WelshSteW

removed as I'm a bit slow

Not 100% how legit this is, but apparently the ex Technical Director Paul Furio is doing an AMA on Reddit.

I don't care one bit if they make 20 Kerbal Farm games. I'm not into it, so I won't buy them, but if other people do and that's what they use to fund another crack at KSP2 then happy days.

I take this as absolutely brilliant news. The game has a chance of being picked up by someone who actually wants to make something of it, rather than just being mothballed and left to rot.

Yeah, I kind of contradicted myself with this bit and the next bit of my post. Maybe I didn't make it as clear as I could have, what I meant was I'd be a bit annoyed about having "wasted" the money I'd spent on this current version of KSP2, but I'd be happy to pay for a new, actually decent and finished version. To try and be clear, I'd be delighted to have a new version of KSP2, or KSP3, whatever it'd be called. As long as it was done properly, and actually finished.

I don't know how much the Kerbal IP would cost (and you'd want it all - KSP1, KSP2, and anything else that may have been in development). Once you've bought that, you have to basically write off what currently exists as KSP2, and start over. People who have already bought KSP2 aren't going to be happy about having to buy it again, essentially, so you'd have to work out some sort of offer for those (well, you wouldn't have to, but it'd be nice! ), so you'd be losing out there. But, I think that if the price for the IP was right, you'd be able to make it profitable long term. As someone who has bought and paid for KSP2, I'd be a bit irked at having it written off and redone, or done as KSP3. But, I'd buy the new game. Even if there was no deal for those of us who've bought KSP2. There's plenty of DLC that they could do, especially if the get interstellar and colonies working. Release a new star system every now and then for £5 or whatever. Could even do a real world one. I'd buy that. Then you've got spin off games involving Kerbals. Could have a racing one, where you build cars to a set budget or part count, then compete against other players? Merchandise could be something. Could look at some sort of deal with Lego, or some other brick toy maker... But yeah, any sort of profit would be long term. It'd have to be done by someone who's got money already, and doesn't mind waiting to see any return.

That is a really annoying video to watch. So many poor decisions, so many chances to put it right, so much wasted time and money and effort. I love how passionate Nate is about the game, and how he wants it to be a visually appealing experience. But I feel he needed someone along side him who was focused more on the gameplay and the technical side. It's such a missed opportunity to make an amazing game. If they'd just focused on the basics - sticking to the Kerbal system, basically just doing a rewrite of KSP1, adding in the best of the mods that are available, and releasing that as the base KSP2 - I think that would have been enough. Once the underlying code and engine had been updated, and the basic game was running well and people were able to have 1000+ part ships without reducing the game to a crawl, the rest could have been done as DLC. Release the basic game as KSP2, for £30, then add colonies, interstellar, whatever as DLCs for £10 each, job done. But to be here now, 6yrs (or more) after being promised KSP2, and finding out that for all that time it was never going to be anything near what we'd hoped and dreamed for, it's sickening.

I am. If that was done by a different team of devs then fair enough, I'm wrong to bring it up.

They didn't have the skills to do what they wanted to do. We should have realised this when they tried to put one of the best mods into KSP1, the alarm clock. They had everything they needed. They had a working version, with source code, and they still produced a version of it which was utter crap. And I think that's why so much time was spent on making things look pretty, because that's all they were able to do. They didn't fix the poor performance when you use more than a few parts, they didn't fix the wobbly rockets issue (in fact they made it worse), they didn't have re-entry heating, they had a broken aero system...

Basic mathematics based on what? The size of the planet? The mass? Ok, but how do we know what those are? We start the game having not sent anything to orbit, having not recorded any science in our own atmosphere. How do we know anything about other planets that would allow us to calculate dV requirements and sphere of influence? Obviously I don't have all the answers, otherwise I'd be a top tier game designer.

