Does anyone else feel as if they saw this coming?

[Kernel Kraken]

Just a disclaimer: I do not want this thread to end in bashing any real human people who have feelings, just like you and me. I understand if this discussion isn’t productive and there’s no ill will if the thread is removed. The developers working on KSP 2 deserve nothing but our thanks, respect, and admiration for the years of effort they put into a franchise we love. I haven’t been active here in about 4 years, so I may be a bit out of touch with current community attitudes lol.

That being said, does anyone else here feel like they saw the current turn of events coming? I remember when T2 first purchased Squad and the rights to KSP’s IP. I remember the community pushback, all of the deleted argument threads, the EULA fiasco, all of the things that most people outside of the forums never really saw. No one was excited for T2. No one thought the franchise would develop in a direction consistent with the established community lore around it. Personally, I never had high hopes for KSP’s development. It’s simply not the type of game Take 2 usually makes a lot of money on. There’s not a whole lot of live-service monetization potential in a sandbox game, and there’s hardly any story potential. It just doesn’t seem like their ballpark. And especially without any of the original team on board, I felt as if it was a matter of time before we started getting some very depressing announcements. There were even threads when the game was announced denouncing those with high hopes for the project. I just feel disappointedly validated with the recent news from T2 & PD. Were there any other warning signs you noticed in the lead-up to the project somewhat falling apart?

Edited June 3 by Kernel Kraken

[TomKerbal]

You mean besides the super slow-motion development, the completely overblown, wickedly expensive trailers that do Hollywood proud, the many deleted posts here in the forum and the subterranean support on Steam? Maybe the price of the unfinished product, or maybe the fact that the developers were all recently fired, even though you still think they're developing the game further.
The good thing is that KSP1 is now back in focus and the mods are being worked on again (especially my beloved RP-1 mod).

[Scarecrow71]

Are you asking about this being in addition to a section of the community at launch saying this was going to happen?

[Pthigrivi]

I can't say I did. I thought they'd push through because it was nuts to cut things off right when they were actually getting things back on track. There was exactly one little thing that raised the hair on the back of my neck but it was just a couple weeks before the WARN notice. 

Y'know typing this I was about to make a very stupid prediction that all these live-service games were a fad and would go the way of Candy Crush and then I looked it up and Candy Crush topped out at almost a billion dollars in revenue last year. I guess I just have to accept that most consumers actually just have microsecond long attention spans? Like there just has to be an actual market for thoughtful, well designed games that teach you something and provide thousands of hours of time. I know it'll never compete with live service arena shooters but damn.

Edited June 3 by Pthigrivi

[Skorj]

During development (pre-release) I was cautiously optimistic.  I was worried, but was willing to buy on day 1 and see.  My general sense was "huh, looks like IG might pull it off".

As soon as I started playing my sense of the game very quickly changed to "Oh.  Oh, no.  No no no."  Once I saw the code quality at launch I expected the game to fail, and everything else has played out as I expected.  I was hoping for better, but that was just hope.  Fortunately I refunded in time. 

I didn't care that colonies weren't ready: I was content with the cash grab if it meant we got a KSP1 without the bugs, even just sandbox at first.  But we so didn't.

Edited June 3 by Skorj

[Tony Tony Chopper]

I was turning in too late for all this drama. Basically, I bought KSP1 sometime in 2020, played the the hell out of it and noticed some trailers on Youtube a good while later. There was literally no reason to worry about anything. Even EA and some lags didn't really bother me at this point. But the negativity before the game was even launched was very surprising to me to say the least. Reading ungrounded claims from typical toxic Steam trolls isn't really new, so who cares. As far as I understand development, appearance does not necessarily mean what's actually working under the hood. 3 years of education in basic development languages (high school stuff) and years of observation on developer working on an open source project had taught me enough here: Most gamers have no idea what's going on in development anyway. I have Strong bias to this. When self described developer entered the Steam forums I got to think they are rather trolls or on the less bright side if they aren't working in a whole other area anyway. I mean, being well educated doesn't really mean you're also intelligent. That's to pair of different socks to me and what would an intelligent human want in such a toxic place?

So, because there wasn't that much positivity I was just signing up here and waited for some patches until FS! released. 0.2.1 has me convinced it will go it's way. It just takes it's time. No problem at all. It's about quality fixes after all. Better than cheap and fast hacks. But really, what do I know about developing? When some developers here were actual criticizing with refined arguments, that got me worried. But not as much until I understand there is a firing going on with the possibility that this project will get frozen. Nope, I didn't really saw anything coming. But since Shadowzone dropped his history video I understand quite a lot why this project has huge problems. I just missed that perspective.

