Valve could easily say "no DLC packs until your game leaves EA" and hold publishers to some measure of responsibility. That's not going to happen because: money.
Valve would never do that, it would hurt their bottom line.
I'm absolutely convinced that this event will increase the frequency of paid DLC in Early Access games. The expansion has been on Steam's top-seller list this week, so it's obviously selling very well despite the "outrage". Ark remains in the top-10 most played games on Steam.
Other devs will look at the sales generated, not the forum heat...
Early access is like buying a shirt that someone thats full of holes that still need to be sown together. What this A-hole did was tell us yes the shirt is still full of holes but we want to sell you a completed shirt for 20 dollars more that requires you own the shirt with holes in it to play. I assume if walmart tryed to do this they probly go out of buisness
Ark seems to becoming a cautious tale. DLC while in early access, if they release paid for DLC for a game, then that game should no longer be classed as being early access, for better or worse that is the final version of the game, whether its incomplete or not. Its no wonder that the developers are getting a bad rep, developers will always be judged by the quality of their work, be kind of odd if they were not after all. O.o
The Island map (and Center) are full of bugs, players are losing valuable dinos where they spent a LOT of hours on taming them. Just like that. Devs do nothing.
The core game has a LOT of bugs, some make that game unplayable for many. (dinos sinking through floors/ground/disappearing etc)
These problems are NOT addressed, and probably never will be. The bet fun: these problems were carried over to the new DLC. So these coding mishaps will cause dinos to disappear there too, and sink through floors etc.
Those bug fixing devs were moved to the team of the new DLC from last january & on. It explains the massive drop in bugfixes.
Yet they try to shush the players by releasing new dinos every month or so. Which again are often bugged and cause damage. (Spawning allosaurs inside player structures and destroying everything inside for example)
They released Primitive servers with a LOT of content the original core games does not have.
They plan to release a version of the game where you can play as dino.
Now this paid DLC.
While the core game is dying because 99% of the official servers have a 70-man player limit and there are seldom more on then 10 at a time on any server. Most official servers are nearly dead.
Wildcard: "starts up many projects at the same time, not finishing one."
Confront them with this, and their forum moderators are coming after you. I experienced that first hand with confronting them with many bugs, and a forum moderator hit me with a ban stick for "flaming" when I posted a thread about map faults where you could get stuck.
IP reset by the ISP and new forum account there and we're back in business though.
And people: yes, the game is released, they are just hiding behind the "we are prerelease" status. Liek some said: "You can not have a paid DLC of a prerelease game."
LOVED this game till New Year with all the events and bug fixes and such, in 2016 though, they kinda abandoned the idea to maintain their official Island maps and servers.
Would not recommend this game now anymore.
"going into arguments with idiots is a lost cause, it requires you to stoop down to their level and you can't win"
I had high hopes that it would be one of the few survival online games that gone out of early access, but with time that hope keeps on going further down.
this game is fun to play but there are still major bugs that should not be in even a early access game they are that bad like falling though the terrain in your house after you log out which means you die and loose everything on you for one. disconnects which kill you and the dino you were riding every few days if your unlucky. one you got all your dinos no real end game at all unless you want to keep building bigger bases. and putting out a paid expansion on a unfinished game that only has a couple different maps is a ripoff, but seems to be the normal way developers go currently.Will admit do have 1000+ hrs on this game so is still worth the base games cost
People that plan to play this game should be aware that they have to log in at least once/week or have friends that reset structure timers and dino timers, if they start on official servers.
Better is to log in 1/day.
I have enough friends with end tier bases and dinos that had a <21d timer on their base, did not log in for 9 (real life/vacation/sickness whatever) and the devs ninja patched a 67% structure timer nerf in.
So it ended up with a LOT of players having for example a 5d timer out of a 21d timer left prepatch the structures lost 67% of their original timers and thus after the patch everything was up for grabs post patch.
And they lost everything, work of a entire year lost in 5 mins.
Devs reverted the change, but refused to run a backup so those players that were Fed got the middle finger by WC.
