Some Improvements on the Way

[RayneCloud]

So, we have 0.2.2.0 coming and we have no idea when after 4 months since the last update... and we have another update coming after that, 0.2.3.0, before we get colonies which I would say is safe to assume will be "0.3.0.0"... So is it just me or is that "10 months from launch to for science wont happen again with colonies" looking a lot more like something that's just not going to end up being true? (I forget which video but Nate said that time between For Science! and Colonies would be "significantly less" than the time between launch and For Science!

I fully expect that we wont see colonies in game before October / November time frame. 

Edited April 30 by RayneCloud

[The Aziz]

12 minutes ago, RayneCloud said:

So is it just me or is that "10 months from launch to for science wont happen again with colonies" looking a lot more like something that's just not going to end up being true? (I forget which video but Nate said that time between For Science! and Colonies would be "significantly less" than the time between launch and For Science!

Missed one important detail there.

Nate was HOPING based on the progress back in October, that it should come quicker. He never said it "would".

But this is software development so 

[Scarecrow71]

12 hours ago, Superfluous J said:

People were asking for something.

...I can't think of the word. I think it was...

...

Oh yeah. Communication.

The point of the post was communication.

I guess the sarcasm was lost on you.  While I don't agree with the entirety of the post - especially being told "Hey, we have a patch, but we can't say when it will drop" - Nate did communicate with us.

[RayneCloud]

 

 

"It should, in my opinion, come faster." That was the quote, and while I get the desire to throw out the statements of "This is software development" like I am not already familiar with that, we're still sitting at 3 months to the day since 0.2.1.0, with no idea when the next patch will come, nor the one after it, nor colonies. At this pace, I reiterate, that I have zero expectations left that we will see colonies in game before the end of the year. 

[Scarecrow71]

1 hour ago, RayneCloud said:

 

 

"It should, in my opinion, come faster." That was the quote, and while I get the desire to throw out the statements of "This is software development" like I am not already familiar with that, we're still sitting at 3 months to the day since 0.2.1.0, with no idea when the next patch will come, nor the one after it, nor colonies. At this pace, I reiterate, that I have zero expectations left that we will see colonies in game before the end of the year. 

For starters, thank you for posting this.  I am guilty of mis-remembering what is/has been said about development, especially on things like this.  I am glad to have been reminded that the accurate statement is that it was Nate's opinion and hope, not a fact, that updates should come faster.

With that said, it is a shame that updates haven't come out faster.  We've had 7 total patches to this point - 5 updates, then For Science!, then 0.2.1 - in the span of 14¹ months since the launch of Early Access.  That's an average of 2 months per patch/update, but even that is skewed a bit because it has already been 3 months since 0.2.1 dropped.  And in the very first post of this thread, Nate stated that they do not yet have a timeline on when 0.2.2 will drop.  My guess² is that we are probably at least another month out from this patch dropping.  I am honestly hoping it happens before then.

One thing that bothers me more than the actual timing of the next patch³ is that we have been told by Dakota that there will be at least one more patch between 0.2.2 and 0.3.  I get that they cannot possibly fix everything all at once, nor could they possibly shove every update into a singular patch.  Development teams don't like to push multiple fixes at once for fear of something they didn't plan on breaking⁴.  And I don't blame them for that.  What I do blame them for is for not communicating what exactly they are working on - prior to Nate's post, so those of you waiting to slam me just hold your horses here - and making it seem like they aren't really doing anything.  I mean, we should know they are working, right?  But if they are, why aren't they communicating more than once a quarter?  If it is simply an issue of "Hey, we don't have much to show you more than once a quarter" then by Jove just come out and say that.  Or, alternatively, come out and say "Hey, we haven't gotten very far with our bug hunting, but at a minimum, here are the bugs we are tackling".