[Pthigrivi]

And just to undermine my own pessimism the true successor to KSP at this moment is actually Tears of the Kingdom, a massively profitable single player open world game that leverages the system of giving players a lego-like kit of parts and physics rules and thats what makes the puzzles fun. KSP2 absolutely could have done that and more with time, resources, and orbital mechanics, it was just that T2 has no idea what the difference is between a good game and a bad game. 

Edited June 4 by Pthigrivi

[RayneCloud]

Yes.

[HebaruSan]

When interest rates are low and companies can get investment money for free, a high-risk, high-return venture makes sense.

When interest rates come back up, they have to be more conservative.

Edited June 4 by HebaruSan

[chefsbrian]

6 hours ago, Kernel Kraken said:

Were there any other warning signs you noticed in the lead-up to the project somewhat falling apart?

Before science, I held the position that if the game wasn't in a stable place with a meaty science system update before the one year anniversary, that I considered the project to be seriously troubled. Science was lackluster, and the game was still very unstable leading into February. That's the closest I came, but even then I was operating closer to "they will struggle to deliver anything good, mods will need to save the game" and not "Take2 initiates a RUD with the entire indie publisher label". So while I wish I could say I saw it, for ego if nothing else, I really can't claim as much.

[Kernel Kraken]

6 hours ago, Scarecrow71 said:

Are you asking about this being in addition to a section of the community at launch saying this was going to happen?

I’m more thinking about 2018-2019, before the game was even announced. I remember rumors of a sequel once Take Two acquired Squad. I’ve always felt very pessimistic, as I felt that the charm of the game came from the classic indie jank- the Krakens, the close-knit community, the Easter eggs, ect.. I’m not sure I expected the project to end up like this, but I remember having somewhat low hopes, simply due to the big publishing company and the way they tend to choke out indie studio’s unique voices.

[ColdJ]

7 hours ago, Kernel Kraken said:

That being said, does anyone else here feel like they saw the current turn of events coming?

When HarvesteR was pushed out and when they asked for our ideas of what to have in the new game while stating that any ideas we gave them would no longer belong to us but them.

Yeah I was pretty sure.

I remember all the forum members complaining that it hadn't been released yet, before EA and then the same ones complaining that it had been released in the state it was in.

There was good reason I never purchased the EA.

You can generally tell when a big company tries to push a sub par game based on the original success of a game they have bought out. Many examples in the past of this.

They forget that the original was a passion project that worked with people playing it in an open way to improve it. As soon as you cut off your consumers and become all secretive, then you are pretty much doomed.

[Stevie_D]

The moment I saw the words "Take 2" I knew a billion-dollar gaming corporation wouldn't treat this game with the love, dedication, and respect that Squad did. The moment I saw a billion-dollar gaming corporation charge --->£50<--- for Early Access, after already being years behind schedule,... that's when alarm bells rang and I saw a cash grab and knew my fears were proving true. I never gave them a penny because a billion-dollar gaming corporation doesn't need to use Early Access, regardless of if you want to call them Take 2 or Private Division. The moment things turned sour they would drop it like a rotten egg, and they did.

I'm not pessimistic, I'm actually one of the most optimistic people you could hope to meet - but above all I'm a realist, and when you examine the facts of who people are and why people do things, you soon learn to trust in reading their intentions and the percentages of what they're most likely to do.
 

Edited June 4 by Stevie_D

[Bej Kerman]

16 minutes ago, Stevie_D said:

The moment I saw the words "Take 2" I knew a billion-dollar gaming corporation wouldn't treat this game with the love, dedication, and respect that Squad did

Because Squad famously cared about their employees during the 1.2/1.3 era.

[cocoscacao]

Tbh, not until FS! announcement. FS! release just cemented suspicions. I wasn't aware of KSP 2 development until second part of 2022. Even buggy EA preview didn't discourage me, 'cause I suspected core functionalities of the game were there, and that a few rapid patches will iron out most problems. About 7 months later, however... well... yeah...

[Mickel]

That moment, at the end of the last promo video, when the craft slammed into Mun.. the thought 'how very Kerbal' was followed by another... 'I hope that's not prescient.'

 

Turns out it was.

 

Still.... I've  contentedly sunk ~400 hours into KSP since FS didn't exactly ignite enthusiasm in its sequel.  So I'm relatively philosophical about the whole debacle.

Edited June 4 by Mickel

[Vexillar]

I had worries... about how long it had taken to get something out, and the change in studio, etc., but remained cautiously optimistic.

But this now haunts me: the newspaper front page from the little "welcome to KSP2" video I posted just before it came out. Perhaps something in my subconscious knew more than I did?

 

Spoiler

 

[MechBFP]

Not expecting this as a potential outcome would be foolish of course. For any game it’s always a potential.  This one certainly was in rough waters more often than it wasn’t however. 