"going into arguments with idiots is a lost cause, it requires you to stoop down to their level and you can't win"
wildcard has provided HUNDREDS of hours of gameplays with ark soemthing most aaa titles cant even come close to. The DLC is VOLUNTARY, and honestly doesnt add anything revolutionary. In fact the devs endorsed a FREE MOD that puts all the dinos and crafting engrams on ANY map a player wants. This on going sense of self entitlement is baffling in the gaming community. Whats worse I have yet to see this or any credible gaming site really rake DEAn hall or sean murray over the coals fro the swindles they pulled. or how about the clowns that made warz and now have another game out? You guys are hypocrites
wildcard has provided HUNDREDS of hours of gameplays with ark soemthing most aaa titles cant even come close to. The DLC is VOLUNTARY, and honestly doesnt add anything revolutionary. In fact the devs endorsed a FREE MOD that puts all the dinos and crafting engrams on ANY map a player wants. This on going sense of self entitlement is baffling in the gaming community. Whats worse I have yet to see this or any credible gaming site really rake DEAn hall or sean murray over the coals fro the swindles they pulled. or how about the clowns that made warz and now have another game out? You guys are hypocrites
The game is not bad but till it's in early access one can't play reliably for long periods because there are going to be wipes.
The alternative is to go in a player hosted server which doesn't keep with the updates. The game is not finished and anyone that tries to review it as such gets backlash because it's in early access. If they finished the game and released said DLC it wouldn't be such a big fuss.
The game personally is an entire big grind, there isn't a lot to do besides taming dinos which take way too much time. So locking content behind paywalls is already bad for some people.
wildcard has provided HUNDREDS of hours of gameplays with ark soemthing most aaa titles cant even come close to. The DLC is VOLUNTARY, and honestly doesnt add anything revolutionary. In fact the devs endorsed a FREE MOD that puts all the dinos and crafting engrams on ANY map a player wants. This on going sense of self entitlement is baffling in the gaming community. Whats worse I have yet to see this or any credible gaming site really rake DEAn hall or sean murray over the coals fro the swindles they pulled. or how about the clowns that made warz and now have another game out? You guys are hypocrites
Ok, I sell you a new game that consists only of a login screen. IF you manage to login, there's 20% chance you crash out.
I make you look at that login screen for a year. In your eyes that makes it a good game.
I release a patch which alters the green background to a yellow one.
The 20% crash odds are still there. I say: "don't blame me, it's alpha"
In a year I release a DLC for 20 bucks. 'best game of the year and everyone else is a hypocrit"
ARK Survival: good idea, fun game, Dino island survival transforms to egg grind kibble based FOTM dino taming, HUGE timesink, TERRIBLE management.
The fact that WC launched a Unreal4 editor where ppl can mod their own maps and modules, where modders (incl me) fix WC's bugs ourselves and add desperately needed tweaks and new content is proof that WC is not delivering,
"going into arguments with idiots is a lost cause, it requires you to stoop down to their level and you can't win"
First congratulations for the article.Now some things that may help in this discussion.
1)Games are amongst other things products so when u suggest, review, critique or anything else the price has a role there.
2)For steam reviews,if someone check the steam reviews he will realize that 99% arent real reviews,and its logical not everyone is capable,have time to make an honest review and review system is basicly open to anyone that just has the game.Most reviews either praise a game without giving a single reason to why or bash it with a swear.There are exceptions ofc and i have read great reviews from random ppl at steam.
3)A review for a game that is released is totally different from a game in early access.
In an early access game is ok to have loads of bugs usually,have missing parts of game,game being unoptimized,mechanics arent even close to balanced,and a lot more.That fits in most games that are in early access so a positive review isnt always in early access games.
In some games that are almost ready maybe it reflects the truth, but in most early access games a positive review isnt about just the current state of game,its the delevopers communication and fixes, often updates and bug fixes, nice promises of new content etc.
I guess people who defend early access titles dont really understand that the cosumer is buying into a beta version of the game, which is often blurred between closed and open beta phases. Adding paid DLC is pretty much saying "Hey guys, we need you to pay us more money to test more of our features before the title goes live."
Wasnt there some mmo that was trying to have subscriptions for testing phases? Pathfinder? I could be wrong.
Don't buy early access games, does anyone even know of a game that was in Early access and is now fully released? You don't, because those games are not intended to be released. They are poorly designed video games for "cheap" that get to hide behind Early Access so people can't point out there horrible work in creating a video game.
Scam,Fraud,Shitty Devs.
Once again it isnt the companies fault its the gamers who simply cannot wait and will pay any dollar amount for any piece of garbage they call a game nowadays.....THen they scream and cry when they find out that $100 they spent was on garbage
Don't buy early access games, does anyone even know of a game that was in Early access and is now fully released? You don't, because those games are not intended to be released. They are poorly designed video games for "cheap" that get to hide behind Early Access so people can't point out there horrible work in creating a video game.