Hang on.  That last statement sounds familiar.  Oh, I remember - that was the purpose of the KERB reports.  Except after a while they decided to remove some of the stuff from the KERB that they were working on, for no other reason than they didn't want the bug reports they didn't have a status update to show to be clogging up the KERB report.  However, in the face of this, you can go look at KERB reports that have come out since they made that decision and see that they have mentioned some of those bugs as a way to say "We got nothing new here".  So I guess they did what they said they would?

The last thing that really bothers me about Nate's post is the misdirection employed to keep people from looking hard at what they aren't doing.  And they are using shiny pictures to do that.  I won't apologize for this stance:  graphical improvements are nice, but the core gameplay loop should be the focus/priority.  I get that not every person working on the game is working on fixing bugs; I wouldn't expect artists to be diving into code any more than I'd expect code jockeys to be creating digital Renoir masterpieces.  But when the communication is, paraphrased, "We are working on bugs, we have no timeline, but look at the clouds!"...yeah, to me, that sounds fishy⁵.  And for those code jockeys who are working on colonies instead of fixing bugs?  You should have the ENTIRE code team working on bugs.  I refuse to believe that people working on colonies are doing better justice to the game than they would by helping out fix the stuff that's been broken since launch⁶.

All told, and as a way of getting off my soap-box now, I do appreciate the communication Nate put forth in this thread.  I wish we had more of this, and I wish this had more substance to it.  But at least they communicated.

 

^{1 - This is another one of the things I mis-remember or mis-calculate.  Early Access launched on February 24, 2023, and we are currently in April 2024.  I continue to say 15 months, but it's only 14 as of the writing of this post when you do the math.
2 - Just speculation on my part.  We have no way of knowing how long things will take the development team or the community managers to make public or drop, so take my guesses here with a grain of salt.
3 - I am bothered by the timing of the next update, and the lack of being given a timeline for it.  There are just other things in the post that bother me more than that.
4 - As a software developer myself, I honestly don't want to push too much out there because, while I can test to my heart's desire, end users have a way of breaking stuff I didn't plan for.  Too many updates at one time = a lot of new bugs we never thought about.
5 - I've got a lot of these little explanations, don't I?  Well, I'm passionate about this, and I'm tired of people not being able to read between the lines in what I say.  Like this one here:  there are still game-breaking bugs that have existed since launch, and to be 14 months in and not be able to get them fixed is a complete travesty and a miscarriage of justice.
6 - Now you can go ahead and start harshing on me.}

Edited April 30 by Scarecrow71

[Stephensan]

1 hour ago, RayneCloud said:

 

 

"It should, in my opinion, come faster." That was the quote, and while I get the desire to throw out the statements of "This is software development" like I am not already familiar with that, we're still sitting at 3 months to the day since 0.2.1.0, with no idea when the next patch will come, nor the one after it, nor colonies. At this pace, I reiterate, that I have zero expectations left that we will see colonies in game before the end of the year. 

Quote

we just had aconversation about managing expectations

so uh so I'm definitely loath to uh commit to a date

I think it's safe to say that we would be pretty disappointed if the amount of time between uh you know the for science update and the colonies update was the same as the distance between launch and for science

um I do think we were working on a lot more foundational stuff over the course of the first eight months of the project and that a lot of that stuff is getting squared away

so it should in my opinion come faster..

Quote

based on based on the estimates that I've seen based on the scope of work for the colonies update I believe we are looking at a significantly shorter turnaround time we mentioned

 

we can assume when they came back from break (around late feburary) they started working hard on colonies. 

Yes there is foundational work for colonies but we are still 2 months + from even getting close to next update as what we understand from leeks/news of next milestone..

• Different people have different jobs
• blackrack working on clouds is a good thing cause i doubt he has much to do as of right now, and he already has extensive knowledge about making "better clouds", weather, storms etc (i just hope he can cook more make them better than the mod)

if we just realistically say that they started in March for colonys they have only worked on it 2~ months so we still have (sadly) 8 months more to go before we hit colony length of work..

but I'm glad to see stuff that the community talked about like clouds not really hitting like what "alpha" showed, and having an experienced person on clouds working on clouds.. i doubt that he wont code it so weather is easier to implement either.

then PQS stuff can as a possibility give us more performance depending on how it actually works, its all slow work to next major update..

