this post was submitted on 08 Jul 2024
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Who are "these companies"? Game publishers and developers certainly aren't a monolith. To me, this publisher's complaint seems like an implicit critique of how big publishers have trained gamers to have expectations that are unrealistic for all but the most high-profile games.
There are a lot of articles like this one lately saying Gamers don't appreciate the products we're given and that we complain too much. Those companies. All of them. Manor Lords is still Early Access on steam. If the developer can't be bothered to develop his unfinished game while taking our money then that's on him, not us.
We're living in a "either 1 star or 5 stars" world. There's no in between, and I fully understand that it can be frustrating and put immense pressure onto developers.
I don't know the company behind this game, but I'm not giving them the 1 star review just because I assume every tiny company is bad as well as all the big companies.
What if there's a boss that tries to protect his employees and sees the issue in extreme expectations?
Not saying it definitely is that way, but why assume the worst first?
Early access games are marketed as such, and it shouldn't come with a suprise that it's an unfinished game. Some do it better, some worse, but an early access title shouldn't be treated with expectations that reflect a finished product.
I'm not a fan of most early access titles myself though, at least not early in development. I don't want to help develop it, so I wait for an almost finished product.
From where I sit, good and critically acclaimed games are plentiful and if you can make a game then it's easy to make a good one: just don't be a greedy idiot and make the game you want to play.
If the developer doesn't want to be badgered about finishing his game then he shouldn't be selling it unfinished, it comes with the territory. The problem is they went and complained.
Neither are gamers. They aren't a monolith either. This article smacks of the "millennials kill billion dollar industry " nonsense. There's definitely mitigating factors on both sides as far as the expectations during such transactions. When I pay for something that is promised to be complete I have an expectation in my mind that it will be completed. If it's an early access beta, I spent the money to support that product and developer.
However a lot of developers big and small have engendered this reaction because they fall victim to the hype train. They market the game. People are interested. People's interest begins to wain because the game is taking too long (cyber punk), or the company doesn't want to lose the hype wave so they release even though the game isn't finished (no mans sky, and cyber punk honestly), and this is what we get. On the other hand, we see the backlash that happens when games get canceled by larger studios. And we see smaller studios constantly miss their launch windows or expected release dates with little to no contact with the fan base or the public (Team Cherry/silksong).
It doesn't matter if you're an indie developer or a triple A studio, what most gamers want is a complete game at launch, or (in the case of an alpha/beta release) updates.
A vocal minority is being shitty here and the article is acting as if gamers are just getting together to hold developers big and small's feet to the coals or something.