PopinFRESH

You might be referring to this interview with ShadowZone where they talk about "high part count" and specifically make mention of ShadowZone regularly making 1000+ part assemblies in KSP. (Time Stamp @ 5:27)

You got that backwards mate. It is "fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me". I was very much looking forward to this since 2020. I didn't care at all when they announced the multiple delays. However, I took pause when they announced that it would be launching as Early Access after 5 years of development given the majority of the communications really had a tone and tenor of launching a feature complete game which they were... taking some extra time to "polish". I still gave them the benefit of the doubt when it launched, however, in less than an hour and a half of fighting the game just to try to do simple things I refunded it. I'll still give them a chance to right the ship also, but that is going to be on someone else's dime.

I'd say its greater than 95% of the announced feature set is missing. It has a new tutorial and on-boarding experience, the rest is "on the roadmap".

https://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/index.php?/forum/144-ksp2-bug-reports/

Ditto, very sad because there are some nice improvements I do really like in the VAB but this was just not ready for prime time in the slightest. I tried to give it a good solid go but when there are new things worse than the Kraken with nearly every launch it just isn't a remotely enjoyable experience. I ended up refunding it after an hour and a half of frustration. This was not the KSP2 launch I was hoping for a year ago and I'm honestly growing less confident that this will survive to a full feature-complete product the more I watch others videos of it and see how poorly it is being received by the wider audience.

I do want the game, but not in the terrible state it is in right now which is why it got refunded. [snip]

That's great for you regex, but that doesn't mean anything to more than half of the player base who see this as an abysmal failure of a launch due to everything from terrible performance, broken mechanics, and completely missing all of the originally touted content. Your glasses are a bit too rose tinted, you might want to take them off and then check out the game.

I did what I said I was going to do on launch when they announced early access. I bought it, played it for a bit over an hour, found the amount of broken things and terrible performance wasn't acceptable nor worth the $50 asking price, and refunded it through Steam. I was expecting it to be on the rough side of things when they announced it as EA after nearly three years of delays which had the tone of finishing / polishing a feature complete game; this launch however is worse than I expected even with my lowered expectations. Very disappointing.

Most of those games around the time had some level or story. Duke Nukem was about the shallowest but it still had a storyline. Wolfenstein, Quake, and Doom all had a bit more depth to their world building and depth and I'd argue that both Marathon and Durandal continued this but they were still largely "levels" spit up by some narrative. It wasn't until Half-life where Valve showed off the relatively seamless level transitions and demonstrated that you can make the narrative the pinnacle driving force in the gameplay. The story dictated the level design more than in any other game before Half-Life. Bungie obviously took note and re-thought how they were approaching Halo. The /noclip documentary UnForeseen Consequences: A Hlaf-Life Documentary covers it really well and the best quote from it is "the entire industry fundamentally shifted with the release of [the Half-Life] demo". Steve Jobs wasn't even at Apple during that time. Apple acquired Next and he came back to Apple in '97, not to say they have ever taken gaming seriously on macOS before, during, or after Steve Jobs. When Valve was working on brining Steam to macOS in the current era, Gabe Newell noted that Apple continues to every once in a while will reach out to "improve gaming on macOS" and then would go silent and squirrel! I don't think this is how I'd characterize things. He, unlike most CEO/keynote speakers at the time, pushed forward engineers to show & tell the tech & design they were leading; including Jonny Ive's industrial design and Scott Forstall's software design.

Yes I did... it was called Halo

Stadia is dead. GeForce Now may be a good option however. I don't suspect there will be much in the way of very latency sensitive gameplay in KSP2 so this would likely be a very doable option.

Regarding this specifically. Steam Play, also known as Steam Remote Play or Steam Remote Play Together, was discussed in my prior post and the link to what it is and how it works is there. Proton is a fork of Wine that Valve developed and supports with additional gaming focused additions and features. Wine was originally developed and is still hosted by CodeWeavers whom also makes a paid and supported variant called CrossOver which works on Linux and Mac (including Apple Silicon). Proton however doesn't have support for macOS as it relies on several linux system libraries that macOS does not have and/or does not have an equivalent. There is quite a lot of nitty-gritty developer level details regarding Proton on Valve's Partner Documentation Site. So the long-story-short is that Proton isn't going to really help you with your situation so you can largely disregard those discussions as they are likely geared toward running the game on Linux. CrossOver, however, may be another solution which you can get a trial to see if it will run KSP2 reasonably on your Mac once the Early Access begins.

