I.e, frustration: This is the issue Larian was faced with when they were deciding on an early (i.e, long) alpha/beta period. The fact is that most games simply announced a delay in release date (which is frustrating) but you don't see the actual state of the game until it is closer to release or progression due to update. This situation is not unique with Larian but it is very new to the gaming industry (i.e, early access seems to have caught fire this year; not only with tiny indie developers that have done it for years with SMALL followers but larger 'indie' developers).
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There are two dangers here: people get bored with the game before it is even released. They get frustrated with waiting. The benefits (esp for small developers) is they get early cash needed near the end of the developement cycle and they get much needed feedback before the 'release' so they can adjust game play and fix hard to find bugs.
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I'm mixed. To be honest I think major games should not be released quite this early for the general population (i.e, on sale in steam) in the cycle (I would say 3 months top but that is just a guess as to what people can tolerate) but I think it would be interesting in the years to come to do some studies on the matter trade off of benefit/harm.
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Am i frustrated. Hum. I guess - not really sure - but to be honest with or without early access the game would still have been delayed. We can only hope (at this juncture in time) that early access allowed for a faster release of a better game and the game is not spoiled by the time gap between first play and final product (I've personally have only played for 5 or 6 hours as the current state is somewhat unsatisfactory for my play style tolerance level).
Last edited by meme; 22/03/14 01:10 PM.
