Why is this game still on the market place?

[juanml82]

3 hours ago, p1t1o said:

Point is, the existing bugs weren't exactly kept secret, so when someone buys KPS on whatever platform and exclaims, "Wth! Its got loads of bugs!" its a bit of a roll-eyes moment.

And yes, it is the buyers responsibility to find easily available information on the product they are about to buy. It would have taken 3 mins on google, from a cold start, not knowing anything about KSP or its development, to get a general picture of the state of development.

What you describe is a dishonest way to do business. There is no honest way to sell faulty goods other than warning the customer beforehand.

Think of it in terms of physical goods: you get yourself a new laptop, it throws random BSODs and when you take it to the warranty, the manufacturer says "Oops, sorry, you didn't google this model before purchase. If you had, you would have found plenty of customers with the same unresolved issues. You get no warranty and no refund, thanks for your money"

And now tell me there are no customer protection laws allowing you to sue this hypothetical manufacturer and there is no reason whatsoever for not to call the manufacturer in this.

 

Unfortunately, the videogame industry has gotten used to this dishonest business model, in which customer protection laws seem to be eluded, buggy releases are the norm (and day zero patches to fix them aren't) and the industry still expects full price for their faulty products. Not only KSP shouldn't have been released for consoles with game breaking bugs, it shouldn't have been released without a revamped GUI to make it usable with a gamepad. But remaking the GUI costs money and videogame purchasers are used to getting scammed.

[m4v]

2 hours ago, p1t1o said:

Yah, thats exactly what Im saying.

You quoted me and edited my words so it would match your rhetoric, that's nice of you. I didn't say anything like that.

[p1t1o]

30 minutes ago, m4v said:

You quoted me and edited my words so it would match your rhetoric, that's nice of you. I didn't say anything like that.

No, I straight copy+ pasted it and even in your own statement it was bounded by a comma and a fullstop. So nice try. These things are recorded by the forum.

I knew it wasnt *precisely* what *you* meant, my point was that you made mine without even trying. Sorry if it came off harsh, thems the breaks.

 

2 hours ago, juanml82 said:

What you describe is a dishonest way to do business. There is no honest way to sell faulty goods other than warning the customer beforehand.

Think of it in terms of physical goods: you get yourself a new laptop, it throws random BSODs and when you take it to the warranty, the manufacturer says "Oops, sorry, you didn't google this model before purchase. If you had, you would have found plenty of customers with the same unresolved issues. You get no warranty and no refund, thanks for your money"

And now tell me there are no customer protection laws allowing you to sue this hypothetical manufacturer and there is no reason whatsoever for not to call the manufacturer in this.

 

Unfortunately, the videogame industry has gotten used to this dishonest business model, in which customer protection laws seem to be eluded, buggy releases are the norm (and day zero patches to fix them aren't) and the industry still expects full price for their faulty products. Not only KSP shouldn't have been released for consoles with game breaking bugs, it shouldn't have been released without a revamped GUI to make it usable with a gamepad. But remaking the GUI costs money and videogame purchasers are used to getting scammed.

I dont think it is dishonest. You can compare it to whatever you like but this product is NOT a laptop, nor any physical product, this is software - and "Faulty" would then apply to pretty much every product, going by the definition of bugs=faulty.

In the case of software, "faultiness" is a vast grey area, and the devs (along with a decent, if admittedly not all, portion of users) consider it "not faulty", or at least "not faulty enough to not sell/buy".

You might be able to debate whther or not its degree of "faultiness" is large or small enough to be good enough to sell/buy, but you could have the same argument about windows.

Have you ever bought a copy of windows? Or any new computer? Did it say in large letter on the front "Warning: contains faulty software that will require many months of updates to become less faulty."

No, you've never seen that.