Reposting for context You'll have a few options to consider that I didn't mention previously. If you want to try to avoid needing to purchase a Windows PC as described previously you can try out Parallels Desktop for Mac when KSP2 early access launches on Feb 24th and see if this works well enough for your content. This would also allow you to run other Windows native applications on your Mac so this may be beneficial beyond just KSP2 if you have any other Windows programs you'd like to use. Some things to keep in mind for consideration with Parallels The standard version is normally $99 as a one-time purchase license for the current version. This version is limited to 4 vCPUs (virtual CPUs) and 8GB of vRAM (virtual memory) so we'll have to wait until they publish the minimum system requirements to see if this might struggle running the game. Having used Parallels before, this also may have some issues trying to run "3D" applications, such as games, depending on the GPU which may be more problematic on Apple Silicon. The pro version is a subscription model which is normally $119/yr which would allow up to 32 vCPUs and 128GB of vRAM. Assuming the game works ok with the trial then you should likely be able to use this license as it should be sufficient in terms of system requirements. You'll need a copy of Windows, which you can also install and use as a trial while running the Parallels trial just to see if this option is viable. If so you'll need to get a Windows license and activate it. Otherwise, if you end up going the route of getting/building a mid-range gaming PC then I'd personally recommend doing the latter of my previous suggestions. Get the Game Capture HD60 X and use it to capture 1080p60 on your Mac while you play the game on the PC. While Steam Remote Play is awesome technology and great, it will be much easier to capture footage for your purpose using a capture device that support M1 Macs via Thunderbolt like the HD60 X. Afaik VirtualBox doesn't support Apple Silicon. EDIT: Just checked on Oracle's site and it seems that they now have a developer preview version of VirtualBox 7 which runs their virtualization on top of an x86 emulation layer. Likely even more potential for problems trying to run a 3D accelerated application and probably not something the OP would want to deal with while just trying to create content.

Probably worth putting this into its own thread, however, for a brief answer here for you Steam's Remote Play Together feature allows you to "stream" a game from a PC to another device like their previous Steam Link, your phone/tablet, or your Mac. So if you do what you were thinking with a mid-range Windows gaming PC then you could still play on your MacBook Pro, with the game actually running on your Windows PC. You might encounter some oddities depending on how you have your setup for capturing/streaming content on your MacBook Pro but it should be doable if you're using OBS to do a screen capture rather than a window capture, etc. The Steam client for Mac works fine for doing remote play, and the remote play functionality is very light weight so it should be very minimal impact running the Steam Mac client via Rosetta2 in order to use it for remote play. Alternatively, you could also just capture the output from the mid-range Windows PC via something like the Elgato Game Capture HD60 X on your MacBook Pro and play on the Windows PC. If you have any other questions on this feel free to send me a direct message or start a new thread in the KSP 2 Discussion forum and I'd be happy to answer any other questions.

Well, all of the features are in progress already. Multiplayer, for example, is the last item in the "roadmap", but IIRC they've talked about how they're already testing with it internally. I expect that the foundations for all this stuff is already in place, and the steps in the roadmap are just getting each feature finished and "polished" enough to enable for users — not starting on each feature from the beginning. Also, remember that KSP1 was in Steam early access for about two years, and early versions could be bought directly from Squad for nearly two years before it even became available (as EA) on Steam. This doesn't seem drastically different. Given the context of the story Nate tells about the KSP2 contract, when T2 acquired the KSP IP, and when Nate became creative director at Uber Entertainment; the development of KSP2 likely started pre-production in late 2017. When it launches in EA next year it will be about 5 years of development, and like sweatbox this announcement gives me substantial pause in regards to the state of the game. What happened with KSP1 is irrelevant in this discussion in my opinion. The context of the previous communications over the past 3 years including the last delay announcement's phrasing appeared to set an expectation of delivering a feature complete game at launch. This announcement not only is a radical departure from that tone, it also lacks any indication as to the state of the roadmap features or any target/expectation of cadence for when they will be added. Also the "just getting each feature finished and "polished" enough to enable for users — not starting on each feature from the beginning." when in context to the stated rational for early access just doesn't pass the sniff test. If you're at the point of "polishing" those features then the "getting users feedback on the core experience" is meaningless because it is not going to substantially change a nearly complete feature that is "just getting each feature finished and "polished" enough to enable for users". I've also been very optimistic and looked forward to when KSP2 would launch. This announcement however seems like it came from a completely different direction when compared to the last 3 years of communications, and as such it gives me the feeling that Private Division had kicked the can as far down the road as they could and Take Two ran thin on patience and gave Private Division an ultimatum to either start generating revenue or cancel the project. I will check it out when it hits early access launch like I've said before, however, given the context of things I will very likely refund it and wait until there is at least most of the expected features and an established cadence of how quickly they are delivering the features on the roadmap.

It doesn't lack anything. Most of the features that we'll see unlocked have been completed for years now. Would love to know who/where you've got this inside scoop? Got any links to posts or evidence of this since you've stated it so factually? None of that post, or thread, show "most of the features...have been completed for years now.". If that was the case then we wouldn't be having an EA release, or at least we wouldn't be having an EA release of just the basic sandbox.

