dont bothere with the demo

[hawk_za]

Extra credits view of why demos are a bad thing ...or better why we no longer see so many of them

thought it would be relevant given this games state of the demo

personally id rather the devs spend time developing the game and not fixing an old demo that may not even help

[Sky_walker]

TL;DR: From a customer point of view - demos are a great thing. From a developer point of view - quite contrary. That's why we don't see demos any more. There we go, saved you few minutes of your life.

BTW: My favourite comment:

This is pure ......... Why 1,6k likes, I don't ....ing know. And I don't want to know. So what are you saying is that a demo is not in the favor of companies and .... the consumers ? So what if a demo gives away that the game is .... ? Well, guess what ? DON'T MAKE A .... GAME AND THEN TRY TO SELL IT AT FULL PRICE ! Why people think that the profit a company makes is more important than what the consumer receivs and his experience with the product ?

It's my right to see what I pay for. When I buy a 15.000 euro car, I get to test drive it. When I buy a 10 euro shirt, I get to test it. Sure you can't test everything, you're not gonna test a condom before you buy it. But mostly because a condom is not a PC game. I know the condom is gonna fit my ...., but will the developers do a great job with the game engine and optimise it well ? Or is it gonna run like .... (aka remember GTA 4 at launch?) ?

So in the end, either I go blindly and buy the game, and rip my .... off in anger or pray and thank god I didn't get scammed. Or either I pirate the game... and everyone yells that piracy is bad and it's why more and more devs are not releasing games on PC. (Because the computer got the highest piracy rate..... feel the sarcasm). Either I don't buy it... so in the end, the companies should lose anyway ! No demo ? Not letting me test 15 minutes to see if it does worth ? Well BAD LUCK, not gonna buy it. Lose money anyway.

Edited October 11, 2014 by Sky_walker

[Lilleman]

I spent an afternoon on the demo, I had so much fun I bought the full version the same day.

I usually don't buy anything in early access, and I think a lot of people actually download KSP illegally because "they're not gonna pay for something that's not finished", but demos are here to have a quick look at what you're buying.

Not having a demo would be an excuse for those people.

Developpers who don't take time to promote their product (because that's what a demo is about) should accept the fact they're losing sales.

[hawk_za]

i figure with lets plays and other vids a client can see just fine if they like a game or not that's why i still recon demos are a wast of dev time spent developing the game

[CaptRobau]

The Extra Credits video pertains mostly to story games, linear games, etc. Those are difficult to turn to turn into a demo without a lot of extra work. Since they're a majority of games, Extra Credits comes to the conclusion that demos are often not worth it. KSP is an exception to this. It's really easy to make a demo out of this game. You lock out half the parts, turn off every planet past Minmus and disable loading of plugins so people can't use mods. A days work has been turned into a great slice of what the KSP has too offer.

[Tex_NL]

A video only shows the parts the producer wants you to see. (And 90% of promotional video's isn't actual game-play anyway.) It can never compare with experiencing the game first hand.

I wholeheartedly agree with the comment posted by Sky_walker. If I'm buying clothes I want to see and feel the fabric and make sure it actually fits. If I want to buy a car or bike I'm taking it for a test-drive. And if I want to buy a game I want to play it first. If I can't download a demo I am going to download the whole game. Problem is: If I've already downloaded the complete game, why would I buy it?

Demos are a good thing! Yes, they do cost a bit of time and money to the producer. But in return more people will buy the game instead of pirating it.

[Jon Tash]

Extra credits view of why demos are a bad thing ...or better why we no longer see so many of them

thought it would be relevant given this games state of the demo

personally id rather the devs spend time developing the game and not fixing an old demo that may not even help

Where did you heard that the devs are spending time fixing the old demo? AFAIK the state of the current demo for KSP is there to stay, they won't be fixing anything anymore. That's what they said when the demo was released (because the previous demo was pretty old). The current demo is suppose to give you the experience to achieve as far as Munar landings and that's it, not the rest of the system.

[severedsolo]

I wouldn't have bought KSP if it wasn't for the demo. A friend of mine told me I should try it, so I downloaded the demo... 24 hours later I bought the game, 18 months and 1000 play hours later... well you get the idea.

[magnemoe]

The Extra Credits video pertains mostly to story games, linear games, etc. Those are difficult to turn to turn into a demo without a lot of extra work. Since they're a majority of games, Extra Credits comes to the conclusion that demos are often not worth it. KSP is an exception to this. It's really easy to make a demo out of this game. You lock out half the parts, turn off every planet past Minmus and disable loading of plugins so people can't use mods. A days work has been turned into a great slice of what the KSP has too offer.

