Poll: Early Access Brutality: Right or wrong?

[Coruptin]

Yeah, that applies to Joe Smith gamer too. Just try to move away from the analogies of what you would expect for your money if it were any other purchase, and in the direction that it is NOT any other purchase.

Some Early Access offers are worse than others, but they are all based around the idea of modern gaming culture being more of a Sharing Economy than a strictly trackable transaction of x goods for y cash, and there is nothing inherently wrong with that.

i must admit that i dont fully understand what sharing economies are and why it excludes video games from being like any other product

 

[sageoftruth]

I'd offer my opinion, but I'm still trying to wrap my head around the idea that there exist people who DO buy games early access. How does one justify the risk of buying a game that never amounts to anything, when the payoff is no different from buying it finished?

 

[Eve Charm]

I'd offer my opinion, but I'm still trying to wrap my head around the idea that there exist people who DO buy games early access. How does one justify this risk, when the payoff is no different from buying it finished?

Well because early access is still new and it was used pretty good when it launched with the games being nearly finished and people couldn't wait to get their hands on titles like don't starve and sir your being hunted and so on.

Now the average game looks like someone Bought unity and played with the stock stuff for about an hour and got it green-lit and early access asap.

Steam used to be a quality place in people's heads for many years, the day steam first green-lit 100 titles was the day it died.

 

[Doomer08]

I'd offer my opinion, but I'm still trying to wrap my head around the idea that there exist people who DO buy games early access. How does one justify the risk of buying a game that never amounts to anything, when the payoff is no different from buying it finished?

Because some people will always want it now. Even if it might be crap.

 

[Whitbane]

Hey, if you're able to sell a half-finished product to a bunch of people and run away with the money, more power to you.

Early access games should be analyzed very closely to make sure the developing studio actually has a reason to finish the game and deliver the promises they made.

Games like Arma 3 which were Early Access for the Alpha and Beta can be trusted because Bohemia is a decent studio. If you're looking at some game developed by a bunch of nobodies with more hype than actual content surrounding the product and a big juicy price tag for an incomplete version of the game, then it's probably better to wait.

Look at The Forest, they released that shit with no SAVE FEATURE. That's a sign of problems to come.

 

[Alterego-X]

i must admit that i dont fully understand what sharing economies are and why it excludes video games from being like any other product

"Sharing Economy" has many interpretations from renting each other's tools, to recycling junk, to donating to Kickstarters, that are all revolving around the idea of maximizing access, and the communities generally supporting a type of work instead of depending on individual ownership. In my usage, it's closest to a classic "gift economy".

Ayways, you have the causality reversed. It's not that entertainment *is* a sharing economy and therefore it's somehow different from "any other product", it's that creating entertainment *is* different from creating rivalous goods, and therefore we can expect it naturally start moving closer and closer to a sharing economy.

For some time, games were sold in stores just like toothbrushes, shoes, and condoms. But now when they are strings of data, infinitely distributable on the net, pretty much only tradition and copyright law are holding together the system of commercializing them through virtual storefronts against all intuitive alternatives.

But even then, we are inevitably moving towards more and more Humble Bundles, Steam Summer Sales, piracy, crowdfunding, Early Access, Free to Play, adware, freeware, game jams, modding, etc. Whether or not they preserve the formality of charging money for accessing copies, each of these are moving in the direction of a gift economy where the gamers are primarily just expected to throw money in the general direction of creators, and the creators expected to throw games in the general direction of gamers (And just like the comic panel above demonstrates, sometime it's not even clear where one group ends and the other begins), with little care for each individual being equally charged for a copy as if they were "obtaining a product", and each creator being expected to provide the same efforst as a retail store offer.

 

[Coruptin]

"Sharing Economy" has many interpretations from renting each other's tools, to recycling junk, to donating to Kickstarters, that are all revolving around the idea of maximizing access, and the communities generally supporting a type of work instead of depending on individual ownership. In my usage, it's closest to a classic "gift economy".

Ayways, you have the causality reversed. It's not that entertainment *is* a sharing economy and therefore it's somehow different from "any other product", it's that creating entertainment *is* different from creating rivalous goods, and therefore we can expect it naturally start moving closer and closer to a sharing economy.

For some time, games were sold in stores just like toothbrushes, shoes, and condoms. But now when they are strings of data, infinitely distributable on the net, pretty much only tradition and copyright law are holding together the system of commercializing them through virtual storefronts against all intuitive alternatives.

