Alpha 21 Discussion Overflow

[Neminsis]

27 minutes ago, Syphon583 said:

I rarely find myself in a position where I have to craft glass jars. Making them uncraftable alone would not make hydration harder to come by. As it is right now, glass jars are everywhere. While I'm not the biggest fan of the proposed changes, it is definitely a step in the right direction when it comes to make the survival aspect of this game more challenging.

The operative words there are "As it is right now" but they will also be removing boiled water from the loot table and that will also have an effect. 

This change isn't going to affect my early game much since I'm a habitual Fortitude player that already drinks the murky and eats the sandwiches. It will however limit my late game crafting potential and that's where my only concerns lay.

[Fanatical_Meat]

9 minutes ago, Roland said:

 

First of all when was the last occasion you heard Joel say anything?

 

Second of all, "zombies with guns" was mentioned by faatal occasionally to describe the very first iteration of them so as to curb unrealistic expectations of fans. They never claimed that bandits were being designed to forevermore be zombies with guns.

 

Third of all, we can all tell by now that if bandits do release initially as "bandits with guns" and then they update them to have more depth you will complain that they have completely overhauled Bandits from scratch for the second time...

“Zombies with guns”….

I will take the heat on that because I remember saying something similar early on about bandits. Some posters were stating fantasy scenarios that just didn’t seem possible given current restraints. I wanted to let those people know they shouldn’t expect the greatest AI programming in any game or arguably any program. This expectation will clearly lead to disappointment with bandit even if they function perfectly fine and add fun to the game. 
We cannot expect the Pimps to do something that has never been done in history as a baseline. This isn’t a reasonable expectation.

Ill take the heat on “Zombies with guns” because I may have been the first one to say it on the forums.

[Roland]

1 minute ago, Shado47 said:

All I get from this is a condescending "you don't get it" and "oh, anyone from the wider online community who is sceptical must've not played the game before".

 

Only if you take it as condescending I guess...

 

Nobody from the community has played A21 and not all information about the changes can be conveyed in text. You MUST play it to understand it. I never said that people who are skeptical probably haven't played the game before. That you are twisting my words to somehow mean that shows that you are not here to find out what's going on, you're here to accuse and attack.

 

6 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

Also I never said "bring back the 600 crafting quality levels". The new system sounds good, and it wasn't my criticism at all. Instead what I commented on was the needless change from the 600 qualities to the 6 qualities that simplified the whole thing massively and took alot of depth out of it, just for the devs to now do a 180 again to bring back more complexity into it. Like, its great that it is getting more complex again. Could've just been built as an iteration of the 600 qualities system though, as opposed to the 6 qualities system. Both still were grouped up into 6 main groups. There was a step backwards inbetween that just wasn't necessary.

 

I never said you wanted to bring it back though it looks like now you do want it brought back. I said that removing the 600 levels to simplify and then making the crafting changes in A21 to make it more complex are not just inverses of each other. One doesn't simply undo the other. We couldn't have kept the 600 levels and gotten the same result that A21 accomplishes. Could 600 levels and the new A21 system work together? Probably-- except the developers decided they didn't want 600 levels.

 

10 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

This is just straight up false and you know it.

 

I invited you to give me an example of a totally revamped from scratch feature and I would show you how it went through iterations and evolved from former versions of itself rather than being recreated from scratch. All you can say to that is that I'm lying and I know it.

 

Who is avoiding the issue? I'm ready for your example of complete redo from scratch. Go. If not then I say you're just a troll and you know it.

[Shado47]

1 minute ago, Neminsis said:

The operative words there are "As it is right now" but they will also be removing boiled water from the loot table and that will also have an effect. 

This change isn't going to affect my early game much since I'm a habitual Fortitude player that already drinks the murky and eats the sandwiches. It will however limit my late game crafting potential and that's where my only concerns lay.

 

I hope they'll balance it out by making mineral water a bit more common perhaps.

 

Idk, the changes don't seem to be particularly well designed. Sacrificing depth to artificially make the game harder, while simultaneously making looting more annoying, removing items from loot tables to make those even more shallow, and so on?

 

How about making glass jars not stack, just like metal cans? How about making them require a mold to craft or something? I mean if they really wanna force players to have dysentery more and to be on lower HP all the time, surely there must be less annoying ways to do it?

4 minutes ago, Fanatical_Meat said:

We cannot expect the Pimps to do something that has never been done in history as a baseline. This isn’t a reasonable expectation.

