Some statistics from Steam DB and discussion about the future of the game

[Kerbart]

2 hours ago, tstein said:

GTX 1050 4 GB (just one gen before ) doing literally 3 FPS with a single part in launchpad. IF it were 12 fps I would  be happy.T he thing is..  this  card uses so much les spowert hat it is the dominant  GPU in notebooks.

My suspicion is that the 4 GB of memory will cause extensive texture swapping as well? That'd be a big hit on performance. I stopped playing on a laptop KSP 9 years ago (I just happened to check this morning when I last bought a new laptop) after it had melted my laptop to slag. After that I switched to a desktop, it's a lot cheaper to get good performance out of those.

And perhaps that is one of the performance issues; a lot of people play on laptops these days. I'm not a hardware expert but I suspect those will always either struggle to  match desktop performance, or require an exorbitant price. The melted laptop had a GPU card, not sure how upgradable those are in modern laptops.

2 hours ago, tstein said:

Or just  make a LOW  setting with a SIMPLE shader.

A set of low resolution textures would probably help if GPU memory turns out to be an issue, and that's an easy fix for IG. I remember from my MSFS days that it was always an option to install (AI) aircraft with low-res textures. Not as pretty but it kept performance on lower-end PC's acceptable.

[Serenity]

15 minutes ago, Bej Kerman said:

KSP 2 has dV right out the box and that, to me, makes it more promising than KSP was.

I truly admire your positivity and optimism, i wish, i really do,  you get a reward for it with a solid KSP2 and that would also be a great thing for all KSP/space fans.

I am super happy you replied to my post and yeah i am not trying to make this another thread ''Locked for moderator review. ''

[tstein]

46 minutes ago, Kerbart said:

My suspicion is that the 4 GB of memory will cause extensive texture swapping as well? That'd be a big hit on performance. I stopped playing on a laptop KSP 9 years ago (I just happened to check this morning when I last bought a new laptop) after it had melted my laptop to slag. After that I switched to a desktop, it's a lot cheaper to get good performance out of those.

And perhaps that is one of the performance issues; a lot of people play on laptops these days. I'm not a hardware expert but I suspect those will always either struggle to  match desktop performance, or require an exorbitant price. The melted laptop had a GPU card, not sure how upgradable those are in modern laptops.

A set of low resolution textures would probably help if GPU memory turns out to be an issue, and that's an easy fix for IG. I remember from my MSFS days that it was always an option to install (AI) aircraft with low-res textures. Not as pretty but it kept performance on lower-end PC's acceptable.

TRully a desktop is better, but  KSP  audience is not made of mostly teens and young adults as most games.  Older people  with families have a hard time surviving the experience of explaining the wife WHY  they need a desktop in the living room.

Edited February 28, 2023 by tstein

[Sunscreen]

I just came across this short but useful and insightful thread which A) Has a lot of useful info in it and B) has a list of known issues that are being worked on and which provide an insight into the path going forward. Its a good answer to a question I was wondering about and I hope its useful for others that are a little concerned about things right now.  

A short sample that highlights some things Ive seen coming up frequently on the forum and in discord..

"Known Issues (currently being addressed)

• Re-entry heating and thermal systems are offline - you'll have a brief window here at the beginning of Early Access during which you can re-enter any atmosphere without a heat shield. We’re still buttoning down our heat transfer, ablation, and occlusion systems. Vapor cone visual effects are also still in-progress.
• No collision on trees or rocks - we're optimizing collision for these objects right now, and in the interest of maintaining good framerates we're going to complete that optimization work before letting you crash into these objects. For now, they're holograms. While KSC buildings ARE collideable, they are not yet destructible.
• Framerate stutters/lag - we're continuing to work down the list of performance optimizations, from highest to lowest impact. As we push processes out of the main thread and continue to improve the efficiency of our physics, resource flow, VFX, and graphics systems, framerates should improve for all players.
• Some UI elements can be challenging to interact with - we're still cleaning up the systems that give priority to different classes of information in the map view, and there are times when you need to click a few extra times to get a hold of the maneuver planner. Similarly, you may have some challenges associating selected parts with their data in the Part Manager. We’re making several changes to the current UI so you can expect this experience to improve over time. This is a particular area within which we welcome your feedback."

Some interesting conclusions I drew from this- that the status of the game was known on Feb 17th and this was not a surprise, the intention is to develop with active feedback E.G. "We’re making several changes to the current UI so you can expect this experience to improve over time. This is a particular area within which we welcome your feedback" and finally the framerate issues were also known and a strategy is in place for that issue (and others).

