Game Release Delay Opinions

Hate to be this guy, but it's different in one crucial aspect: Windows Vista was a $200 operating system, MWO is a free-to-play premium game in beta. I don't disagree with the sentiments on this thread, generally, but if you're feeling like you've been ripped off, you should probably pump the brakes and realize that any money you coughed up was done of your own volition. No one had to pay to walk in the door.

 

Exactly.

 

Ahhh, but they can't (or hopefully won't). It's not like the Clans sent out notification of "Hey, we're coming to invade you and this is how" in the lore. If we had that information, we would prepare and stop them in their tracks.

 

The thingis, for us, we KNOW this game is beta and we are in with that. And playing a game that is BETA means that are are things like bugs and other problems here and there. Yes, I did pay for some stuff, hoping to help with the development, and to have a good time. I think we can sort of say the same for the rest of us.

The problem comes when a NEW player shows up AFTER the game is officially launched, expacting it to be a somewhat complete game. But the content, as we know it, is still a beta game tiwh the beta sign removed. Now THEY would be disappointed, and they may not come back.

I do not expact magical ponies jumping out solving all the bugs and adding akk the missing features right after the launch date, but right now the status of the game is quite Beta indeed. For me, launch date or not, it makes no difference, I will just play on as normal.

In short, I don't think we have been ripped off. But new players coming after the so-called official launch date may feel that way, and that is not a good thing.

 

This is my whole concern. We dont MWO to kill itself.

 

In general, I don't disagree with the sentiments in this thread. Launch does seem underwhelming. Personally, I would have been satisfied with just the new UI at launch and a roadmap on the months ahead.

Anyway, I am not familiar at all with the relationship between PGI and IGP, but I wonder if IGP, as their publisher, put some sort of requirement in their contract to "launch" by a certain date. To go deeper into the land of tin foil hats and conspiracy theories, but what happened with MechWarrior Tactics might be a case in point. Roadhouse Interactive is no longer the developer, and I don't know if there was ever an explanation on that. It might have been that they failed to meet their contractual requirements (missed milestones, etc.) and IGP pulled them.

Again, I have no facts to back up these theories, just some random thoughts on what I've seen happen in the game industry.

 

Vergere heard my opinion on this earlier today, but I'll share with everyone.

I think releasing is a bad idea based on 2 things:

1) F2P model relies on customers spending money, and new customers who are spending money to justify the cost of producing content. It's a surprisingly complicated business model, but has proven to be very successful when deployed correctly. But we're also facing a strange time for game opinions that tend to be based on reviews >= 80% or higher. Anything less has this weird effect of being viewed as garbage and unplayable... So releasing a game before it's even feature complete (something that should be labeled Alpha, btw), is generally a bad idea these days. If MWO gets a slew of bad or mediocre reviews, a lot of people are going to skip right over it and not think twice. MWO has a solid fanbase now, but if the official forums are a litmus test for how the community feels, it's a toxic community.

2) Not having at least one major feature available prior to release is a problem for the above reasons, which could also result in IGP not granting needed or further publishing assistance to Piranha when requested. Since I don't know very many details about IGP or it's publishing agreements with Piranha or other two studios, I'm basing this completely and totally on assumptions.

I generally think it's a bad idea to launch (even if it is just a "milestone") before you have at least one of your two major features completed. The game is simply not far enough along to justify arbitrarily hitting this rather important milestone. I would wait, at least, for UI2, if nothing else.


Edit:: Let me know if I need to better clarify this.