A week in... 10% still playing

[HebaruSan]

Regarding pricing, I know it is too late to do this and even if it wasn't it would probably be impossible, but I feel that a nice compromise would have been:

• Announce that the full release will be $75 (or whatever they're planning)
• Announce EA at some discount, WITHOUT inclusion of access to final product; EA builds would cease updating at release
• Anything you pay for EA is discounted from your eventual full purchase price, so if you pay $50 for the current EA, and the final game is priced at $75, then you'd pay $25 for 1.0

That way the publisher can look forward to the same net cash flow through full release if goodwill is maintained and players are retained, even if a large part of the loyal playerbase buys EA. And if they need to move the EA price up or down to adapt to market conditions, players can console themselves that we'll all be equal in the end even if some have paid less for now. Of course there would be the difficulty of how much of an upgrade players are really getting if the "big 4" features are included in the late-stage EA and mostly playable; maybe certain updates would cost again up to a new interim threshold? Like I said, probably impossible, but I can dream.

On 3/4/2023 at 12:15 PM, severedsolo said:

If you're not on Discord at the right time, you either miss it or have to wade through hundreds of messages to find it. God forbid you want to go back and review what bugs have been reported later.

I've seen some servers that manage to tame bug reports on Discord somewhat by locking down a certain channel and forcing every comment to start a "thread". Still painful to use, and probably annoying to configure all the needed bots, but an improvement over constantly scrolling inane chaos.

[The Aziz]

Bruh that would be a PR apocalypse. Doing irreparable damage to both developer and publisher.

Edited March 6, 2023 by The Aziz

[Stoup]

Yeah, that's basically the same as calling early access the full release and roadmap updates DLC

[Gotmachine]

On 3/3/2023 at 3:55 PM, RayneCloud said:

Genre and Game Type play a factor - aka, KSP is a "Niche" game within a sub market of simulation and sandbox

KSP is fundamentally a casual game about quick-and-dirty putting together goofy contraptions in a vaguely physically accurate sandbox.
The main reason KSP 1 ever was a commercial success is because of the goofy kerbals, the weird elastic joints, the explosions and the vague promise of a space adventure that was mostly virtual.
The majority of people that ever bought the game barely made it to orbit, and 90% never got past the Mun.
Judging from my personal network, I know a lot of people that bought the game, played 15-30 hours, had some fun, and barely ever touched it again.

It's not a bad thing, but it's important to realize that the only reason T2 spend big money buying the KSP IP, and the only reason why KSP 2 is a thing is because that casual player potential exists.
The concept has very little commercial value as a simulation game, it's indeed way too niche for anything else but a small independent team trying to make a living out of a passion project.

[Moons]

45 minutes ago, Gotmachine said:

KSP is fundamentally a casual game about quick-and-dirty putting together goofy contraptions in a vaguely physically accurate sandbox.
The main reason KSP 1 ever was a commercial success is because of the goofy kerbals, the weird elastic joints, the explosions and the vague promise of a space adventure that was mostly virtual.
The majority of people that ever bought the game barely made it to orbit, and 90% never got past the Mun.
Judging from my personal network, I know a lot of people that bought the game, played 15-30 hours, had some fun, and barely ever touched it again.

It's not a bad thing, but it's important to realize that the only reason T2 spend big money buying the KSP IP, and the only reason why KSP 2 is a thing is because that casual player potential exists.
The concept has very little commercial value as a simulation game, it's indeed way too niche for anything else but a small independent team trying to make a living out of a passion project.

Doubt that - its not casual at all which is why its a niche game.

 

Yes everyone can launch a rocket streight upwards but that doesnt mean its a casual game since many of the mechanics are mechanics you have to learn and understand - doing landings actually is a rather difficulty task if compared to other games and nothing for casuals. Lets take KSP1 for example - do you think a random casual player could land on one of the  further away planets or even the moon and fly back to Kerbal without reading into the mechanics of the game and watching youtube videos etc. within a reasonable ammount of time?

Also i think you are underestimating the market for simulation games - a lot. Microsoft Flight Simulator has over 10 Million players. The main problem of modern RTS, Simulation games etc. isnt the potential player base but that many games of that niche simply werent good.

 

By the same logics you could say any flight simulator is a casual game since any casual player can start the game and crash his plane.

 

Wikipedia quote:

Quote

A casual game is a video game targeted at a mass market audience, as opposed to a hardcore game, which is targeted at hobbyist gamers. Casual games may exhibit any type of gameplay and genre. They generally involve simpler rules, shorter sessions, and require less learned skill.[1] They don't expect familiarity with a standard set of mechanics, controls, and tropes.

KSP is pretty much the exact opposite.

Edited March 6, 2023 by Moons

[softweir]

Am I playing KSP 2? Nope. My PC isn't man enough to play it. Let's face it, adding a few more mods to KSP 1 has brought it to its knees!