 

Software is not a laptop, nor a car or item of food. One needs to learn how to buy software. One needs to learn things like "buy software compatible with your OS" and "check hte system requirements first", one also needs to learn to check the status of software before buying. This may not have been true in the 80s or 90s when software and computers were an order of magnitude or two simpler, but it is the case today.

 

And having said even that - consider if it was food or a car - one needs to learn how to buy those properly too. 

 

Products do not come with all of their worst points plastered on the front of the pack. One really needs to learn to live in a world where that is the case. 

Ok, maybe you can say we live in a dishonest world, all I can say is that the honesty of the KSP devs is good enough for me.

Edited August 23, 2016 by p1t1o

[juanml82]

7 minutes ago, p1t1o said:

No, I straight copy+ pasted it and even in your own statement it was bounded by a comma and a fullstop. So nice try. These things are recorded by the forum.

I knew it wasnt *precisely* what *you* meant, my point was that you made mine without even trying. Sorry if it came off harsh, thems the breaks.

 

I dont think it is dishonest. You can compare it to whatever you like but this product is NOT a laptop, nor any physical product, this is software - and "Faulty" would then apply to pretty much every product, going by the definition of bugs=faulty.

In the case of software, "faultiness" is a vast grey area, and the devs (along with a decent, if admittedly not all, portion of users) consider it "not faulty", or at least "not faulty enough to not sell/buy".

You might be able to debate whther or not its degree of "faultiness" is large or small enough to be good enough to sell/buy, but you could have the same argument about windows.

Have you ever bought a copy of windows? Or any new computer? Did it say in large letter on the front "Warning: contains faulty software that will require many months of updates to become less faulty."

No, you've never seen that.

 

Software is not a laptop, nor a car or item of food. One needs to learn how to buy software. One needs to learn things like "buy software compatible with your OS" and "check hte system requirements first", one also needs to learn to check the status of software before buying. This may not have been true in the 80s or 90s when software and computers were an order of magnitude or two simpler, but it is the case today.

 

And having said even that - consider if it was food or a car - one needs to learn how to buy those properly too. 

 

Products do not come with all of their worst points plastered on the front of the pack. One really needs to learn to live in a world where that is the case. 

Ok, maybe you can say we live in a dishonest world, all I can say is that the honesty of the KSP devs is good enough for me.

Software is a product. Or a service, depending on contractual arrangements. As such, it should be treated as any other product.

If I buy a windows computer and, out of the box and without adding additional software, I get random BSOD, I take it to wherever I've purchased it for warranty or a full refund. And if they don't, I sue them, because the law is on my side. And windows doesn't work that way. Even in the old days of Windows 95, the issues where often related to faulty third party drivers or hardware. Sure, it will have security updates, because at no point is any operating system advertised as a piece of software capable of keeping good hackers or intelligence services away from your computer. But it's not shipped with major bugs that disrupt everyday use, and not even Windows 8 was shipped with a GUI as unsuited with the preferred input method as KSP was released for consoles.

 

Cars and food are an even worse comparison. Due safety concerns, it's completely illegal to sell them with faults equivalent to game breaking bugs.

As for software status, KSP status is "released game". Not "early access", not "ongoing beta". "Released". Therefore, it has to be fully functioning.

[nascarlaser1]

can someone explain to me why everyone hates 1.1.3??? I have watched videos and no where are any landing gears or wheels messed up. I have 1.1 or 1.1.1 (can't figure out which) and I agree it does crash every so often, but it runs 99% of the time.

4 minutes ago, juanml82 said:

Software is a product. Or a service, depending on contractual arrangements. As such, it should be treated as any other product.

If I buy a windows computer and, out of the box and without adding additional software, I get random BSOD, I take it to wherever I've purchased it for warranty or a full refund. And if they don't, I sue them, because the law is on my side. And windows doesn't work that way. Even in the old days of Windows 95, the issues where often related to faulty third party drivers or hardware. Sure, it will have security updates, because at no point is any operating system advertised as a piece of software capable of keeping good hackers or intelligence services away from your computer. But it's not shipped with major bugs that disrupt everyday use, and not even Windows 8 was shipped with a GUI as unsuited with the preferred input method as KSP was released for consoles.