But even then, we are inevitably moving towards more and more Humble Bundles, Steam Summer Sales, piracy, crowdfunding, Early Access, Free to Play, adware, freeware, game jams, modding, etc. Whether or not they preserve the formality of charging money for accessing copies, each of these are moving in the direction of a gift economy where the gamers are primarily just expected to throw money in the general direction of creators, and the creators expected to throw games in the general direction of gamers (And just like the comic panel above demonstrates, sometime it's not even clear where one group ends and the other begins), with little care for each individual being equally charged for a copy as if they were "obtaining a product", and each creator being expected to provide the same efforst as a retail store offer.

So it's kind of like what patreon is right? Hmm, I don't think I'd like that, but from what I understand it sounds like sharing economies require mutual assumption of good will from both producer and consumer towards each other, so as long as I refuse to hand a carte blanche over to people who want my money I guess I can stay out of that mess.

 

[Alterego-X]

So it's kind of like what patreon is right? Hmm, I don't think I'd like that, but from what I understand it sounds like sharing economies require mutual assumption of good will from both producer and consumer towards each other, so as long as I refuse to hand a carte blanche over to people who want my money I guess I can stay out of that mess.

My point was not that *one specific* model will replace the current ones, so much as trying to describe the general attitudes that are encouraging Early Access and similar models.

There are gamers spending years of they life putting together huge mods like Skywind, or huge freeware games like Katawa Shoujo, just to freely share them with the public. Yet at the same time, some of those same people feel entitled to pirating the shit out of games themselves play. They pirate Game of Thrones because they can't buy in conveniently, then throw money at the Veronica Mars kickstarter. They buy a bunch of little games at a Steam Summer Sale, even though they don't intend to play half of them. They pay for Early Access, knowing that the game will probably never get finished.

Critics who are reviewing Early Access games "as if they were "proper retail releases", are completely ignoring how the retail model itself is becoming a relic of the past, or at least the attitude of treating it as the One Proper Way of making "full games", is.

The wider gaming industry itself is turning into something fluid, and quickly changing, and wild, with ad hoc creativity, and generosity, and savvy new commercial opportunities, and new moral attitudes.

There are some ways to keep reviewing the end results, but those reviewers need to adapt. The ones who still just want to write down a list of features, and end with a "do/do not buy" recommendation and a number of stars, are missing the point as bad as a comic book critic that tries to review Homestuck.

 

[Buckshaft]

There are some ways to keep reviewing the end results, but those reviewers need to adapt. The ones who still just want to write down a list of features, and end with a "do/do not buy" recommendation and a number of stars, are missing the point as bad as a comic book critic that tries to review Homestuck. (snip)

So what do you propose? A lot of people, especially one here, like to criticise the fact that a list of features and number of stars is effectively inconsequential because of each person's unique experience with the game. I'd say that's true. However, not everyone has the disposable income to buy all these games and see if they like them, even the ones they really like. Not everyone has the time to watch countless streams and YouTube videos and do other such research when finding out if a game is for them or not. Very often, that number of stars is very helpful for your average Joe who just wants to know what games are widely considered the best. Now, yes, this system is flawed, and Everyone should do their best to steer away from Gamespot and other Publisher-inflated hype machines, but it still stands as a way for people to easily get the information they need without having to waste time digging deeper.

You can argue all you like about how it's a different business model, and a new way of distributing games, but it's still a GAME. What companies have considered worthy to sell is what they should be judged on. We have services like Steam to prevent this "Gift Economy" as you put it, and throwing around business buzzwords about how the industry is changing doesn't alter the fact that games should be judged as they always have. Because no matter how they're funded, or released, they're still games. That's not what I was referring to in the opening post, and I don't see how a game's criticism should change based on that.

Also, I know how a critic should review Homestuck. By not bothering their arse.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

I don't think that early access games need to be judged or reviewed professionally. It wouldn't be fair to the games to be reviewed professionally because professional reviewers can't be asked to go back and alter their reviews or scores every time an early access game is updated.

Fairness to the developer is not, nor should it ever be, a part of the review process. A reviewer is a consumer advocate. If they look at a product that a developer is confident enough in to ask for money from consumers, a reviewer absolutely should review the product being offered. Not the product being promised - the actual thing being sold. Any protection from harsh judgement that a developer might hope to receive is absolutely lost when they start trying to sell their product.

