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[Megas]

@ Alex:  I think the game implied what you said.  It just feels sloppy that I need to start a game, save and exit, start a new game if I want to skip it after a clean install.  At least it does not check if I made it to the end at Jangala.  Probably about the least imposing you can get if the tut must be forced.  I played the tutorial instead of skipping it because I thought it was a good idea.  Even on future playthroughs, I might do tutorial if I need a heavy blaster badly.  Those things are fiendishly rare without farming Remnants or sucking up to Tri-Tachyon.

[Embolism]

I feel like a lot of bad feeling about being "forced" to do the tutorial is that the game offers you a fake choice on your first game: if it didn't even tell you it's a tutorial and that "hah hah you can't skip this" and merely dumped you into it you can easily spin it as an "introductory quest" complete with cool rewards.

(More story quests missions plz)

[RawCode]

as far as i can see this is not MMO or AAA project with "maximum audience coverage" features to ensure usability by "intellectual majority".

yes there are few "academic" guidlines about usability, that cause nearly every AAA project to follow same rules, including difficulty sliders and forced tutorial, but this is not only way.

[Embolism]

as far as i can see this is not MMO or AAA project with "maximum audience coverage" features to ensure usability by "intellectual majority".

yes there are few "academic" guidlines about usability, that cause nearly every AAA project to follow same rules, including difficulty sliders and forced tutorial, but this is not only way.

I hope you're not insinuating that only MMOs and so-called "AAA" titles are allowed to reach a broader audience and maximise their profits, and that indie devs should... know their lowly place and serve the glorious True Gaming Masters^TM?

Parroting "it's not the only way" and making no counter-suggestions isn't very convincing, especially when the current implementation is nowhere near as disruptive as you folks are claiming. Not to mention Alex has already made further changes to make it even less disruptive.

[Andy H.K.]

In fact I enjoyed the tutorial quite a lot because I think it enriched the lore of Starsector somewhat - a glimse into how the Hegemony operate and how "flexible" they are at times... I'd love to see more of it.

So I think the worst mistake Alex made here is calling it a "tutorial". If it was called something like "an induction to the Sector" I think our veterans here would feel better.

I believe It's a matter of presentation.

[Embolism]

In fact I enjoyed the tutorial quite a lot because I think it enriched the lore of Starsector somewhat - a glimse into how the Hegemony operate and how "flexible" they are at times... I'd love to see more of it.

So I think the worst mistake Alex made here is calling it a "tutorial". If it was called something like "an induction to the Sector" I think our veterans here would feel better.

I believe It's a matter of presentation.

This exactly. I'd love to see similar missions in the future. Just don't call them tutorials, and don't give the option to skip them when you actually can't: that makes people react negatively by instinct (don't tell me what to do!), as evidenced by this thread's existence.

[Megas]

Decades ago, when the best gaming at the time was in arcades (and all that was available as home consoles was either Pong or maybe Atari 2600), the games were generally Nintendo hard because they wanted as many quarters as possible fed into the machine.  For that purpose, the game was not trying to give the win to the player to make him feel good.  (Actually, games that ended aside from time limit or running out of lives were almost non-existent until about the mid-'80s.)  The game was trying to beat the player mercilessly (sometimes spectacularly, sometimes not) after about a minute grace period, and it was up to the player to fight back and get the highest score, or survive as long as possible.  Because of hardware limitations of the day, instructions were on the cabinet and/or played during games' attract mode.  Level 1 may give a one-liner hint or two.

Before video games became widespread in arcades the '80s, pinball machines were dominant.  Arcades in the late '70s were dominated by pinball machines (and some had pool tables).  Even during the early '80s, there was roughly a fifty-fifty split in pinball and video games.  The point of early video games was much like sports or various pinball machines.  Play as long as possible to get the best score or something similar.

The closest thing people had to a console RPG was Adventure on Atari 2600.  That game is classic.

[nomadic_leader]

My views are based on what I personally want the game to be like. The developer does not pay me to be a marketing consultant. I am not part of a 'fan base' that is emotionally invested in the financial or otherwise success of the developer. My support is the 15$ I already paid, and I want the game to be as I'd like it.