In all, cause for optimism I feel.

•  

 

Edited February 28, 2023 by Sunscreen

[Chilkoot]

40 minutes ago, Profugo Barbatus said:

This is expected in an EA title

KSP 2 is actually a lot of fun (I'm at maybe 20 hours now), but we need to remain honest with ourselves and each other:  it's hard to name any EA title that has launched in this state of disrepair.

I'm a pretty big fan of EA in general, and even volunteer mod for smaller devs on Steam in EA, but I can't think of a single EA game I've bought into that was this rough in its first public and paid EA release.  I've seen some really horrific updates pushed live with unforeseen bugs, to the point where updates had to be rolled back, but nothing at initial release with as many serious game-breakers as KSP 2.

As has been noted by several prominent and professional reviewers, this game sets a new low bar for Early Access.  That won't stop me from enjoying it, but we really need to stop trying to sweep the very significant problems under the EA rug by retroactively altering the established expectations associated with an EA title.

[Profugo Barbatus]

35 minutes ago, Chilkoot said:

it's hard to name any EA title that has launched in this state of disrepair.

Bannerlord immediately comes to mind, being developed by 3x-4x the staff, over a significantly longer length of time, and launching into a really rough and feature incomplete experience compared to its final goal, with chunks of kingdom, clan and troop management missing, myraid placeholder and missing assets, and a lot of unrefined core systems. Even after release from EA, many of these systems were never really completed as expected. KSP is rough, but its among good company, not alone in its state.

KSP2 is technically very ambitious, moreso than Bannerlord in many aspects. Whether they can deliver that ambition is to be seen, but I'm happy to give them a chance.

[danfarnsy]

3 hours ago, regex said:

Nothing about the base game is good.

Your consistent feedback on this has been a staple of these forums since their beginning. It has been a treasure, and I mean this only about 1/4th sarcastically, 3/4ths sincerely.

[regex]

14 minutes ago, danfarnsy said:

Your consistent feedback on this has been a staple of these forums since their beginning. It has been a treasure, and I mean this only about 1/4th sarcastically, 3/4ths sincerely.

hahaha, thanks?

[Kerbart]

48 minutes ago, danfarnsy said:

I mean this only about 1/4th sarcastically, 3/4ths sincerely.

Yeah, but what 1/4 part?

[Profugo Barbatus]

Just now, Kerbart said:

Yeah, but what 1/4 part?

Obviously the 2nd 4th, because 2[fort]h is the quintessential TF2 map

[RocketRockington]

4 hours ago, Profugo Barbatus said:

I'm not really sure why these stats are surprising or concerning - KSP1 has had forever to be super popular, and KSP2 has launched roughshod at best, and feature lacking. This is expected in an EA title, but such an anticipated title is going to get way more attention than might otherwise be warranted for an EA release. So a lot of people bought it expecting way more, letting hype and anticipation overcome the warnings about the games state. So a lot of people have likely done what many of us have done, which is 'enjoy' the bugs, review as to how they felt about the current state of the game, and then put it down to wait until whenever it looks better before seriously diving in. 

 

KSP1 also had forever to screw the pooch.  There was a brief period around 1.4 (I think) when they implemented something the community deemed might be spyware where it was getting plenty of negative feedback and reviews.  But they kept the community genuinely positive and happy for the most part for the last decade - and you're writing that off like its no big deal, just an easy layup for them.    Having a 94% positivity rating for 10 years is a monumental achievement, which they accomplished through a cadence of constant updates that gave us not just holiday-themed cash grabs and new skins, like most games, but new systems and gameplay as well as new core content.   And did it on a shoestring budget, from all accounts.

Also PD/Intercept/T2 did NOTHING to but encourage all that hype and anticipation. They fed it through material they posted, multiple trailers, developer interviews, etc.   A lot of them labeled 'pre-alpha gameplay' to indicate this was actual footage of the game - and that it would just get better from here.  I cannot off the top of my head (my memory may not be the greatest, I'm sure there's something) of a single thing that isn't either equivalent or worse in the actual release except the sound.  The sound is genuinely awesome but everything else?  Same or downgrades.  Even the UI that they rebaked multiple times seemed pretty damn 'meh' to me.

And yes, I know how marketting works - I wouldn't have expected them to say negative things about the game.  But if the game's situation was as dire as this release indicates - I would have expected them to pump the brakes a bit, go dark - or maybe just not say anything at all?   I have no idea what they were thinking with that 2019 trailer but even after that they kept a cadence of developer movies and all that jazz to keep some section of this community hoping and hoping..