Scam,Fraud,Shitty Devs.
Plenty of Early Access games have reached a release state.
Grim Dawn...
DreamFall: The longest Journey.
Divinity OS
ARMA 3
Wasteland 2
Darkest Dungeon etc...
Just to name a few.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
So its not okay to release paid DLC for a company who isn't getting as much money as you think (look at how much is being taken by Microsoft and them before they get their money), but its perfectly fine for developers to release paid DLC to "finish" a game that was already in full release? I mean really whats the difference? I wasn't really happy to see a paid DLC during early access at first but then I thought to myself, Why not give them a bit more money to help along towards a more finished product upon release. At least the $45 I have put towards the game now with the DLC gives me complete access to the game and I'm not having to pay hundreds of dollars after a $60 to get content for a game that was in "full release" 3 months ago. Stop acting like your entitled to everything, the game was already cheaper than most games of its like on steam, now its cheaper after DLC dropped. These hard working Devs need to make a living as well, they aren't your slaves that just make games when and how you want for no money. Should they have explained their reasoning behind the DLC at this stage better? yes. Do they deserve to be paid for what has been the best DLC I have seen for a game in ages? yes.
and on a final note I am really tired of such whiny articles on this site. I used to come here for great game news and updates on coming features to games I play, now all I see is whine whine whine from what seem to be inexperienced writers. But that's a paragraph for another day.
It's fine that you disagree, but you're also drawing a false comparison and reading a lot into this that isn't there.
. Post-launch DLC does not equate to the current, "hey, we took your money and made a thing you can't actually play unless you pay us 60% more."
^ Pot meet kettle?
Your statement is completely false. You can play the original game just fine and the amount of playable content in that original game that you paid 10-25 dollars for has more content in it than most games that release at 60$ now a days.
If you want to fling crap, at least make sure your crap is correct.
Who was flinging crap? And you're still drawing false equivalencies. This is not about what base ARK does or does not have or a comparison of its content load compared to other games. This is about the prime, important difference between releasing DLC for a finished game (acceptable, the inherent promise of a complete game is fulfilled) and releasing an "expansion pack" for an unfinished, unoptimized/poorly performing game that took funds from customers to contribute toward its completion. Taking that money and developing a separate addon they will not have access to without paying a second time, and one whose players will transfer their dinos back from, is ethically questionable, which is the entire reason nearly 12k steam reviews in 16 days have severely dropped their rating.
To be clear, I am not personally attacking you, so let's both try to be lighthearted on this. :-)
To be clear and upfront, I haven't ever felt attacked in this thread. I just don't see the point of the original article other than to provide clickbait to increase add revenue 15 days after the flames have started to die down and reignite a spark so you can draw attention. Negative response is still engagement and still provides a paycheck. I understand your point.
However..... Many people are approaching this the wrong way. Many things happen like this but people are just so used to it and much of it happens behind the scenes that it never occurs to them that it is happening.
For instance, you go to a restaurant, you order a steak dinner. You sit and wait and then your steak dinner arrives. Now, the waiter approaches you and says, you have the dinner you ordered and as offered, but with the profit we made off of making your dinner, we were able to make a second steak dinner but with different seasonings. Would you like to try that one as well at a reduced price? That is what Wildcard is doing. They are still making the base game with all of the features originally promised+LOTS more, but now they are also using the profit they have gained to make a great game even better and, of course, making more profit. The early adopters are stating that since they paid money, EVERYTHING Wildcard makes during that early access period is theirs and free for them...... Really? I can't help but sigh at this.
The real question, and one most people haven't even bothered to ask is... Did Wildcard expect for their game to be as popular as it now is? Because I am willing to bet their original design plan was not even a million copies sold. So now that they are popular, what are they going to do with the extra money? They could have had it vanish without anyone knowing about it, or they could make their great game even better.
MY ONLY complaint about the DLC is on PvP servers, they are allowing those that did buy the expansion use their Expansion Dinos in the Vanilla game, which is wrong. Once they fix that, if they intend to, then I won't have any complaints. Ark is a fun and engaging game and the expansion is amazing as well.
