, and you would be on one of your finer rants right now

Not really, it's more an example of my attitude towards life in general. I'm utterly pragmatic.

Basically I find "normal" humans and their emotional reactions somewhat incomprehensible. As an example, I was at a dinner a while back and telling a couple of people around me a story from my childhood, and one of them saw the waiter passing by and talked over me to ask the waiter for something or other. I of course halted my story and waited politely for her to complete that transaction. When she was finished she turned to me and with an attitude of quite sincere contrition apologized for interrupting me. I told her not to worry about it, but she continued to apologize, saying she knew how much she hated to be interrupted.

I was honestly confused as to why someone would even feel the need to apologize, because her transaction with the waiter was time sensitive and my story was not, so of course her transaction should take precedence. I guess other people don't look at things that way.

Additionally, unless I'm engaged in relaxation with people explicitly defined as members of my friends group in my internal categorization, I tend to dislike interacting with other humans. I see things in a transactional way... I dislike the "protocol" of human interaction. It seems wasteful and inefficient to have to perform the social handshake of "Hi, how are you, how's the kids, blah blah, oh, by the way, can you tell me..." when I just need some small piece of data from them or whatever.

So anyway, when the game was released, I was severely disappointed, but I thought about it and realized that in practical terms I'd not lost anything on it, there was no injury or damage done to me since that $49 was earmarked for the game since the game was announced, long before there was a firm release date of any kind. I would have pre-ordered right then even. SotS is one of my two favorite games of all time, and I'm incredibly picky. I mean, the one game I esteem more highly is the original Majesty, and I haven't really loved a game in years.

But anyway, point is I can already see the awesome game at the core of this one, and I have no problem funding its development. If it was another developer I didn't have a history with I wouldn't have pre-ordered at all. I'm pretty picky and cynical about games. But I also wouldn't have been off on a rant about them if I had pre-ordered, because I'd have considered it my own mistake for buying a game blind, which is something I learned long ago is a serious mistake. If it had been another developer I'd have shrugged, put another mark in the huge column of evidence in support of never ever trusting anyone who's trying to sell me something, put in a refund request, and let it go.

I always look at everything in terms of what's productive and practical, and rarely act on an emotional response, such as my disappointment with Kerberos for doing something I hadn't expected of them. If they were any other developer I'd have expected this of them, is the thing. I just assume every games publisher is a bunch of asshats, because honestly I've seen little evidence to the contrary. If anything though, Paradox's refund offer was a pleasant surprise to me, because as I said, I expect the worst of people. Kerberos had earned a bit of trust I wouldn't normally extend to anyone, but the disappointment that stemmed from their failure to meet that expectation is an impractical emotional response that serves no purpose, and I like the game, even if it still needs work.

I also don't have any idea what booly's talking about with his claim that there were tons of bugs in SotS I that never got fixed. I never ran into any major bug that wasn't fixed eventually, and usually quite fast. The final patch version of SotSANY is probably the cleanest, tightest game I've ever played. So he's got some pre-existing bone to pick with them that I don't.

[Moe]

So uh... how exactly do I access the DLC?

[Weavern]

If you believe the paradox/kb fanbois on the paradox forums they will eventually show up as purchased content in your steam DLC tab. (highly dubious of this) However at present the only thing that tells you that you have dlc is when you start a new game under the factions tab the blank spots are replaced by "race immersion pack". At present they have yet to fully fulfill their promise to give all DLC (except humans) to anyone who bought the game prior to nov30. Speaking as a steam user I only have the DLC i got with the preorder and suul'ka.

[n0z3k1ll3r]

I got the extra DLC through Gamersgate. So it's probably just Steam shillyshallying.

[Paladin]

Yeah, it depends on where you bought it. If you bought it from GamersGate the keys are already available in your list of games.

And the Suul'ka Horde DLC was activated on my game without me even having to go there for it.

[Kushan_Pilot]

This is great timing. I get home from classes, download another super-patch, and get playing. Been a while baby...please surprise me...*click*.

[Akranadas]

@Paladin: The reason why I'm annoyed at Kerberos is because I feel deceived by them.

