A proposition that players can give much better feedback now if the devs become more open with the future of the game.

[moeggz]

First off, I would like to say that For Science! has made the game massively more playable, fun, and performant. I appreciate the hard work and dedication of IG when some of the player base (myself included)  went from not just critical, but skeptical that we would even see the promised features. The science update proved that skepticism wrong, and I want to sincerely thank the IG team for their persistence. I say this because while part of this post may sound negative, it’s coming from someone who’s genuinely a fan of the game, wants the game to succeed, and appreciates the massive step forward this last update was.

All that said, after playing it long enough where I feel I can give a solid opinion, I must say For Science! still hasn’t reached the tipping point of being fun to play for fun’s sake yet. As a tester, and an EA player seeing the game grow, yes. But KSP1 remains more fun at this point.

I really would like to share my feedback on the game, but it’s hard to do with the specifics of future features still largely unknown.

For instance, how much are resources going to affect the early, mid, and late game restrictions of exploration mode, if at all? There’s a lot of feedback I can give here, but without details on the roadmap beyond just the highest level concepts, most of that feedback is meaningless.

KSP1 had a lot of janky complexity. I loved it dearly but career mode was hodgepodged together for sure. KSP2 (seemingly so far) didn’t so much streamline the complexity as outright remove it. It’s rather simple to get to anywhere in the system without unlocking any tech nodes as there’s no restrictions on size, part count, or funds/resources. (I personally prefer no funds and the limiting factor to be resources, as I believe to be the plan.)

How I feel those restrictions could be added in an engaging game play loop is something I’d love to talk about, but currently it’s unclear if any such limitations are even being considered.

The new and zombie bugs did also sadly affect my gameplay, both with the resurgence of the orbital decay and the loss of orbital lines. Those I see have been clearly communicated to the devs and it is clear they are a priority. I would personally, at this point in development with a “game” now in the sandbox game, rather they focus on bugs for a bit.

My larger point with this thought though is that bugs can be clearly communicated, and then addressed. Larger framework decisions and feedback much less so without knowing exactly the plan for interstellar, colonies, and isru. The devs have clearly asked for feedback, and I’m happy to provide it. I just feel it’s hard to give good, actionable or even considerable feedback with so many unknowns for the player community. 

Had KSP2 launched in this state into EA I feel there would’ve been much less criticism. The game, while buggy and feature lacking, has clear potential, details of quality in the surfaces of the planet, audio design and other areas. Most EA games are very clear about the development process, and I fully understand why they went so quiet with the harsh criticism they were receiving. They knew the only way to win back trust was to deliver, and while there’s still a ways to go for me personally they delivered a great update that won my trust. Now that we have that trust, I feel like it is the time to open up more about the specifics, and then recieve, consider, and implement as they see best fit player feedback. This would include the plans changing slightly as the game progresses and in response to the feedback, and trusting the community to be understanding of that.

Again, I don’t want to be too negative. My pessimistic outlook was solidly proven wrong, I’m excited and passionate about KSP and am way happier now having my pessimism be proven wrong and having a fun KSP2. I just please ask that now that trust has been rebuilt some thought is put into how much of the specifics of the coming features can be shared with the community so we can give quality feedback.

Edited December 28, 2023 by moeggz
Improperly posted early

[Superfluous J]

11 minutes ago, moeggz said:

First off, I would like to say that For Science! has made the game massively more playable, fun, and performant. I appreciate the hard work and dedication of IG when some of the player base (myself included)  went from not just critical, but skeptical that we would even see the promised features. The science update proved that skepticism wrong, and I want to sincerely thank the IG team for their persistence. I say this because while part of this post may sound negative,

Your post seems to have been cut off, but based on the title:

12 minutes ago, moeggz said:

A proposition that players can only give good feedback now if the devs are more open with the future of the game.

I vote "no."

Being "open" with the future of the game means guessing, and guessing means people will take what they hope to achieve as promises and massive public negative response any time a plan changes.

Also, I have opinions, thoughts, and desires for the game that are not limited to but are most importantly reflected in bug reports. I care far more that bugs get fixed (which starts by them being reported) than Intercept publicly stab in the dark as to what they expect to be able to accomplish over the next 6 months.

So yeah. Put me down as a "no."