Edited February 28, 2023 by RocketRockington

[softweir]

I must admit to not reading the entire thread, so forgive me if this has been said before:

KSP 1 was in development for years before it went on to Steam, so the (very few) bad reviews that might have come from teething troubles won't appear on SteamDB. Not that it got poor reviews during the early days: it was an indie game that was initially played by a very small number of people who were highly invested in it, who saw the potential and were having fun finding ways around the limitations of the early versions. Heck, it was barely a game at all! When I first started playing it there was no savegame, maybe a dozen parts, no Mun, crap physics (a limitation of (PhysX at the time) and if you landed on the dark side of Kerbin your ship was destroyed! Not to mention the many varied incarnations of the Kraken - every time it was defeated, it would reincarnate as something else even more subtle and hard to destroy! But it was fun, and got a lot of very enthusiastic fans, many of whom became developers as the project expanded.

KSP 2 is in a very different situation. It is no longer an indie game and is being seen by a much wider fanbase, many of whom are disappointed that it doesn't - yet - face up to the hype. It will therefore get a lot of bad reviews.

Will KSP 2 eventually live up to the hype and the expectations? I dunno. I hope so, to the extent I paid for EA. I may yet be disappointed, I may not.

[Monger]

7 hours ago, Bej Kerman said:

Well, I don't often find people who don't concede that the game in its unmodded state is not a very good way to play it.

I never played KSP 1 with mods. I played hundreds of hours, and cursed a lot during them.

There is a lot wrong with the original game, but the things that nagged me most were: insanely long loading times, especially switching between VAB and launch pad annoyed me every time. Weird glitches, stutters, ice-skating friction...

Content never bothered me, it took me hundreds of hours until I got interested enough to visit Jool. What I hoped for in KSP 2 is a much more technical sound implementation that takes away all the small disturbances. 

7 hours ago, Bej Kerman said:

 

 

7 hours ago, Bej Kerman said:

 

 

Edited March 1, 2023 by Monger

[J.Random]

The problem with "devs needed feedback" argument is that that they really didn't need any feedback, don't need  it now and won't need it for quite some time. The only reason for them pushing the game out of the door is the FY shenanigans. The issues with fizzicks, graphics, model rigging are so obvious that I'm sure that they knew about them long before the EA release. Which is also why I don't buy the "we worked the weekend, please pity us" quotes from discord or wherever. Should've worked harder (or smarter) in the previous 3 to 5 years of development, sunshine.

[Bej Kerman]

1 minute ago, Monger said:

7 hours ago, Bej Kerman said:

Well, I don't often find people who don't concede that the game in its unmodded state is not a very good way to play it.

I never played KSP 1 with mods. I played hundreds of hours, and cursed a lot during them.

There is a lot wrong with the original game, but the things that nagged me most were: insanely long loading times, especially switching between VAB and launch pad annoyed me every time. Weird glitches, stutters, ice-skating friction...

Content never bothered me, it took me hundreds of hours until I got interested enough to visit Jool. What I hoped for in KSP 2 is a much more technical sound implementation that takes away all the small disturbances. 

And I see a more sound implementation. The game opens pretty much instantly as far as KSP standards go, loading to the launch pad is quick and the game isn't loading every single model, texture and little thing into RAM at once. KSP 1 could not have been retrofitted to do all that. Squad tried for a decade and KSP 1 takes longer to load than ever. Just give the devs time to work on things - they have been juggling other roadmap features as well, and dataminers can confirm.

3 minutes ago, J.Random said:

Should've worked harder (or smarter) in the previous 3 to 5 years of development, sunshine.

And you weren't saying this in regards to Squad CONSTANTLY? KSP 1 has some of the worst priority management I've seen in a game, full stop. You can't say anything bad about KSP 2 without having previously written a million bad things about KSP 1.

This is the worst KSP 2 is going to be - it's only going to get better. The devs have not just been working on the core game you see, they've been working on roadmap features in the background as well. In three years, they've gone from a tech demo to a mostly playable product and they've got builds of the game with multiplayer and interstellar to work on as well so players don't come to winge about those things being broken.

Your condescending attitude isn't going to get KSP 2 into a more presentable state any quicker. If you don't want to waste energy with EA games you don't like, then don't waste energy being here dealing with EA games you don't like, it's as simple as that.

