Brazilian_Joe Brazilian_Joe

Do you want to test one more BETA before game release?

Do you want to test one more BETA before game release?

I would prefer to make a poll, if the forum provided such a tool. 

I think it's a given that on any strategy game with the scope of SOASE, that there will be bug-and-balance fixes after release.

Regardless, do you think it would be fruitful to have at least one more round of beta testing before release, even if it means delaying the release date by 1~2 weeks or more?

I vote for YES.

44,938 views 55 replies
Reply #51 Top

I'm not saying that I believe that people should make games for profit.  I'm saying that they should make awesome games because they love it and if it turns out well, they deserve to get money from it.  Content driven development: good.  Profit driven development: bad.

Reply #52 Top

Yes, we all see what EA provided us. I have several friends once been core fans of Need for Speed, they bought every games of NFS they can (just consider the fact that in 1990s, the price of NFS5 in China can provide a family with one month of food). But now, they cursed and abandoned the latest NFS.

But the devs are people, not androids, they have family to feed. They have pressure.

I respect the devs because they offer us a good game with quite low budget. But the only reason I spend my money is because I love the topic and how the game shows us that topic. And that's problem: such a space RTS can hardly become a popular game, so the financial pressure is always there, the devs can never polish their products like Blizzard; but the other side of coin is, such an "unfinished" game will surely scare some potential new players, if not many. The circle has already been small, and each potential loss is severe loss.

I'm not defending the devs; I write these just because I'm a firmware developer, and always has the pressure of quality and schedule and cost, and I think I can understand the devs. But, I'm a fan of Sins, I love it, and hope it to become a great game instead of only a good game. So I really hope the devs can persuade their managements and publishers, to give them at least two weeks more for beta testing.

And I read an article somewhere, which says, most game sales income is within the first week of release.

Reply #53 Top

Quoting gundamlit, reply 52
And I read an article somewhere, which says, most game sales income is within the first week of release.

That's most true for hype-driven console games, where it's all front loaded and then disappears once the hype is gone. Console games also don't tend to have sale prices very often, and they disappear from store shelves due to limited space or when the number of copies pressed simply runs out (a lot of translated Japanese games just disappear because there's no copies left to buy and it's too expensive to make more, so sales are lost).

It's much less true for PC games these days, thanks to the market now being primarily digital. Games don't disappear from Steam. Sales are plentiful and can rekindle interest later (and garner huge revenue). If it takes a while for word of mouth to create an audience for a game, it doesn't matter that much anymore. A game like Recettear blew past expectations, but didn't do it in the first few days. It took some time for word to spread, and once it did then sales shot up.

It's pretty much reversed for iOS games though, because almost everything is based on word of mouth and what your friends are playing there (and reviews, and showing up in the top games lists. There's very few real franchises that get front loaded sales (Angry Birds Space being one that did), stuff like Draw Something sold continuously for weeks as more people learned about it.

Reply #54 Top

Quoting Volt_Cruelerz, reply 51
I'm saying that they should make awesome games because they love it and if it turns out well, they deserve to get money from it.

If only the world worked as such...unfortunately, it does not v_v

Reply #55 Top

Hence my fear that they might be losing money..