What are your suggestions for KSP2 development?

[Meecrob]

Since it seems fairly obvious that the powers that be making KSP2 are only paying us lip-service by saying they want our suggestions, I figured I'd open a thread so that players can have their suggestions actually listened to and discussed, and hopefully we can get some modders in here to make your suggestions happen!

Unfortunately, I have some errands to run, but when I get back, I'll get the ball rolling with some of my suggestions.

Have a great day everyone, and try not to lose too much hope regarding KSP2 development, we can still make OUR game!

Also, I have a video coming up on my channel where I have a reply to Nate's recent interview.

www.youtube.com/@chrismacbean

Enjoy!

[GGG-GoodGuyGreg]

Some weekly or at least monthly short real clips of WIP features that are upcoming would be great.

[HighCaliber]

• Solar sails
• Aerospike engines
• Launch loop for colonies
• Customizable kerbals
   

[Flush Foot]

33 minutes ago, GGG-GoodGuyGreg said:

Some weekly or at least monthly short real clips of WIP features that are upcoming would be great.

Or even ‘footage of playtests’ of things like bug-testing, if not actually brand-new content, might be “entertaining” and “insightful” ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Nerdy_Mike]

1 hour ago, Meecrob said:

Since it seems fairly obvious that the powers that be making KSP2 are only paying us lip-service by saying they want our suggestions, I figured I'd open a thread so that players can have their suggestions actually listened to and discussed, and hopefully we can get some modders in here to make your suggestions happen!

Unfortunately, I have some errands to run, but when I get back, I'll get the ball rolling with some of my suggestions.

Have a great day everyone, and try not to lose too much hope regarding KSP2 development, we can still make OUR game!

Also, I have a video coming up on my channel where I have a reply to Nate's recent interview.

www.youtube.com/@chrismacbean

Enjoy!

No lip service. I'll check back in here later I know myself and the team would love to hear from everyone. 

[Spicat]

Don't want to be the party pooper but there is a whole subforum for this:

https://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/forum/120-ksp2-suggestions-and-development-discussion/

[GGG-GoodGuyGreg]

33 minutes ago, Nerdy_Mike said:

No lip service. I'll check back in here later I know myself and the team would love to hear from everyone. 

You can’t tell us, after one year of feedback, you don’t have even a rough idea about the common things people will write in this topic. 

[Meecrob]

2 hours ago, Nerdy_Mike said:

No lip service. I'll check back in here later I know myself and the team would love to hear from everyone.

I love it!

[Meecrob]

2 hours ago, Spicat said:

Don't want to be the party pooper but there is a whole subforum for this:

https://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/forum/120-ksp2-suggestions-and-development-discussion/

I know, but I'm starting this thread as a signal that I am joining you fine gentlemen

[Dakota]

2 hours ago, Nerdy_Mike said:

No lip service. I'll check back in here later I know myself and the team would love to hear from everyone. 

I think development would go faster if Dakota had 5 monitors at this desk. That would really help with their productivity levels. Thanks for hearing out my suggestion.

[Just Jim]

4 minutes ago, Dakota said:

I think development would go faster if Dakota had 5 monitors at this desk. That would really help with their productivity levels. Thanks for hearing out my suggestion.

 

[Dakota]

Just now, Just Jim said:

 

oh @Nerdy_Mike Jim definitely needs snacks delivered to his place too - would really help with the creative process.

[moeggz]

Unnecessarily combative phrasing of the post aside (if you’re looking for actual discourse that phrasing I don’t think helps. Paying for a server to host discussions about your game and hearing negativity can’t be easy, and they literally just listened to the community and in particular by making some of those criticisms more visible), since Mike said he’d want to look into this thread I want to share two concise points and some explanation below.

1. How will the foreseeable problem of “time warp to get infinite resources/science” be handled?
 

2. How will colonies and resources integrate into and build off of the foundation of For Science! ?

 

In regards to 1, is it seen as a problem, has a solution been found or is one still in the works? I had made a post about limiting a VAB’s construction abilities to the number of unique supply routes set up by the player. This incentivizes going to new mining sites on multiple planets (which feedbacks into getting more science to get better parts to get more resources and so on.) if it’s timed to the in game clock, just time warp 1 billion seems to take away any incentive to make new bases, one per resource would be enough. Life support is another route, and the last post by Dakota had a surprisingly high amount of people ask for some form of life support.