You charge for your game and don't wipe progress it's launched. Call it Early Access or Early Enrollment or whatever made up excuse term you want. It's launched. If more articles showed balls like this one maybe the industry wouldn't be filled with apologists at every turn.
Well done.
I dont speak of all gamers but I do speak for a lot. There are a lot of us who dont give a rats ass if the game is called 'early access' or 'nut sacks'
we just care if that game is fun.
You speak for yourself and only yourself. Not a lot. The game wouldn't have tanked in ratings if people didn't care about the change.
Obviously there are a lot of people who don't care (what state they consider the base game in ) otherwise the game wouldn't have 50k+ people playing on a given day. Nor would the DLC be in the top sellers on steam.
I've never heard anything but praise for this title up until this article. I could understand outrage if the base title was in shambles, unplayable, etc... Yet prior to this it had mostly positive feedback (many saying things like " No way I'd think this game was Early access without knowing it was") as well as praise for being a great deep game.
A moniker isn't as important as the true quality/state of the overall title.
Price matters. Integrity matters. Because a game is playable doesn't make great. A game in Early Access is not a launched title, but usually games that release on XB and PS are considered launched titles - thats what people expect them to be.
Therefore on the console people probably know no better, they don't follow games like PC players do. It would never have been an issue if this game was a released title - even day 1 DLC throws up red flags but doesn't get this much attention. No, this is still an Early access game. Is this an Early Access expansion? For an unfinished game?
I've played Ark probably around.. 20 - 30 hours total, not much in comparison to others but I played enough to get the gist of it, and while it is a nice survival game in general it still has TONS of bugs.
I've seen finished games with more bugs, and some early access titles with less bugs, but I understand why the game went from mostly positive to mixed reviews in the span of a day.
Totally agree. I was about to buy ARK today, until I saw there was an expansion... An expansion for a game that is not even released. That's unreal. Steam needs to do away with this bullcrap.
I bought another Early Access(my first EA purchase) game and regretted it immediately. $20 wasted. I won't make that mistake again. The game had unbearable performance, and was not as advertised.
I've said basically the same thing the article is saying since the DLC launched. It's wrong. Releasing paid content for an unfinished game should never be acceptable.
They took our money that was meant to help develop ARK and funneled it into a paid DLC, just to try and sell that to us too.
It's pretty obvious by the scale of the DLC that its been in development for a while. Why couldn't that work have gone into the main game so that it could actually be released?
I'm pretty dissapointed with Wildcard, and like a lot of people I know, I've removed ARK from my library and will not be playing it again.
So its not okay to release paid DLC for a company who isn't getting as much money as you think (look at how much is being taken by Microsoft and them before they get their money), but its perfectly fine for developers to release paid DLC to "finish" a game that was already in full release? I mean really whats the difference? I wasn't really happy to see a paid DLC during early access at first but then I thought to myself, Why not give them a bit more money to help along towards a more finished product upon release. At least the $45 I have put towards the game now with the DLC gives me complete access to the game and I'm not having to pay hundreds of dollars after a $60 to get content for a game that was in "full release" 3 months ago. Stop acting like your entitled to everything, the game was already cheaper than most games of its like on steam, now its cheaper after DLC dropped. These hard working Devs need to make a living as well, they aren't your slaves that just make games when and how you want for no money. Should they have explained their reasoning behind the DLC at this stage better? yes. Do they deserve to be paid for what has been the best DLC I have seen for a game in ages? yes.
and on a final note I am really tired of such whiny articles on this site. I used to come here for great game news and updates on coming features to games I play, now all I see is whine whine whine from what seem to be inexperienced writers. But that's a paragraph for another day.
It's fine that you disagree, but you're also drawing a false comparison and reading a lot into this that isn't there.
. Post-launch DLC does not equate to the current, "hey, we took your money and made a thing you can't actually play unless you pay us 60% more."
^ Pot meet kettle?
Your statement is completely false. You can play the original game just fine and the amount of playable content in that original game that you paid 10-25 dollars for has more content in it than most games that release at 60$ now a days.
If you want to fling crap, at least make sure your crap is correct.
Who was flinging crap? And you're still drawing false equivalencies. This is not about what base ARK does or does not have or a comparison of its content load compared to other games. This is about the prime, important difference between releasing DLC for a finished game (acceptable, the inherent promise of a complete game is fulfilled) and releasing an "expansion pack" for an unfinished, unoptimized/poorly performing game that took funds from customers to contribute toward its completion. Taking that money and developing a separate addon they will not have access to without paying a second time, and one whose players will transfer their dinos back from, is ethically questionable, which is the entire reason nearly 12k steam reviews in 16 days have severely dropped their rating.