 

"Never been done before" is a strong statement when many role playing games exist, including more survival oriented ones. It is absolutely possible to do a deep faction system where you can gain favor with different factions through different interactions with them, and have the NPCs act towards you accordingly.

 

If this is the plan for 7dtd, as it was stated a long time ago to be (with NPCs having schedules and the player being able to get either on their good side or their bad side), then I don't entirely understand why they'd first only put "zombies with guns" into the game as opposed to dedicating an update to do it properly right away. Like yeah, maybe it'll take a year. So what? This is 7dtd. After it didn't go Gold 5 years ago, it really stopped mattering when it actually ends up going Gold.

 

The trickier question is whether or not the engine supports implementing something like that, as well as the random gen nature of most of the gameplay taking place. But I think it can be done in Unity, I seem to remember some other Unity games with decent NPC systems.

[Fanatical_Meat]

3 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

 

I hope they'll balance it out by making mineral water a bit more common perhaps.

 

Idk, the changes don't seem to be particularly well designed. Sacrificing depth to artificially make the game harder, while simultaneously making looting more annoying, removing items from loot tables to make those even more shallow, and so on?

 

How about making glass jars not stack, just like metal cans? How about making them require a mold to craft or something? I mean if they really wanna force players to have dysentery more and to be on lower HP all the time, surely there must be less annoying ways to do it?

I look at the water change differently. The way the game plays now water is only relevant the first or second day. Once you have a cook pot and possibly a forge you are set forever. The way the game currently works there is little reason to have water because after a small amount of playtime you are literally swimming in water jars plus all the damn clutter they cause.

I like the proposed water changes.

[Shado47]

1 minute ago, Fanatical_Meat said:

I look at the water change differently. The way the game plays now water is only relevant the first or second day. Once you have a cook pot and possibly a forge you are set forever. The way the game currently works there is little reason to have water because after a small amount of playtime you are literally swimming in water jars plus all the damn clutter they cause.

I like the proposed water changes.

 

Fair enough, right now it is suboptimal and hardly playing a role. I just disagree about the solution to that.

[Roland]

7 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

I don't religiously follow here, but I remember long dev streams of Joel discussing the bandits. Does that count?

 

So that was over a year ago ( the last one) and so I'm thinking your memory is probably fuzzy if you think that Joel was saying that the goal was to hopefully have bandits that would simply be "Zombies with guns". More likely he said that they don't want the zombies to be that way. In fact I know that is what he said.

 

9 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

And I never claimed that either. Could do them properly right away though, don't you think? Instead of doing a super bare bones version first that people get used to, and then changing them around again completely? And then they could still be improved from there, without it completely changing every aspect of them.

 

They could do them properly. But you already made a snide remark that "They aren't even here yet" So they can do all their bandit work behind closed doors and all their iterating where you can't see any of it and simply reveal bandits when they are ready to release at 1.0 or they can follow the Early Access model of making indev features available to everyone to try out as they develop and have them go through several changes where someone might possibly fall in love with an early version that isn't intended to remain and then get mad.

 

I hope they go with the Early Access model. Early Access isn't for everyone though.

 

13 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

See the hysterical thing here is that I wouldn't mind the Bandits being improved, but you certainly would get that reaction from some people if the initial version is just a low effort "that'll do" version. But I like how you immediately come at me with the "oh, you'd just hate on that change as well" as if I am hating for the sake of hating. I love this game, and every one of my arguments comes with alot of substance and I am backing them up. So stop the condescending tone if you wanna keep up the conversation.

 

I don't think you are hating for the sake of hating. I think what you hate is playing a game that is still in development. You love playing a game that is all done and finished and not slated for changes. Putting out initial "that'll do" versions of features into an alpha build is exactly what is supposed to happen. If you don't like the process then just wait for the game to be finished. I guarantee that anyone who plays the game for the very first time on the day it releases as 1.0 will not feel any of the grief, or loss, or anger over what the game used to be like. They won't know. They'll simply enjoy it for what it is in its final version.

[meganoth]

7 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

 

I mean this is hardly an argument. And alot of cover in the world is 2 blocks high anyways, so it does not make a difference. They have been oftentimes described as zombies with guns, Joel himself mentioned the phrase as well on occasion, so can we stop the pretense?

 

What pretense? What else should bandits be in this game? What do bandits with guns do in other open world games? I'd say hiding behind cover and shooting at you.