I too feel that Sword of the Stars 1 was a absolutely great game, and love it why I was playing it, so I was kind of looking forward o SotS2 coming out, as it would mean more multiplayer madness with other RN players here. The reason is quite simple, I was led to believe that the product I was purchasing was a full retail product, which in fact it was not. They advertised it as such and when I finished downloading it and fired the game up I was confront with a beta test version of the game, then they released the next up, saying this was the proper release version of the game, when it fact it was still the same beta, but with DLC enabled.

I effectively paid money for a lemon, a product that does not work as advertised. If Kerberos had come out a week or so before release and said "Look guys, We haven't finished the game yet, but we're willing to release what we've done now and continue updating it if you are willing to buy it" I would be fine with that, that's being honest, rather than going "We've got your money now, so we'll update it continually. Thanks". It's basically the same as purchase a car, under the idea that said car is brand new. Only to find out once you've pay for it that its missing a whole bunch of features, like seats, air con, glass ect; but it still works... just barely. Then have the manufacturer say, that they'll add all those in other the next couple of week/months.

I really don't want to play this game in its current state. I don't want to have to wait weeks/months with it sitting on my hard drive, waiting for Kerberos to basically continue to develop the game into the proper retail product. I also don't feel like investing hours into a game only to have it crash, bug or something that renders that play time all for naught, and that already happened. I just don't have the free time to invest into broken products, when I pay for something I want it to work. Kerberos would have to be insane to not offer a refund, so i doubt it more out of good will and more their legal team telling them to, because I could easily win a case against them with the consumer law in Australia related to refunds and faulty products.

In the end, I paid $40 for a game that I've yet to enjoy, a game that still awaiting core features, a game that I do not have any confidence in getting finished before the end of the year. I'd rather have my cash back, and pay for the game when it's done, it'll probably be cheaper by then away.

[A7K]

Except they dont have your money, the only ones with your money atm are steam / GG / w/e you bought it. Contractually the distributors dont have to pay out for months.

[Carl]

If Kerberos had come out a week or so before release and said "Look guys, We haven't finished the game yet, but we're willing to release what we've done now and continue updating it if you are willing to buy it" I would be fine with that...

Thing is if they'd have done that Akranadas we know from the beta testers that it would have been an outright lie.

Whilst we can argue what "a few missing features" means precislly, the reality as described to us was of a game with far more working. Quite possibbly to the point that if you didn't know what features where missing you wouldn't in fact notice their lack, (though that is conjecture). Kerberos seeminglly didn't know how FUBAR things where themselves until after you guys did.

Why do you think there offering refunds, they know that, (intenionally or otherwise), what they dillevered wasn't a full game, it was, (as you put it), a beta at the price of a full game. It's there way (to me), of goign, "Look we know you didn't agree to pay for a beta, and that is ultimetly what you got. Good intentions aside we know thats not on so if you want to opt out and get a full refund, well here you go".

[boolybooly]

changelog

Changelog for update r17948b

*** This update might break some old save games. ***

Critical fixes:
- Fixed a bug that prevented income from being generated when doing a feasibility study.
- Fixed a crash that could occur when trying to automatically distribute sliders from a hidden slider.
- Fixed a crash with support missions trying to open a dialog twice in a turn.
- Fixed a crash that would occur if closing the game while it was booting up.
- Fixed a von neumann crash caused by the faction running out of resources for a new collector fleet.
- Fixed an issue with crashing gem/forge world events from trying to apply moral bonus.
- Drones can now be designed and assigned to ships.
- Battle Riders may now be launched and recovered via their weapon icons in combat.
- Combat turn flow was rewritten. All combat queries are now answered at once, and then all combat simulations play out.
- Fixed a bug that stopped biome colonizers from improving terraforming values.

