KSP Making History

[minepagan]

25 minutes ago, Snark said:

Why not?

• Has new stuff in it that Squad is spending money to develop?  Check.
• Will charge money, to cover that cost and make a profit?  Check.
• Seems likely that lots of people will buy it?  Check.

Sounds like a good candidate for paid expansion to me.

How's that, exactly?  Where are the rules that state what shall go in the stock game and what shall go in an expansion pack?

Well, yes, but if you go by that metric, practically everything that Squad has done for the past couple of years could be done with mods.  So?  That's a nice testament to how extraordinarily moddable the Squad devs have managed to make KSP, but since when does "can you do it with a mod" have anything whatsoever to do with "what software can people sell"?

Look, if it's so simple-- and all the stuff in the expansion is "doable with mods", for free-- then I suppose everyone would just get the mods and the expansion wouldn't sell any copies, yes?  Somehow I doubt that's going to be what happens, which indicates there's a business case for doing this stuff for money.

Okay, sure.  A different game, produced by a different (and much larger) company in different circumstances, with a different audience that has different expectations, chose to do something different.

This is relevant... how, exactly?

 

Really?  How so?  You have inside information that Squad is planning to replace them?

Right, so, there are some bugs.  So?  If by "finished" you mean "has no bugs in it", then no software is finished, ever.  Doesn't seem like a very useful definition to me.

Putting on my software-industry-professional hat for a moment, I'll tell you what "finished" is.  Finished means,

• have shipped all the features we're planning to ship
• the quality bar is high enough

Definition of "high enough" does not mean "bug-free".  It doesn't even mean "fewer than N bugs," for any value of N.  It's simply this:  Does the financial benefit of addressing further bugs (or, if you prefer, the financial cost of failing to fix them) exceed the financial cost of fixing them?  If it doesn't, then the product is "finished."

What about them?  I play with them all the time.  They work great.  There's a problem?

To the first part: point made, and after sitting back for a bit I think its a good idea for a DLC

When I say "it" I am refering to the missions. But if what I read from the OP is correct, there will be 2 packs, so I'm good with that.

 

Now for the second part, "finished"

I think a game is "finished" when the Devs fulfill all their promises. There are quite a few things we've been promised over the years, and a few of those promises still haven't been fulfilled.

Speaking of, on a semi-related note, would Squad be legally allowed to integrate what Porkjet did finish into the stock game? THAT would be pretty rad.

 

EDIT: After reading over the OP again, I'm not sure - is it 1 expansion with 2 main features, or 2 seprate smaller expansions/DLCs?

Edited March 17, 2017 by minepagan

[TheUnamusedFox]

Looking forward to this. Regardless of whether the promise is kept, and I am expecting it will, because Squad tends to be a good company, I'm probably going to buy it. I want KSP to live even longer... And I don't see why the promise wouldn't be kept. There aren't all that horribly many of us that have been around from the start, at least not in comparison to the numbers who bought it after 2013. Not that big of a hit profit estimate wise. KSP needs constant life breathed into it for me to enjoy it, modded or otherwise... can't enjoy playing if it gets too same old same old, curse you ADHD...

Edited March 17, 2017 by TheUnamusedFox

[Raven Industries]

I look forward to seeing what missions are. The parts aren't much of a big deal to me, I already have too many part mods as it is, and my kerbals never live long enough to bail out when stuff goes wrong, so the parachutes are sort of useless, but these missions sound interesting.

[KerbinNation]

Woo, I bought the gane in Dec 2013. You guys lied when you said that all the updates would be free. 10/10 Squad, I supported you until now. (Side Note: I don't think they know there's a mod for kerbal parachutes.)

 

[Long Finger]

The only bad DLC is the DLC that is stripped out of a game prior to release and then given or sold to buyers at a later date which includes all of those cosmetic DLC's, and worst of all, the so-called "pre-order bonus".

Expansion packs created at a later date that add new content to already finished games is exactly what you should expect from good developers, and those developers most definitely should be charging for them. Expansion packs are not something you HAVE to buy to play the game, and you also can't expect people to WORK for free to produce new content.

[TheUnamusedFox]

Just now, Long Finger said:

The only bad DLC is the DLC that is stripped out of a game prior to release and then given or sold to buyers at a later date which includes all of those cosmetic DLC's, and worst of all, the so-called "pre-order bonus".

Expansion packs created at a later date that add new content to already finished games is exactly what you should expect from good developers, and those developers most definitely should be charging for them. Expansion packs are not something you HAVE to buy to play the game, and you also can't expect people to WORK for free to produce new content.