 

So Joel has humor and frankly says that bandits will not be the super feature that transforms the game into something completely new (which it shouldn't, this is still a zombie game). 3 years ago some forum users who were missing their "endgame" were so hyped they thought bandits would heal all their grievances with the game.

 

It makes sense to downplay that hype because players with no sense of the complexity of programming and especially AI programming were dreaming of camps of bandits and bandit groups that actually work together and attack your base intelligently as a group. Sorry, but it was clear even then that TFP could not make this happen with their small team.

 

7 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

 

Maybe once factions become a thing, the bandits will be overhauled and merged into that, so you can be on good terms with the factions and there'll be more depth to them.

But thats not how they're currently described.

 

As usual they don't tell us anything about features planned but not in the game. So you won't even find official infos about bandits going into cover. It doesn't make sense to complain about bandits already when nobody knows how they will enhance the game (or not).

 

7 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

No because I am not lifting my complaint off the steam forums. I have been a member of this particular Forum since 2013, I have played the game since the super early Alphas, I have seen more systems reworked in that time than new systems being added. And not just a slight overhang on one front. The vast majority of game updates have reinvented systems.

 

You were making that complaint about the water change. I haven't been with the game that early so you could be so nice to tell me the alpha where water was scarce (to show it was already fixed and they unfixed it to fix it now). Or were there were no water containers (to show it was reinvented). Bring some facts to the table.

 

7 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

For other games, when a system is spotted that needs redesign, usually on the drawing board it gets iterated a bunch until the right alternative is found. For 7 Days To Die, it gets iterated on many times update to update (presumably) without any drawing board. Like, the skill tree variants could've all been drafted years ago and the best one been picked and then perfected. Instead, we're once again getting a reinvented version that is already highly controversial before it even comes out.

 

Possibly they are not very good at picking the best version immediately. I have the impression many game developers have the same problems as some (even famous ones) bring out a game once in a while that simply doesn't work well and is misconstructed. Maybe the drawing board isn't always the perfect solution for this problem. Maybe at least not for all developers.

 

7 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

 

And also... maybe if you hear a complaint "all the time" on steam it shouldn't be ignored completely? Maybe at the end of the day, the customers might actually have a point? Responding to customer feedback with "oh, you just don't get it" seems awfully condescending.

 

I can (mostly) distinguish rants from reasoned discourse and the ones that come to mind were rants. I especially look down on rants about "there was no reason to bla bla" when I had heard about a few reasons on this forum and often could think of a few myself.

Oh, and I can look down on them as I am not part of TFP and the ranting posters are not my customers.

 

 

[Shado47]

14 minutes ago, Roland said:

 

So that was over a year ago ( the last one) and so I'm thinking your memory is probably fuzzy if you think that Joel was saying that the goal was to hopefully have bandits that would simply be "Zombies with guns".

 

I like how you accuse me of putting words in my mouth and then you do the exact same thing, when I have basically paraphrased the old plan from the dev streams of the more complex NPCs they were meant to be from the announcements back then. But if you seriously want to tell me that no dev ever mentioned that they'd just implement them as "zombies with guns" early on (and that is also a boiled down version of their statements), then I don't know what to say.

 

And I don't appreciate your remarks of "Early Access isn't for everyone though".

This game has not followed a conventional Early Access path at all. It has been milking the Early Access tag on steam for almost a decade. I don't know what you think you know about game development, but the development of this game has been highly unusual. Instead of it following a clear direction, the whole entire thing has been a construction site for like 9 years.

 

Again, I love the game, I have had great fun playing many different versions of it, for almost 2000 hours. But as you already admitted, not every change is always for the better. I fail to think of any other game that has redone its systems this often.

 

And you asked me for an example of a system that has been redone from scratch?

How about the Crafting System. It used to be a 5x5 grid and was completely changed.

Maybe it is not technically "from scratch" since some recipe amounts and some backend code might have been carried over, but in that case consider my initial claim to be "exaggeration to get the point across".

10 minutes ago, meganoth said:

As usual they don't tell us anything about features planned but not in the game. So you won't even find official infos about bandits going into cover. It doesn't make sense to complain about bandits already when nobody knows how they will enhance the game (or not).

 

When have I complained about bandits?

