To play Devil's Advocate on behalf of people like craig2848 - you need to understand a few things which IMHO clearly explains their expectation.
- The store page does NOT indicate that the game is currently in 'Alpha' state. None of the screenshots or the trailer mention the state that the game is currently in. The Early Access blurb does not state what condition the game is in, that it's in alpha, etc. So other than buying the game and running it (which then brings up the "This is in Alpha" message), one would have to dig around the Steam Discussion & these forums to even know that the game was in Alpha state.
Also, neither the sticky on the Steam Discussion forum, nor on the
http://www.divinityoriginalsin.com site states that the game is currently only in Alpha state. Only Larian forums make it clear that D:OS is in Alpha.
What does this mean? It means that anyone relying on the store page, the Early Access Blurb & Steam Discussion forums to know the state of the game, whether it's Alpha, Beta RC, etc will not have that information available unless they dig through many threads on the Steam forums.
Larian IMO really, really need to edit the Blue Early Access blurb and make it absolutely clear that the game is in Alpha. Because at the moment all it says regarding the state of the game is "Be aware that it's still rough around the edges and that certain features are missing. New features and improvements will be added regularly." - I'm sorry, but reading that... I can not blame people like craig2848 from expecting that the game is in a workable and playable state both single-player and multi-player.
- 'Early Access' / Beta expectations due to PR moves made by AAA companies over the past few years.
This sadly is another thing that needs to be considered. The sheer amount of AAA companies which have put out "Public Beta's" for people to "Test" which were only intended to market the game. Look at a lot of recent MMO's, or BF3 & BF4, etc. These games (and others) all came out with public 'beta's for people to 'test' the product... but no testing was required.
Because of things like this, there are many people out there who do not really know what a Beta is, or what Early Access is for. In their minds a beta is a mostly non-buggy RC version of the game (RC btw is Release Candidate), not something that actively needs testing or will have serious bugs & other issue's.
Also, due to high profile games (typically MMO's... like Star Wars: The Old Republic) have an "Early Access" program/procedure... which let people 'pre-order' the game and get access to it early, this has also changed many people's expectations for what 'early access' means. To them, Early Access means you can get access to the full game earlier than the rest who wait for release.
This is a lesser issue IMO than the 1st issue, but it should still be considered. Because of what has happened in the past with big well known games, companies, etc... many ppl have a distorted / incorrect view of what Alpha/Beta is and what Early Access is.
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So personally, I can see where people like craig2848 are coming from, why they might have expected a mostly working product at purchase. Lack of clear explanation of the state of the game on the store page, lack of this info on the steam discussion forums... and possible incorrect expectations due to previous game launches... could easily lead to someone believing and expecting that the game is mostly working, workable and that you should be able to pick it up and play it mostly fine, with just some hiccups as it is 'Early Access' and not released.