[K^2]

It's in good shape for an alpha build. There are a few problems I'm surprised made it this far, like the fuel management performance and world origin relocation bugs, but for the most part, this is pretty much what I expected. A few graphics glitches, some unexpected performance bottlenecks, and frequent visits from the Kraken, but also many QoL improvements, beautiful environments, and overall playable game. So long as you save often and don't mind re-starting when something stops working.

Clearly general population of users expected something different. Which, I guess, is not their fault, given that the marketing on YouTube looked pretty crisp and didn't really mention the problems. Although, I think by now people should understand what an "early access" of a game is. We should all get better about the communication surrounding this - developers, reviewers, and gamers alike. Early access doesn't mean you get the finished game early through the magic of time travel. You're playing an alpha, or in a best case beta, version of the game. By definition, alpha means playable to completion with major bugs. You can build a rocket to take you to any of the game's planets and moons and you'll be encountering major bugs. Alpha version - check.

I understand that some people have been waiting for the game for a long time, and so falsely believe it should be done. It's not done, and it shouldn't be graded as a game that's done. Once again, for an alpha, it's in a good state, and I'm enjoying the experience. People who can only enjoy a game when it's finished and polished should wait until the game is fully released. And that goes for any game in early access. And yeah, communication about that could and should have been better, and that's a fair thing to call out on any review, but complaining about the fact that an early access game is buggy is just silly.

[J.Random]

10 minutes ago, Bej Kerman said:

And you weren't saying this in regards to Squad CONSTANTLY?

I was one of the most vocal critics of Squad when they forced the end of .90 "beta" prematurely and worked idiotic overtimes under self-imposed deadlines from there to 1.3 or so. I got banned for a while at the time. Squad is far from perfect in my books, but it was also an indie dev, as indie as they come. Everything experienced back then translates perfectly into my disgust with the current state of affairs. And nothing and nobody except devs will get KSP2 into a more presentable state right now. Not feedback, not brownnosing praise, not criticism. It's on them and nobody else.

[Bej Kerman]

4 minutes ago, J.Random said:

Everything experienced back then translates perfectly into my disgust with the current state of affairs

I see nothing to be disgusted about. Intercept did in 3 years what Squad didn't manage in 11 years, create a foundation that isn't missing critical features like dV, accurate maneuver nodes, <s> Kerbals that don't trip over and take 50  years to get back up </s>, a UI designer that knows how human eyes work, etc. Superficial things like re-entry effects and ISRU and go make love to themselves for now, what you're angry over is merely a foundation, one that's better than the other one we've been dealing with for a decade at that. All this - the foundation we get to play for now, multiplayer, interstellar - was done in just three years, and soon enough the bugs will die out and you'll get the nice shiny features you're so anxious for.

Just be patient.

[J.Random]

3 minutes ago, Bej Kerman said:

foundation that isn't missing critical features like dV

That was a (very stubborn and eventually overturned) design choice. And this "feature" seems to be broken in KSP2.

5 minutes ago, Bej Kerman said:

accurate maneuver nodes

In KSP2? Are you serious? I mean, if them resetting and drifting and not having fine/accurate adjustments (implemented in KSP 1.7 or 1.8, I think) is "accurate"... idk ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

5 minutes ago, Bej Kerman said:

UI designer that knows how human eyes work

idk, it looks like a mobile game interface. Lots of wasted space and huge buttons, essential info hidden behind shortcuts (and when shown, splitting mostly empty vertical tab VERTICALLY AGAIN), "part manager" lumping everything together, no apparent way to split symmetry, non-working horizontal/vertical build switch, poorly designed translation/rotation gizmos and non-working alignment options (you could put a surface-attached part into dead center in KSP1, because there were both "local" and "global" grids, you can't in KSP2 because none of the existing grids is centered on the root part's origin). GLARES. There's probably much more which I didn't get from videos and backseat driving.

14 minutes ago, Bej Kerman said:

etc

Yeah, "etc". The foundation looks very shaky to me. But we'll see.

[Bej Kerman]

4 minutes ago, J.Random said:

if them resetting and drifting and not having fine/accurate adjustments

Don't toggle the map view, and the control is fine enough already. The former is a bug, just wait for a patch.

4 minutes ago, J.Random said:

Lots of wasted space and huge buttons

Not true

7 minutes ago, J.Random said:

essential info hidden behind shortcuts (and when shown, splitting mostly empty vertical tab VERTICALLY AGAIN)

These things aren't irreparable and won't need major overhauls to the UI.

5 minutes ago, J.Random said:

no apparent way to split symmetry, non-working horizontal/vertical build switch, poorly designed translation/rotation gizmos and non-working alignment options (you could put a surface-attached part into dead center in KSP1, because there were both "local" and "global" grids, you can't in KSP2 because none of the existing grids is centered on the root part's origin). GLARES. There's probably much more which I didn't get from videos and backseat driving.