To be clear, I am not personally attacking you, so let's both try to be lighthearted on this. :-)
To be clear and upfront, I haven't ever felt attacked in this thread. I just don't see the point of the original article other than to provide clickbait to increase add revenue 15 days after the flames have started to die down and reignite a spark so you can draw attention. Negative response is still engagement and still provides a paycheck. I understand your point.
However..... Many people are approaching this the wrong way. Many things happen like this but people are just so used to it and much of it happens behind the scenes that it never occurs to them that it is happening.
For instance, you go to a restaurant, you order a steak dinner. You sit and wait and then your steak dinner arrives. Now, the waiter approaches you and says, you have the dinner you ordered and as offered, but with the profit we made off of making your dinner, we were able to make a second steak dinner but with different seasonings. Would you like to try that one as well at a reduced price? That is what Wildcard is doing. They are still making the base game with all of the features originally promised+LOTS more, but now they are also using the profit they have gained to make a great game even better and, of course, making more profit. The early adopters are stating that since they paid money, EVERYTHING Wildcard makes during that early access period is theirs and free for them...... Really? I can't help but sigh at this.
The real question, and one most people haven't even bothered to ask is... Did Wildcard expect for their game to be as popular as it now is? Because I am willing to bet their original design plan was not even a million copies sold. So now that they are popular, what are they going to do with the extra money? They could have had it vanish without anyone knowing about it, or they could make their great game even better.
MY ONLY complaint about the DLC is on PvP servers, they are allowing those that did buy the expansion use their Expansion Dinos in the Vanilla game, which is wrong. Once they fix that, if they intend to, then I won't have any complaints. Ark is a fun and engaging game and the expansion is amazing as well.
I know you think your restaurant analogy is great, but it isn't. When you order food from a restaurant, the restaurant is a started business. It had an opening and such, meaning its 'released' and open to review. When they add new items to the menu, these new items have been tested until the owners feel they are ready to be served to the costumers. Going back to the beginning which what you're over looking >>> The restaurant was launched <<<. In Ark's case, they are still developing the game which is supposed to pull enough funds for the game to be officially released. You are saying that they pulled in enough money to accomplish that goal; however, they have not pulled away from early access which is the point of the money.
Again, most people do not care of the game was officially released, but it hasn't been. In essence, the team is using the early access money to start a second project and then charge for that project, pretty much putting 2 early access projects in one.
Price matters. Integrity matters. Because a game is playable doesn't make great. A game in Early Access is not a launched title, but usually games that release on XB and PS are considered launched titles - thats what people expect them to be.
Therefore on the console people probably know no better, they don't follow games like PC players do. It would never have been an issue if this game was a released title - even day 1 DLC throws up red flags but doesn't get this much attention. No, this is still an Early access game. Is this an Early Access expansion? For an unfinished game?
I've played Ark probably around.. 20 - 30 hours total, not much in comparison to others but I played enough to get the gist of it, and while it is a nice survival game in general it still has TONS of bugs.
I've seen finished games with more bugs, and some early access titles with less bugs, but I understand why the game went from mostly positive to mixed reviews in the span of a day.
You say price matters, buying both the expansion as well as base game comes in at under the price of a typical retail purchase. Just saying..
As for having tons of bugs, coming from folks who play MMORPgs regularly that's a bit ironic, in comparison all the games we play are essentially early access titles, they're never finished as well as they always have numerous bugs on just the surface level. To top it off these games are coming from major studios with tons of backing.
I understand why the negative reviews are tanking the score as well. That doesn't make them legitimate reviews of the actual product though. They're in protest to a practice not opinions of the quality of the actual game.