Remember, Rumor of 200-300 parts is in colonys

Quote

 

       Shacknews Interviews Interview (2023)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=easPDj-o06o&t=358s [May 2, 2023]
- There will be between 200 to 300 colony parts

 

this isn't a small update compared to Science, we are getting a lot more parts compared to science (9 parts), we have to be getting more missions due to freya, more tech tree lines, a lot more work than just science.

 

I'm hoping that they are trying find ways to make colonies run more performant due to the amount of colony parts that we can use, and even a modest 100~+ part build starts to slow the game into the 30~fps .

[PDCWolf]

14 hours ago, Superfluous J said:

The point of the post was communication.

Let me rephrase this whole upnate into a single sentence:

"We're working on showstopping bugs, PQS optimizations, prettier clouds, and also prettier engine exhaust plumes".

Now go back to this thread, check what people wanted, and see if this post is that. Spoilers: it is not.

If you want to know why traffic is slow, why the auxiliary bridge supposed to alleviate traffic has not seen construction progress in months, why the paint on the road hasn't been fixed and it's still illegible, why your boss insists on not telling you when you'll be getting your next free day... the guy rolling down his window to talk about "look how nice the clouds are" doesn't help.

[Superfluous J]

55 minutes ago, PDCWolf said:

"We're working on showstopping bugs, PQS optimizations, prettier clouds, and also prettier engine exhaust plumes".

Now go back to this thread, check what people wanted, and see if this post is that. Spoilers: it is not.

Like I said elsewhere, people don't want communication. They never did.

People want to be told what they want to hear, and they want that to also be the truth. Anything less will be met like this.

I hope they keep communicating in spite of it. I less and less make the mistake of reading the comments after these kinds of posts, but do enjoy reading the first post still.

[The Aziz]

People: we want communication!!!
Devs: okay so here's some info we have
P: But we wanted dates :(((((((
D: We don't have any dates yet.
P: Then why are you communicating :((((((
D: Cuz you asked.

[NexusHelium]

29 minutes ago, Superfluous J said:

I less and less make the mistake of reading the comments after these kinds of posts, but do enjoy reading the first post still.

The one where someone like me is like "YOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO GAME IS AMAZING!!!!"? all over the thread? 

 

Just now, The Aziz said:

People: we want communication!!!
Devs: okay so here's some info we have
P: But we wanted dates :(((((((
D: We don't have any dates yet.
P: Then why are you communicating :((((((
D: Cuz you asked.

How true this has proved time and time again  

[EvelynThe Dragon]

On 4/28/2024 at 8:40 PM, Jaypeg said:

I mean, its more complex on things they've actually worked on so far vs ksp 1 (maneuver nodes, different fuel types, science/missions).
Its definitely not a conscious decision, more about just being in development. E.g. fuel flow is still a thing, but its harder to do.

Aside from fuel lines to strap-on boosters, there is no fuel priority. And as far as I have been able to discern, no way to implement it through any game mechanism that exists today. All directly connected tanks in a stage drain directly in proportion to the amount of fuel burned. So if you have burned 20% of the stage total, each tank burned 20%.

I know this is an esoteric thing for most people, but I like rockets without stabilizing fins so I don't have to carry that mass on launch. By manipulating which tanks drained first, I could maintain my center of mass where I did not have to add fins. And oh, BTW< this prioritizing of fuel burn is something done on aircraft all the time, so it should be here. Make it an advanced option, but it should be an option for those who know how to use it and want to use it. Just like it was in KSP1.