Plus one all the way, very true. Don't know why everyone is hating on this.

[Rainbowd4sh]

23 minutes ago, Snark said:

Well, sure, there's no guarantee how well they'll pull it off. 

Like any business, setting prices is a challenge.  It's important not to set it too low, because then you're leaking money, which is bad for business.  On the other hand, it's important not to set the price too high, either, because then 1. not enough people buy it, and 2. it alienates customers and makes them less likely to buy your stuff in the future.

So, the onus will be on Squad to set a price tag on the expansion that the players collectively feel is "worth it."

Based on the track record thus far, though, I'm cautiously optimistic.  KSP has given me far more fun per dollar than any other product I've bought.  I've gotten literally thousands of hours of enjoyment out of KSP, for a total investment of US$27.  Can't beat that with a stick, as they say.  If the expansion manages to do even a few percent as well as the original in that regard, I'll consider my money well spent.

Other folks can make their own decisions about that, of course.  How well the expansion sells will answer the question.

ATM, I played 1120 hours. I payed 20 dollars (sale), the ol' calculator tells me that's 1 cent an hour. That's pretty darn good. 

[Snark]

35 minutes ago, Veeltch said:

All that can be in the game for free.

It can?  All the people who work at Squad can just donate their time for free, and not get paid, and spend time making stuff which they give away?

Not following the logic here.

If you're asserting "this expansion isn't worth any money at all," then of course you'll vote with your wallet.  On the other hand, just based on the reaction I've seen here so far, a fair number of people are eager to shell out.

Ultimately, of course, how successful it will be will come down to how many people think it's worth their hard-earned money, which in turn will be a matter of "what does it provide" versus "what does it cost."  Since Squad hasn't given full details yet on the former, and haven't provided even a hint of the latter, I'll reserve my own judgment until there's more information.  But given their fun-per-dollar track record with KSP (i.e. excellent), I'm cautiously optimistic.

 

27 minutes ago, minepagan said:

I think a game is "finished" when the Devs fulfill all their promises. There are quite a few things we've been promised over the years, and a few of those promises still haven't been fulfilled.

Such as?  I'm searching for posts from Squad with the word "promise" in them, not turning up a lot.

This post here comes closest to being relevant, from among the few hits that the above-linked search turns up.  Unfortunately, it pre-dates the switch in forum software, so it's turned into an unreadable mess now, but here's just one snippet extracted and reformatted by me for readability:

Quote

Q: What about the features you promised on the Wiki's Planned Feature List?

A: That list is maintained by the community, and doesn't imply any promise on our part. In fact, the best thing to do about that list is disregard it. We did implement a significant portion of it, in any case, but let me go ahead and quote the very first lines on that page: "This list is not an official road-map for KSP. It is maintained by the community, and has no direct relation to what may or may not be included in the final product."

Q: Can you give us an official list of planned features for 1.0 then?

A: Not without a time machine. Seriously though, any lists we publish can only result in leaving people disappointed. The problem here is that no amount of disclaimers and notices will keep everyone from taking every feature on a list as a commitment from us. We don't want to commit to anything we're not sure about ourselves, so if we do have to leave something out, we should be only ones to be disappointed. It's not great, we know, but it's for the best.

...That was back in October 2014, even before 1.0.  So, there they're saying pretty explicitly "we promise you nothing."  Which, in my book, puts everything since 1.0 as gravy.

So, which specific promises are you referring to?  As in, actual promises, and not thing-they-said-they'd-like-to-do-which-some-people-in-the-community-then-interpreted-as-a-promise?

[AlexTheNotSoGreat]

Hopefully this DLC becomes public within the next month, I'd like something to go with ONI for my birthday!

[minepagan]

9 minutes ago, Snark said:

...That was back in October 2014, even before 1.0.  So, there they're saying pretty explicitly "we promise you nothing."  Which, in my book, puts everything since 1.0 as gravy.

Huh. Ok then, I guess my mission was over before it ever started 

Back to Porkjet's revamp, I can't seem to find the thread it was in, does anyone have a link? Or at least know what license it has?

[Frybert]

Some off topic posts have been removed.

[Lupi]

2 minutes ago, minepagan said:

Huh. Ok then, I guess my mission was over before it ever started 

Back to Porkjet's revamp, I can't seem to find the thread it was in, does anyone have a link? Or at least know what license it has?

In all probability, the Porkjet revamp, while done by him, was done under contract to SQUAD. Porkjet as such is unlikely to have retained ownership of the assets, and what of them that have been created all belong to Squad as he was on payroll to create those assets for them.