Will I play KSP 2 anytime soon? Mmmmaaaaybe... I need to smash open my piggy-bank and count the coppers and decide if I can afford a better PC - and once I have done that, given that I won't have all that much to spend, it depends on how fast KSP 2's performance improves.

Do I want to play KSP 2? YES!

[mcwaffles2003]

On 3/3/2023 at 11:30 AM, Moons said:

I told you before and i will tell you again - i think most of what you do (or to be more specific the place where you do it) is sadly a waste of time - in my opinion. Discord isnt a good tool for the management and communication with a big community - nothing of what you do will shop up if anyone uses google to find information and most of what you do will be hidden in the utter chaos of what is discord. If you did the same ammount of work here it would be visible to everyone doing a google search.

How would you even have a normal discussion about a single specific topic on Discord - and how would anyone outside of discord ever find out about it? Most of the interaction on discord is probably just people joining it because they have discord anyways and doing some casual chat - looks like a lot of interaction - but isnt.

 

To be honest i think Discord is beeing used for lots of things its not made for. Its like steering a car with a touchpad - you can do it - but you probably shouldnt ...

 

Twitter is bad from my point of view aswell because it locks out way too many people these days - without an account a lot of the content on Twitter is locked - i mostly can only read a few posts before twitters wants me to make an account.

You say a lot of things about Discord without ever interacting with it. Just saying.

7 hours ago, Moons said:

Doubt that - its not casual at all which is why its a niche game.

 

Yes everyone can launch a rocket streight upwards but that doesnt mean its a casual game since many of the mechanics are mechanics you have to learn and understand - doing landings actually is a rather difficulty task if compared to other games and nothing for casuals. Lets take KSP1 for example - do you think a random casual player could land on one of the  further away planets or even the moon and fly back to Kerbal without reading into the mechanics of the game and watching youtube videos etc. within a reasonable ammount of time?

Also i think you are underestimating the market for simulation games - a lot. Microsoft Flight Simulator has over 10 Million players. The main problem of modern RTS, Simulation games etc. isnt the potential player base but that many games of that niche simply werent good.

 

By the same logics you could say any flight simulator is a casual game since any casual player can start the game and crash his plane.

 

Wikipedia quote:

KSP is pretty much the exact opposite.

Did you not notice where the person you're responding to said most people didn't play more than 15 to 30 hours?

[Moons]

11 hours ago, mcwaffles2003 said:

You say a lot of things about Discord without ever interacting with it. Just saying.

Did you not notice where the person you're responding to said most people didn't play more than 15 to 30 hours?

I use Discord - just not very often and mostly for the things its meant for - small groups of friends, other smaller communities etc. - whenever i use it to look into an indie game that mainly uses Discord it just reinforces my views (at least any indie game with more than lets say 50-100 ppl in Discord).

Yes but why does that matter - 15-30 hours is probably more than the average buyer spends on a game, and 15-30 hours would also be way too much time for people that just launch random rockets straight upwards.

Edited March 7, 2023 by Moons

[Gorby1]

I played about 8 hours after the release, but there's just not enough there for me to keep playing. Once the "Science Mode" is available I plan to start playing a lot though.

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

12 minutes ago, Gorby1 said:

I played about 8 hours after the release, but there's just not enough there for me to keep playing. Once the "Science Mode" is available I plan to start playing a lot though.

I'm interested in this as well.  The game needs some kind of progression system to be more than a sandbox - which, while appealing to some, isn't really a 'game'.

[Chilkoot]

21 hours ago, Gotmachine said:

The main reason KSP 1 ever was a commercial success is because of the goofy kerbals, the weird elastic joints, the explosions and the vague promise of a space adventure that was mostly virtual.

That's a heck of an assumption, and one that is not true for anyone I personally know that plays KSP.

If it *were* true, there would have been a much more positive reception to KSP 2 as it sports more Kerbals, more elastic joints, and even more explosions.

[Scarecrow71]

I fully anticipate the numbers of players to spike and then regress again once the first patch is released.  Many, but not all, of the people who decried the game right out of the gate will once again give it a shot, and a large majority of them will quit again because the first patch won't have all the things they want (interstellar, colonies, etc.).  And I think you'll see this time and again with each patch, with the number of players who quit shrinking with each new release.

[Mutex]

4 minutes ago, Scarecrow71 said:

I fully anticipate the numbers of players to spike and then regress again once the first patch is released.  Many, but not all, of the people who decried the game right out of the gate will once again give it a shot, and a large majority of them will quit again because the first patch won't have all the things they want (interstellar, colonies, etc.).  And I think you'll see this time and again with each patch, with the number of players who quit shrinking with each new release.

This I think is part of why they're not releasing weekly (or faster) updates, but one update after a few weeks. People who gave up trying to play the game in its initial form will give it a second shot, and if it's not fixed enough issues to be playable for them, they're going to be much less likely to keep checking back later. The first patch needs to get the game playable enough for the majority of the player-base.

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

39 minutes ago, Mutex said:

The first patch needs to get the game playable enough for the majority of the player-base.

Yep.

