The Vanguard Newsletter - Issue 3

I'm actually thinking delay until December. I think the community would support that move, especially if you call it Delta OMG AMAZING NEW STUFF! And Steam would love it anyway.

And indefinite beta seems to work for Kerbal, anyway.

I still think delaying a game a whole year just to get some of the more extra features in before release instead of after is a bad move. Anyway it's Uber's choice and we have no real reason to be upset with what they ended up choosing.

KPS is in a different situation thought, it has no monetization scheme, modding is already doing very well for it, it's being handled by a very small team and their goal is beyond simply making a "game" as it were.

Mike

reply plz :>

Yes. It does. I do not challenge that.

Which is why my idea of Delta and releasing server side and material stuff is what I think is the bee's knees.

However, again, it really is all a name. I considered Kerbal "done" by now, is there any problem with that? People have been reviewing it, it's not fair to review a "not done" game, but generally that is just namesake, Kerbal is fairly functional atm. It went the route of "stability" over "features", and has not had extensive features for the longest and only base features including till recently no campaign. However, it is still development, it is still release as well, enough people have access to Kerbal and enough people have opted into playing Kerbal that it is practically released and is still being developed.

There is no inclusive relationship between development and release. That line no longer exists, that is a legacy concept. If it happens it is the design choice of the company. AAA titles hold development up to release and thats how they roll. Some offer DLC after the matter, thats blurring that old-fashon line. Some keep developing years after release on game updates, like TF2, which more serverely blurs the line of release and development. Kerbal has never released but everyone plays it and it stays in development, it has completely blurred the line.

It sounds to me like Uber has chosen Team Fortress 2 as a development naming frame. We can support or petition that, but there is nothing damnable about it, because no matter what the naming frame, they are doing the same development as hard as they can muster, and they will be still yet for long to come.

Well, there's also the concern people have about negative or lukewarm reviews, and also keeping the backers/community happy with a "finished" version closer to what people thought was going to happen. I figure that dragging it out to Delta, etc would keep things rolling for a while. So I don't get why there is a rush to 1.0 at all. In fact, why technically "finish" a game that is meant to be updated long after release anyway?

I'm not sure the whole "early access" style of game development has to work the old way anymore. That sounds like it's for the traditional publishing model and consoles. BETAFIELDS FOREVER!

Really? I thought of Hawken as more or less pulling off the loooong beta thing. I'm surprised that people would dislike that. Their move to Steam is probably exactly what they need to keep going and wrap it up.

Remember the backlash that blizzard caused with the release of Diablo 3? People were totally anxious for a it, but at release time everyone hated it because it was totally incomplete and released too early.
Of course blizzard being blizzard they can take such a hit, but can Uber?

whooo hold your horses there, some might not notice or come across the many bugs and design/mechanics breakdowns, but I do,

The whole of ship construction is absolute shiite, I cannot express how bad it is, you can sometimes grab a part or multiple parts and they will start glitching out, showing their animations in a loop, sticky-ing to the mouse and to wherever they were last droped and rendering said construction unfinishable, unfixable and irrecuperable. The save file will load up like this hereafter. This and numerous other things have not been fixed.

Plus they never implemented multiple point re-attachment where multiple case scenarios with their own parts would permit this.

I consider Kerbal's beta a bad excuse for non-squashed bugs.

They continued technical support for Diablo 3 after release. Did they continue free dlc style additions?

Either way, we are still really articulating "names". So, I will get your attention by being grotesque:

So, human beings are either male or female, and are created that way in their natural development, right? No, not all human beings are strictly male or female. One can mod their gender. One can be created with both. One can be created with neither. All national governments usually ask for information in the form of [M or F], but that is so legacy, traditional, outdated, misconcieved, WRONG, and Germany has started leaving the answer form on that question a blank so you can now answer "Other" or "Rather Not Say".

Speaking of, when does development of a human being end? At birth? So if a human being isn't released, it has no rights yet? Some people argue human beings have rights earlier than birth. Either way, how is "birth" such a grand state of development to be deemed "release"? How different is it at birth, than it was 2 days prior still in the womb? At what exact point should it be considered alive and inclusive, it starts off as nothing and becomes a human being after all, but is it self conscious enough at it's first trimester or is it not self conscious enough until it is 2 years after it started and little over "1 year old"?

Well, just like this game, naming is all semantics. If you want my answer though, it is all grey areas, but if I were to be controversial here for a moment, I don't think human beings are self sentient until they are 1 or 2 years old and start doing "intellegent" self-inspired things, yet I believe they have rights under different things at different stages. Society can grant some rights before birth, parents have control of other rights through development and after birth, and the individual has individual rights once they have the ability to orchestrate accomplishment of their own agendas and debate how their agenda is correct or how they are motivated to it.

Yeah. Deep. Still want to talk about grey areas and naming?

I thought everyone hated it because it was a crap game with a real money auction house. Though, they're probably backpedaling on that latter point because they managed to fatally break the economy, further proof of the first point. Then again, this is only what I've heard second-hand.

Question - were metal planets discussed at all? Are they still on for whatever 1.0 is? Like full on deathstargameover type things?

No we didn't. We have no information on this other then whats on the forums. As far as I know, it a long term stretch goal that won't be in the game at 1.0.

Im not asking for fanboys here. I'm specifically combating a speculative post that helps spread rumors. There are quite a few others here. KNight is dealing with the issues. I'm touching on the principle.

My apologies if I came off too harsh. I did not mean to come off as negative towards negativity.

Yes. Later. In a deep, dungeon, where no one can hear you scream.

It will be a scream of joy.

I was thinking about this just earlier today as my roommate walked in and was watching me play. Odd coincidence you mention this.

Would be interesting, as I stated elsewhere, that as we go back to having normal multi-topic newsletters, that when we discuss progress on development, we try to distant-estimate peg whether features meet with release.

The obviously difficult thing about this, is that "timelines" curse games, especially Uber's games and Uber's development of them. They end up being a kanker sore. That being said, I would like to try to ask questions in that perspective, and ultimately we won't have any great accuracy as to timelines as usual because timelines are bull****.

So, just to list things I think are bull****: Labels (release and beta and genres and everything), timelines (what exact date will things happen, SOONtm, UberTime), and reviews (take everything with a grain of salt, because ALL reviews are biased, so grow a spine and make judgements all your own)

I might be overly preachy today. What's new? Well, apparently its more than usual, nano thought I was high earlier, because some of this stuff is just so distant and stoner-talk as far as undebateable topics and nonexistant answers. Meh. I always sound like this, and I don't even drink/smoke.

The fact that a good portion of people who reside on the Interwebs still take absolutes seriously is kind of sad. These folks need to take a chill pill and watch that moment on Mustafar with Obi-Wan again.

I'll quote: "Only a Sith deals in absolutes." - Obi-Wan Kenobi

Yeah. Darn straight.

There are still absolutes (binary logic anyone?), but this whole game release thing is definitely not one of them.

I was obviously excluding programming and some parts of the Bible.

Thought that would be common sense.

It usually is, but common sense is getting quite rare these days.

Unbelievably so.

RIP common sense. I will keep you around.....though others may bury you....

Me too. But hey, this isn't a conversation for this thread.