Early access = "we'll never finish this hot mess. Now pay us."

[Zeke45]

It's ludicrous, and we have Steam to thank for allowing and outright promoting this crap and making it mainstream.

People need to stop buying incomplete, never-to-be-finished crap. Would you buy a book while it's in "busted novel" mode? "I started writing this but now I got writer's block. I haven't a clue how to advance the plot any further. Also, what there is of it, badly needs editing. There's some good stuff in it though. Now pay me."

Off the top of my head I can think of maybe 8 or 10 instances where an early-access release got finished. In at least one of those cases the "finished" version was anything but.

[superblake_]

Publicado originalmente por Eagle_of_Fire:

Publicado originalmente por Crazy Tiger:

I don't. I'm just not the type to make an Everest out of a tiny ant hill like you do in this.

I don't either. I just plainly say the truth instead of avoiding it.

Yet you just did the thing that you said you don't do. In your reply to both my reply and that persons reply.

[Ben Lubar]

Publicado originalmente por HikariLight:

Publicado originalmente por HisBangalore:

Until Steam doesn't honor your refund requests anymore due to "excessive" requests. Plus there's certain criteria to be met to get approved for a refund. A 2 hr free demo is less risky imo

The 2 hour playtime window is not to demo the game, Steam tells this in the refund policy.
It is for you to see if the game works on your system, not to see if you like it.
The user is responsible to RESEARCH before they buy the game.

If you play a game for 15 minutes and find out you don't like it, that is absolutely a valid reason to refund the game. If you're using that instead of reading the store page and thinking about whether you want to play the game described, then yeah, you're going to run into some resistance. But if you're not trying to game the system, Valve would much rather have no money and a customer who will buy games in the future than a dollar and a customer who won't.

[Eagle_of_Fire]

Publicado originalmente por superblake_:

Publicado originalmente por Eagle_of_Fire:

I don't either. I just plainly say the truth instead of avoiding it.

Yet you just did the thing that you said you don't do. In your reply to both my reply and that persons reply.

The strange scenarios that people create in their heads is of no concern to me. Go away.

[BJWyler]

Publicado originalmente por Dura_Ace:

Publicado originalmente por AmsterdamHeavy:

Dont buy it.

You dont get to decide what *I* might want to buy though.

Yet your decision is having an impact on the quality of games i get to play.

People who bought loot boxes like casino vegas style addicts now are responsible for tons of RNG garbage in games and tons of more RNG riddled mechanics in games. Garbage.

RNG mechanics have been in games since the 70's, bud. Heck, if you want to get technical, even longer than that with the roll of the dice.

[AmsterdamHeavy]

Publicado originalmente por Dura_Ace:

Publicado originalmente por AmsterdamHeavy:

Dont buy it.

You dont get to decide what *I* might want to buy though.

Yet your decision is having an impact on the quality of games i get to play.

People who bought loot boxes like casino vegas style addicts now are responsible for tons of RNG garbage in games and tons of more RNG riddled mechanics in games. Garbage.

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ logic. You can not buy those games well. You can also not buy cases and/or keys, I dont.

[Nikonos]

Never bought Early Access software and never will. Same goes for pre-ordering.
If you want game suppliers to behave - educate them.

[Dura_Ace]

Publicado originalmente por Seraphita:

Some people seem to forget that a game could easily have snes graphics even in 2024 and still be the best thing ever. Many EA games are bad but then we have games like Cross code that started a demo on Newgrounds one day and became a gem later.

I still play a game from 1999 called Asherons Call. It was one of the first 3 big release MMO's in the world. I closed down in 2018 after a 17 year run online with monthly content update patches. We got new content every month.

The game went into maintenance mode the last year or so. It is still playable right now because peole tha tloved he game built an emulator for it just like for wow private servers.

You can run your own private server for yourself at home and play by yourself or you can go online and play with others.

The game always had some very talented people from the programming world involed and they are nearly done now building the emulator. Game is like %95 done now.