I haven't read the whole thread, so apologies if I'm rehashing ideas already given. I like the science / exploration mode, it's how I played KSP1, and it's how I'm playing KSP2. But it could, and should, be better than it is. Science needs to be more than a way to get points to unlock new bit for building things. It needs to actually be a way of finding things out in the game. I shouldn't start the game knowing exactly how much dV I need to get somewhere. I shouldn't start the game and be able to go and look at every planet in the system, have high def pictures of them, know where the sphere of influence is etc etc etc. I should have to find all of that out. And I know not everyone will like that, so why not have difficulty options which let you choose how much knowledge you start the game with? There needs to be a reason to do science, outside of getting points to unlock things.

I've waited a little while before posting my thoughts, just so I can be fairly sure I've given it a good crack before spouting off. So far I'm LOVING it. I love the science concept even though I'll agree it needs tweaks, I love the missions / contracts and the structure / path it gives you. It's honestly like this is now KSP3. It's a huge step forward. Yes there are still bugs, and yes it's nor absolutely perfect - but so what? The game is still in development, I don't expect it to be perfect. I can play it, and I can have fun. So after many messages where all I did was moan, this one is intended as a massive 'thank you'. Oh, and a 'well done' too.

There are places on Mun where it's flat. But, what you really need is a short, wide, ship, as Vanamonde says.

New vid is out, deep dive on the For Science update. Just in case you hadn't seen it.

HYPE!!!!!! I'm SO looking forward to this. I swore I'd never let myself get hyped up for anything ever again, I got burnt with KSP2 and Cities Skylines 2, and it hurts man. But here we are, and here I am bouncing around the place I can't wait.

YES!! HERE WE GO!

I'm still sticking with this. And I'll add that we'll get a release date sometime next week.

I imagine they'll all want a decent Christmas break, so I guess they'd want to release early enough to be able to fix any major bug(s) that slip(s) through? If we guess that they'll finish for Christmas on the 21st, I'd imagine they'd be aiming for release on / around the 8th, or very early the following week. Maybe.

To answer your question, yes it is possible. It's been done for KSP1 already. I tried using the Real Solar System mod for KSP1, but it really bugged me that the cities / roads etc weren't actually modelled. It's the same with EVE (I think it's Eve), which adds city lights to Kerbin, but if you actually go to one of the cities, it's not there. It's just the picture of a city over the terrain. A dream scenario would be a real solar system, with something like whatever Microsoft Flight Simulator uses to model the terrain / cities / roads. But I think that's only ever going to be a dream.

I hope there are classes. It would add to the gameplay, especially when developing colonies, if you had to think about who you were sending on certain missions. Every Kerbal being able to do every job makes it too easy, imo.

There needs to be a happy medium. I wouldn't want it to be all automatic and not have to be involved in it at all, but I also don't want to have to click on every single experiment in every single biome. So for me, it sounds like what they have is pretty much spot on. If it's all automatic, it makes it almost pointless, imo. I could find myself collecting science 'by accident'. If I plan a trip to one of the poles to carry out some experiments there, and I momentarily pass over some other biome, should I really get science from there? Ok, if I'm in the other biome for a good few minutes, and I notice it, happy days. But to get that 'extra' science without any involvement kind of feels a bit like cheating? But again, we need to have a base set up and let mods appear to get the game exactly how each of us likes it. The ideal KSP2 will be different for nearly every user. As long as things aren't hard coded or locked, there'll be someone who creates a mod to play with it. We just need to wait.

It should be - "The GSCM-01 is a favorite for smaller satellites and landers. Designed to be completely configurable, the 'Science Jr.' can be outfitted with everything, including the kitchen sink, if the kitchen sink had scientific value." Or maybe - "The GSCM-01 is a favorite for smaller satellites and landers. Designed to be completely configurable, the 'Science Jr.' can be outfitted with everything but the kitchen sink - luckily the kitchen sink has no scientific value." But yeah, as it is at the moment, it doesn't work. If this is the level of things we have to worry about, I'm delighted, btw

It is a bit odd that they've called it 'Mun Landing' rather than just 'Landing Gear' or something. No reason at all to tie it into landing on the Mun, from what we've seen.

Might bring the issues front and centre!

Also, it would be nice to have a throttle of some kind for rovers, rather than having to hold the 'W' key down. Unless there's already something that does that?