This is literally the first version of the game. These niche things will come sooner or later.

10 minutes ago, J.Random said:

Yeah, "etc"

So you want me to list everything?

8 minutes ago, J.Random said:

The foundation looks very shaky to me.

Well it hardly is. The game is only 3 years old, that's hardly a lot of time, and unlike Squad's attempt at a game, there aren't any super important things blatantly missing.

11 minutes ago, J.Random said:

But we'll see.

Yes we will, but it'll require patience so I suggest a bit of that.

11 minutes ago, J.Random said:

And this "feature" seems to be broken in KSP2.

Again, first version. At least you won't be waiting until 2029 for dV readouts, they're there and can be fixed.

[J.Random]

1 hour ago, Bej Kerman said:

This is literally the first version of the game.

Don't expect me not to point out the obvious flaws of the UI design after you praise the (nonexistent, imo) genius of it (another point, btw: "brilliant" idea to put mostly useless Training Center right next to the Tracking Station in the menu. Won't cause a single misclick, I'm sure). Don't try to sell me (or anybody else) the "accurate maneuver nodes" lie (literal lie, come on). "Early days" worked and still works for certain title which scams its customers by promising a release "right around the corner" every year for the past 10 years, while selling them insanely priced virtual "assets", often nonexistent even in virtual sense. Since KSP2 isn't planned to have such source of income, using the same tactic will kill it. I am and will be aggressively against any "early days", "tier 0", "you don't understand game development", "the had to build a studio", "never been done before" and similar arguments.

[Periple]

2 hours ago, J.Random said:

I am and will be aggressively against any "early days", "tier 0", "you don't understand game development", "the had to build a studio", "never been done before" and similar arguments.

Noted. What's your explanation?

[MarcAbaddon]

I'd agree the foundations are pretty shaky at the moment, with the way that even basic orbital mechanics are bugged right now and you have your AP and PE change without any thrust.  There's really not a fundamental system which is fully working at the moment. The maneuver node editor is a lot worse than in KSP 1 - definitely a lot worse than 1.7 version and even the earlier versions had at least the option to skip orbits which helps a lot in waiting for a good intercept. Say what you will about KSP 1 bugs, but orbital mechanics worked as intended for most of it after the initial test versions.

It's also strange to state that KSP 2 having some of those systems at the start is somehow proof that they are more effective than Squad was, when Squad pioneered all those systems and options in KSP 1 and all Intercept had to go was take them over and take inspiration from some mods. Still, the maneuver node usability (it is technically a bit more accurate, but much less usable from an UI perspective), the delta-v engineer and vessel stats are all worse than we had in KSP 1.  

Finally, I am not sure you can say the game is 3 years old. That would indicate a full reset when Intercept took over, which seems unlikely. It's worth noticing that Intercept took over ~February 2020 and the next delay to the game was only announced in May 2020 citing "development taking longer than expected". This doesn't seem like the full reset people like to depict it as. Fact is, it was under the same leadership of Nate Simpsons who is still responsible for the game that we were told in 2019 that the game would release in early 2020. Of course, Covid and losing a lot of your team are huge setbacks. I'd easily credit them an extra year for it. But it's still been in development longer than 3 years.

I know people don't trust big publisher (I don't either), but there was something very fishy going on at Star Theory.

To say a few positive things because I still hopeful about the game: I think it is good that we now have some Squad developers more involved in the game. And I agree that the loading times improvement is great, though we also need to see how it will scale with more parts. KSP 1 without DLCs and mods has ok loading times for me, it just scales very badly once you add more parts and mods. 

[Monger]

9 hours ago, Bej Kerman said:

And I see a more sound implementation. The game opens pretty much instantly as far as KSP standards go, loading to the launch pad is quick and the game isn't loading every single model, texture and little thing into RAM at once. KSP 1 could not have been retrofitted to do all that. Squad tried for a decade and KSP 1 takes longer to load than ever. Just give the devs time to work on things - they have been juggling other roadmap features as well, and dataminers can confirm.

Unfortunately I was stuck in loading screen until I decided to refund. But yeah, I can recognize a strategy here. The foundation is rough, but it's there.  Also, I can see a sound business plan here. You might disagree with it, and it is arguably risky, but it is recognizable.

Imho the next three months are crucial to show that they can deliver and can stay in control. I will watch closely. 

[Twipsy]

It's a sad statistic.