This game needs polish!

[Marceror]

I know what you’re thinking. Of course it does, stupid! It’s still in beta.

 

Yes I get that, but the number of issues that I’m seeing with such a small portion of the game has me very concerned. I mean, I presume that OE took the time to make this beta demo as good as it can be. It is still lacking and, well, what about the rest of the game? If the 3 – 5 hour backer beta needs this much work, what about our stronghold? The 13 odd levels of Od Nua. Two major cities, and so on and so on? Can a December 2014 target still be attained? For me the beta isn’t even playable, as in 3 separate games my party members have consistently had their equipment disappear. Try playing a wizard without a spell book!

 

Let me be among the first to say that I fully expect the release to get pushed back. I just don’t see Winter 2014 happening. You figure, they’re going to want to release at least a little before Christmas, so at most they 4 months to get this out on time. I just don’t think there’s going to be enough time.

 

Now let me pause to say that the “wrapper” of this game is fantastic. I love the graphics. I love the Infinity Engine feel – obsidian has nailed this! I love the varied classes and races and sub-races. I truly feel that this game has all the potential to be the first worthy spiritual successor to Baldur’s Gate, and perhaps even end its 15 year reign as the King of cRPGs.

 

But I hope that OE will take the time to give it the polish it deserves, and release it when its truly ready.

[Giubba]

After an afternoon playing the beta i have to admit i'm pretty much fed up with the beta.

 

The combat (just like in that cluster**** know as witcher 2) prevent me to appreciate anything else in the game.

 

Just thinking that at some point i will have to fight something is enough for makeing me quit the game.

[Osvir]

Patience. Wait for an update or two Marceror.

This is the first build released. We might see massive improvements in the very first update, or massive improvements in 3-4 updates that'll make you feel "This game can be released today!!". Naive of me to say it perhaps, but we have no real idea just how much the beta will improve in 1-2 weeks. Let alone 1-5 days. It's a mystery!

Yes, this topic is stupid, impatient and has an air of "entitlement". The initial thoughts would be more understandable and reasonable had you posted them 3-4 months from now.

We know way too little at this moment. It's been out less than 24 hours.

Combat is an issue, the strong parts at this moment is the feels, the presentation, exploration and the feeling of adventure in my opinion. It is fun to run around in this world

Edited August 19, 2014 by Osvir

[salo]

Well, one assumes that if they'd fix the disappearing equipment bug, that it would be fixed for the entire game...

Edited August 19, 2014 by salo

[C2B]

I know what you’re thinking. Of course it does, stupid! It’s still in beta.

 

Yes I get that, but the number of issues that I’m seeing with such a small portion of the game has me very concerned. I mean, I presume that OE took the time to make this beta demo as good as it can be. It is still lacking and, well, what about the rest of the game? If the 3 – 5 hour backer beta needs this much work, what about our stronghold? The 13 odd levels of Od Nua. Two major cities, and so on and so on? Can a December 2014 target still be attained? For me the beta isn’t even playable, as in 3 separate games my party members have consistently had their equipment disappear. Try playing a wizard without a spell book!

 

Let me be among the first to say that I fully expect the release to get pushed back. I just don’t see Winter 2014 happening. You figure, they’re going to want to release at least a little before Christmas, so at most they 4 months to get this out on time. I just don’t think there’s going to be enough time.

 

Now let me pause to say that the “wrapper” of this game is fantastic. I love the graphics. I love the Infinity Engine feel – obsidian has nailed this! I love the varied classes and races and sub-races. I truly feel that this game has all the potential to be the first worthy spiritual successor to Baldur’s Gate, and perhaps even end its 15 year reign as the King of cRPGs.

 

But I hope that OE will take the time to give it the polish it deserves, and release it when its truly ready.

A lot of these issues are with the games systems. I wouldn't rule out 2014 yet.

[Caerdon]

The vast majority of the bugs is not at all related to the content in the beta, and I think the most of the unplayability comes from just a handful of bugs. So I'm not worried in the slightest.

 

Sure, there are lots of bugs, but personally I'm extremely happy that Obsidian is definitely on the right track with this, and the most important design decisions so far have been the right ones.

 

In a few weeks the roughest edges will be gone and the beta will be just pure enjoyment.

[Monte Carlo]

 

I know what you’re thinking. Of course it does, stupid! It’s still in beta.

 

Yup, that's exactly what I think.

[RagingFlower]

Ooooooh.

 

So that's why my wizard can't cast spells. 

 

I feel that your criticism is fair, and as every single game worth caring about seems to be pushing their dates out of 2014, I don't see why Obsidian won't take the time they need to react to the feedback they've received.