Other fixes:
- Fixed a recent issue where only the default player profile would be used.
- Fixed tech requirements on a few freighter ship sections.
- Removed "freighter" designation from ship sections to which it was incorrectly applied.
- Tarka freighter savings cost has been reduced from 1.5-million to 150,000.
- Leviathan stats have been improved.
- Tweaked turret arcs on a number of ship and station sections.
- Stations whose crew die off stop rotating in combat.
- Patrol battle riders now follow their tenders better.
- Fixed an issue where battle riders were not swarming around stations effectively.
- Fixed feasibility speech cues from using wrong speech library.
- Fixed admiral driven speech to use proper case.
- Fixed researching sound.
- Fixed research completed early sound cue.
- Fixed the battle draw and winning battle speech cues.
- Fixed under-the-hood sliders to automatically reset themselves to zero.
- Fixed an issue with swarmers trying to assign themselves to systems with no planets.
- Fixed an issue with the flock bonus not being used as a percentage.
- Moved the overharvest warning event to the correct location to stop it spamming every time the IO was queried.
- Fixed an issue that caused the gem and forge world events to spam.
- Fixed battle manager bug when entering system with no Naval base.
- Made visual culling much more subtle on star map to avoid labels popping in and out.
- Cleaned up view filter modes, populated list through code instead of through xml.
- Fixed issue in battle manager where station slots where being displayed even if no CP was available.
- Properly hooked up Mission/Engine section name display to riders in rider manager.
- Combat ready animations no longer loop incorrectly on ships.
- Save games should stay significantly smaller now due to the disabling of a debug feature that was storing a detailed history of all previous changes.
- Fixed a visual issue where tracking torpedoes would draw erroneous lines across the screen.
- The trade view filter on the star map now shows different icons for star systems.
- Fixed a bug that caused the admirals to return an incorrect admiral prefix to sound cues.
- Fixed a bug where Liir Naval Stations were displaying Hiver station assets.
- Fixed visual jitter for battle riders returning to tender.
- Fixed an issue where turn events were not displaying for some.
- Fixed various sizing bugs in GUI lists.
- Protean pods will return attacks.
- Fixed incorrect terrain names in Clouds and Ring star maps.

Other changes:
- New entries have been added to the encyclopedia's Galactic Atlas.
- Added new weapons: Blast Storm Missile, Polaris Blast Beam Missile
- Added new Rift star map.
- Added the ability to skip camera transitions with the escape key.
- Added a tutorial help screen for trade.
- Added Zuul freighters.
- Added missing Von Neumann PD weapons.
- Adjusted station visibility distances for combat.
- Added default ship names for command ships, bore ships, and gate ships.
- Implementation of initial, new post combat dialog.
- Added trade Modifier for trade distances.
- Added a table to keep track of trade results to stop clients from not being able to see trade.
- Stopped the ability to trade with someone you are at war with.
- Increased the max planet range for provinces by 1 ly.
- Added a configuration ability for disabling the main menu combat scene. There is no user interface for this diagnostic option, but it can be modified at your own risk in

'%localappdata%\Sword of the Stars II\settings\settings.xml' by adding or modifying the LoadMenuCombat element with a True or False value.
- Added launch effects for planet-to-orbit weapons.
- Added "Reserve Slot" label to reserve rider slots.
- Added events for post combat.
- Added realtime feedback to trade slider adjustment in trade view.
- Added filter to battle rider manager to display only carriers in widget.
- Added color coding to riders in rider manager.
- Added max flock bonus to strat mods and hooked it up to morrigi drive tech.
- Added a function for adding orbits with orbit numbers.

Key known issues:
- There is no post-combat popup.
- Screen transition time still slow for some.
- Game not running in 64-bit for some (running 32-bit works).
- Looking for people unable to connect to GameSpy for MP.

[Methuselath]

That's weird, I seem to only have the tarka immersion pack, but didn't receive the Suul'ka pack from gamersgate. Are we supposed to get it now?

[Paladin]

Akranadas: If you honestly feel that way about it, you should request your refund and buy it at a later date, or not, even. My point is that the only thing that has any real effect on corporations is whether or not you give them your money. Everything else you can do is pretty irrelevant. Gamers in general are a bunch of whipped pansies in this area. They'll buy Brand X's next game even though the last three sucked and they've screamed and moaned about how the series is going to hell for years.

It's like raising a kid or training a pet. If you give them a treat for everything they do, whether you like it or not, it doesn't matter if you yell at them about the stuff you don't like. At some point they're going to, reasonably enough, decide that what you say is irrelevant, and they can do whatever they want.

If you feel a company has done you some sort of actual injury you should demand a refund, because if you don't your displeasure is essentially meaningless.

[Imrix]

And this right here, Paladin, is an example of how far people will go to defend those developers they are biased in favour of. Any other game, any other developer, and you would be on one of your finer rants right now

Maybe so, but Kerberos has done enough to earn my bias in their favour.