 

Cars and food are an even worse comparison. Due safety concerns, it's completely illegal to sell them with faults equivalent to game breaking bugs.

As for software status, KSP status is "released game". Not "early access", not "ongoing beta". "Released". Therefore, it has to be fully functioning.

Every single new game on the market, wether its released or otherwise will always have bugs. The only time this is not true is if you live in a perfect world, which we do not.

[juanml82]

36 minutes ago, nascarlaser1 said:

can someone explain to me why everyone hates 1.1.3??? I have watched videos and no where are any landing gears or wheels messed up. I have 1.1 or 1.1.1 (can't figure out which) and I agree it does crash every so often, but it runs 99% of the time.

Every single new game on the market, wether its released or otherwise will always have bugs. The only time this is not true is if you live in a perfect world, which we do not.

There is a difference between "push the gameplay in completely unexpected directions and find clipping textures (or a kraken drive)" and "released game has gamebreaking bugs"

That the latter is becoming common doesn't mean customers should accept it. Quite the opposite, should customers vocally complain, or withhold their credit cards, demand for working games should entice developers to release finished products instead of betas

 

ETA: Imagine the newest version of Excel has a bug that prevents the use of conditional sums. Citibank upgrades all its Office suits worldwide, or gets the new Excel with new computers, and their analysts find out they can't do conditional sums. Do you think this would happen? Or that Citibank would simply shrug it if Microsoft tells them "Oh, you didn't do your research before upgrading, thanks for your money, we'll fix it whenever we can/want". Or is Citibank a bit more demanding than that?

Edited August 23, 2016 by juanml82

[Alshain]

4 hours ago, John FX said:

Not sure the issue with the wheels n stuff is the best analogy as the issue with them is one caused by third party software, either Unity or the wheel extension.

It`s not possible for Squad to code a fix for that one, they have to wait for an update to software not under their control, but there are plenty of other examples though.

It doesn't matter where the problem lies.  It makes the game worthless either way.  Ultimately Squad made the decision to release it like that and because of that decision many of us either don't play anymore or play older versions.  It was a very bad decision.

What's done is done though.  No point in dwelling on it now, we have to look to the future and hope 1.2 turns KSP into a game again.

Edited August 23, 2016 by Alshain

[p1t1o]

45 minutes ago, juanml82 said:

As such, it should be treated as any other product.

I dont see why this should be a given.

 

46 minutes ago, juanml82 said:

Cars and food are an even worse comparison. Due safety concerns, it's completely illegal to sell them with faults equivalent to game breaking bugs.

Agreed, but "game-breaking" is not a strictly defined term, many users would not describe the game as "broken". 

 

Your paragraph in the middle Im not sure I agree with at all. You dont take the computer back on the first error, and you dont sue if you do. Otherwise you gonna spend alot of time doin gpaperwork and not much with the computer.

 

I'm not saying I LOVE the condition that KSP is in, I just see it as a good game that needs some polishing. I see developers trying hard to make it better and I see plenty of information and honesty about the whole thing. I also see alot of butthurt folks who made a mistake but cant accept any responsibility. Not pointing any fingers, some complaints are legit. But also it is *how* the complainst are made.

 

PEACE!

[nascarlaser1]

37 minutes ago, juanml82 said:

 

ETA: Imagine the newest version of Excel has a bug that prevents the use of conditional sums. Citibank upgrades all its Office suits worldwide, or gets the new Excel with new computers, and their analysts find out they can't do conditional sums. Do you think this would happen? Or that Citibank would simply shrug it if Microsoft tells them "Oh, you didn't do your research before upgrading, thanks for your money, we'll fix it whenever we can/want". Or is Citibank a bit more demanding than that?