 

I still believe that bugs aside, I am getting exactly what I expected to get when Project Eternity was first pitched. While my time with the beta was a little jarring due to all the bugs and the fact you're kind of thrown into a random area with little context, I believe the final product still has the potential to be a big hit.

 

Given Obsidian track record in the past, I expect to find interesting, well written characters and a quality main plot. Without any of that in the beta, it's hard to judge it. Hopefully by the time the game comes out they can work out the problems people are having with the combat. 

[Marceror]

Patience. Wait for an update or two Marceror.

 

This is the first build released. We might see massive improvements in the very first update, or massive improvements in 3-4 updates that'll make you feel "This game can be released today!!". Naive of me to say it perhaps, but we have no real idea just how much the beta will improve in 1-2 weeks. Let alone 1-5 days. It's a mystery!

 

Yes, this topic is stupid, impatient and has an air of "entitlement". The initial thoughts would be more understandable and reasonable had you posted them 3-4 months from now.

 

We know way too little at this moment. It's been out less than 24 hours.

 

Combat is an issue, the strong parts at this moment is the feels, the presentation, exploration and the feeling of adventure in my opinion. It is fun to run around in this world

A few things here. First off, my post is not one born of "impatience." I'm plenty patient, in fact I'm the one suggesting that OE take "more" time with the game if needed. So "impatience" was the wrong argument to hit me with.

 

As for entitlement, I hear this word bandied about a lot on these forums, with an unnecessarily negative connotation associated with it. Yes, I am fully entitled to share my opinions, even if they happen not to be of the 100% praise category. So yes, I appreciate you acknowledging my entitlement, even if you mistakenly think there's a problem with it.

 

Further if I was raising concerns 3 - 4 months from now, that would be way too late. That's when the game is set to be released, and at that point those concerns would be release day realities. Far, far better to raise one's concerns early, in my humble opinion. The other thing that this forum is going to have to deal with, is that the world is filled with cynical people. I'm one of them, and in my personal life I have turned this into an advantage, so I don't see it necessarily as a flaw. It's the folks who "assume it's all under control" that I have a hard time understanding. When it's something that I care about, as I care deeply about this game, that's not good enough for me.

 

And further, why should I assume it's all under control? Why should I assume that Obsidian will have things all wrapped up in 4 months? They might, but frankly, any voice other than their's on this topic means little to me. For my way of thinking, for the way my brain works, there is legitimate reason for concern only 4 months away from release. And further, they opted to release the beta in a barely playable state. This is a discernible behavior that I am reacting to, and it indicates that they might they do so with the final release too. I don't want that. Why should I be dismissive of that?

 

At the end of the day, I want only what the rest of you want. I want PoE to be the rousing success that many of us have waited 15 years for, and have overly bloated expectations of. I guess I just happen to express myself differently than many of you. I expect to be held accountable for my actions in my real life, and I don't have a problem holding others accountable.

 

So be prepared for some honesty from me in the weeks/months to come!

[Malicron]

On top of all the things already mentioned, I for one think we desperatly need a scroll speed slider. I can't count the number of times my party bravly charged to the edge of the screen, only to wait for me to realize I'd just ordered them to run face first into a wall.

[Tartantyco]

You're the biggest drama queen on this forum, Marceror. Calm down. There are bugs in your beta. That's how it usually is. It's no more buggy than other betas I've participated in, it's only that a couple of bugs make it hard to play the game. This does not make those bugs hard to fix.

 

My suggestion to you is, when you feel an overwhelming urge to come on the forum and yell "the sky is falling" throughout this week, don't. Just don't.

[Wintersong]

I know what you’re thinking. Of course it does, stupid! It’s still in beta.

 

Yes I get that, but the number of issues that I’m seeing with such a small portion of the game has me very concerned. I mean, I presume that OE took the time to make this beta demo as good as it can be. It is still lacking and, well, what about the rest of the game? If the 3 – 5 hour backer beta needs this much work, what about our stronghold? The 13 odd levels of Od Nua. Two major cities, and so on and so on? Can a December 2014 target still be attained? For me the beta isn’t even playable, as in 3 separate games my party members have consistently had their equipment disappear. Try playing a wizard without a spell book!

 

Let me be among the first to say that I fully expect the release to get pushed back. I just don’t see Winter 2014 happening. You figure, they’re going to want to release at least a little before Christmas, so at most they 4 months to get this out on time. I just don’t think there’s going to be enough time.