Again, while we are at it, I also truly despise the part manager window. I don't want a giant piece of crap in my way when I want to right-click and target a docking port or some such. I don't need any more info than what I need on a SPECIFIC part. This game would be a lot more awesome without the seriously garbage UI design decisions.

And give me the damned Comm-Net. Signals should be modeled realistically with fading and occlusion.

[MechBFP]

3 hours ago, Scarecrow71 said:

You should have the ENTIRE code team working on bugs

No, that is inefficient, ineffective, and unhelpful to the timeline of the entire project as a result.

[Scarecrow71]

21 minutes ago, MechBFP said:

No, that is inefficient, ineffective, and unhelpful to the timeline of the entire project as a result.

How so?  If the entire team comes together to fix the bugs, then the entire team can get to work on coding enhancements.  And as I stated before, you shouldn't be working on or pushing enhancements when the core product isn't working.  KSP2 is playable to an extent.  But why focus on something that's multiple patches away when the work can be put to better use getting the foundation right?

As an example, let's use the dV calculation bug.  Say we have part of the dev team working on this, and part of the dev team working on interstellar.  Anything the interstellar team does regarding dV for trips is for naught until the dV bug is fixed.  Same with colonies and the need to establish resource routes.  You cannot plan anything effectively until that bug is fixed, so why not have all of these guys - who are all very smart coders, by the way - working together to fix the foundational bug first?

Edited April 30 by Scarecrow71

[cocoscacao]

54 minutes ago, Scarecrow71 said:

How so?

They're not moving boxes around. It's more efficient to stick to the module you're familiar with, and work on that, than familiarize yourself with a different one. Plus, it prevents clashing of work.

Edited April 30 by cocoscacao

[EvelynThe Dragon]

4 hours ago, Scarecrow71 said:

But when the communication is, paraphrased, "We are working on bugs, we have no timeline, but look at the clouds!"...yeah, to me, that sounds fishy⁵.  And for those code jockeys who are working on colonies instead of fixing bugs?  You should have the ENTIRE code team working on bugs.  I refuse to believe that people working on colonies are doing better justice to the game than they would by helping out fix the stuff that's been broken since launch⁶.

Different people on the team have different specializations and may NOT have the skill set to do certain things while having the skill set to do other things. This is often true of large development projects.

And while I am sure this is true here, the insistence on massive bug fix releases over small focused hot fixes, is IMO, the wrong approach.  Fix something regression test it, release it, maybe even a few bugs at the same time, but not hundreds of things like previous releases. This does two very important things , 1) It gets the code in the hands of the user base to get more time to evaluate if it actually fixes the bug or if more edge cases exist and more work is needed. 2) It shows progress reducing the user base frustration.

[Scarecrow71]

44 minutes ago, EvelynThe Dragon said:

Different people on the team have different specializations and may NOT have the skill set to do certain things while having the skill set to do other things. This is often true of large development projects.

And while I am sure this is true here, the insistence on massive bug fix releases over small focused hot fixes, is IMO, the wrong approach.  Fix something regression test it, release it, maybe even a few bugs at the same time, but not hundreds of things like previous releases. This does two very important things , 1) It gets the code in the hands of the user base to get more time to evaluate if it actually fixes the bug or if more edge cases exist and more work is needed. 2) It shows progress reducing the user base frustration.

And I didn't say anywhere in my post that they should be releasing massive patches with hundreds of bug fixes at one time.

[Flush Foot]

Just now, Scarecrow71 said:

And I didn't say anywhere in my post that they should be releasing massive patches with hundreds of bug fixes at one time.

@EvelynThe Dragon has urged the devs to do more regular, smaller hotfixes in other posts so no, I do not believe that was intended as a 'criticism' of you / your post.

So it was a comment on the studio's apparent insistence on fewer, bigger patches.

[DaveLChgo]

On 4/28/2024 at 3:29 AM, The Aziz said:

And then start manufacturing spacecraft to launch it from orbit, without having to deal with atmospheres, launch vehicles and all the work to get into orbit. As the saying goes, if you reach the orbit, you're halfway to anywhere - you get that first half for free.