That example is doesn't make sense to me. I don't even know what conditional sums is. sorry :(.

[razark]

1 hour ago, p1t1o said:

You can compare it to whatever you like but this product is NOT a laptop, nor any physical product, this is software...

In the case of software, "faultiness" is a vast grey area, and the devs (along with a decent, if admittedly not all, portion of users) consider it "not faulty", or at least "not faulty enough to not sell/buy".

 

31 minutes ago, p1t1o said:

I dont see why this should be a given.

I don't see why it should be treated any differently.  If a company puts a product on the market, they are saying "This product is worth buying."  If the product frequently fails to do what it is supposed to, then it is a bad product that should not have been sold.  It shouldn't matter if that product is a physical object or a bunch of computer code.

 

1 hour ago, juanml82 said:

Software is a product. Or a service, depending on contractual arrangements. As such, it should be treated as any other product.

The response I'm seeing seems to be "We can't get a perfect product, so we will have to put up with whatever they give us."  The only reason any company would be able to sell a non-working product is because the customers keep letting them do it.  For some reason, it seems to have become considered normal and expected for software to be released in an unfinished state.

Edited August 23, 2016 by razark

[Curveball Anders]

40 minutes ago, juanml82 said:

Citibank upgrades all its Office suits worldwide, or gets the new Excel with new computers, and their analysts find out they can't do conditional sums. Do you think this would happen?

No.

Since CityBank and all other largeish checks every update on scratch monkey systems before it's cleared to be applied to any computer inside.

You can't expect that of an ordinary user of course, but  your comparison fails.

 

[razark]

6 minutes ago, Curveball Anders said:

Since CityBank and all other largeish checks every update on scratch monkey systems before it's cleared to be applied to any computer inside.

But do you think CityBank would take the attitude of "Well, it's software, so what can you do?  We'll just wait patiently and hope they get it fixed sometime.", or "We just paid a bunch of money for software that doesn't work.  Get Microsoft on the phone now, and tell them to fix this or make it right!"?

Edited August 23, 2016 by razark

[Dunnfore]

p1t1o : The game as it is now on Ps4/Xb1 is frankly unplayable. It's possible to muck around in sandbox provided you don't save any ship designs. But that's about it. Never mind the hardware reset crashes, glitched achievements or UI problems. Like being chained to corpse in the desert, all we console costomers can do is hope that help is coming. KSP is a great game, don't get me wrong. It should never have been placed on PSN/XBLIVE in it's current state, and should be suspended from further sale until at least basic functions are made to work. I don't think that's an unreasonable request.

 

[Curveball Anders]

7 minutes ago, razark said:

But do you think CityBank would take the attitude of "Well, it's software, so what can you do?  We'll just wait patiently and hope they get it fixed sometime.", or "We just paid a bunch of money for software that doesn't work.  Get Microsoft on the phone now, and tell them to fix this or make it right!"?

As a matter of fact I'd say that decided to use that software based on what they knew it could do, not on what they hoped that it would.

And they would get Microsoft on the phone if the next upgrade doesn't work, which means that the upgrade will be held in limbo.

Get over it, don't compare a game and a single user with a large company and vital software.

It's like comparing apples and elephants.

[ChillingCammy]

I think it is massively unfair the console version still has game crashing and data corruption. I bought the game to have fun (didn't you?) and this shortcoming is standing between me and enjoying this title. 

 

[AlexisBV]

FWIW I've played console games for years without any ability to save. Those were the golden years of the NES.

Not saying KSP is that type of game, mind you, I just thought I'd mention it.

Speedrun to Jool-5 challenge, anyone? Hard mode: no saving allowed!

 

[razark]

11 minutes ago, Curveball Anders said:

As a matter of fact I'd say that decided to use that software based on what they knew it could do, not on what they hoped that it would.

But if it was sold on being able to do what older versions were capable of, and then turned out not to be so?