I consider all arguments about steam reviews etc as null in regard to my interests. I can understand why economic arguments would sway the developer, but they have zero influence on me as an already paying customer. I don't consider it my duty to worry about such things or make suggestions based on them either.

So it's an irreconcilable difference and a design compromise for economic factors, which disappoints me, since the overall project seems to be non-economic in motive (6 year development, etc) But prerelease games are expected to disappoint, and much of the fun are these meta discussions about the game's design progress, so I certainly hold no grudge.

[Megas]

My views are based on what I personally want the game to be like.
...
I consider all arguments about steam reviews etc as null in regard to my interests.

Same here.  What is the point of indie development if everyone dances to Steam's tune?

[Midnight Kitsune]

My views are based on what I personally want the game to be like.
...
I consider all arguments about steam reviews etc as null in regard to my interests.

Same here.  What is the point of indie development if everyone dances to Steam's tune?

Because many times Steam sales can make or break an indie dev? Because many people get their games THROUGH Steam and the first few days, weeks, months are the most crucial? Hell, there are many out there that won't even BUY games like starsector UNLESS it is on Steam!

[Megas]

That is all fine and good.  That just makes the devs effectively Steam employees, despite being so-called indie, if said devs are relying on Steam for their success.  I know I have not bought games because I needed Steam to play it.  Since it seems with so many modern games dependent on Steam, I have resigned that I probably will play mostly older games or maybe make my own some day.

[Andy H.K.]

Whether SS goes on Steam is besides the point... What Alex have done is to make sure new players can get into this huge and deep game easier and faster via a short segment of guided gameplay. WE got nothing to lose here (quite a nice head start on the contrary)... Does this thing (that you've already passed) really bother you this much?

Even that segment is as good quality as the rest of the gameplay.... Have you guys even read the well-writen conversation? And the final fight... it was a well-balanced challenge to both the ability to maneuver in the campaign map and in-combat fighting prowess. Even here the SS dev team made no compromise!

Or are we going back to wall-of-text Manual?

That said, some written material would be nice, especially that it seems a lot of information is buried deep within blog posts and patch notes....

[Thaago]

That is all fine and good.  That just makes the devs effectively Steam employees, despite being so-called indie, if said devs are relying on Steam for their success.  I know I have not bought games because I needed Steam to play it.  Since it seems with so many modern games dependent on Steam, I have resigned that I probably will play mostly older games or maybe make my own some day.

No, devs aren't Steam employees, they are paying Steam customers. The product that Steam offers them is the access to an incredibly large consumer base with readily available data to efficiently advertise (Steam's targeted ads about games know me well enough that I'm interested in probably 2/3 of what they show me: I will deliberately look at the 'recommended titles' stream aka advertisement because it offers me something of value as a consumer). And a distribution and payment system too, I guess, but there are other solutions to that problem.

[Alex]

My "this is why we can't have nice things" point is more about people self-inflicting a bad experience. Obviously first-time-player impressions are always a concern - I'd like people that bought the game to have a good time with it, you know? Steam reviews/word of mouth/etc are all tied to that, but only as a consequence of the players' experience - I don't think it makes sense to look at that as a primary design goal.

Basically, what I'm saying is: one can look at it as something based on wanting to avoid a bad steam review, and it's not entirely unreasonable since that may be an outcome down the line, but that's not where the primary motivation comes from. I'd make the same decision if that (Steam/money) wasn't a concern.

...
I believe It's a matter of presentation.

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. It might be better to just straight-up skip the "do you want the tutorial or not" step if it's not actually skippable, and replace it with "start game" or some such.

[nomadic_leader]

I understand why you want people to have a good time, and the tutorial is fine (except that it hammers you into a faction), but none of this convinces me that you shouldn't let people skip it if they want to. Give them a grave warning or something.

You can lead a horse to water but you cannot make it swim. This person you're imagining, if indeed they are so limited, will end up being frustrated with starsector no matter what you do. It's not the simplest game, you know? Your concern for this hypothetical person seems fastidious.