[boolybooly]

I cant say I did but I did rename my KSP forum bookmark to "Kerbal Space Program : owned by Take Two Interactive"  to remind me that things had changed and there was a risk attached.

The basis of that was my distrust of hired publisher managers and the danger they may have a subjective lack feeling for the subject matter of KSP, which I think it always struggled against even with Squad.

KSP is niche and at risk from such individuals seeing it as valueless because they don't understand the potential in niche markets and instead make careerist choices to bet on top selling genres like first person shooters, based on spreadsheets and bar charts, even though these are also risky as the success of a few belies the failure of others.

This kind of mismanagement, first Star Theory and then Intercept does not bode well for the company as a whole. My guess would be TTWO profits reduced because they were freakishly high due to covid. This reaction is inappropriate and does not address reality.  Its not like they are cutting out the rot, as those wielding the knives are the rot.

I am reminded of the Homeworld saga, likewise a niche space IP mismanaged by relic. Took years but the IP eventually ended up with THQ, assets were sold and went to Gearbox because the creative director Brian Martel likes Homeworld, simple as that and cooperated with Blackbird which includes some of the original developers. Homeworld3 has just  been published and development to improve it by listening to player feedback is ongoing, because the decision makers like the game and want it to be right for players. As a player you can feel that in the way they behave.

What we need is for the KSP IP to be in the hands of someone who loves the game. Someone at TTWO may have done once but they clearly no longer have executive control.

 

 

 

[dprostock]

1 hour ago, boolybooly said:

I cant say I did but I did rename my KSP forum bookmark to "Kerbal Space Program : owned by Take Two Interactive"  to remind me that things had changed and there was a risk attached.

The basis of that was my distrust of hired publisher managers and the danger they may have a subjective lack feeling for the subject matter of KSP, which I think it always struggled against even with Squad.

KSP is niche and at risk from such individuals seeing it as valueless because they don't understand the potential in niche markets and instead make careerist choices to bet on top selling genres like first person shooters, based on spreadsheets and bar charts, even though these are also risky as the success of a few belies the failure of others.

This kind of mismanagement, first Star Theory and then Intercept does not bode well for the company as a whole. My guess would be TTWO profits reduced because they were freakishly high due to covid. This reaction is inappropriate and does not address reality.  Its not like they are cutting out the rot, as those wielding the knives are the rot.

I am reminded of the Homeworld saga, likewise a niche space IP mismanaged by relic. Took years but the IP eventually ended up with THQ, assets were sold and went to Gearbox because the creative director Brian Martel likes Homeworld, simple as that and cooperated with Blackbird which includes some of the original developers. Homeworld3 has just  been published and development to improve it by listening to player feedback is ongoing, because the decision makers like the game and want it to be right for players. As a player you can feel that in the way they behave.

What we need is for the KSP IP to be in the hands of someone who loves the game. Someone at TTWO may have done once but they clearly no longer have executive control.

 

 

 

Errr...

It was already in the hands of someone who loved the game, so it went. 

He continuously squandered resources, stuck his nose in everything he could, managed stupidly and managed to finish off a great project. 

He should have been kicked in the teeth in 2020. 

[PDCWolf]

*Raises hand*

I will first admit I wasn't right in all the things I said, but I was right in a considerable majority of the things I said. I could probably write an hours-long "I told you" post delineating every single thing I called that became reality, but it's always been wasted effort when people just handwave you away as a "toxic doomposter".

During the "delay era", I was worried because the trailers had performance issues. During the "post covid" era, I was worried because they were showing barely asset mounts and no real gameplay of anything but rockets flying (they ended up having to stick a "not real gameplay" label on a lot of videos). During the "it'll come out as early access" era, I was worried because why would you remove everything from your game you already allegedly showed working?. Finally, after release, I knew it was mediocre garbage and looking at the sales numbers and reviews it was obviously gonna need a lot of work to be exceptionally good mediocre garbage. Then the work just never came, they were exceedingly sluggish.

Some time after, the AMA series came out and I realized it wasn't even gonna be "maybe fun mediocre garbage". That's when I realize the game was creatively and technologically bankrupt. Every devblog talked about dumbing stuff down, every other devblog was just some dumb deflection instead of showing real work... "here's how we made an algorithm to draw a pretty circle" like dude, really? "here's some ms paint mockups of how we made the heating system less complex which somehow means it's better." They were not putting in the work or creativity. Plus it was around the time people started to discover massive foundational issues like save bloat, performance rot, and so on. They also teased that the solution to wobble was just gonna be autostrut again...