This is, no doubt about it, their worst release to date. But when have they ever released a game in tip-top shape? They're Kerberos! They have terrible releases, they stick by their products, and about a year after the release date you have a fantastic game that you're still playing for yonks afterwards. That's just how they work, and I bought SotS2 in full knowledge of this.

I got a worse deal than I thought, and I was angry at Kerberos for that. But they're sticking with their product, they're patching it swiftly and repeatedly, and I can see the potential in this. Once it finds its feet, I expect I'll be enjoying it for a long, long time to come

I have faith in Kerberos. That faith has a dent in it, but it's a dent, not a hole. It might become a hole if they do something like this again, but that's for the future. On the strength of Kerberos' past work, I'll stick with them.

[boolybooly]

My feeling is I want this game to be finished more than I want to score points against KP.

But if we are having a postmortem I am not going to prevaricate. IMHO KP knew exactly what they were releasing which is why Erinys blogged it as Black Friday.

I think this happened because they wanted to go pro as game devs and wanted to raise their standards, make a great game, hit the bigtime. So they went for it and pulled out all the stops, too many in fact. Which is part commendable part understandable part tragicomic.

The scenario I have in mind, all hypothetical conjecture, is they went into debt to Paradox to fund the expanded studio, they over specced the SotSII release version at design stage, took too long to fill out the spec, ran out of money, had to downsize the studio with an unfinished game, dwindling workforce and big pile of debt and their credit was running dry so they had to make a big pile of money or lose the game and the studio.

Before this they were self funded indys and were more cost effective but used to get the mickey taken for various cheap elements of the game like sound. I think they wanted to do better but the transition to pro dev was too much for their level of experience. I think success upset them. I dont think they managed their resources or the project effectively. All that is forgivable.

What it appears they then chose to do, when they were looking at a big pile of debt and the potential demise of the studio, was to not tell us about the state of the game to maximise the release day income. I think they felt that they either lose the studio or pull a fast one and to their mind the latter was the lesser of two evils. I think they felt that a buy in beta would put a lot of people off and they might miss the financial target and lose it all anyway so they decided to do what they did with complete awareness of what they were doing and felt it was better to face the music from the angry fans than lose everything. At any rate I do hope they had felt they were going to lose the studio, because that is the only thing which would justify this decision in my mind.

Its hard to say if there was a middle way or not without seeing the figures, it depends on deadlines and debt. Whether there were other contributory factors involved in derailing development I dont know but I think the main reason is lack of project management experience at that kind of professional level. I can understand that as IMHO its trickier than you might think. But what I as a gamer and responsible citizen cannot do is say its OK to do that. It cannot be condoned, but it is preferrable to losing the studio and the game so I would back it in that context. Luckily for KP the law is on their side and what happens to SotS2 now depends on who trusts KP and who wants a refund. I dont think that denial and prevarication and fantasy football of various shades will do anything but anger those thinking about a refund, I think the truth is more persuasive. If you like what this game could be, then give them time.

[Akranadas]

Paladin: I have requested a refund. I said that earlier. I was pointing out why I was requesting said refund.

I tend to agree with Gorb, if this was say a product made by someone like EA or Activision; even if they had the exact same intentions of continual updates to make the game up to par on what it should been at released, you would be calling for their heads. But because Kerberos and Paradox are "little guys" they have this strange underdog status, so people will blindly defend poor decisions and praise words from the developers.

[Carl]

@Booly: That bull and you know it. Please can the hyperbole for your own agenda, i'm not in the mood to show any paitence with it.

@Akranadas: if this where activision et al i would be going mad myself. But i'd be doing it because i know it will absolutly never get fixed and they absolutly will not learn from the experiance. This isn't one of those companies though. They're not known for repeatedly releases utterly FUBAR products or known for minimial support for their FUBAR'd non-MMO games. This could be an honest mistake and a one off, and there's no sign they're just going to cut support.

Now if they do cut support and they do establish a precedent of FUBAR'd releases with their next release you cna bet we'll all be a LOT less forgiving. This is the first time it's happened. A relitivlly new studio getting in over it's head and screwing things up? Pretty much par for the course IMHO. It's only more suprising it dosen't happen more often.

[Paladin]

Paladin: I have requested a refund. I said that earlier. I was pointing out why I was requesting said refund.

