Y'all (players) have forgotten the meaning of "Early Access."

[Cereal Killer]

For God's sake would you all quit with the whining? People have gotten so used to games constantly being updated and patched that they've lost sight of what Early Access even means.

The very definition of an Early Access game is a game that is UNFINISHED.

Typical characteristics of an Early Access:

Alpha/Beta state
Graphical bugs
Audio bugs
Mechanic bugs
Lack of content (characters, items, missions)

Early Access does not mean "pretty much done and just needs some polish." It means the game is "playable." It is stable enough and has enough of the core mechanics in place for people to get an idea of the direction the game is going.

You're essentially beta testers. Play the game. Provide constructive feedback to the developers. Offer content suggestions, quality of life suggestions, bug reports, etc. Your recommendations and observations are an important part of the development process and heavily affect the final product. Jumping into every thread and saying "iT's MisSiNg BLuePriNtS, TF1 wAs beTTer" over and over again or "iS tHiS tOO eaRLY foR EaRly AcCeSS???" is asinine and does not contribute in any way to the development.

If you like the game, play it and have fun. If you don't like it for xyz reasons then add those into the pinned suggestion and bug threads and go play a different game for a while then come back in a month or two and see the current state of the game.

No one forced you to buy an unfinished game and no one made any promises. Steam explicitly states you are about to purchase an Early Access title and describes what that entails before you even get to the payment step. FFS the whining is absolutely obnoxious...

[Bobby_Hill (♀)]

This so damn much. I gotta keep reminding people EndNight Studios has only 15 employees!

[JJ]

I think none of the people who are complaining played The Forest on the first day of early access release. If they had, they'd know how much more stable and put-together this game is for early access. If only they knew how buggy and low on content The Forest was on release.
It's just people being naive is all.

[Ataxio]

Just let them screech like wild cannibals and move on. This is all because the games popular right now. As soon as another $700 CoD DLC comes out they will vanish.

[Eric Clapped 'Em]

Early Access for this game isn't the problem. The problem is that this game was supposed to be a full release until like 2 weeks before where the developer changed it to be an Early Access release. Obviously the developers did so for a reason (and that reason is apparent), but leading everyone on right before it released was a bit much.

I think because this game was supposed to be a finished product, people are expecting it to be more finished than they have experienced. I also think those people are very valid in their complaints considering this game was never planned to be released in Early Access. The game has been supposedly worked on for years and years, so it is valid that people would expect a game that felt, to them, like it was worked on for years and years.

To your comment, 'Early Access does not mean "pretty much done and just needs some polish."', except it actually does for this game. Even the developers themselves that was pretty much the case. If you read the Early Access section on the store page, it tells you that. The game is effectively complete with story and such, but the developers wanted another 6-8 months to add more recipes and maybe some other mechanics in the game. I'd say that pretty much sums it up as, "pretty much done, but needs a little more work".

[Your English Teacher]

Originally posted by SleddingHedgehogs:

Early Access for this game isn't the problem. The problem is that this game was supposed to be a full release until like 2 weeks before where the developer changed it to be an Early Access release. Obviously the developers did so for a reason (and that reason is apparent), but leading everyone on right before it released was a bit much.

I think because this game was supposed to be a finished product, people are expecting it to be more finished than they have experienced. I also think those people are very valid in their complaints considering this game was never planned to be released in Early Access. The game has been supposedly worked on for years and years, so it is valid that people would expect a game that felt, to them, like it was worked on for years and years.

To your comment, 'Early Access does not mean "pretty much done and just needs some polish."', except it actually does for this game. Even the developers themselves that was pretty much the case. If you read the Early Access section on the store page, it tells you that. The game is effectively complete with story and such, but the developers wanted another 6-8 months to add more recipes and maybe some other mechanics in the game. I'd say that pretty much sums it up as, "pretty much done, but needs a little more work".

At least it hasn't been delayed already before this.

[NIXXION44]

Endnight used the word polish on twitter not me, i said broken.

[kuraiken]

Originally posted by SleddingHedgehogs:

Early Access for this game isn't the problem. The problem is that this game was supposed to be a full release until like 2 weeks before where the developer changed it to be an Early Access release. Obviously the developers did so for a reason (and that reason is apparent), but leading everyone on right before it released was a bit much.

I think because this game was supposed to be a finished product, people are expecting it to be more finished than they have experienced. I also think those people are very valid in their complaints considering this game was never planned to be released in Early Access. The game has been supposedly worked on for years and years, so it is valid that people would expect a game that felt, to them, like it was worked on for years and years.