With the second point, a lot of the negative feedback regarding communication is because we don’t really know how to give feedback without knowing the direction of the game. I find For Science! as a great step forward, but lacking until there are some additional player restrictions beyond science points. There’s feedback I’d like to give, but without knowing what (and if) those additional restrictions will be it’s hard to. One assumes it will be tied to resources, but it doesn’t seem that IG is willing to share any info on how they will play into the game. Which is fine, but I would expect many to stay grumpy when that much is in the dark and the game is in early access.
 

Some clarification on if this more broad idea type feedback is still wanted and helpful would smooth things over I think. If these things are set in stone and are being kept quiet for a surprise an indication that they’re not helpful will keep us from speaking into the wind.
 

If they are helpful, you guys know where the undecided bits are- we don’t. If the devs wonder if more/enough players would prefer x feature/solution over y (say enough to make the time and effort to implement it worth it) open up and include us in the discussion. I would love to give feedback that can be specific enough to be actually helpful, even if I’m outvoted by other community members. That type of engagement, where the community is able to offer helpful insight that is applied to the game to make the game better for the majority seems to be what many are missing. Right now the feeling is really that just bug reporting and that level of feedback is desired.

A CM launching a poll or discussion where they say “the team is working on x problem, would you rather us do y, z, or something else?” would be the absolute best thing to happen for community sentiment in a long time. You guys pick where large crowd feedback is helpful (I get that it’s often not, too many voices and too many contradictions) and then each of us gets to communicate a small part to the crowd response that can then hopefully be helpful.

Also get the whole team more snacks and Dakota another monitor. The proper number of monitors at a workstation is always n+1.

 

[Spicat]

5 hours ago, moeggz said:

A CM launching a poll or discussion where they say “the team is working on x problem, would you rather us do y, z, or something else?” would be the absolute best thing to happen for community sentiment in a long time.

Like Minecraft Mob Vote? I don’t think that’s a good idea. It ends up to be very controversial.

[Meecrob]

6 hours ago, moeggz said:

Unnecessarily combative phrasing of the post aside

What are you talking about? The way I phrased the post made sure the CM's stated their exact intentions, and I replied that I love their attitude. They fully understand what I was getting at.

My apologies, but I don't always have time to explain all of my intentions to everyone on the board. I'm trying to steer this ship to calmer waters. You can tell the CM's appreciate it by the fact that both of them and JustJim jumped into the thread.

I'm seriously getting sick of the comments from the peanut gallery.

 

 

As to the topic, my number one request is that the powers that be look at the value in making this a proper sim like KSP1. As it stands, the direction it is going seems to be a mostly curated mission structure with a sandbox to pick up science points if needed. Almost like a space GTA. KSP1 had open ended contracts and a sandbox to grab your science points from wherever you wanted. That made it so that the only thing fixed was that your start point was Kerbin. From there, you can go anywhere. In KSP2, you are going from Kerbin to Mun, to Minmus, to Duna, etc. I know I can still hit Eve at the start if I want, but most people new to the game won't.

I really believe that the whole reason KSP caught on was a bunch of enineering people sunk their teeth into the game. If they want to replicate the success of the first game, they are going to have to give the same tools to us players to show the world how cool the game can be, or else they are going to get a bunch of youtubes titled "My KSP Run - Exactly the Same Order as Everyone Else, but My Craft is Green!"

Edited April 12 by Meecrob

[Presto200]

7 hours ago, Spicat said:

Like Minecraft Mob Vote? I don’t think that’s a good idea. It ends up to be very controversial.

Maybe it could be good for decisions on what could come first, knowing that the option that was not chosen will still end up in the game. I would love a poll to vote for if recourses or interstellar should come first, obviously they will both end up in the game but I would be interested to see how many people agree/disagree with the current roadmap

[Meecrob]

1 hour ago, Presto200 said:

Maybe it could be good for decisions on what could come first, knowing that the option that was not chosen will still end up in the game. I would love a poll to vote for if recourses or interstellar should come first, obviously they will both end up in the game but I would be interested to see how many people agree/disagree with the current roadmap

I think you might be on to something here - a poll will give users an idead of how popular certain ideas are. As it is right now, we can only guess based upon an assumption of how many people share the same views based on who talks the loudest. I know a ton of people are sitting these debates out as to not get caught in the crossfire.