 

Now let me pause to say that the “wrapper” of this game is fantastic. I love the graphics. I love the Infinity Engine feel – obsidian has nailed this! I love the varied classes and races and sub-races. I truly feel that this game has all the potential to be the first worthy spiritual successor to Baldur’s Gate, and perhaps even end its 15 year reign as the King of cRPGs.

 

But I hope that OE will take the time to give it the polish it deserves, and release it when its truly ready.

I don't know if it will be delayed or not. But I want to trust Obsidian to do the right thing and delay the release if the game really needs it. This time, they cannot blame buggy release on publisher's testers plus imposed deadline. I love them but a messy buggy release this time... That said, I expect some bugs on release, unfortunately and as in every other game released these days. Hopefully, they will be few and minor.

 

The only bug that really annoys me is the items dissapearing one. A total party destroyer. My character lost two sabres and a mace. The dwarf lost the shield, the Orlan the Night Runner armor... Even with the respawning loot from the Orlan in the inn (when it doesn't dissapear when you pick the items!!), totally annoying bug.

 

Welcome to the beta, we got fun 'n' games...

[Answermancer]

People who are reacting negatively to you are doing so because your post is hyperbolic and ignorant of game development in a way that makes people roll their eyes. You say that they "opted to release the beta in a barely playable state" which is nonsense. They committed to releasing it at a certain time and did so, and plenty of people are playing it. There are some massive bugs, sure, and all it takes is one or two impactful bugs to make a game "unplayable" by yours or most people's standards. These kind of bugs, though they make the game barely playable, are not particularly difficult to fix (once you find the root cause) and they can easily sneak into a game that's undergoing rapid development between builds.

 

Imagine a full finished game like BG2 but add a bug where all your characters are reset to level 1 periodically. This would make it unplayable, sure, but it's also just one bug, and likely an easy one to fix (though perhaps hard to track down).

 

I have worked on games, and I've played a ****ton of early, alpha, and beta releases and I see nothing here that is out of the ordinary for a beta, particularly one that is only going out to backers rather than the world at large. They are wise, in my opinion, to only release it to us in this state (rather than selling it as an early access demo like many companies are doing), collect our bug reports and feedback, and concentrate on finishing the game.

[Osvir]

If all you're saying is "I'm fine with the game coming out 2015". Then we're on the same page. Obsidian should put as much time as they deem required. If it's not coming out 2014 then *shrug* I'm fine with early-, late-spring 2015. But if it means 2014 that's cool too.

All I'm saying is we shouldn't jump our guns within 24 hour post-beta release. This is the same discussion as "Will the game come out 2015?", which is a topic that healthily recycles. Because we don't know yet, Feargus was pretty sure it would be 2014 though

Your topic title is misleading and comes of as rather harsh, when it's "The game might ship 2015" you want to talk about.

Edited August 19, 2014 by Osvir

[vril]

 

You're the biggest drama queen on this forum, Marceror. Calm down. There are bugs in your beta. That's how it usually is. It's no more buggy than other betas I've participated in, it's only that a couple of bugs make it hard to play the game. This does not make those bugs hard to fix.

 

My suggestion to you is, when you feel an overwhelming urge to come on the forum and yell "the sky is falling" throughout this week, don't. Just don't.

 

 

People who are reacting negatively to you are doing so because your post is hyperbolic and ignorant of game development in a way that makes people roll their eyes. You say that they "opted to release the beta in a barely playable state" which is nonsense. They committed to releasing it at a certain time and did so, and plenty of people are playing it. There are some massive bugs, sure, and all it takes is one or two impactful bugs to make a game "unplayable" by yours or most people's standards. These kind of bugs, though they make the game barely playable, are not particularly difficult to fix (once you find the root cause) and they can easily sneak into a game that's undergoing rapid development between builds.

 

Imagine a full finished game like BG2 but add a bug where all your characters are reset to level 1 periodically. This would make it unplayable, sure, but it's also just one bug, and likely an easy one to fix (though perhaps hard to track down).

 

I have worked on games, and I've played a ****ton of early, alpha, and beta releases and I see nothing here that is out of the ordinary for a beta, particularly one that is only going out to backers rather than the world at large. They are wise, in my opinion, to only release it to us in this state (rather than selling it as an early access demo like many companies are doing), collect our bug reports and feedback, and concentrate on finishing the game.

 

This, not to mention the very fact they stripped content out of the game to push a beta that did not spoil story content for players in itself can create bugs.