[moeggz]

@Superfluous J

Yeah I hit the enter button early 

I agree it means guessing, and partially being fluid with the plan as well. Some things may be added, some things may be dropped. But for me it’s hard to put into words how, even tho I’m enjoying science and the progress of the game, how I find science lacking without knowing if those lacking features are planned further down.

Absolutely it takes trust, and an understanding community. I feel they have won enough back over that they can start extending that trust back so get quality feedback, but I understand the other point of view on the matter.

And also my full post agrees with you, the game has enough of a gameplay loop now I feel bugs should be a priority over features.

[Periple]

1 hour ago, Superfluous J said:

I vote "no."

Being "open" with the future of the game means guessing, and guessing means people will take what they hope to achieve as promises and massive public negative response any time a plan changes.

Very much this!

Game designs are really hard to communicate even between professionals with lots of experience evaluating them and seeing them turn into games. That’s why we prototype a lot. Attempting to do this with a lay public that’s also highly opinionated and emotionally invested would be a recipe for disaster!

The proper way to go is to roll it out, gather feedback, and iterate — and even that’s risky because a lot of vocal players will assume that the first iteration is the final one and blow a gasket if it’s unbalanced or rough!

[moeggz]

Ok I feel I should clarify some. I’m not asking for the resource spreadsheet and the specs of all the upcoming engines. Ie not the lowest level gameplay plans, as I recognize these are the most likely to change and really for that type of stuff early feedback isn’t helpful. 

We have the high level gameplay planning, the core gameplay loops and features planned in the roadmap.

My request is for the middle level gameplay plans, how those large features will integrate with each other and plans for features too small to get a whole roadmap update named after them.

Will we be given a mechanical reason to bring 3 Kerbal on missions? The way KSP1 did it was janky and made a hard to pick up game even harder for new players so I agree it needs to be heavily modified. Even if the answer is as vague as “yes” I can focus feedback on other areas.

How exactly will ship building be limited without funds? Lots of routes this can take, and I have thoughts on a few different ways they could do it but I don’t feel any feedback is helpful without some more information.

In the first game, Kerbals quickly became disposable. Is this the same design philosophy? I have thoughts on how life support could be integrated, or other systems to give a mechanical reason for rescue missions and flying carefully to not lose Kerbals. 

And tons more about ISRU and colonies. I get some of these may change, but other EA games I’ve played have all communicated this mid level of gameplay loop and features earlier than KSP2 does (KSP1, Minecraft, the long dark)

And I’ll edit the title to a less binary version of my statement, as a heads up to those reading this thread.

Edited December 28, 2023 by moeggz

[Periple]

23 minutes ago, moeggz said:

My request is for the middle level gameplay plans, how those large features will integrate with each other and plans for features too small to get a whole roadmap update named after them.

Those are the things that are really hard to communicate and that you need to prototype. They also evolve. If they did release that, it would just cause a huge uproar with some people going yay and other people going boo and a few people writing really long essays about how it’s all wrong, and then when they changed or dropped something it would be another uproar.

There’s simply no useful feedback to be had there at all, just lots of contradictory opinions. They would just pretend to listen to the ones that fit with what they already think.

You evaluate paper designs and plans internally and playtest prototypes with carefully selected testers who know what they’re looking for and are able to give actionable feedback.

What you want simply won’t work. It won’t fine the team anything useful to work with, and it will do bad things to the mood in the fan base.

[moeggz]

13 minutes ago, Periple said:

There’s simply no useful feedback to be had there at all, just lots of contradictory opinions. They would just pretend to listen to the ones that fit with what they already think.

I understand where you are coming from, but then I’m left with the question of why EA at all. I can’t give specific feedback on the balance of science points and progression without knowledge of down the road features. The reason for EA was listed as player feedback, and from my personal view, other games have been that level of open, have had to adjust things, and not had community breakdown. The reason they weren’t before this update is obvious, but now that they’ve shown progress I feel they can take this step.

For me, science is a big step forward and worth playing with to give feedback, but if feedback isn’t possible yet there’s not really a reason for me to play yet as it’s not yet fun on its own legs. 
 

When they progress more, or open up about the plan I’ll happily jump back in.

[Kerbart]

4 minutes ago, moeggz said:

I understand where you are coming from, but then I’m left with the question of why EA at all. I can’t give specific feedback on the balance of science points and progression without knowledge of down the road features.