This, I love demos and they have had significantly effect on my purchases.

First was the daggerfall demo: result in buying daggerfall, morrwind, oblivion, skyrim and elder scroll online.

Second was mount & blade

Then WOW and latest KSP.

Demos don't make so much sense for linear games and not so important for games in an long franchise but might help to draw in new players.

The demo for dragon age 2 was not an good idea no I would not bought it anyway.

An pet idea of me is an demo mode in steam as all steam games uses steam drm, now allow people do download and play any steam games with some restrictions, total time to play or limited to areas or levels.

One major benefit of demos is that it prevent many people from downloading an pirated version to try the game and then continue without buying it.

[Red Iron Crown]

An pet idea of me is an demo mode in steam as all steam games uses steam drm

I don't think that's right. KSP does not use Steam DRM at all.

[severedsolo]

The Extra Credits video pertains mostly to story games, linear games, etc. Those are difficult to turn to turn into a demo without a lot of extra work.

Surely these are the easiest games to turn into a demo? You just let the player run through the first 2 levels/areas. Win for all parties, the player gets a taste of what the game is really like, the dev doesn't have to put any more work in, as it's just a "cut off" version of the game. If a player is on the fence about a game, and is waiting for the review, then this isn't going to change that.

[nine_iron]

I certainly would not have bought the game if it was not for the demo.

It must be kept in good condition to generate sales to ensure us current users keep getting fantastic updates like .25!

[Epthelyn]

The KSP demo isn't a special version; it is 0.18.3 with features removed (most of the parts), and 0.18.3 was a version all paid KSP players had access to at the time.

I doubt Squad have touched it since then, unless something game-breaking turned up.

I've seen a lot of people on this forum say that they have purchased the game after playing the demo; I fall into that category, but after playing the 0.13.3 version. It's far from useless.

[magnemoe]

I don't think that's right. KSP does not use Steam DRM at all.

Ok, then its probably not required, just a part of the package steam deliver. No drm make it easier to have multiple copies of the game at once who is important for KSP as its under development.

[robopilot99]

Yeah I had great fun with the demo as well before I bought it. I wish squad would update it though. It doesn't look nearly as good as the current version of KSP.

[Epthelyn]

Ok, then its probably not required, just a part of the package steam deliver. No drm make it easier to have multiple copies of the game at once who is important for KSP as its under development.

Copy the KSP folder out of Steamapps/Common

Congratulations, you now have multiple copies. The one remaining in Common will be updated by Steam, the other left alone.

[O-Doc]

I bought the game because I enjoyed the demo. I had seen youtube videos so I knew there was more to the game but, the demo gave me the experience to make a purchasing decision.

[cantab]

Well extra credits has missed Outcome 0: Your game is awesome but you have no demo. Your competitor's game is pretty good, maybe not quite as good as yours, but it has a demo that does it justice. Guess which one I'm going to end up buying.

Maybe if you're releasing number x in an established massively popular series you'll get tons of sales on reputation alone, and everyone will review your game to boot, but for a lesser-known developer with a new product that's not going to be the case. Reviews will be scarce and players are going to walk away when they see an unknown game with a big price tag.

As for "freemium", I expect a backlash against that in the next few years. People don't like being nickle-and-dimed which is exactly what these games do.

Also I think that demos that significantly misrepresent their games, in either direction, are pretty rare.

As for KSP, I think the demo warrants an update when the Unity 5 port is done, which with any luck will boost performance.

[tater]

I grabbed the demo, played for about an hour, then bought the game.

[Robotengineer]

I grabbed the demo, played for about an hour, then bought the game.

Me to, I heard about it from a friend and got the demo, played for about 15 minutes, and bought the game.

[GusTurbo]

I also bought the game after playing the demo. I had so much fun with the demo that I almost didn't want to buy the game because I knew I would get really sucked-in.

[MGCJerry]

If I didn't bother with the demo or see one, I would have downloaded it from a questionable sources.

Regardless, I would have bought it to support development, and I enjoy KSP and want to see it flourish.

[problemecium]

I too would never have become a Kerballer if not for that free demo. I actually played the old 0.13.3 demo first way back when, then forgot about KSP for a while, then came back one day and saw the new shiny 0.18 demo, which was ultimately what got me hooked.

I can see the points about SQUAD not wasting too much effort maintaining the demo, but if they find a way to easily incorporate demo updates into their workflow I won't complain.

[ravensoul6@hotmail.com]

I think I played the demo for a bit less than an hour before I bought the full game. I think I'm just shy of 700 hours played on it now, which is far more attention than I give most games these days.

[Javster]

I stand by my opinion that the demo should be the version 5-8 versions behind the current one.