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Starsector 0.97a is out! (02/02/24); New blog post: Simulator Enhancements (03/13/24)

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Author Topic: Stagnant Development  (Read 35298 times)

phyrex

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Re: Stagnant Development
« Reply #15 on: July 29, 2012, 11:24:52 AM »

this is ludicrous
for a game in alpha, starfarer rank incredibly high in playability.

OP is blind or too hardheaded to realize this
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OrangeLima

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Re: Stagnant Development
« Reply #16 on: July 29, 2012, 11:30:45 AM »

OP voiced a opinion, no need to call him blind. This is a friendly forum, where we respect peoples opinion, even if we disagree.
I am sorry, but calling people blind from the truth is a bad idea when the person may be measuring development time on his scale.

I beg you to not make harsh accusations and insults, as a fellow forum member.
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Griffinhart

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Re: Stagnant Development
« Reply #17 on: July 29, 2012, 11:41:01 AM »

itt: customer with over-inflated sense of entitlement and no sense of progress re: game development and development in general.

(Sorry. It's a particularly bitter point for me, as a game developer-in-training, when people say "x game is making no new changes at all" when I look at the same game/patch notes and see thousands of lines of code having been writ.*)

*: It's surprising how much you can do with a few k LOC, though. Once worked on a team with four other people and we farted out a 2D ASCII dungeon-crawling RPG in ~16k LOC. The combat code alone (which I worked on) weighed in around 2.5k (so nearly a sixth of the work put into the game), and the visual overlays for combat were another 1-2k, IIRC.

-- Griffinhat
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hadesian

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Re: Stagnant Development
« Reply #18 on: July 29, 2012, 11:59:36 AM »

I don't feel entitled to anything but the following:
1. To receive updates when they are ready to be released
2. To make suggestions and be a member of the community.

That's all I'm entitled to. Not whining
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Changes as of May 24, 2013
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BillyRueben

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Re: Stagnant Development
« Reply #19 on: July 29, 2012, 12:40:34 PM »

Everyone is entitled to their opinion. I also had the feeling that Alex was stalling with these combat updates. I'm not going to lie and say that feeling has disappeared, but I do feel that every update has improved the game enough so far.
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Temjin

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Re: Stagnant Development
« Reply #20 on: July 29, 2012, 03:25:07 PM »

Everyone is entitled to their opinion. I also had the feeling that Alex was stalling with these combat updates. I'm not going to lie and say that feeling has disappeared, but I do feel that every update has improved the game enough so far.

Weird. I can't say I really understand that.

He's been pretty transparent with his updates, and I can completely understand wanting to have combat locked down before moving onto other systems.

Plus, what does he have to gain by stalling?
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Chancellor Meatsteak

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Re: Stagnant Development
« Reply #21 on: July 29, 2012, 03:44:29 PM »

Plus, what does he have to gain by stalling?

I wouldn't look at ship systems as any kind of detour from the original plan. That's something that was always meant to be in the game, and had to get done at some point. Not saying that you necessarily were looking at it that way, but thought it worth mentioning in any case.

Part of the reason I ended up doing them now was to have a little more time to think through certain non-combat aspects, while still making concrete progress on something that was more better defined in my mind (i.e., ship systems). I'm happy to say that the extra time to think has helped a lot - I know that's rather vague, but that's all you get until I'm more certain of how the non-combat aspects in question will actually work :) (That generally means implementing a basic working version, btw.)

Getting combat closer to a finished state more quickly is a nice bonus, too.

As for my opinion, I'm happy with the speed development is going thus far. I'd rather have the economy implemented sooner rather than ship systems, but I understand why it's being done the way it is, and I'm still excited for the upcoming patch anyways.
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Griffinhart

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Re: Stagnant Development
« Reply #22 on: July 29, 2012, 03:56:28 PM »

From my point of view, it makes sense to get combat locked down and feature-complete ("feature-complete" is the important part; usually, when a game moves into beta, it's usually entirely asset- and feature-complete, and the rest of the work is in balancing and bug-quashing; in my experience, games that aren't this by beta are... significantly more difficult to work with and/or on) before moving onto campaign/economy, since combat is smaller in scope (also, it's where a lot of the gameplay is, and for a dev to sell their game in alpha stage, there had better be some kind of gameplay worth playing, to make funding the rest of development feel "worth it").

Consider what Starfarer would look like if the developers had chosen to focus on campaign first, before combat. Or, worse, if the devs were working on all parts all at the same time. The former would be like Mount & Blade overworld and nothing but; the latter'd be a friggin' nightmare.

-- Griffinhart
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moontan

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Re: Stagnant Development
« Reply #23 on: July 30, 2012, 07:21:14 PM »

let the man work!

they didn't asked Michelagenlo when was gonna be the next 'update' when he was painting the Sixtine Chapel, did they?  :)
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Reshy

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Re: Stagnant Development
« Reply #24 on: July 30, 2012, 09:56:00 PM »

I hope you guys realize that the game in it's current APLHA state is pretty much at the same level that many COMPLETE games are at.  If Alex wanted to he could have ignored the campaign and simply sold it as a space arena sim.  And you know what?  I'd still buy it.
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phyrex

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Re: Stagnant Development
« Reply #25 on: July 31, 2012, 11:16:11 AM »

I hope you guys realize that the game in it's current APLHA state is pretty much at the same level that many COMPLETE games are at.  If Alex wanted to he could have ignored the campaign and simply sold it as a space arena sim.  And you know what?  I'd still buy it.

well said !
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DSMK2

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Re: Stagnant Development
« Reply #26 on: July 31, 2012, 11:31:16 AM »

I'd complain about stagnant development if the developer decides to hide from us for more than half a month; giving us the impression that nothing is "moving" in the game's development. Otherwise I'm pleased with the team's involvement with the game's development and community.

I want to see more of the lore guy!
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StianStark

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Re: Stagnant Development
« Reply #27 on: July 31, 2012, 11:32:00 AM »

I've worked on quite a few indie projects, I'm working on Starfarer now and all I will say is that I disagree with the OP to just about the maximum possible extent. I know I might be biased, but especially considering the team size I think the game is making very good progress.

Also, making games is not easy - in fact it's the very opposite! :)
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OrangeLima

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Re: Stagnant Development
« Reply #28 on: July 31, 2012, 11:52:44 AM »

I've worked on quite a few indie projects, I'm working on Starfarer now and all I will say is that I disagree with the OP to just about the maximum possible extent. I know I might be biased, but especially considering the team size I think the game is making very good progress.

Also, making games is not easy - in fact it's the very opposite! :)

You work on starfarer?? Hi, nice to meet you!
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hadesian

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Re: Stagnant Development
« Reply #29 on: July 31, 2012, 11:57:09 AM »

I've worked on quite a few indie projects, I'm working on Starfarer now and all I will say is that I disagree with the OP to just about the maximum possible extent. I know I might be biased, but especially considering the team size I think the game is making very good progress.

Also, making games is not easy - in fact it's the very opposite! :)

You work on starfarer?? Hi, nice to meet you!
Mr. Stark does the music.
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Changes as of May 24, 2013
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