I agree that it looks a lot like we're here for advanced bug testing and not a lot else. @Nate Simpson perhaps do a video on how player feedback so far has influenced the direction of the game, outside bug fixing?

[PDCWolf]

Imagine telling your boss/investor at any job that you can't tell them your plans because they're really hard to communicate, you'd be on the streets in the next 2 weeks.

45 minutes ago, moeggz said:

Ok I feel I should clarify some. I’m not asking for the resource spreadsheet and the specs of all the upcoming engines. Ie not the lowest level gameplay plans, as I recognize these are the most likely to change and really for that type of stuff early feedback isn’t helpful. 

We have the high level gameplay planning, the core gameplay loops and features planned in the roadmap.

I'm gonna be more doomer here. Look at what happened on the heating dev blog... It's clear they're not really onboard with taking feedback for the design of features (which kinda defeats the point of an EA, IMHO). Another example of this is how little the UI has changed even though it's been getting absolutely bombarded since before release with criticisms of styling, color, experience, design choices, and such. Sure, changing some icons and tonalities? they just did, large design changes to the flawed philosophy they used? Not even plans in sight. There's other features that have received the same non stop criticisms (the PAW, docking, SAS, heat system as mentioned above, cojoining parts into single monolithic pieces, and now some aspects of science).

So we're in this awkward middle ground where they clearly have a strong vision, and ask for feedback about it as things come out, but aren't really up to changing anything that isn't a glaring bug, and we're meet with (and I'll paraphrase a bit) "ehh, we'll do it our way and see if it works, and fix it down the line if it doesn't". So, if they communicate all the plans and designs they have, they'll get a lot of feedback, and then we'll see in a couple years as those systems come, that such feedback didn't go anywhere, as it's been the case.

Just now, Kerbart said:

I agree that it looks a lot like we're here for advanced bug testing and not a lot else. @Nate Simpson perhaps do a video on how player feedback so far has influenced the direction of the game, outside bug fixing?

Really, it's just this.

[Wheehaw Kerman]

I’m a don’t care.  I think that For Science! did more to dispel the, um, anxiety around here about the future of the game than any number of updates and dev blogs and what nots.  I think I’m quite comfortable with IG’s current comms strategy, and would rather they emphasized hammering the next roadmap items out of the park, like they did with For Science!

Deeds not words, or Roadmap releases not comms, IMHO.

[Periple]

1 hour ago, moeggz said:

I understand where you are coming from, but then I’m left with the question of why EA at all.

The problem is that what players want from EA only has a little overlap with what developers and publishers want from EA. Players want to play the game early, get it cheap, and have their specific concerns heard and incorporated into the game. Developers and publishers want word-of-mouth, aggregate data, to find edge cases triggered by specific hardware they may not be testing for, community building, and a constant revenue stream.

In this case, EA has given IG and PD all of this. For example, the bugfix and performance updates up to and including 0.1.5 failed to produce a sustained increase in player count or turn around sentiment. This tells them that even though bugs and performance were clearly responsible for bad word-of-mouth, poor sentiment, and poor review scores, that clearly wasn't what was stopping players from playing. Then when 0.2.0 landed and did produce a sustained bump, that told them that even a pretty simple gameplay loop is enough to keep and retain players, and that they're on the right track. The black-dotted-cloud bug was an example of something triggered by specific hardware that QA might not catch. The noise about specific bugs gives valuable info on what's bothering people the most. The clamor about pixelated fonts and accessibility will likely get them to shift that. And so on.

As to feedback specifically on science, for sure it's useful. Just tell them what you think and why. They know what their plans are and they'll be able to filter and adjust what you're saying to that. Your feedback would be much less valuable if it was colored by your expectations of future features, since those expectations will likely only have a fairly tenuous relationship with what's actually coming down the turnpike, for all kinds of reasons.

[moeggz]

@Periple

The incongruence between what players expect to get out of EA and what devs expect to get out is I think the central point Im  trying to make. Especially when they are ostensibly saying the reason for EA is for the feedback the players want to give, and not the actual analytics and bug testing they’re getting.

I personally am uninterested in not only doing free bug testing, but paying IG for the privilege of me doing so.