[Dakota]

There was a discussion on Discord with some overlap into the whole feedback vote/poll topic, just passing along my thoughts then:

In my personal opinion, Mojang has really hurt its community through those mob votes. It sparks engagement because people are excited and the polls/posts get a ton of visibility with people campaigning for their favorite, but then when 60%+ of their audience ends up disappointed with the result it really undermines the fan<>studio relationship.

[moeggz]

11 hours ago, Spicat said:

Like Minecraft Mob Vote

Yes and no.

Yes in that I mean something that’s periodical, not like every week. And yes that the CMs get to steer the feedback to what they want it on, instead of a sea of opinions on everything they narrow down it down to what they’re actually looking for.

No in that I’m not suggesting a binding democratic like vote. A poll if they want but devs still have a way better handle on the cost of different decisions. They could just make some of these with community sentiment in mind. 
 

Also the mob votes are contentious because the losing side can still see how their vote could still be in the game. The different ways to prevent time warp abuse or at least incentivize against it are mostly either-or and not something you can do both simultaneously. I’m not really concerned that they go with my idea as a solution so much as there is a solution. But for these types of ongoing efforts they have on these different issues it could be made with the weight of both development cost and larger community sentiment, if we’re just told what to give feedback on.

Id view it closer to what Hinterland did with the long dark when they asked where the community would rather they drive their efforts, and as such survival has gotten a lot more updates as that’s the direction the community requested.

@Dakota as I see you’ve just replied, yeah I meant way more the last comment from discord that you posted than the mob vote type. I agree that type leads to just more infighting. Where I feel we can go this way or that way but obviously not both is less likely for that.

[Flush Foot]

3 hours ago, Presto200 said:

Maybe it could be good for decisions on what could come first, knowing that the option that was not chosen will still end up in the game. I would love a poll to vote for if recourses or interstellar should come first, obviously they will both end up in the game but I would be interested to see how many people agree/disagree with the current roadmap

@Dakota, might “roadmap adjustments” be a possible poll question? (Assuming of course that there aren’t already devs hard at work on Interstellar and so moving Resources/Delivery Routes to v0.4 from v0.5 would be less disruptive, if the poll went that way)

[Presto200]

18 hours ago, Flush Foot said:

@Dakota, might “roadmap adjustments” be a possible poll question? (Assuming of course that there aren’t already devs hard at work on Interstellar and so moving Resources/Delivery Routes to v0.4 from v0.5 would be less disruptive, if the poll went that way)

 

19 hours ago, Dakota said:

There was a discussion on Discord with some overlap into the whole feedback vote/poll topic, just passing along my thoughts then:

In my personal opinion, Mojang has really hurt its community through those mob votes. It sparks engagement because people are excited and the polls/posts get a ton of visibility with people campaigning for their favorite, but then when 60%+ of their audience ends up disappointed with the result it really undermines the fan<>studio relationship.

@Dakota Just throwing my hat in the ring because I’ve always been of the thought process of resources should be before interstellar. I think that mob vote hurts the Minecraft community because whatever is not voted for will never be in the game (or at least not for a long long time). I think if we had a poll for this big decision of the road map, where we know whatever we didn’t vote for will still end up in the end game, it would make the community feel valued in their opinion on how development should go and could be a boost to moral also. I personally am more curious than anything at this point, I feel like a lot of people agree that they want resources to bring functionality to colonies sooner but that’s just what I have seen, I don’t know if that’s how most feel. Since this is such a big decision there would be a large amount of players who actually vote for their choosing (especially if you announced it on the YouTube channel for those not in the loop on all the socials/forums). Anyways I see why mob vote sucks but I don’t think “which should come first” would suck. Anyways I know both will come eventually and I appreciate the work that the team puts in but I would love if this were a possibility (obviously behind the curtains development schedule/progress matters a lot about if that sort of poll would even be reasonable/possible) Anyways, Happy Weekend Y’all!

[The Aziz]

The biggest problem of the community is that they don't seem to accept that the devs have their own vision for the game. And everything that's released that isn't met with community expectations ends up being (very) loudly criticized. (And I don't mean bugs, I mean features that end at certain threshold of complexity)

We're here to give feedback on what's already planned, suggest some changes, give ideas on what could be improved - not to order the devs to build a game against their vision. It's not a community made project.