To your comment, 'Early Access does not mean "pretty much done and just needs some polish."', except it actually does for this game. Even the developers themselves that was pretty much the case. If you read the Early Access section on the store page, it tells you that. The game is effectively complete with story and such, but the developers wanted another 6-8 months to add more recipes and maybe some other mechanics in the game. I'd say that pretty much sums it up as, "pretty much done, but needs a little more work".

The time a game is being worked on does not correlate to how well a game is at ANY stage of the later development process.

The game was delayed, twice. That should tell you something about issues in the development process.
The game was released as early access with the dev OUTRIGHT saying that this is the only alternative to delaying again because the game is not ready for a full release.

Those things were communicated. You knew them.
Why didn't you pay attention?
Why did you have to go and buy an Early Access marked game on RELEASE DAY, instead of waiting a couple of days to get the lay of the land.
What on earth made you think that's a good idea if you didn't have the foggiest clue as to what the above mentioned, communicated issues meant?

Is it that hard to not release-day buy an early access game if you don't know what you're in for?

[Zack911]

I agree with waht ea means but for real it isnt worth 30 dollar they could have selled it for less money in ea

[76561198018342430]

All I read was, gobble gobble.

Let me give you an example of another early access game, Star citizen, it has been in early access for like 10 years,it is full of bugs, poor performance and you know what, I am fine with that, want to know why ? because they are making something that has never been done before on a massive scale in a highly ambitious project. Sure they are taking the piss with the prices of some of the ships and I am not going to suck their ♥♥♥♥ and defend everything about the game but I do cut them some slack because of the type of project that it is.

There is nothing groundbreaking about this, it is a couple of ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ trees and the graphics are not even that great yet it runs like crap.

[Buntkreuz]

The game was supposed to be finished at this date.
Its kind of like the Halo Infinite situation.

"We release it 2021"

Its 2021.

"Its pretty much done and can be released, but we would like to release the best game to you, so we would push back into early 2022".

Its 2022

"Ok so we release it now as promised"
*game lacks basic features, is incomplete, misses modes and other stuff*
"We will release the other stuff through the next months".

A year later, coop is still missing.


Darktide did the same. Releases full game, misses 2/3 of its features, like crafting and all that.

See, Sons of the Forest was supposed to be done as of now.
And then they said the same corporate stuff as Microsoft or Fatshark "we want to make it better, so its going early access."
Then it turns out, its at least 1 1/2 years away from an actual polished release.

Learn that none of these terms mean anything.
Early Access is merely an info banner on the storepage, nothing else.
Its no legal contract or anything.

[Bilbo's Bath & Shire Gel]

Originally posted by Potatoking_lp:

I agree with waht ea means but for real it isnt worth 30 dollar they could have selled it for less money in ea

Or they could've just delayed it.
If people honestly think they deserve it cheaper just because the devs felt generous enough to switch the model to EA just to release it on-time for the fans who've been waiting...

You aren't being forced to buy it, and they aren't begging you to. Nobody deserves it cheaper. It's already half the price of most new releases.

[kuraiken]

Originally posted by Zero Fox Given:

The game was supposed to be finished at this date.
Its kind of like the Halo Infinite situation.

"We release it 2021"

Its 2021.

"Its pretty much done and can be released, but we would like to release the best game to you, so we would push back into early 2022".

Its 2022

"Ok so we release it now as promised"
*game lacks basic features, is incomplete, misses modes and other stuff*
"We will release the other stuff through the next months".

A year later, coop is still missing.


Darktide did the same. Releases full game, misses 2/3 of its features, like crafting and all that.

See, Sons of the Forest was supposed to be done as of now.
And then they said the same corporate stuff as Microsoft or Fatshark "we want to make it better, so its going early access."
Then it turns out, its at least 1 1/2 years away from an actual polished release.

Learn that none of these terms mean anything.
Early Access is merely an info banner on the storepage, nothing else.
Its no legal contract or anything.

Was Halo Infinite released as Early Access?
Was Darktide released as Early Access?

Do I need to spell it out?

[Fulgrim]

Would be nice if steam applied penalties, like: goes into early access at set price, and if after 2-3 months still no full release in sight, steam forced prices down 10% every month there after.

"Well, they will just release the unfinished game as finished if they did that" - i hear you say, yes, but at least the steam reviews will actually matter.

[VeinySnickers]

The devs instead of delaying, released on EA. They stated this.

[Bilbo's Bath & Shire Gel]

Originally posted by Fulgrim:

Would be nice if steam applied penalties, like: goes into early access at set price, and if after 2-3 months still no full release in sight, steam forced prices down 10% every month there after.

"Well, they will just release the unfinished game as finished if they did that" - i hear you say, yes, but at least the steam reviews will actually matter.

I'm pretty sure what you're describing is flat-out illegal.