When the game reaches the point of more fun than frustrating (which I feel is soon, probably before even the next roadmap update) I’ll hop back for more precise feedback. 

The broad stroke is science is a good skeleton for the gameplay loop. I agree that science and career in KSP1 was janky and left room for a sequel to iterate on. But so far the answer to the jank is to simplify, and until there is more complexity and restrictions exploration mode feels closer to a sandbox than a progression game. 
 

The story driven main missions are way more polished than KSP1, and I think much better at getting players not just to the mun but to the other planets. But the removal of multiple layers of complexity from KSP1 make it, to me, a much less fulfilling gameplay loop. 

[Periple]

That's really good feedback and I hope the devs see it!

I haven't even had a chance to play it yet, but I have a hunch my impressions at this point will be much like yours. I'm expecting the game really comes together when resources come online, if it works as intended it should produce a lot of emergent gameplay -- scouting for resources, exploiting them, transferring them, and so on. We'll only be able to tell how it feels when we're able to interact with all of the systems; it might be that a system that feels thin and overly simple on its own is just right when accompanied by other systems, or that a system that feels complex and rewarding on its own becomes a chore when there are other equally complex systems to engage with. 

[HebaruSan]

I also vote "No" on the proposition, because neither the form nor the content of the feedback would be useful.

Some of us flatter ourselves that all those fifteen-paragraph essays and sharp retorts we write are brilliant and would be super valuable for the devs to read. The reality is that the devs don't and won't read them, and wouldn't gain anything from them if they did. They don't need long-form analysis; they need individual bite-sized pain points that have a broad and strong player consensus behind them.

The point of the EA as currently structured is to collect actionable feedback on the product as it actually exists and develops. This proposal would generate feedback on what players guess and imagine and hope and fear would exist based on necessarily incomplete summaries and descriptions of things of which even the devs don't yet know the final shape. Players will guess wrong, assume, misinterpret, clutter discussions with irrelevancies, and overlook actual problems that have to be experienced in-game to be noticed. Extracting something useful out of such a discussion would be an exercise in futility.

If the devs reached a decision point where they genuinely weren't sure which design choice to make, I could imagine them putting together some carefully composed and carefully labeled mock-up screenshots in a carefully written post soliciting feedback. But I think we all know how that would go; people would rapidly "take sides" and argue back and forth, the feedback would be all over the place, and any position the devs wanted to take could be justified by selecting this or that reply from this or that faction.

[Scarecrow71]

I am going to vote a hard "no" here as well.  We do not want another situation like we had eith the promises of when the game would originally drop, coupled with continued rehashing of what we were told and that the company is lying and Yada Yada Yada.

We have been down that road, and we really don't want to go down it again.  All it would take to destroy this trust that has been regained and/or rebuilt is to be told that x system will include y mechanics, but then what is released isn't what was promised.  I can already see the forum threads and the endless reposting of links and videos to prove the company didn't deliver.  We simply don't want that.  I don't want that.

[Pthigrivi]

Id love to see a bit more reveal and discussion about upcoming features and what they have planned and absolutely agree it would help guide feedback even on current features. For instance much of the feedback on the science update has been about the lack of constraints on part cost, which might be solved down the road by resources but we have no clear idea how.  Will resources even matter at KSC or just at colonies? Having a broad idea how this will be tackled helps focus the discussion on the released content and probably helps give a bit of clarity on tech tree balance as well (like what is the role of solid boosters and why are they on the main-line tech path rather than on their own branch?) Having a better sense of the role kerbals might play down the road helps inform feedback on balance between different experiments and playstyles. Certainly having a clearer picture of how future features will treat time as a factor has deep implications for how experiments could and should work and how progress down the tech tree relates to launch windows and overall exploration pacing.
 

As an example Im really enjoying the Factorio Friday Facts as Wube leads up to 2.0. Each week they put together a bit of a dive on an upcoming feature, some small, some large. Many have been well received and others have been controversial and sparked debate among fans. These are long-time experienced players and content creators with the background and intuition to extrapolate the implications of a given change. Those discussions then spurred follow-up clarifications by the devs and Im sure a bit of recalculation here and there. 
 