Good point bringing Mojang up as they're somewhat self aware. Because they have released this: https://www.minecraft.net/pl-pl/article/vote-update

As an obvious joke, but it resulted in one of the most unhinged experiences I've seen in that game. Because of power of vote.

Community as a whole doesn't know what it wants, as there's as many different ideas as members. Hard to make a working, logical game based on this.

One thing is sure, they're listening to feedback, maybe taking notes of sensible ideas that they didn't come up with on meetings. But none of that can clash with original idea that's been laid out for years.

Goodnight. Where 0.2.2.

[Fizzlebop Smith]

I like how "feature requests could potentially already be on the road map" precludes the need to reaffirm interest. 

Would this not defeat the idea of a focus groups and surveys? Commonly used in all manner ways to determine if content proposals align with consumer expectations. 
Alternatively ways of gaining this insight is through "Social Listening" and Live Chats.

This latter was a proposed intention at onset.

By this logic there is no need to ever value the community opinion regarding additional features. as long as there are steps on the road map, those things that we might may want *could possibly* be brought to us,

and what? would therefore just waste everyone time?



If poll voting turned up 20000 different opinions regarding different things i would be very surprised. The tones of many conversations seem to align across platforms and threads. This seems a bit disingenuous or at least non sequitur. 

There have been many many times, i have not used Data that i have spent time gathering.
Saying that there is no need to gather it based on some a perceived possibility it will not bear fruit is not really how it works in my fields. There is a cost gain analysis in terms of what could potentially be learned VS the cost association of data collection / interpretation.

This does not generalize  exactly into other fields, but data itself has value.
If every single of the 20000000 threads all only had a single comments, it would be great grounds for not really considering this feature request. Thus no one would be upset if it never got considered.

However, if there were 2 posts.. and one received 19,999 comments in support, well.....


I do understand the argument about Feature requests getting upvoted when bugs need to take the priority. Is there a suggestion that people would "Stop" voting on bugs bc an option to vote on features appeared?

Is there concern that some people would few Features and Bugs as an Either / OR type of vote? I bet people would still upvote the bugs they are sick of while also voting on the content they would love to see..

Edited April 13 by Fizzlebop Smith

[Fizzlebop Smith]

On 4/11/2024 at 11:28 PM, Meecrob said:

As to the topic, my number one request is that the powers that be look at the value in making this a proper sim like KSP1. As it stands, the direction it is going seems to be a mostly curated mission structure with a sandbox to pick up science points if needed. Almost like a space GTA. KSP1 had open ended contracts and a sandbox to grab your science points from wherever you wanted. That made it so that the only thing fixed was that your start point was Kerbin. From there, you can go anywhere. In KSP2, you are going from Kerbin to Mun, to Minmus, to Duna, etc. I know I can still hit Eve at the start if I want, but most people new to the game won't.

I really believe that the whole reason KSP caught on was a bunch of enineering people sunk their teeth into the game. If they want to replicate the success of the first game, they are going to have to give the same tools to us players to show the world how cool the game can be, or else they are going to get a bunch of youtubes titled "My KSP Run - Exactly the Same Order as Everyone Else, but My Craft is Green!"

This is Poetry ...

KSP1 was amazing because there was NO RIGHT approach. This is starting off wrong bc there is only ONE approach. Missions or birds and your get soft locked from any parts you actually wanna use.
Half that is because they are grouped in ways that don't feel organic in terms of progression at ALL... like the disjointed missions that want you to Chonk and Chonk again without ever doing a rendezvous / dock.

[kdaviper]

One does not need to complete missions in order to unlock tech, they merely serve as a potential pathway for new players and yet offers some challenges.  I do think there is a lot of room for improvement however. For example, I think it is an astute point that there is no mission that requires docking when it is a core mechanic and opens up so many mission profiles.

As far as the tech tree is concerned I don't think that is bad that decisions must be made between parts. However I do feel that planes are sort of jimmied into the tree and their tech cost does not necessarily reflect their usefulness. Perhaps they could be integrated into other nodes and the node cost or science rewards could be adjusted slightly to compensate.