The game itself....is 1 Gb in size lol. Graphics from 1999. Square faces almost. But fun as heck.

The world of warcraft number one rogue in the world, got his start on asherons call. Rekt was his name. He died a few years ago. Not by natural causes if you get my drift.

Asherons Call

Its an island and it will take youlike 45 min at least to get to one end of the island to the other using your feet with max speed skill.

[Ordon]

Easy fix:
Don't buy early access games

Not so easy fix:
Refund policy for early access games should be much more lenient (being able to refund a game within a year of buying it)
You buy a game thats half finished with a full price (most of the time), so you except that content to be delivered within some reasonable timeframe. If the game is clearly stagnant, you get your money back. There are great offenders of "being delivered in a reasonable timeframe" on steam right now
This however brings a problem of what games should be considered early access in the first place

[Crazy Tiger]

Publicado originalmente por Super Racist:

Easy fix:
Don't buy early access games

Not so easy fix:
Refund policy for early access games should be much more lenient (being able to refund a game within a year of buying it)
You buy a game thats half finished with a full price (most of the time), so you except that content to be delivered within some reasonable timeframe. If the game is clearly stagnant, you get your money back. There are great offenders of "being delivered in a reasonable timeframe" on steam right now
This however brings a problem of what games should be considered early access in the first place

There is no such thing as a "full price". You're also displaying the main issue with Early Access: users who have false expectations.
If one purchases an unfinished product that is advertised as "may or may not get finished" and has the expectation that the game will be "finished in an arbitrary timeframe", then the problem is with those people and their utter inability to manage their expectations and to properly read.

Perhaps people should stop thinking that others have to adhere to made up expectations?

[BJWyler]

Publicado originalmente por Crazy Tiger:

Perhaps people should stop thinking that others have to adhere to made up expectations?

This is probably the single most biggest issue in gaming today. And it lies squarely at the feet of the gaming community.

[Piston Smashed™]

>>>>> BIG BLUE WARNING!!!! <<<<

Nothing more needs to be said, unless of course you cannot read and understand the >>>>> BIG BLUE WARNING!!!! <<<< and if that is the case then you should stop what you're doing and get your homework done or take night classes if you've left sk00l and still can't read. I always found Janet and John books great in learning how to read, awesome stories about a ball, a bouncing ball...

[Nikonos]

Publicado originalmente por BJWyler:

Publicado originalmente por Crazy Tiger:

Perhaps people should stop thinking that others have to adhere to made up expectations?

This is probably the single most biggest issue in gaming today. And it lies squarely at the feet of the gaming community.

That is outright hilarious. Games never promoted hypes?

[Tito Shivan]

Publicado originalmente por Nikonos:

Publicado originalmente por BJWyler:

This is probably the single most biggest issue in gaming today. And it lies squarely at the feet of the gaming community.

That is outright hilarious. Games never promoted hypes?

But then gamers take that hype. Multiply it a thousand times and put their expectations way above whatever hype was promoted by the game.

Then come the inevitable downfall when reality hits.

Games promote hype. But "gamers" have no idea of how to have their own expectations in check

[Nikonos]

Publicado originalmente por Tito Shivan:

Publicado originalmente por Nikonos:

That is outright hilarious. Games never promoted hypes?

But then gamers take that hype. Multiply it a thousand times and put their expectations way above whatever hype was promoted by the game.

Then come the inevitable downfall when reality hits.

Games promote hype. But "gamers" have no idea of how to have their own expectations in check

Exactly that is why these hypes are invented by the marketing industry.

So "it lies squarely at the feet of the gaming community" is outright hilarious.

No 'but's.

[Tito Shivan]

Publicado originalmente por Nikonos:

Exactly that is why these hypes are invented by the marketing industry.

So "it lies squarely at the feet of the gaming community" is outright hilarious.

No 'but's.

But... "Knowing is half the battle"