I haven't played the game at all TBH, I have no real interest in Dinosaurs vs man or what ever it entails.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
So its not okay to release paid DLC for a company who isn't getting as much money as you think (look at how much is being taken by Microsoft and them before they get their money), but its perfectly fine for developers to release paid DLC to "finish" a game that was already in full release? I mean really whats the difference? I wasn't really happy to see a paid DLC during early access at first but then I thought to myself, Why not give them a bit more money to help along towards a more finished product upon release. At least the $45 I have put towards the game now with the DLC gives me complete access to the game and I'm not having to pay hundreds of dollars after a $60 to get content for a game that was in "full release" 3 months ago. Stop acting like your entitled to everything, the game was already cheaper than most games of its like on steam, now its cheaper after DLC dropped. These hard working Devs need to make a living as well, they aren't your slaves that just make games when and how you want for no money. Should they have explained their reasoning behind the DLC at this stage better? yes. Do they deserve to be paid for what has been the best DLC I have seen for a game in ages? yes.
and on a final note I am really tired of such whiny articles on this site. I used to come here for great game news and updates on coming features to games I play, now all I see is whine whine whine from what seem to be inexperienced writers. But that's a paragraph for another day.
It's fine that you disagree, but you're also drawing a false comparison and reading a lot into this that isn't there.
. Post-launch DLC does not equate to the current, "hey, we took your money and made a thing you can't actually play unless you pay us 60% more."
^ Pot meet kettle?
Your statement is completely false. You can play the original game just fine and the amount of playable content in that original game that you paid 10-25 dollars for has more content in it than most games that release at 60$ now a days.
If you want to fling crap, at least make sure your crap is correct.
Who was flinging crap? And you're still drawing false equivalencies. This is not about what base ARK does or does not have or a comparison of its content load compared to other games. This is about the prime, important difference between releasing DLC for a finished game (acceptable, the inherent promise of a complete game is fulfilled) and releasing an "expansion pack" for an unfinished, unoptimized/poorly performing game that took funds from customers to contribute toward its completion. Taking that money and developing a separate addon they will not have access to without paying a second time, and one whose players will transfer their dinos back from, is ethically questionable, which is the entire reason nearly 12k steam reviews in 16 days have severely dropped their rating.
To be clear, I am not personally attacking you, so let's both try to be lighthearted on this. :-)
To be clear and upfront, I haven't ever felt attacked in this thread. I just don't see the point of the original article other than to provide clickbait to increase add revenue 15 days after the flames have started to die down and reignite a spark so you can draw attention. Negative response is still engagement and still provides a paycheck. I understand your point.
However..... Many people are approaching this the wrong way. Many things happen like this but people are just so used to it and much of it happens behind the scenes that it never occurs to them that it is happening.
For instance, you go to a restaurant, you order a steak dinner. You sit and wait and then your steak dinner arrives. Now, the waiter approaches you and says, you have the dinner you ordered and as offered, but with the profit we made off of making your dinner, we were able to make a second steak dinner but with different seasonings. Would you like to try that one as well at a reduced price? That is what Wildcard is doing. They are still making the base game with all of the features originally promised+LOTS more, but now they are also using the profit they have gained to make a great game even better and, of course, making more profit. The early adopters are stating that since they paid money, EVERYTHING Wildcard makes during that early access period is theirs and free for them...... Really? I can't help but sigh at this.
The real question, and one most people haven't even bothered to ask is... Did Wildcard expect for their game to be as popular as it now is? Because I am willing to bet their original design plan was not even a million copies sold. So now that they are popular, what are they going to do with the extra money? They could have had it vanish without anyone knowing about it, or they could make their great game even better.
MY ONLY complaint about the DLC is on PvP servers, they are allowing those that did buy the expansion use their Expansion Dinos in the Vanilla game, which is wrong. Once they fix that, if they intend to, then I won't have any complaints. Ark is a fun and engaging game and the expansion is amazing as well.
I know you think your restaurant analogy is great, but it isn't. When you order food from a restaurant, the restaurant is a started business. It had an opening and such, meaning its 'released' and open to review. When they add new items to the menu, these new items have been tested until the owners feel they are ready to be served to the costumers. Going back to the beginning which what you're over looking >>> The restaurant was launched <<<. In Ark's case, they are still developing the game which is supposed to pull enough funds for the game to be officially released. You are saying that they pulled in enough money to accomplish that goal; however, they have not pulled away from early access which is the point of the money.
Again, most people do not care of the game was officially released, but it hasn't been. In essence, the team is using the early access money to start a second project and then charge for that project, pretty much putting 2 early access projects in one.
Let me reiterate......
How much did they think the game would sell. If their early access plans were to sell 500K copies and use that money to fund the finished development of the game, and they sold 5 million, then you expect ALL of that money to go to the funding of the game? That's naive at best...
Game developers have shareholders that demand profits and game developers get laid off if they don't make said profits . There I translated if from whiney millennial to real world English for you.