I tend to agree with Gorb, if this was say a product made by someone like EA or Activision; even if they had the exact same intentions of continual updates to make the game up to par on what it should been at released, you would be calling for their heads. But because Kerberos and Paradox are "little guys" they have this strange underdog status, so people will blindly defend poor decisions and praise words from the developers.

Whether you say it or Gorb says it, it's still incorrect. I'm pretty much the ultimate authority on what I'd do in a given situation yanno, and I can tell you I would not. I didn't bitch over Might and Magic Heroes VI, which was and is in at least as bad a state at release as SotSII, without the advantage of patches... at all.

Have the hungarian developers even broken their utter and complete wall of silence or released a patch yet? I haven't checked in a week or so.

Anyway, point is I don't buy a game unless I would want to purchase it regardless of its buggy/incomplete status, because I expect all developers to deliver their games in that state at release. It's kind of the general rule, to be honest.

I look at game costs as a frivolous expense anyway, so it's just kind of something I only spend what I can afford to "throw away" on.

So I barely buy any games, and when I do, if they're blah, I just shrug and move on, because you can't get a refund for PC games anywhere. Except Kerberos apparently, which still shocks me tbh.

[Akranadas]

I suspect Kerberos offering refunds has more to do with potential legal action that could be taken against them. I know my countries consumer laws product customers against faulty or products which aren't what they said they were, even digital ones.

Not all of us have $40 to blow on a game that has the potential to sit on their hard drives, waiting for the developers to patch it to a playable level (my opinion on playable is obviously different), when I put down that cash, I was expecting to get at least $40 worth of entertainment from SoTS2, I've got none of that so I feel like I waste my cash. Unfortunately, I won't get that cash back, I get steam credits instead -_-

[Imrix]

if this was say a product made by someone like EA or Activision; even if they had the exact same intentions of continual updates to make the game up to par on what it should been at released, you would be calling for their heads.

If this was a product made by EA or Activision, it wouldn't get continual support and patches, because that's now how those companies operate.

In fact, I challenge you to prove me wrong. Name a game released by EA or Activision that had support, meaning actual updates and patches, for more than two years. You may include expansion packs.

[Gorb]

That's hardly a fair comparison, given the number of expansion packs SotS has had.

Find me a game by EA that has had a number of expansion packs equal to SotS, and then we'll talk. Not that comparing the respective length of a company's member is going to get us anywhere, but you are proposing a somewhat weighted comparison there.

[Paladin]

I suspect Kerberos offering refunds has more to do with potential legal action that could be taken against them. I know my countries consumer laws product customers against faulty or products which aren't what they said they were, even digital ones.

I honestly doubt that those laws protect you as well as you think they do, because I know for sure that in the US there's definitely no way to get a refund on PC software, pretty much ever. There've been plenty of other games that were released in states as bad or significantly worse than this, and I've literally never seen a developer or publisher actually provide a refund when asked or demanded, let alone actually offer one publically and proactively. It may have happened in the past, but I'm not aware of a single instance of it ever.

[Akranadas]

In fact, I challenge you to prove me wrong. Name a game released by EA or Activision that had support, meaning actual updates and patches, for more than two years. You may include expansion packs.

Battlefield 2

- Released in 2005
- Updated all the way to 2009 (4 years)
- Updated 11 times during that 4 years
- 3 Expansion Packs (Or DLC)
- Special Forces
- Euro Forces
- Armoured Fury
- Last update was Sep 01, 2009
- Released previous paid expansions for free

[Imrix]

That's hardly a fair comparison, given the number of expansion packs SotS has had.

Find me a game by EA that has had a number of expansion packs equal to SotS, and then we'll talk. Not that comparing the respective length of a company's member is going to get us anywhere, but you are proposing a somewhat weighted comparison there.

That was why I was including expansion packs in the length of support provided for the games. Apologies, I should have been more clear about that.

Battlefield 2

Fair enough, and if they did that for every game they released (like Kerberos does), I'd probably trust them a lot more.

[Akranadas]

All games are support after release through patches, they may not go on for 1 or 2 years, but I guess you could debate whether EA or Activision games need patching as often (if they squash majority of the bugs in 1 - 2 patches) within the first few months of release. It's not like they simply ship and forget, they support their products as much as Kerberos, but you could debate the quality of patches vs how buggy the product is.

