Some thoughts about the eventual launch on Steam

[Jaime619]

I've been lurking on this forum for more than a year now and since the release on Steam is closing in I decided to create this post to give my thoughts about it.

For the developers:

I've been following your work for some time and I must say that I like how far you have come since then. With that aside, I think you need to understand that Steam Early Access is a ruthless place where the community has extremely high expectations, that is also tied with the price of the game on launch. As such I think it's important to understand a few things about what the average Steam EA player will look for in this game:

• They will focus a lot on performance and stability;
• Most of them won't care about this forum;
• They will expect decent levels of communication (about 1 dev post/month or more) out of you in the Steam platform;
• They will expect at maximum 3 months between major updates (exceptions occur, but on average this is what I found to happen);
• They are extremely impatient, dependant on guidance;
• They will compare your work rate and content with other games to the point of decontextualizing some actions or decisions.

With that in mind, I think you should be aware that for Steam EA the current pricing is high, this will mean that expectations will be incredibly high at launch. The average EA player will expect a stable Beta with few major bugs and some minor ones. To avoid the bane of EA titles that end up in the mixed and below reviews categories I think you will need to plan out to launch a bit later than autumn, give yourselves around 2-3 extra months to fix the performance bugs that might come with the added campaign features. Could also consider lowering the price a bit at launch. Since the players there won't care at all for this forum and it's content, prepare yourselves to launch content every 2 months at least for the first year in EA.

Hopefully you guys will avoid the easy to slip, hard to spot EA death spiral of reviews that will have a very negative influence on this game. Look how long it took NMS to get out of it and how hard the devs must have worked for it.

I look forward to getting this game on Steam, and I really want you guys to succeed!

For the community:

For you guys, I hope you understand that you need to avoid being excessively agressive to the new players who show lack of knowledge. As I stated previously, they are impatient and will lash out sometimes but overall try and make this a welcoming community. Since this is a niche game and has a separate forum it's really easy to "withdraw" from the steam forums, turning them into a toxic place. Keep this in mind, otherwise the new players might think you lot are all diehard fanboys and leave.

Another sensitive topic is about filtering, censoring and such. I know this will be hard on the moderators but please don't censor too much, I've seen devs and mods that censor every little negative thing (even constructive feedback), it ends up killing the community as only the fanboys are left and that won't help the game grow.

Overall I think you guys can do it, I've seen some cool ideas pop up and you all seem civilized. Also look forward to seeing you guys on steam!

Final bits:

I hope I wasn't too boring or intrusive, but this has been brewing since alpha 7,8. Also what do you think? I would like to see opinions on this, if what I'm saying is reasonable or not.

[Cptbarney]

Some noice points too be fair also welcome to dah forums! I agree with all of this, although i don't have steam (too lazy to install it lol and also forget about it a lot). I've been here since alpha 1 so i've seen a lot and seen how the game has grown too be fair, although i think the biggest problems with devs are the lack of comms during patch waiting times (so inbetween patches) and also the large scope of the game (a few have mentioned they wanted CV's and subs although with how much the devs have to do already r.i.p).

They do listen and atm, seems like they are doing all the modern bb's and scheebs first, before moving to the old boags (pre-dreads and older ships from 1875-1920).

[Commander Reed]

49 minutes ago, Cptbarney said:

Some noice points too be fair also welcome to dah forums! I agree with all of this, although i don't have steam (too lazy to install it lol and also forget about it a lot). I've been here since alpha 1 so i've seen a lot and seen how the game has grown too be fair, although i think the biggest problems with devs are the lack of comms during patch waiting times (so inbetween patches) and also the large scope of the game (a few have mentioned they wanted CV's and subs although with how much the devs have to do already r.i.p).

They do listen and atm, seems like they are doing all the modern bb's and scheebs first, before moving to the old boags (pre-dreads and older ships from 1875-1920).

Agree with all above.

Seems like submarines are confirmed, as there is a section about them in the Campaign Help screen. As for CVs, would love them, but it's a lot of work, so I'd expect it to be added - if at all considered, near to completion or after.

[Jaime619]

1 hour ago, Cptbarney said:

Some noice points too be fair also welcome to dah forums! I agree with all of this, although i don't have steam (too lazy to install it lol and also forget about it a lot). I've been here since alpha 1 so i've seen a lot and seen how the game has grown too be fair, although i think the biggest problems with devs are the lack of comms during patch waiting times (so inbetween patches) and also the large scope of the game (a few have mentioned they wanted CV's and subs although with how much the devs have to do already r.i.p).

They do listen and atm, seems like they are doing all the modern bb's and scheebs first, before moving to the old boags (pre-dreads and older ships from 1875-1920).

If I'm not mistaken I first got in contact with this game around alpha 4 or 5, but only started serious lurking around 6 and 7. I did see what was happening  before this patch got announced. The best part is that this game will let me get into contact with people that know a lot about ships of this time period, helping me get more knowlegdeable about this topic. At the same time I'll be able to try out some weird designs once I get the game.
So all in all, a lot of fun to be had

39 minutes ago, Commander Reed said:

Agree with all above.

Seems like submarines are confirmed, as there is a section about them in the Campaign Help screen. As for CVs, would love them, but it's a lot of work, so I'd expect it to be added - if at all considered, near to completion or after.

Oh I didn't know that, sounds good!

 

For context, I barely know ship stuff from all eras and I'm hoping this game will help me understand a bit more about this, be it either through the game itself or the community.

[Commander Reed]

Interesting! Ships are a very fascinating subject, in my opinion. I'm sure you'll have some fun learning about them to a more detailed extent. 

Also, welcome to the community.

[davidt_man]

On 9/18/2021 at 10:14 AM, Cptbarney said:

Some noice points too be fair also welcome to dah forums! I agree with all of this, although i don't have steam (too lazy to install it lol and also forget about it a lot). I've been here since alpha 1 so i've seen a lot and seen how the game has grown too be fair, although i think the biggest problems with devs are the lack of comms during patch waiting times (so inbetween patches) and also the large scope of the game (a few have mentioned they wanted CV's and subs although with how much the devs have to do already r.i.p).

They do listen and atm, seems like they are doing all the modern bb's and scheebs first, before moving to the old boags (pre-dreads and older ships from 1875-1920).

The Devs have a lot of work to do in adding all the missing Light and Heavy Cruiser hulls and superstructures.

Edited October 4, 2021 by davidt_man

[neph]

On 9/18/2021 at 9:55 AM, Jaime619 said:

let me get into contact with people that know a lot about ships of this time period

time for you to fall down the drachinifel rabbit hole. in with you!