Edited August 19, 2014 by vril

[PrimeJunta]

To be fair, it's way buggier than our betas. :smug:

 

That said, if the architecture is sound and the project is well managed, a team can chew through a lot of bugs fast. When in full bugfixing mode, I average about ten a day. Most of the most annoying bugs in the beta (e.g. the disappearing item bug, the combat clusterhug bug, the pathfinding issues) are in the systems, and once fixed, they're fixed for the whole game. A lot of the bugs are missing strings and similar content issues, which are trivial to resolve once someone gets to it, and they're the kind of thing that can be done in parallel across the entire game.

 

I'm quite confident the next build will play a lot better, and in a month or two it'll start shaping up well.

 

That said... they should have waited a little. We got a list of things to look for as high-priority feedback, and especially the combat is too borked at the moment to be really able to say anything.

[IndiraLightfoot]

Hopefully, this feedback flood, may mean a beta build with much better playing combat coming pretty soon.

[PrimeJunta]

Oh, I'm sure a better build will be coming soon anyway, feedback or no feedback.

 

Giving it another spin. On Easy this time.

[axan22]

Well I do like the fell of the game etc and some awesome work has gone into it, but I had a big that woudn't let me complete one quest, out of the 2 I finished dragon egg and ogre.  Combat isn't great at the mo, but give it some updates and think it will be an awesome game, although would prefer a normal HP mechanic. 

[Headbomb]

While this beta is buggier than a psychopath's shack, the bugs seem mostly related to

 

*UI design and UI responsiveness (the big one)

*Load/reload issues

*Missing ressources

*Unimplemented screens and mechanics

 

If Obsidian does a UI pass, how the game plays and many of the most annoying things about the beta will be fixed. Personally, I would focus on this because this is so buggy and so detrimental to the experience that it makes no sense to "try and get a feel" for each of the classes when you can't use them or their abilties. I got no idea how the Wizard feels because I can't even cast spells with him. Half the time my fighters get stuck in the ground after switching from ranged to melee and I just can't use them anymore. They must have kept the Gamescon demo on rails, or used a later build, because what I've seen at gamescon felt a lot more polished than this.

[war:head]

People who are reacting negatively to you are doing so because your post is hyperbolic and ignorant of game development in a way that makes people roll their eyes. You say that they "opted to release the beta in a barely playable state" which is nonsense. They committed to releasing it at a certain time and did so, and plenty of people are playing it. There are some massive bugs, sure, and all it takes is one or two impactful bugs to make a game "unplayable" by yours or most people's standards. These kind of bugs, though they make the game barely playable, are not particularly difficult to fix (once you find the root cause) and they can easily sneak into a game that's undergoing rapid development between builds.

 

Imagine a full finished game like BG2 but add a bug where all your characters are reset to level 1 periodically. This would make it unplayable, sure, but it's also just one bug, and likely an easy one to fix (though perhaps hard to track down).

 

I have worked on games, and I've played a ****ton of early, alpha, and beta releases and I see nothing here that is out of the ordinary for a beta, particularly one that is only going out to backers rather than the world at large. They are wise, in my opinion, to only release it to us in this state (rather than selling it as an early access demo like many companies are doing), collect our bug reports and feedback, and concentrate on finishing the game.

While you are correct about a lot of the gameplay related bugs, there are indeed some disconcerting issues with this beta that do not fit the regular development cycle. I already stated as much in the first impressions thread but the amount of interface and auxiliary issues has me a bit worried as well, because they fall into the fix&forget category that are usually fixed on a very early stage to ensure a more convenient in-house testing environment.

 

 

Take the zoom issue for example - zoom is a core interaction mechanic and usually implemented before even thinking about actual game mechanics and such. Seeing issues with something that should be working perfectly for about a year now isn't all that assuring.

[Tigranes]

UI / Interface is not an early dev fix & forget issue. RPG UIs at least tend to keep getting polished right to the end.

[Bryy]

 

 

I know what you’re thinking. Of course it does, stupid! It’s still in beta.

 

Yup, that's exactly what I think.

Yeah. This.

[lolaldanee]

wait for the pathfinding, auto attack and disappearing item fixes - before that, any criticism is wasted breath, those issues influence everything else way too massive

[Luridis]

Actually, I'm pretty impressed with what I've seen so far. No C++ runtime errors, no DirectX issues, even on my oddball SLI system with multiple video reflection drivers. No CTD's, no missing, scrambled or wrongly colored textures, no oddities from the 2D perspective projection they've created, no strange lighting behavior.

 

In other words: The engine appears to be pretty solid. Fixing the rest is all in the scripting and data files, which concerns me far less than if I was seeing stuff like crash dumps.

 

OP: You're coming across as a little alarmist. Raising issues is a good thing, but...

Edited August 26, 2014 by TrueNeutral
Removed video