 

12 minutes ago, Curveball Anders said:

And they would get Microsoft on the phone

So they would complain about the software not working.

 

13 minutes ago, Curveball Anders said:

Get over it, don't compare a game and a single user with a large company and vital software.

It's like comparing apples and elephants.

No, it's comparing software and software.  A company sells a product to perform some task.  In one case, it's spreadsheets, in another, it's entertainment.  The only other difference that had been brought up so far had been the difference between a company selling software and a company selling physical products.  At least this involves software, and puts to bed the falsity that software defects are simply to be accepted.  (Excel isn't vital.  You can do everything it does with a pencil and paper.  People and companies just buy Excel because it lets them do it a lot easier.)

[Randazzo]

It's not ok that such literally game breaking bugs made it through all of the QA, but it's also not as simple as Squad snapping their fingers to get it fixed. Flying Tiger Entertainment did the port, and it's going to take time to get it fixed.

[Curveball Anders]

2 minutes ago, razark said:

No, it's comparing software and software.

Whatever floats your boat.

I personally don't see much similarities between a 40 buck bit of entertainment software and anything installed on a corporate desktop.

[ChillingCammy]

 Currently the saltiness of this thread is drying out any productive discussion.

[juanml82]

1 hour ago, nascarlaser1 said:

That example is doesn't make sense to me. I don't even know what conditional sums is. sorry :(.

They are a Excel function that performs a sum if a certain condition is met (idk, "add B5 to F5 if A6 is a negative number"). Most Excel customers don't use it, but power users do. A bug affecting that function is something that would fly under the radar for most people, but it's critical to those who need it. 

And Microsoft, a software company, wouldn't release an Office version with such a bug, period, because its customers demand quality.

Squad, EA, Paradox, and countless other software companies don't care to release, and cash in, software with such bugs, because their customers don't demand quality. The solution to this issue is to demand quality.

Edited August 23, 2016 by juanml82

[ChillingCammy]

2 minutes ago, juanml82 said:

 

Squad, EA, Paradox, and countless other software companies don't care to release, and cash in, software with such bugs, because their customers don't demand quality. The solution to this issue is to demand quality.

I agree very much. Squad will continue to release buggy software unless pressure is applied

[Red Iron Crown]

Trimmed a couple of posts, no need to backseat moderate. If you see a thread is moving in an inappropriate direction just hit the report button and we'll look at it.

I'll again ask that people not stoop to personal attacks in here. Please discuss the post, not the poster.

[nascarlaser1]

1 hour ago, juanml82 said:

They are a Excel function that performs a sum if a certain condition is met (idk, "add B5 to F5 if A6 is a negative number"). Most Excel customers don't use it, but power users do. A bug affecting that function is something that would fly under the radar for most people, but it's critical to those who need it. 

And Microsoft, a software company, wouldn't release an Office version with such a bug, period, because its customers demand quality.

Squad, EA, Paradox, and countless other software companies don't care to release, and cash in, software with such bugs, because their customers don't demand quality. The solution to this issue is to demand quality.

ok thxs

[mikegarrison]

3 hours ago, nascarlaser1 said:

can someone explain to me why everyone hates 1.1.3??? I have watched videos and no where are any landing gears or wheels messed up. I have 1.1 or 1.1.1 (can't figure out which) and I agree it does crash every so often, but it runs 99% of the time.

I don't hate 1.1.3.

1.1.2. crashed early and often for me in the VAB, but 1.1.3 works OK. Just don't happen to let your kerbal touch a landing leg, or the leg (and possibly the kerbal) is likely to explode for mysterious reasons.

In some ways I liked the early 1.0.x versions the best, but they had problems where Squad hadn't really balanced their new physics with the legacy parts.

IMO, the main issue with the game overall is that it carries too many remnants of early development decisions. Personally I think it would be better to start from a clean slate and make KSP 2.0, but that would be years of work and might not result in a game that is substantially better than what exists now.