I kind of agree that previous to 0.2 KSP may have been in too rocky a state for that kind of generous approach to be received well but it really does feel like we’ve turned a corner. (I also agree that if IG had kept their powder dry and released what we have now this process might have gone much more smoothly, but water under the bridge.) But given that things are performing much better with many fewer showstopper bugs and something close to feature parity with KSP1 Id love to see that more transparent, open and excited-to-share approach return. It doesn’t need to be every week, maybe every 2 weeks digging into a bit more detail on how colonies will work, what the thinking is, how they will relate to expanding the science system, etc. We have been getting a bit of that but its been a bit scattershot and unstructured. We only got deep dives on science after it had been locked in without any real way to weigh in before we had our hands on it. Despite the risks I think gathering feedback earlier in the process might be informative and give players a greater sense of buy-in. 

Edited December 28, 2023 by Pthigrivi

[Sea_Kerman]

Yeah the Friday Facts are great

[moeggz]

3 hours ago, HebaruSan said:

The reality is that the devs don't and won't read them, and wouldn't gain anything from them if they did. They don't need long-form analysis; they need individual bite-sized pain points that have a broad and strong player consensus behind them.

I agree with this 100%. A sentence or two of actionable feedback is way more valuable. While we may disagree on the conclusion, my desire for more openness comes from a shared view on this topic. Bad feedback isn’t helpful, and to give concise feedback requires a bit more of a look behind the curtain.

As far as the worries of many in the community of this hurting relations and fracturing the community, I would point to the games I mentioned and Factorio as mentioned by @Pthigriviand @Sea_Kerman

I really haven’t experienced that negative pushback in beta level EA games, which is where I feel KSP2 is now. The discord comments from Nate for instance is I think a huge step in the right direction. The reveal that the current plan isn’t for line of sight to be a consideration with comm nets may have been disappointing to some (me included) but it gives a chance to give feedback. Which, if they want to listen to feedback, /now/ is the time for them to reach out and hear how desired different features are compared to the time and manpower restrictions they have. 

If occlusion considering comm nets are left to mods after this, I’m still much happier to be having the conversation now then be surprised by it’s absence at 1.0.

But there remains a chance, precisely because of their more openness now rather than later, that the weight of the difficulty of programming such a complicated system for (seemingly) little gameplay gain may actually be worth it because the value of that gameplay element as weighted by the devs is different than that of the community at large.

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

3 hours ago, Pthigrivi said:

more reveal and discussion about upcoming features

So... Cities-skylines 2 did that really, really well.  The communication about features and the depth of the simulation got everyone hyped. 

The release wasn't quite as bad as KSP2's - but it wasn't great. 

The 'deep simulation' was impossible to detect due to the safety rails built in to protect players from failure 

Etc 

[Pthigrivi]

3 hours ago, moeggz said:

I agree with this 100%. A sentence or two of actionable feedback is way more valuable. While we may disagree on the conclusion, my desire for more openness comes from a shared view on this topic. Bad feedback isn’t helpful, and to give concise feedback requires a bit more of a look behind the curtain.

I think this is a little cynical but probably not far off, and certainly gathering broad data from as many players as possible is important. I like Dakota's Top 10 requests thread for that reason as it kind of captured some broad expectations in a democratic way. Still I hope they do read some of the deeper dives and longer discussions we've had on specific elements as I think just like with the Factorio community there are a lot of people out there that have thought about these problems for a long time and can provide both more specific and more theoretical insights on how this or that system is progressing or could progress. 

[Vl3d]

12 hours ago, moeggz said:

My request is for the middle level gameplay plans, how those large features will integrate with each other and plans for features too small to get a whole roadmap update named after them.

 

[Vl3d]

8 hours ago, Pthigrivi said:

Id love to see a bit more reveal and discussion about upcoming features and what they have planned and absolutely agree it would help guide feedback even on current features. For instance much of the feedback on the science update has been about the lack of constraints on part cost, which might be solved down the road by resources but we have no clear idea how.  Will resources even matter at KSC or just at colonies? Having a broad idea how this will be tackled helps focus the discussion on the released content and probably helps give a bit of clarity on tech tree balance as well (like what is the role of solid boosters and why are they on the main-line tech path rather than on their own branch?) Having a better sense of the role kerbals might play down the road helps inform feedback on balance between different experiments and playstyles. Certainly having a clearer picture of how future features will treat time as a factor has deep implications for how experiments could and should work and how progress down the tech tree relates to launch windows and overall exploration pacing.
 