You clearly have some weird hang up with millennials-that's the only reason I can see why two posts in a row refer to them in a negative way when and a false rhetoric. But please, keep on being ageist-it shows your level of intellect oh so well.
Comments
I'm absolutely convinced that this event will increase the frequency of paid DLC in Early Access games. The expansion has been on Steam's top-seller list this week, so it's obviously selling very well despite the "outrage". Ark remains in the top-10 most played games on Steam.
Other devs will look at the sales generated, not the forum heat...
Its no wonder that the developers are getting a bad rep, developers will always be judged by the quality of their work, be kind of odd if they were not after all. O.o
The Island map (and Center) are full of bugs, players are losing valuable dinos where they spent a LOT of hours on taming them. Just like that. Devs do nothing.
The core game has a LOT of bugs, some make that game unplayable for many.
(dinos sinking through floors/ground/disappearing etc)
These problems are NOT addressed, and probably never will be.
The bet fun: these problems were carried over to the new DLC. So these coding mishaps will cause dinos to disappear there too, and sink through floors etc.
Those bug fixing devs were moved to the team of the new DLC from last january & on.
It explains the massive drop in bugfixes.
Yet they try to shush the players by releasing new dinos every month or so.
Which again are often bugged and cause damage.
(Spawning allosaurs inside player structures and destroying everything inside for example)
They released Primitive servers with a LOT of content the original core games does not have.
They plan to release a version of the game where you can play as dino.
Now this paid DLC.
While the core game is dying because 99% of the official servers have a 70-man player limit and there are seldom more on then 10 at a time on any server. Most official servers are nearly dead.
Wildcard: "starts up many projects at the same time, not finishing one."
Confront them with this, and their forum moderators are coming after you.
I experienced that first hand with confronting them with many bugs, and a forum moderator hit me with a ban stick for "flaming" when I posted a thread about map faults where you could get stuck.
IP reset by the ISP and new forum account there and we're back in business though.
And people: yes, the game is released, they are just hiding behind the "we are prerelease" status.
Liek some said: "You can not have a paid DLC of a prerelease game."
LOVED this game till New Year with all the events and bug fixes and such, in 2016 though, they kinda abandoned the idea to maintain their official Island maps and servers.
Would not recommend this game now anymore.
"going into arguments with idiots is a lost cause, it requires you to stoop down to their level and you can't win"
Better is to log in 1/day.
I have enough friends with end tier bases and dinos that had a <21d timer on their base, did not log in for 9 (real life/vacation/sickness whatever) and the devs ninja patched a 67% structure timer nerf in.
So it ended up with a LOT of players having for example a 5d timer out of a 21d timer left prepatch the structures lost 67% of their original timers and thus after the patch everything was up for grabs post patch.
And they lost everything, work of a entire year lost in 5 mins.
Devs reverted the change, but refused to run a backup so those players that were Fed got the middle finger by WC.
"going into arguments with idiots is a lost cause, it requires you to stoop down to their level and you can't win"
Originally posted by Arskaaa
"when players learned tacticks in dungeon/raids, its bread".
so say we all
The alternative is to go in a player hosted server which doesn't keep with the updates. The game is not finished and anyone that tries to review it as such gets backlash because it's in early access. If they finished the game and released said DLC it wouldn't be such a big fuss.
The game personally is an entire big grind, there isn't a lot to do besides taming dinos which take way too much time. So locking content behind paywalls is already bad for some people.
I make you look at that login screen for a year.
In your eyes that makes it a good game.
I release a patch which alters the green background to a yellow one.
The 20% crash odds are still there.
I say: "don't blame me, it's alpha"
In a year I release a DLC for 20 bucks.
'best game of the year and everyone else is a hypocrit"
ARK Survival: good idea, fun game, Dino island survival transforms to egg grind kibble based FOTM dino taming, HUGE timesink, TERRIBLE management.
The fact that WC launched a Unreal4 editor where ppl can mod their own maps and modules, where modders (incl me) fix WC's bugs ourselves and add desperately needed tweaks and new content is proof that WC is not delivering,
"going into arguments with idiots is a lost cause, it requires you to stoop down to their level and you can't win"
1)Games are amongst other things products so when u suggest, review, critique or anything else the price has a role there.