Then the buildup for science started, whilst we still had an unreadable UI, heating wasn't still in almost a full year after launch, all they had added along the way were some engines and fins... They just couldn't get anything visible done. The FS! media event kinda looked good, until people here began analyzing it in detail. It was obvious there was no thought applied to the tech tree, and it was much more linear... dumbed down. Science itself was dumbed down to a single blinking light and all in one parts.

For Science was probably when the meter changed from "I'm worried it's gonna be a really bad game" to "there'll be no game." The update just completed the vision of how slow, amateur, and incapable they were, and I'm now even vindicated in saying that since it's been revealed that they were indeed just hiring juniors. It also didn't really sell... only about a thousand new reviews popped up on Steam, some of those indicating refunds as well. That's when I became 100% sure the game wasn't making it if they didn't violently 180º. They didn't. They kept dripfeeding us meaningless "sneak peeks" of lazy all in one parts, they refused to talk about anything colonies, and they made a killer devblog about... how their game doesn't even have eclipses.

 

 

[Jacke]

To the best of my recollection, I did feel some concern when TTI bought KSP and Squad the gaming studio.  More concern over the Star Theory to Intercept Games mess.  Maybe I posted then, can't remember for sure.  Sure was a lot being commented at that time.  Also didn't like that there was an end to improving KSP.

Fast forward to just before the release.  I heard what happened at the KSP Content Maker Event a few weeks before the launch, how the game barely ran on much more powerful hardware than my old machine.  I decided there was no point me buying KSP 2 at release.

Independent of me running KSP 2, I was concerned about what appeared to be a very poor product at a vital event right before release.  I can't remember when Early Access was announced, but that too increased my concern.  Then what was released was just as bad as the event version (which put paid to comments about there must be a better version coming for release).  And the reviews and feedback were not good at all.

Then not having a stake at the time in KSP 2 and not playing KSP at the time, I drifted away.  Didn't think about it.  Completely missed FS.

Then the bottom dropped out at the end of April.  And I've been following here more closely since.  But more the mess and not KSP and its mods.  I don't think that's a good thing.

I want to start back with KSP.  But there's RL in the way.  And I worry the other shoe's going to drop.

Edited June 5 by Jacke

[tam_kaur]

On 6/4/2024 at 3:26 AM, Kernel Kraken said:

Just a disclaimer: I do not want this thread to end in bashing any real human people who have feelings, just like you and me. I understand if this discussion isn’t productive and there’s no ill will if the thread is removed. The developers working on KSP 2 deserve nothing but our thanks, respect, and admiration for the years of effort they put into a franchise we love. I haven’t been active here in about 4 years, so I may be a bit out of touch with current community attitudes lol.

That being said, does anyone else here feel like they saw the current turn of events coming? I remember when T2 first purchased Squad and the rights to KSP’s IP. I remember the community pushback, all of the deleted argument threads, the EULA fiasco, all of the things that most people outside of the forums never really saw. No one was excited for T2. No one thought the franchise would develop in a direction consistent with the established community lore around it. Personally, I never had high hopes for KSP’s development. It’s simply not the type of game Take 2 usually makes a lot of money on. There’s not a whole lot of live-service monetization potential in a sandbox game, and there’s hardly any story potential. It just doesn’t seem like their ballpark. And especially without any of the original team on board, I felt as if it was a matter of time before we started getting some very depressing announcements. There were even threads when the game was announced denouncing those with high hopes for the project. I just feel disappointedly validated with the recent news from T2 & PD. Were there any other warning signs you noticed in the lead-up to the project somewhat falling apart?

Hello there @Kernel Kraken

It is totally natural to have doubts about the direction of KSP 2, especially with Take-Two's involvement and the departure of the original team. Many in the community shared similar concerns. While recent events may confirm those worries, let's remember to respect the developers' efforts and stay hopeful for the game's future.

[MarcAbaddon]

I wasn't surprised. You are always fully funded until you aren't, and it seemed pretty clear that there would have be serious discussions behind the scenes about pulling the plug after the delays and the bad EA launch. If anything I would have expected it a bit earlier and as part of a more specific cut, not as part of the larger restructuring. 

Edited June 5 by MarcAbaddon

[Majorjim!]

From the moments that I heard about the studio issues early in development and then what cemented it was the first ingame footage. Seeing how badly it ran on good hardware and then the system requirements announcement and the fact it was released full price as early access it was clear this would not get finished. It is for me the most disappointing thing that’s happened in gaming for 40 years.. the game looks stunning and just what I wanted from a new KSP and to be honest even if the game was just the Kerbol system and a  full set of parts in sandbox I would be more than happy. I don’t care about career or science mode. I don’t care about interstellar or colonies. I just want a stunning system to explore and an efficient physics system. 

TLDR

  Maybe it’s just because I’m pessimistic sometimes but I saw this coming a mile away..