can we say that PA is halfway to be completed

I know that there are many new thing added in the game and there still thing to be added, but the question is are we halfway there to see this game finished(released).

I have some questions and I would like your opinion in them:
1- Can we say that PA is half way finished?
2-At what point is PA now?
3-will be PA be released between February and March, or will there be another delay?

I would say far more than half. Just building the engine is more than half. There's no telling how many units and features we will get in the final product, and I think there's a mountain left to do, but we have to keep in mind that the hardest parts are all long behind Uber. The game gets on screen and is in a playable state, that's 75%. Everything after that is delicious icing.

Well, let's look at what's missing:

Gas Giants (Being worked on by one person as of last month ?source?)
Unit Cannons (Put on hold due to coding issues)
The full unit roster (I don't even know what we are missing but I''d like to know)
Orbital mass transport units and Orbital balancing for the ending of stalemates no matter the system.

I'm guessing Late February - mid March release, but that completely depends on the Unit Cannon.

Meh. Whats about the galactic war ? This is a launch feature and we have nothing at the moment, so I think this could take a while, but it's okay...
With this topic we really need a Vanguard or an Developer.

[OPINION] I would say we are more than halfway, you will probably find the latter stages happen really quickly.

At the moment they are finalising becoming feature complete and starting balance and then it's on to UI + polishing and then optimisations.

Vanguards have the same information I do. I talk to them almost daily remember? lol.
Oh wait, you kinda do to.

Anyway, Galactic War is also being worked on, but that info is so outdated that it could be completely wrong.

I think also the UI is being overhauled, by ~3 people? Should be done SOON

That's optimistic. It's like asking if we are half done curing cancer. How they hell to you qualify or quantify that?!

what about offline feature, when will that be implanted?

I'm assuming here that by "your opinion", you are indicating that of one of the devs, but I'll give you my own thoughts on this as well.

1 - Probably more than halfway, but that depends on how you define 'finished'. I'm assuming by finished you mean the first public release, but Uber has already made it clear they will continue to expand and support the game well beyond release. So in that sense it will not really be finished for a long time, and continue to change.

2 - This is probably something that no one outside Uber knows, so I'll leave it to them. My guess is that with various shifting features, the complicated nature of debugging, and community input changing things, it may be hard for even them to pin it down.

3 - If I had to guess, I'd bet it will probably not come out before the end of March, but that's almost purely speculation.

Bottom line, there are a lot of uncertainties and decisions outside our knowledge, but I'm confident in Uber to deliver a solid product in that way that the best game companies do, "when it's ready" : ]

I would say its actually 25% when devs think its nearing 50%. Because there goes a lot of work for optimization, finding and fixing bugs and features, then game balance, making modding tools stable etc. So when you have all features coded in and all assets in kind of final state then its half way to polished game, and we not yet there. Also with games you can say its either ready or not, counting percentage for something that you can not put in numbers is kind of pointless.

But anyway game is fun already, I do not regret paying for this alpha at all. And guys be realistic, do not get pumped up on marketing crap, because its marketing madness that ruined normal way of publishing games, do not repeat same mistakes for crowd funding.

The last 10% of the project is 90% of the work.

I think it's pretty hard to estimate how much is left to do without knowing the amount of polish they intend to put into this before release. It will also never be "done" because they will keep working after release.

i meant released by saying finished

HEY! It's a better alternative to saying December this year.

I mean, honestly, these devs aren't SOE. They don't change their minds on what to do every thirty days or thirty minutes.

So yeah, I reserve the right to be optimistic, because all these features have been worked on to some extent afaik.

These aren't greenhorns. They know what they are doing not telling us their ETR.

my list of "necessary and not yet done" includes;

-code optimization
-linux bugs (some keys not working)
-offline play & save game options
-eye candy (rubble instead of grey versions of destroyed units, and planetary collisions)

but that's not to say I'm not happy. i'm having a blast toying around with the game. in a sense, I kinda consider it "done", in that I can play it and have a good time (the whole idea). and I know it's just going to get better.

i would almost consider a delay good news, because it's just going to be that much better in the end.

but at some point Uber needs to sell product to the masses

We say this daily at my office. Every ticket that pops up 5 minutes before a delivery deadline reminds us. At the same time, even though the last 10% takes 90% of the time, It's still 90% complete if you don't mind the missing 10%.

I don't know if I'd agree. Building the engine is not necessarily more than half at all, it's one thing to have an engine but it's quite another to construct a functional and enjoyable game around it. Look at the likes of Starcraft 2 for example - that game was in development for years and years after its initial reveal, even though it was clear the engine it ran on was fully functional - Game design is an extremely iterative process. So I wouldn't agree that anything above "playable" is icing. Anything above "an extremely fun game" is icing.

To be honest Uber are taking a bit of a risk in their development cycle. First impressions are pretty crucial, the danger they have is that a lot of people will associate the PA brand with those early buggy alpha videos. Starcraft 2 on the other hand (as an arbitrary example) was only really revealed when the game was extremely functional and they demonstrated some very pretty graphics and ingame playthroughs. I'm not saying it would be right to judge PA from alpha footage, I'm just saying that a lot of people unfortunately will, either through ignorance of the early access development process or just plain stupidity.

Regardless, aside from it being clear that the overall game design itself isnt final, it's clear a lot of back end work on the engine is still to be done also. They must have a huge laundry list of features yet to be implemented, and that doesnt even have to include the masses of system design to allow for matchmaking, tournaments, "galactic war" or whatever the stretch goal was called. In game they havent got round to implementing relatively fundamental things like units with independent firing multiple weapons, let alone more cosmetic things like destructible foliage. It's clear the planet smashing design needs a lot of work too.

Then theres the basic UI and how information is relayed to the player - they need to give that some serious thought and start experimenting with some ideas for feedback. I think it's clear that only allowing the player to view the units on half a planet at once, in a game with multiple planets, is a bit too limited. Information needs to be accessible "at a glance", at the moment it's seriously hidden.



But then, I don't doubt that it can all be done - Uber have laid some impressive groundwork. I don't think it would be reasonable to expect a version 1.0 release until at least September this year though.

Who says Uber doesn't have a wad of cash lying around labeled MARKETING CAMPAIGN? I can see them making some awesome new videos to promote PA as it is supposed to be on some big name sites or making a TV ad.

I don't agree with some people who posted on this thread, while others i do agree in some points. in the end non of us except the Devs know the true ETR(estimated time for release).

It's like building a house.. you feel like you are making great progress putting up the foundation and structural bits.. then the last 10% takes forever. It keeps you warm and dry but you'll die of lung cancer from all the dust.

To keep things in context... if you make a fantastic cake but forget to add icing it's not going to be a very good cake upon delivery. The real point was that the technical hurdles are 75% delivered while building in-game assets and balancing are no where near as demanding or risky a task. Given they've been developing for quite a while before opening up to the public 25% still implies many months, possible more than a year.

I'm in no rush to see a "finished" label slapped on PA. I'd rather it be done right. On a related note, I wish my customer took me seriously when I said "I need a year to build this." They have a nasty habit of "I'll give you 6 months, it should be enough." Last development cycle we asked for 2 years, they gave us 3 months. When it wasn't ready it got delayed 3 months... it still wasn't ready, so it got delayed 3 months. 2 years later they were shocked we delivered right when we said we would.