2)For steam reviews,if someone check the steam reviews he will realize that 99% arent real reviews,and its logical not everyone is capable,have time to make an honest review and review system is basicly open to anyone that just has the game.Most reviews either praise a game without giving a single reason to why or bash it with a swear.There are exceptions ofc and i have read great reviews from random ppl at steam.
3)A review for a game that is released is totally different from a game in early access.
In an early access game is ok to have loads of bugs usually,have missing parts of game,game being unoptimized,mechanics arent even close to balanced,and a lot more.That fits in most games that are in early access so a positive review isnt always in early access games.
In some games that are almost ready maybe it reflects the truth, but in most early access games a positive review isnt about just the current state of game,its the delevopers communication and fixes, often updates and bug fixes, nice promises of new content etc.
Wasnt there some mmo that was trying to have subscriptions for testing phases? Pathfinder? I could be wrong.
Grim Dawn...
DreamFall: The longest Journey.
Divinity OS
ARMA 3
Wasteland 2
Darkest Dungeon etc...
Just to name a few.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
However..... Many people are approaching this the wrong way. Many things happen like this but people are just so used to it and much of it happens behind the scenes that it never occurs to them that it is happening.
For instance, you go to a restaurant, you order a steak dinner. You sit and wait and then your steak dinner arrives. Now, the waiter approaches you and says, you have the dinner you ordered and as offered, but with the profit we made off of making your dinner, we were able to make a second steak dinner but with different seasonings. Would you like to try that one as well at a reduced price? That is what Wildcard is doing. They are still making the base game with all of the features originally promised+LOTS more, but now they are also using the profit they have gained to make a great game even better and, of course, making more profit. The early adopters are stating that since they paid money, EVERYTHING Wildcard makes during that early access period is theirs and free for them...... Really? I can't help but sigh at this.
The real question, and one most people haven't even bothered to ask is... Did Wildcard expect for their game to be as popular as it now is? Because I am willing to bet their original design plan was not even a million copies sold. So now that they are popular, what are they going to do with the extra money? They could have had it vanish without anyone knowing about it, or they could make their great game even better.
MY ONLY complaint about the DLC is on PvP servers, they are allowing those that did buy the expansion use their Expansion Dinos in the Vanilla game, which is wrong. Once they fix that, if they intend to, then I won't have any complaints. Ark is a fun and engaging game and the expansion is amazing as well.
Therefore on the console people probably know no better, they don't follow games like PC players do. It would never have been an issue if this game was a released title - even day 1 DLC throws up red flags but doesn't get this much attention. No, this is still an Early access game. Is this an Early Access expansion? For an unfinished game?
I've played Ark probably around.. 20 - 30 hours total, not much in comparison to others but I played enough to get the gist of it, and while it is a nice survival game in general it still has TONS of bugs.
I've seen finished games with more bugs, and some early access titles with less bugs, but I understand why the game went from mostly positive to mixed reviews in the span of a day.
I bought another Early Access(my first EA purchase) game and regretted it immediately. $20 wasted. I won't make that mistake again. The game had unbearable performance, and was not as advertised.
They took our money that was meant to help develop ARK and funneled it into a paid DLC, just to try and sell that to us too.
It's pretty obvious by the scale of the DLC that its been in development for a while. Why couldn't that work have gone into the main game so that it could actually be released?
I'm pretty dissapointed with Wildcard, and like a lot of people I know, I've removed ARK from my library and will not be playing it again.
Again, most people do not care of the game was officially released, but it hasn't been. In essence, the team is using the early access money to start a second project and then charge for that project, pretty much putting 2 early access projects in one.
As for having tons of bugs, coming from folks who play MMORPgs regularly that's a bit ironic, in comparison all the games we play are essentially early access titles, they're never finished as well as they always have numerous bugs on just the surface level. To top it off these games are coming from major studios with tons of backing.
I understand why the negative reviews are tanking the score as well. That doesn't make them legitimate reviews of the actual product though. They're in protest to a practice not opinions of the quality of the actual game.
I haven't played the game at all TBH, I have no real interest in Dinosaurs vs man or what ever it entails.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
How much did they think the game would sell. If their early access plans were to sell 500K copies and use that money to fund the finished development of the game, and they sold 5 million, then you expect ALL of that money to go to the funding of the game? That's naive at best...
You clearly have some weird hang up with millennials-that's the only reason I can see why two posts in a row refer to them in a negative way when and a false rhetoric. But please, keep on being ageist-it shows your level of intellect oh so well.
Smile