That the apparatus for review might not be able to handle such a development scheme is not the problem here - the problem is that there are companies selling a thing before they ought to and wanting to avoid any backlash for that transgression. If they want to avoid that fate, they should probably try waiting until their product is worth buying to try and sell it. That doesn't mean the product needs to be done - just worthy of someone's time and money.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

I don't think that early access games need to be judged or reviewed professionally. It wouldn't be fair to the games to be reviewed professionally because professional reviewers can't be asked to go back and alter their reviews or scores every time an early access game is updated.

Fairness to the developer is not, nor should it ever be, a part of the review process. A reviewer is a consumer advocate. If they look at a product that a developer is confident enough in to ask for money from consumers, a reviewer absolutely should review the product being offered. Not the product being promised - the actual thing being sold. Any protection from harsh judgement that a developer might hope to receive is absolutely lost when they start trying to sell their product.

That the apparatus for review might not be able to handle such a development scheme is not the problem here - the problem is that there are companies selling a thing before they ought to and wanting to avoid any backlash for that transgression. If they want to avoid that fate, they should probably try waiting until their product is worth buying to try and sell it. That doesn't mean the product needs to be done - just worthy of someone's time and money.

Except that kind of review isn't useful to consumers either. The longer the early access game's production cycle goes on the less relevant an old review of it would become if the game is in fact getting regular updates. Look at something like minecraft, if every review of minecraft was from when it was still in 1.0 80% of it's features wouldn't be mentioned in any official reviews. That's A LOT of features.

These kinds of reviews protect the consumer from getting a worthless and unfinished product, but they would also punish the developers who are actually doing what they promised and are updating their games regularly with new features. Ignoring this fact doesn't allow consumers to make an informed decision on a product.

If the professional review can't be kept up to date (and that's not something I would expect from a professional reviewer, who have enough trouble reviewing all the new games coming out without having to replay older ones) then it's not a useful measure for consumers on whether they should buy the game. Reviewers are not consumer advocates, they are journalists, they aren't there to protect you from making bad purchasing decisions, they are there because they want people to click on their reviews and read them, not because they want to make sure that people are getting a fair deal.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

Except that kind of review isn't useful to consumers either. The longer the early access game's production cycle goes on the less relevant an old review of it would become if the game is in fact getting regular updates. Look at something like minecraft, if every review of minecraft was from when it was still in 1.0 80% of it's features wouldn't be mentioned in any official reviews. That's A LOT of features.

Two points here. First, to review something based on promised features isn't consumer advocacy; that's just marketing. A review of an incomplete product (a choice the developer made when they started selling it you recall) is at least accurate for a particular point in time. By contrast the marketing review may never be true. One serves the interests of the consumer while the other actively seeks to undermine it. Second, Minecraft was sold as a product and became successful because even with an incomplete feature set it still offered people something desirable. Even today after lots of updates the core of what makes minecraft a success is the same thing present in those early days. Minecraft thus demonstrates something important here: they weren't done building it but what they had was worth playing.

These kinds of reviews protect the consumer from getting a worthless and unfinished product, but they would also punish the developers who are actually doing what they promised and are updating their games regularly with new features.

The developer's job is to produce a product that people want. The reviewer's job is to see if the product they are selling is worth playing. If the developer is incapable of producing a product worth playing by the time they start asking for money, they have fundamentally failed. You advocate the reviewer ignoring this failure because it might get better - you thus ask for one failure to become two.

Ignoring this fact doesn't allow consumers to make an informed decision on a product.

The developers are the one creating the problem by selling garbage not ready to be seen by the public.

Reviewers are not consumer advocates, they are journalists, they aren't there to protect you from making bad purchasing decisions, they are there because they want people to click on their reviews and read them, not because they want to make sure that people are getting a fair deal.

A reviewer is a consumer advocate. They might also spend their time being a journalist. They might also spend time being a critic. Examining in detail some feature, idea, or bit or art direction tends to result in criticism. Examining the development process that lead to a game being released is journalism. A review on the merit of the game itself, though - that's just plain consumer advocacy.

To put it another way, a review serves to inform a readers of one person's experience with a game. The reader thus is informed about a product that they wanted. They may use this information to alter their purchasing strategy. By arming the reader with information about a game they want to play, the writer has thus acted as an advocate for the consumer by giving them a tool they can use to determine if they want the game in question. This is consumer advocacy because it upholds one of the core notions of of consumer advocacy which is the free flow of truthful information to the consumer.

 

[DementedSheep]

Normally people talking about a beta like its the finished product annoys me. You can certainly criticise and point out issues, in fact that is the point of a beta but you get people getting outraged at glitches and unpolished things.