Would love to know who/where you've got this inside scoop? Got any links to posts or evidence of this since you've stated it so factually?

This is an insane timeline if the team expects to get community input at every stage, much less produce a quality end product. We're probably looking at a much more reasonable February 2023 + (4 * 6 months) = February 2025. You might get four month cycles but I highly doubt they can keep that pace and still manage community input. You both mean February 2023 + (5 * 6 months) = August 2025... assuming you realistically think they will complete each of those things in 6 month timeframes. Science / Progression Colonies Interstellar scale parts New system and resource gathering Multiplayer

That would be Fiscal Year 2023. Fiscal Year 2022 was from April 1st 2021 - March 31st 2022. I'm also with MachBFP that I'd put more weight / faith into that being the case if all of the prior communication wasn't contextually implying that the full, feature complete, game would be released at launch; e.g. in early 2023 as of the previously most recent delay. I'd also have put more credence in that notion if they had shown any evidence of that being the case in the EA video, along with providing some actual context to what we should be expecting in terms of cadence for those feature milestones. While the spirt of this is nice, in my opinion it rings hallow when coming a few months after a delay announcement that had the implication that the game was mostly feature complete and needed a bit more time to "push towards the finish line". And as others have said, I'm not "upset" that it will now be an early access release. I'm significantly disappointed at the poor communication and the very limited scale of what has been said to be coming at the release of EA considering their prior communications. This announcement does not inspire any confidence that we will see a feature complete version of the game anytime in 2023.

Concurred with both of you. The previous communications definitely were contextually and tonally implying that the game, as a finished "1.0" product, would be released in early 2023. I'm also rather disappointed that it is effectively being delayed again and more-so disappointed that they are choosing to burn some goodwill by disingenuously trying to spin this as a "we need your input" for the core functionality. The majority of their core audience aren't braindead, they aren't 10 year olds, and the majority will be well aware that this is putting lipstick on a pig of another significant delay while needing to start generating some revenue stream to satisfy the publisher/T2 investors. If they had been more forthcoming with the previous delay announcement(s) this wouldn't be as disappointing as it is now. Otherwise this announcement should have been treated as what it is, another delay. They should have acknowledged where they are in development and announced that they have now chosen to launch it in EA rather than delaying it further to continue developing it behind closed doors. They also should have shown some level of progress or current state of those delayed features (essentially the majority of the game) and provided some estimated timeline for when they think they will be introducing those features to the EA public branch. I'll be doing the same as Master39. I'll check it out on Steam when it launches to EA, however, given what they've shown with this announcement it is very likely I'll be refunding it. Also to be clear, this is a failure in their communication in my opinion which had they handled this better I'd have no qualms buying it as an early access just to help fund the game.

They kinda have though. If you take both what was projected to T2 for their investor call, along with "early 2023", then I'd say they've pretty much provided a release window of Q1'23. I wouldn't call this "teasing an announcement" either unless I'm missing something. This was them responding to someone prodding them on twitter, not some unsolicited post they made to tease anything. While they certainly could add in an actual release date I'd be far more inclined to believe this will be another feature video that shows off either colonies or multiplayer. I said a while ago back when they announced the delay to early 2023 that I'd expect they will put out two more feature videos for those two remaining feature pillars and will then announce the release date some time in January with a launch in March. Given the cadence of the past feature videos of roughly every ~4 - 5 months this is about when I was expecting the next one (more toward September), followed by another one sometime in January along with a launch trailer with the release date. Launch date of... 32123?

Concurred. I don't tend to read into individuals moving about the industry either. I believe when Take Two started up Intercept Games it was Nate S. Nate R. and Jeremy A. that were the principal staff responsible for standing up the studio so it was just a bit surprising to see he departed before KSP2 was done. Also concurred. I wasn't intending to add commentary on why he left nor add any judgement of him for leaving. Was just noting that when someone like him in a senior role that was foundational in standing up the studio that it might adjust my hype meter a bit.

Should my hype be heightened or diminished a bit? I just noticed that Nate Robinson (not Nate Simpson) left as Senior Producer for Intercept Games and is now at Epic Games. Not sure if I should be more hyped if they felt they were at a point in production that the role was no longer needed or if I should be concerned that someone like him left so shortly after the delay announcement.

Fair point and more correct than I originally stated. I guess I should have rather said that generally the move to alpha "fixes the scope" and has most features prototyped. End of an alpha should be "feature complete", e.g. all of the features have been implemented and are functional but may have bugs.

Alpha would generally mean the software is "feature complete" and it is being tested to find bugs, working on optimizations, working on artwork, audio, etc. Pre-Alpha is essentially everything before finalizing the features before formalized testing is started. This is essentially when iterative testing of individual features or feature sets is done, but its not formal "testing of the game as an actual game".