[Misiok]

Except Kerberos hasn't released that many games. They released like what? 3 games, one SotS + Expansions (if you count Expansions as games then add 3 games to that 'list'), Fort Zombie (which is terribly indie - terribad optimization, feels more like a shitty mod than a full game, but I didn't mind that, it was their second game, made somewhat during the time they were making the second expansion for SotS) and SotS 2.

So yeah, right now they released a whole one good game. Then the fucked it up by releasing a beta. For 60$ or so. That's how you build good image. Hopefully they won't turn out as that guy responsible for Project Zomboid who was making the game on donations and good will (just like Kerberos is doing right now) and screw you all over.


I love SotS, interesting story, races, nice gameplay elements and all. I love the first game. But the second one I can't call even call a 'game'. Stop fooling yourselves. You bought it, you paid for it, okay, it's not what they promised but you have to justify it now and hope for the best. Me? I'm terribly disappointed. My faith in gaming was pretty much non-existant after lots of promises turned out to be downright lies and the games themselves were just shit/unplayable by the plenthora of bugs. Compare RAGE/Sots 2 to Skyrim, a Bethesda game, a company that's KNOWN for releasing buggy/glitchy games that get sorted out with patches and huge mod support. And yet their day 1 release is way better than most of the games released in this month.


Also, some of you said that you already get enjoyment from this. I bet there's as much enjoyment from playing an unstable beta release as there is in playing Grand Theft Auto 4 on a single core cpu.

[A7K]

Its hardly unstable at this point can you at least speak from a position of experience before you start spouting hyperbole and unsupported facts.

300 turns in with not one crash at this point.

been like that for 5 games since the 3rd patch.

[boolybooly]

@Booly: That bull and you know it. Please can the hyperbole for your own agenda, i'm not in the mood to show any paitence with it.

Heh, maybe it is conjecture like I said but its not so far from the truth as hyperbole and there is supporting evidence. One that Erinys knew what they were doing, two that the studio has been downsized and she was mourning the loss of co workers. Thay have had to let their interface guy go and I think he was one of the partners so that may be a voluntary move for the moment. I think they are down to four (of five) partners and an assistant, either that or the five partners. I think they have Kludgy and rimbimbambo on engine, mecron on sundry scriptables, erinys on text, and castewar is running around producing, probably meeting people looking for money and publicising and damage control. Its getting pretty close to the thin end of doable but it is doable and if they can keep it going until they turn the corner financially they may be able to bring back some of the others.

The difference between EA of old and KP is that KP have a substantial bug fixing strategy whereas EA always tried to treat a game like a film and wanted expenses to stop once it was out, you cant really do that with software. I have my fingers crossed for KP, I expect the new financial year will be make or break.

[Paladin]

Dude... They've all specifically said they had no money troubles, outright said it. They've also said that the person(s) Erinys referred to missing were not "let go", but left due to health concerns. They have not elaborated on what those health concerns are, nor would it be appropriate for them to do so.

[boolybooly]

No money troubles *now*, as for health, I did read something ambiguous about that, but decided it was incidental to the main explanation because you cant explain downsizing a 14 employee studio to 5 because they are all ill! Not unless it is contagious...

[Paladin]

They've never said there's only 5 people there, just that they only have 5 programmers. Rimbimbambo said they have as many coders as they've ever had.

[A7K]

They have lost 4 people If i correctly recall, an art guy, and intern, a code-monkey, and someone who I don't know what job they had.

I know this because I applied for an internship with them and they told me their intern had just moved on to another studio.

[boolybooly]

Interesting...! Good luck A7K Make us some good games eh!

I hope you are right about the current staff situation as that would be more hopeful on one hand though more people is more expensive and less bug fixing time per capital on the other. Mecrons assertion there will be no early demise to SotS2 patching all hinges on what he means by early, doesnt it? And we know how his statements require a legalistic interpretation already.

But if the studio was not at stake then how can you explain this release? It would be kind of insulting to assume they just bumbled their way into a disaster of this kind of magnitude. Erinys was pretty clear with her *birthing* analogy that either they released now or the game died and that has to mean a financial contractual thing, I dont think she was talking about artistic ennui.

If they didnt realise the state of the game they would have to be totally incompetent, which just doesnt make sense. In the end it has to be about money, or possibly a contract with a bad deadline and IP forfeit clause, nothing else can explain this IMHO.