[StrandedonEarth]

I can't believe I didn't notice this thread for a whole 22 hours! And that I read or at least skimmed all 12 pages of it before responding!

You can count me in the group opening their wallets, since I know the dev's have bills to pay, and I've gotten way more than my money's worth out of this game. It's just stuff that can be done with mods? I don't think the Mission Builder will be like any mod out there yet.

Speaking of mods, is this DLC how we'll finally get stock versions of essential informational mods like KER, KAC, TWP, and NDAL? (Ok, so Navball Docking Alignment Indicator isn't essential, but it's such a simple little add-on that makes it much easier to learn docking.)

Oh and... Called it!

 

[Wjolcz]

6 minutes ago, Snark said:

It can?  All the people who work at Squad can just donate their time for free, and not get paid, and spend time making stuff which they give away?

Not following the logic here.

Well, to be frank, there are better ways of making money. What this is is just another way of saying "Oh, boy. This ship is sinking and we need YOUR money to patch it"

I suggested making a new game many times. Releasing DLCs for an unfinished one is just ridiculous. What's next? A delta-V readout DLC? And a TWR calculator one after that?

7 minutes ago, Snark said:

If you're asserting "this expansion isn't worth any money at all," then of course you'll vote with your wallet.  On the other hand, just based on the reaction I've seen here so far, a fair number of people are eager to shell out.

I've read enough overhyped posts from people who came after the Shmelta-Vee and procedural craters for all the planets announcements to understand their way of thinking.

11 minutes ago, Snark said:

Ultimately, of course, how successful it will be will come down to how many people think it's worth their hard-earned money, which in turn will be a matter of "what does it provide" versus "what does it cost."  Since they haven't given full details yet on the former, and haven't provided even a hint of the latter, I'll reserve my own judgment until there's more information.  But given their fun-per-dollar track record with KSP (i.e. excellent), I'm cautiously optimistic.

No point in saying "We'll see about that" since we simply won't see anything. SQUAD never revealed how much money they earned in total. It's been discussed and it has to do with cartels so let's not continue this topic. It doesn't matter how much it will cost. It's probably one of the last money grabs anyway.

Talking about fun-per-dollar: fair enough. KSP always was a great modding platform. The base (unmodded) game and fun? Hm...

I have nothing against DLCs as long as they add something no mod can add. That list up there? I've seen it done already.

[minepagan]

6 minutes ago, Lupi said:

In all probability, the Porkjet revamp, while done by him, was done under contract to SQUAD. Porkjet as such is unlikely to have retained ownership of the assets, and what of them that have been created all belong to Squad as he was on payroll to create those assets for them.

If that is true, I hope Squad incorporates them into stock (and maybe down the road give other oldish parts a similar treatment)

[Shadowmage]

5 hours ago, JPLRepo said:

As per above. The design is that the core will contain the interfaces to any expansions, along with determining if any are installed or not.
Interfacing to anything within any expansion may or may not require seperate mod versions depending on what you are doing. Modding specific components of an expansion would in all likelihood require seperate linkage to DLC DLLs. Given the extend of modding that occurs today on stock KSP I'd expect there will be cases of this. But other types of mods that don't go that deep would probably only need to interface via the core expansion Interfaces.
It's still heavily in development, so not a lot more details at this point in time. But those details will become available as we get closer.

Thank you for the information and explanation, that greatly reduces my worries/concerns; sounds like you guys are already taking it into consideration.  Perfectly understandable that mods dealing heavily with expansion-specific features might need a bit more careful versioning and setup.  My main concern was that every mod, large or small, would need to build and ship multiple versions, which was no fun when I was dealing with it.

Hopefully this turns out to be a profitable venture, and we might continue to see additional KSP updates and expansions for years to come   (the DLC word still makes me cringe, even if it is perhaps the more proper term in this case).

[KerbinNation]

1 minute ago, StrandedonEarth said:

I can't believe I didn't notice this thread for a whole 22 hours! And that I read or at least skimmed all 12 pages of it before responding!

You can count me in the group opening their wallets, since I know the dev's have bills to pay, and I've gotten way more than my money's worth out of this game. It's just stuff that can be done with mods? I don't think the Mission Builder will be like any mod out there yet.

Speaking of mods, is this DLC how we'll finally get stock versions of essential informational mods like KER, KAC, TWP, and NDAL? (Ok, so Navball Docking Alignment Indicator isn't essential, but it's such a simple little add-on that makes it much easier to learn docking.)

Oh and... Called it!