[Stoup]

6 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

Yep.

I agree, but I can't help but feel like we're left to set ourselves up with our own expectations such as this... I'd like it if instead there would be some controlled management of what we can expect, really. This incongruousness between what we can logically expect and what they want us to expect should be cleared up

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

22 minutes ago, Stoup said:

I agree, but I can't help but feel like we're left to set ourselves up with our own expectations such as this... I'd like it if instead there would be some controlled management of what we can expect, really. This incongruousness between what we can logically expect and what they want us to expect should be cleared up

That is kind of the big problem, isn't it?

We were told the game would get to us early, in an EA state.  So on the one hand, yay, we get it early.  On the other hand, EA communicates a certain level of playability that was not provided.

Instead this is in a painfully Alpha - Beta hybrid with some EA features tacked on. 

• Buggy as hell at the basics = Alpha
• Lots of stuff that does work - but not always = Beta
• Considerable amount of content and things in the game that could be worth paying for = EA

The problem is that the price and what you get for the price is not met.  (Price alone has its own expectations).  So, had the game come out in a Beta - EA hybrid, I think we'd be way more forgiving.  But the glaringly obvious bugs, the simple things that should work and don't are a major problem.

The thing I am anxious about is the reputational harm that they are either ignoring or handwaiving.  Perhaps they are confident that the next build we get access to will allay most of our concerns - which if it does, good on them! - but if it doesn't... I don't see return on investment being enough for the investors to keep throwing money at the project.

The thing is - with the reputation it has right now (not just bugs, but hardware required due to optimization issues) - it may take 2-3 big patches before people start being willing to give it a second try.  I'll be here, sure, but I've already paid.  The question is how many other people are going to be willing to open their wallets given 'the word on the street?'  (and if they are... when?)

[Terwin]

17 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

The question is how many other people are going to be willing to open their wallets given 'the word on the street?'  (and if they are... when?)

Isn't that sort of the reason they set out the major features and the order in which they plan to implement them?

'These features are not yet present, but we plan to add them, if you deem one or more of them to be required before you want to buy the game, then just wait and buy it when those features have been added, and continue to enjoy KSP1 until then.'

 

It just turns out that there are some less major mile-stones that are also needed for some players, but no one was aware of them in a time-frame to do anything about it.

 

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

4 minutes ago, Terwin said:

Isn't that sort of the reason they set out the major features and the order in which they plan to implement them?

'These features are not yet present, but we plan to add them, if you deem one or more of them to be required before you want to buy the game, then just wait and buy it when those features have been added, and continue to enjoy KSP1 until then.'

 

It just turns out that there are some less major mile-stones that are also needed for some players, but no one was aware of them in a time-frame to do anything about it.

 

I really do think they did a good job of advertising and explaining the EA feature-set and roadmap.

I just don't see that they've got the vehicle on the road yet.  

(Urkel asking "Did I do that" comes to mind).

[RaBDawG]

And the lead Technical Director for KSP2 laid off along with others….. 

Im starting to actually believe the “this was a last ditch cash grab” narrative the tin foil hats have been pumping. 

[TackleMcClean]

11 minutes ago, RaBDawG said:

And the lead Technical Director for KSP2 laid off along with others….. 

Im starting to actually believe the “this was a last ditch cash grab” narrative the tin foil hats have been pumping. 

You have this thread here about player count:

And this thread about layoff:

Maybe considering asking a mod deleting this thread?

I see no value in this post.

[fragtzack]

15 minutes ago, TackleMcClean said:

 

Maybe considering asking a mod deleting this thread?

I see no value in this post.

+1 to delete thread, or move the OP post to one of the other threads.

[The Aziz]

Woooow.

Have you seen the charts for No Man's Sky? After huuuuuge drop from 200k initial player count within few days or weeks it stayed below 2000 for two years. With mostly negative reviews. Because they didn't deliver what they said they would.

Only after the NEXT update in 2018 things started improving, bringing more and more with every larger update, until it leveled out at 10-20k.

And guess what, now the game is praised as the best comeback in gaming history.

Edited March 8, 2023 by The Aziz

[RocketRockington]

4 hours ago, The Aziz said:

And guess what, now the game is praised as the best comeback in gaming history.

Exactly.  A very unique case.  But that one-in-10,000 shot is now what KSP2 fans have to count on for KSP2 to live up to their hopes and dreams.  

Edited March 9, 2023 by RocketRockington

[RayneCloud]

2 hours ago, RaBDawG said:

And the lead Technical Director for KSP2 laid off along with others….. 

Im starting to actually believe the “this was a last ditch cash grab” narrative the tin foil hats have been pumping. 

You know you're like the 3rd or 4th person to post something like this? Games drop off. Especially EA games. Do you know how many games on steam have above a 1000 players? Above a 150, out of nearly 60,000 games on team. 

[regex]

2 hours ago, RaBDawG said:

Im starting to actually believe the “this was a last ditch cash grab” narrative the tin foil hats have been pumping. 

Cool story, kid