Im late to comment on this but had to chime in.   Building in orbit is a must.  But its not quite getting the first half free. As all of the fuel and building materials would still need to come from somewhere. Be it the surface or a captured asteroid.

[EvelynThe Dragon]

3 hours ago, Scarecrow71 said:

And I didn't say anywhere in my post that they should be releasing massive patches with hundreds of bug fixes at one time.

Go back and read my replies throughout this thread. Especially my first one. Don't accuse me of something I did not do.

3 hours ago, Flush Foot said:

@EvelynThe Dragon has urged the devs to do more regular, smaller hotfixes in other posts so no, I do not believe that was intended as a 'criticism' of you / your post.

So it was a comment on the studio's apparent insistence on fewer, bigger patches.

Correct. Context is important.

[MechBFP]

4 hours ago, cocoscacao said:

They're not moving boxes around. It's more efficient to stick to the module you're familiar with, and work on that, than familiarize yourself with a different one. Plus, it prevents clashing of work.

Not to mention it allows them to rotate people out. I.E. have half the team working on bugs for modules they worked on, while the other half develops new features. Then they swap and the people who worked on the new features are now bug squashing on the things they are familiar with while the previous bug squashers go and builds new things. Prevents burnout both mentally and creatively.

Edited May 1 by MechBFP

[EvelynThe Dragon]

2 minutes ago, MechBFP said:

Not to mention it allows them to rotate people out. I.E. have half the team working on bugs for modules they worked on, while the other half develops new features. Then they swap and the people who worked on the new features are now bug squashing on the things they are familiar with while the previous team goes and builds new things. Prevents burnout both mentally and creatively.

And that is a key factor in helping keep people motivated and engaged. Giving them a variety of work tasks is something that I do for my team members on my development projects (I head up small engineering teams to work certain things on a much larger program effort).

[Scarecrow71]

40 minutes ago, EvelynThe Dragon said:

Go back and read my replies throughout this thread. Especially my first one. Don't accuse me of something I did not do.

You responded to my post by saying:

5 hours ago, EvelynThe Dragon said:

the insistence on massive bug fix releases over small focused hot fixes, is IMO, the wrong approach.  Fix something regression test it, release it, maybe even a few bugs at the same time, but not hundreds of things like previous releases

So I'm not accusing you of something you didn't do.  You responded to me with this, and I'm telling you I didn't say anything about massive amounts of bug fixes.

If your response was not meant in the way it read, it is on you to clarify.

Edited May 1 by Scarecrow71

[Flush Foot]

4 hours ago, Flush Foot said:

@EvelynThe Dragon has urged the devs to do more regular, smaller hotfixes in other posts so no, I do not believe that was intended as a 'criticism' of you / your post.

So it was a comment on the studio's apparent insistence on fewer, bigger patches.

42 minutes ago, EvelynThe Dragon said:

Go back and read my replies throughout this thread. Especially my first one. Don't accuse me of something I did not do.

Correct. Context is important.

@Scarecrow71 ^^^^

 

2 minutes ago, Scarecrow71 said:

You responded to my post by saying:

So I'm not accusing you of something you didn't do.  You responded to me with this, and I'm telling you I didn't say anything about massive amounts of bug fixes.

If your response was not meant in the way it read, it is on you to clarify.

 

[Scarecrow71]

@Flush Foot

It is on Evelyn to clarify.  She responded to my post, which means she is replying to me directly.  If she didn't mean what she wrote, it is on her to state that.

Until then, I don't appreciate her telling me I'm accusing her of something she didn't do when yes, she did in fact reply directly to me with something I didn't mention up front.

[Flush Foot]

Is it not possible that she wrote two posts back to back and the forum merged them?

1) A reply.

2) Should stop pushing for jumbo patches

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Pretend item (3) moments later.