[FriendlyFire]

It's called "contractual obligations".

[Carl]

@Booly: Ok i thought you where just being delibretlly ignorant, now i really don't know what to think becuase it's like you haven't read more than a handful of the posts in this thread ATM.


To summarise the issues:

1. If they'd released becuase they ran out they would have known well in advance what the state was, and thus so would Paradox, meaning Paradox screwed up just as badly if not more so here, (Since there's often nothing stopping the publisher from passing one studios game onto another studio for that second studio to finish off).

The scenario we got is a lot more pluasiblle IMHO, and defintlly lets paradox take no more than equal blame. Namely that they made last minute changes less than 24 hours from release and then made some bad snap decishions based on very limited testing. Natrually it shouldn't have ended up like it did, but it's understandable even if it's not acceptable.

2. We know from industry insiders that it's going to be many months before they see any money, if they where as short as your suggesting they'd go banckrupt before they saw a penny.

3. Likewise if they where so short they simply wouldn't be able to to afford to give the patch throughput we've seen or the refunds they're giving out.


To anwser the last section of your last posts a bit more than the prior poster:

Simply put several monhs ago when they hashed out how long the beta was going to be they would have agreed with paradox a publishing date. Barring Paradox changing that last minute, (difficult and expensive to do), the game was going out the door on that date regardless of how finished it was.

[A7K]

The main reason the game is in the state it is, is in fact steam not the company but the way in which the client itself functions.

Steam has a policy that they will not force a user to redownload a game against their will. In an ideal situation they would have just pulled their stable backups and reuploaded them to Steam doing away with the old version. However since they cant do that the bastard child of a beta build and a buggy release build that had a few too many last minute changes combined their directories, messing up code destroying swathes of patches to existing code and in general blowing the game all to hell.

They literally had to download the steam version, decompile it and work from there completely making all their backups useless for anything but reference.


P.S.- the only way they could restore their backups is to make a patch containing the entire game-directory of their backups and ensure it overwrites the existing files in their entirety, after the backlash for the first patch i doubt people will be happy with a 5-8Gb patch.

[Shin]

seems like the last patch took the game out of alpha and into beta

[boolybooly]

Well OK that is the good news, if I can just get my grumpy hat off this morning, but... a very early beta!

A7K, what evidence do you have for that, is it your hypothesis or do you have access to personal communication? I certainly considered that possibility as an explanation but it does not seem very likely to me, seems to come under the "Alien from Atlantis stole my code" heading for fantasy excuses! I dont think they would balk at making people redownload if it meant saving months of work. Though they might use that excuse for eyewash to help with audience irritation.

Carl I thought about those excuses too and they dont hold much water either IMHO. They made snap decisions to disable code modules because the code was already a mess and it was presumably less of a mess after that or at least comparable to the state before that decision and easier to work on, more eyewash IMHO. Whoever holds KPs debt eg a bank or Paradox itself is not going to foreclose if money is en route so that does not invalidate the financial/contractual scenario.

[A7K]

Its in Steam's Publishing agreement if i recall correctly. It says that for no reason can a customer be forced to remove any program already installed.

and logically if you replace the build online without wiping everyone's directories you will just cause more snafu's by mixing versions.


Just try it by try taking half a game folder from an older version of the same game and past it into the latest version. See how far you get without bugs and crashes.

Edit: I cant for the life of me find the damned document but ive seen it somewhere, till i do treat this with a grain of salt.

Double Edit: Its more likely they disabled the modules in the patch made on day one not the version they intended to release.

[Paladin]

booly: Actually from Steam's perspective I can see why they'd make that decision. Getting users to comply with instructions like "wipe entire directory" can be an absolute unmitigated nightmare. If you've ever worked support, you'll know just how hard it can be to get people to follow instructions.

So just having a "All updates must be patches to existing installation" policy would make sense. It would inconvenience your developers, but make it easier for you as the distributor.

[A7K]

On top of that I would imagine from a business perspective, its much better to inconvenience your developers than to inconvenience your customers.


Edit: Considering people were absolutely raging at them for the day one patch id argue that making everyone re download at this point would do more harm than good.

[Paladin]

Yeah, the people on metered broadband throw spectacular fits.

[boolybooly]

it now has a show stopper bug with no survey outside initial support range

*starts to blub*