The problem is early access games are charging for this and may never even get a finished product. Because it is a purchase consumers should be informed of the pros and cons like any other product. They might mention it is early access so some problems could get fixed eventually or the developers is planning on doing X but that's all they should get. You are reviewing what you get for your cash at the time.
I don't like the entire concept of people paying to be beta testers but if you want to spend your money that way or support a dev you like go for it. It makes reviewing a bit muddled though, do you update the review every time it gets an update? do you do a completely new review for the finished product?

 

[Atrocious Joystick]

Any product should be judged on how it performs in relation to what the seller claims. Early access shouldn´t be used as some sort of catch all excuse, if you sell an early access game that is supposed to be mostly playable with some kinks to iron out that in reality is effectively unplayable you shouldn´t be able to hide behind it being early access but if a developer is up front with the fact that a game is currently pretty much just a proof of concept then it should be judged on those merits and it is up to you if you want to buy what is essentially only an investment.

 

[Something Amyss]

Once you've started charging money, the product is released and should be treated as such.

Basically, this. Commercial products should be treated as commercial products. People should know what's there. I would want to see reviews before I considered an EA game. Though currently, the "Early Access" label serves as a warning and I click out.

Also, especially considering Valve's "new" policy in EA (same as the old one), what you buy might be all you get.

 

[sageoftruth]

I'd offer my opinion, but I'm still trying to wrap my head around the idea that there exist people who DO buy games early access. How does one justify the risk of buying a game that never amounts to anything, when the payoff is no different from buying it finished?

Because some people will always want it now. Even if it might be crap.

Someone give those poor souls some games to pass the time with. People with that kind of impatience must be starving for something to do.

 

[SonOfVoorhees]

If your charging money for it, then your game should be judged the same as any other game we pay for. If its for free because you want to iron out the issues, then fine, be judged less harshly as the game isnt finished. Personally, if your charging money i would expect the game to be up to a certain standard, it should be playable apart from some bugs and leveling issues.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

Reviews are meant to be a consumer tool to help guide purchases, not free advertising for the developers. If a game is in a beta or alpha state, and barely playable, or riddled with bugs, it should be described as such, with all the caveats that would accompany such a product were it a "final release". Consumers should be industry savvy enough to research price point on their own, and understand the nature of early access and that they are basically funding development, not buying a polished product. Reviewers should be letting you know how it plays as it stands...not speculating about future greatness that may never occur and scoring accordingly.

Besides, it'll be good for them. It'll help them remember the numbers 1-6 on the 1-10 scale.

 

[iseko]

Because anything that a company deems fit to stand on its own as a game, and to be sold for a sum of money (Even if that sum is lower than a full retail product) should be held the same standards, if not even harsher ones than a game sold on a shelf.

Because when paying for these, you aren't buying a complete game. You're buying an unfinished game in the hopes that it'll get better. People need to know which games are worth that risk of buying, because they don't want to end up wasting their money.

It is sold so should be viewed as a full game Should be treated even harsher because you are buying an unfinished game.

I'm sorry but you can't have it both ways. Too me: You know what you are getting into and the fact that there are so many of them is because people buy it. I don't buy early acces, never did never will. I'll pay the full price for the final product. It seems like a good idea but the designers are under no obligation of actually doing what they say they will do.

It is kind of like this to me: Person A has an idea and goes to an investor (me). Person A says: give me money so I can make my idea happen. You will never share in the profit though. And that is if I even feel like actually making my idea and not just spending the cash on hookers and blow. To which I say as an investor: Go fuck yourself. Which I do say because I don't buy early access. The analogy is not completely up to par but you get the idea I'm trying to make.

 

[Caiphus]

Reviews are meant to be a consumer tool to help guide purchases, not free advertising for the developers. If a game is in a beta or alpha state, and barely playable, or riddled with bugs, it should be described as such, with all the caveats that would accompany such a product were it a "final release". Consumers should be industry savvy enough to research price point on their own, and understand the nature of early access and that they are basically funding development, not buying a polished product. Reviewers should be letting you know how it plays as it stands...not speculating about future greatness that may never occur and scoring accordingly.

Besides, it'll be good for them. It'll help them remember the numbers 1-6 on the 1-10 scale.

I suppose an interesting follow-up discussion might be whether or not reviewers should be encouraged to update reviews of Early Access games as development continues.

Actually, that doesn't sound interesting at all.

Forget I said anything.