As an example Im really enjoying the Factorio Friday Facts as Wube leads up to 2.0. Each week they put together a bit of a dive on an upcoming feature, some small, some large. Many have been well received and others have been controversial and sparked debate among fans. These are long-time experienced players and content creators with the background and intuition to extrapolate the implications of a given change. Those discussions then spurred follow-up clarifications by the devs and Im sure a bit of recalculation here and there. 
 

I kind of agree that previous to 0.2 KSP may have been in too rocky a state for that kind of generous approach to be received well but it really does feel like we’ve turned a corner. (I also agree that if IG had kept their powder dry and released what we have now this process might have gone much more smoothly, but water under the bridge.) But given that things are performing much better with many fewer showstopper bugs and something close to feature parity with KSP1 Id love to see that more transparent, open and excited-to-share approach return. It doesn’t need to be every week, maybe every 2 weeks digging into a bit more detail on how colonies will work, what the thinking is, how they will relate to expanding the science system, etc. We have been getting a bit of that but its been a bit scattershot and unstructured. We only got deep dives on science after it had been locked in without any real way to weigh in before we had our hands on it. Despite the risks I think gathering feedback earlier in the process might be informative and give players a greater sense of buy-in. 

I support this and agree with @Pthigrivi. That being said.. I feel like the devs read and listen to player opinions, but they don't confirm it. Slowly I see that gameplay decisions are made, the items on the wishlists are getting added and some things seem to be well thought out. We're all starting to have an idea about what this game wants to be. But the dev - player interaction is minimal at best. Good thing we have the CMs to talk to.

Anyway, when you as a player feel like life is not fair.. remember that @Nertea's Discord handle is Destroyer of Fun. That should tell you everything you need to know.

[Pthigrivi]

19 minutes ago, Vl3d said:

Anyway, when you as a player feel like life is not fair.. remember that @Nertea's Discord handle is Destroyer of Fun. That should tell you everything you need to know.

I have played and adored nearly all of Chris's mods and they are absolutely brilliant. I don't always agree with him though when it comes to gameplay. I think efficiency and simplicity are really important but I'll return again and again to the chess vs checkers example. What makes good gameplay is not absolute simplicity, but maximizing the ratio between input rule complexity and total output creative gamespace. Sometimes a very large investment in dev work results in a very small increase in creative gameplay. Sometimes a modest investment in dev work results in a HUGE increase in creative gameplay. Every smart developer is playing these odds. I happen to think there were some decisions in KSP1 like instant scanning on polar orbit and not incorporating biome maps that were huge missed opportunities, and across the board when you talk to folks who used SCANsat the verdict is pretty unanimous that the mod did it better. Thats because it hit that sweet spot leveraging a bit more complexity in design to capture a much more robust gameplay experience. I think avoiding LoS, real-time mapping, time-based mechanics, and life support are similar kinds of missed opportunities where a modest investment in development time could leverage a much more dynamic set of design, planning, and navigation puzzles for the game. 

Edited December 29, 2023 by Pthigrivi

[moeggz]

On 12/28/2023 at 8:11 PM, Pthigrivi said:

I think avoiding LoS, real-time mapping, time-based mechanics, and life support are similar kinds of missed opportunities where a modest investment in development time could leverage a much more dynamic set of design, planning, and navigation puzzles for the game. 

This is where I’m at too. There’s ways to increase the complexity of a game and add layers of decision making without overwhelming a new player. Games like chess and go have simple rules, but have enough depth to the few rules they do have that a very wide “gameplay possiblity net” is cast.

Reducing progression mode to a one axis progression where you can only add to science, and only science unlocks more things, really overly simplifies the game to me.

I'm pretty sure this isn’t the end goal to exploration mode, but without just a little more feedback on how resources will be utilized it’s hard to really dive into KSP2 right now as finishing tier 1 tech in just a few launches made me lose interest. 

[Periple]

55 minutes ago, moeggz said:

I'm pretty sure this isn’t the end goal to exploration mode, but without just a little more feedback on how resources will be utilized it’s hard to really dive into KSP2 right now as finishing tier 1 tech in just a few launches made me lose interest. 

I’m pretty sure I’ll feel the same! I am curious though if there will be enough new mechanics in the colonies update to keep things interesting.