 

 

Are you suggesting we pay for KER? Even if it breaks your only stock thing, if you have one, DLC is technically not stock, so that won't help either.

[Jestersage]

Can I still call it Stock if I build stuff with parts from DLC?

[StrandedonEarth]

12 minutes ago, KerbinNation said:

Are you suggesting we pay for KER? Even if it breaks your only stock thing, if you have one, DLC is technically not stock, so that won't help either.

Well, as part of the game, is what I mean. It would fit in with the mission planning. If we have to pay them to finally put stuff like that in, then so be it. There's no such thing as a free launch.

[SpaceplaneAddict]

Sadly, I bought in 2016, and have no moneys to give. Can I pay with moral support and friendship?

[Rune]

Wait, a DLC that I get for free because I have been here for like forever? And here I was thinking getting yet another update this week was already something very cool, considering I bought this game so freaking long ago! 

Congrats @SQUAD on going the extra mile to be the bestest game company I've ever been a customer to. Totally understand your necessity to create new revenue streams for KSP, and amazed at your generosity with your early backers.

 

Rune. Heck, I'm thinking I'll buy the DLC for somebody else, just to show my appreciation.

[KerbinNation]

3 minutes ago, Rune said:

Wait, a DLC that I get for free because I have been here for like forever? And here I was thinking getting yet another update this week was already something very cool, considering I bought this game so freaking long ago! 

Congrats @SQUAD on going the extra mile to be the bestest game company I've ever been a customer to. Totally understand your necessity to create new revenue streams for KSP, and amazed at your generosity with your early backers.

 

Rune. Heck, I'm thinking I'll buy the DLC for somebody else, just to show my appreciation.

 

"Going the Extra Mile to be the bestest game company." If they are the best company you've been a customer to, you need to get some more games. I bought this in December 2013, and because of me being "late" in buying it, I don't get the DLC free. 

[tater]

1 hour ago, Veeltch said:

I'm not paying anything for that DLC. All that can be in the game for free. You've just hit rock bottom with that announcement.

Now, excuse me. I'm off to give modders as much rep as I can because they actually deserve it more than the thing that happened to this company.

EDIT: And I'm out of rep

We agree on a lot of things in terms of how the game would ideally be...

But I could not disagree more with the general tone of this. Squad is a business, and the people who continue to work on the game deserve to make money. I said above that my basic cable plus HBO (Game of Thrones, lol) sat TV costs nearly $100 a month. Maybe it's 70, I can't remember. Its a lot of money. It's frankly too much money, typing this makes me want to unsub it, lol. Anyway, I play KSP at least as much as I watch TV, and KSP is a steal in terms of value per dollar. I'd feel obliged to pay for this DLC even if it was only adding multiplayer---a kind of KSP gameplay I will never use, because I fundamentally disagree with instancing. Why? Because I didn't pay enough for KSP.

 

 

[Rune]

Just now, KerbinNation said:

"Going the Extra Mile to be the bestest game company." If they are the best company you've been a customer to, you need to get some more games. I bought this in December 2013, and because of me being "late" in buying it, I don't get the DLC free. 

Well, they made me a promise that I had pretty much forgotten, and then they went and kept it. You see, back when I bought the game (2012), I really didn't expect KSP to still be a thing by now, or squad be so successful with it, or the game ever getting to where I would call it finished... andas much as I want more things in KSP, if Squad called it quits tomorrow, I wouldn't feel cheated in any way.

Besides, as I'm saying, I'm kind of feeling obliged to buy this for somebody else, because I've enjoyed the game way too much for the ...15$ I paid for it? Do you also think I paid too little, BTW, because I bought 0.17?

 

Rune. I kind of do.

[KerbinNation]

4 minutes ago, Rune said:

Well, they made me a promise that I had pretty much forgotten, and then they went and kept it. You see, back when I bought the game (2012), I really didn't expect KSP to still be a thing by now, or squad be so successful with it, or the game ever getting to where I would call it finished... andas much as I want more things in KSP, if Squad called it quits tomorrow, I wouldn't feel cheated in any way.

Besides, as I'm saying, I'm kind of feeling obliged to buy this for somebody else, because I've enjoyed the game way too much for the ...15$ I paid for it? Do you also think I paid too little, BTW, because I bought 0.17?

 

Rune. I kind of do.

 

Rune, along with Civ5, KSP was the first game that got me into buyable games, and I'm trashing it because I want it to be good. I don't feel obliged a tiny bit to pay for DLC. I payed 22$ for 0.22, I also think I deserve the DLC.