Edited December 15, 2022 by Shado47 (see edit history)

[Doomofman]

[Shado47]

6 minutes ago, meganoth said:

You were making that complaint about the water change. I haven't been with the game that early so you could be so nice to tell me the alpha where water was scarce (to show it was already fixed and they unfixed it to fix it now). Or were there were no water containers (to show it was reinvented). Bring some facts to the table.

 

Oh look, more words put in my mouth and other things I wrote ignored, when I already explained my views on the water thing in detail. What a surprise.

7 minutes ago, meganoth said:

I can (mostly) distinguish rants from reasoned discourse and the ones that come to mind were rants. I especially look down on rants about "there was no reason to bla bla" when I had heard about a few reasons on this forum and often could think of a few myself.

Oh, and I can look down on them as I am not part of TFP and the ranting posters are not my customers.

 

I mean fair enough if you were talking about rants. I wasn't. I see lots of fair criticism all over the place, and it just gets shrugged off. And before anyone accuses me of only looking at Twitter criticism: I check Twitter like once per month, none of my opinions are lifted from there.

[Neminsis]

2 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

I hope they'll balance it out by making mineral water a bit more common perhaps.

It will just make the water purifier mod a more highly prized find and by the time you're up to finding mineral water in loot or getting the recipe you'll be well past any hydration issues. The real issue is that it limits your ability to produce enough water to handle a lot of glue dependent items in late game.
 

10 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

Idk, the changes don't seem to be particularly well designed.

I can't really agree here because it does in fact make gameplay more complex and it's something they're sure to iterate on later.  
 

15 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

How about making glass jars not stack, just like metal cans?

All of these suggestions have been made and talked about, even going as far as working out the average number of game days that hydration will even be an issue. It's about 3 game days btw. that's it, while adding a new station and a continuing goal of expanding water production. Not enough for my needs but still it's not removing depth. 

What you seem to be describing when you're talking about depth is more about just more items whether or not they add to gameplay complexity...

[Fanatical_Meat]

40 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

 

I hope they'll balance it out by making mineral water a bit more common perhaps.

 

Idk, the changes don't seem to be particularly well designed. Sacrificing depth to artificially make the game harder, while simultaneously making looting more annoying, removing items from loot tables to make those even more shallow, and so on?

 

How about making glass jars not stack, just like metal cans? How about making them require a mold to craft or something? I mean if they really wanna force players to have dysentery more and to be on lower HP all the time, surely there must be less annoying ways to do it?

 

"Never been done before" is a strong statement when many role playing games exist, including more survival oriented ones. It is absolutely possible to do a deep faction system where you can gain favor with different factions through different interactions with them, and have the NPCs act towards you accordingly.

 

If this is the plan for 7dtd, as it was stated a long time ago to be (with NPCs having schedules and the player being able to get either on their good side or their bad side), then I don't entirely understand why they'd first only put "zombies with guns" into the game as opposed to dedicating an update to do it properly right away. Like yeah, maybe it'll take a year. So what? This is 7dtd. After it didn't go Gold 5 years ago, it really stopped mattering when it actually ends up going Gold.

 

The trickier question is whether or not the engine supports implementing something like that, as well as the random gen nature of most of the gameplay taking place. But I think it can be done in Unity, I seem to remember some other Unity games with decent NPC systems.

Dude you don’t understand. People were saying things like Will bandits:

create new towns or settlement

can I befriend a bandit/can that bandit fall in love with me

will bandits setup traps (then some completely unrealistic traps based upon terrain or time or something a game AI will not be able to do)

Can I live in the bandit town as a crafter and help the bandits build better houses

and so on and so on.

Game AI is pretty stiff in every game. No chance the Pimps are going to build an AI that will pass the Turing test using Unity which can barely handle 20 zombies on the screen at one time.

[Javabean867]

3 hours ago, BFT2020 said:

 

Players have been complaining about it in the past, they weren't complaining about jars specifically; but I recall a lot of posts about how survivability in the base game was too easy.  Water in A20 is trivial.  I never had a hard choice about water in the game, never had to drink murky water.  The only "hard" choice I had was whether I should venture out night to the water source nearby to fill a stack of jars to craft glue for items I didn't need that very minute.

I had 1 playthrough where I got the water filter mod, and jept a stack of murky water on me, because it holds so much water lol.

[Matt115]

3 hours ago, BFT2020 said:

 

Sex Rex is not being removed.  TFP is just incorporating the perk's bonuses into the other perks because their data showed that non-strength players were perking into it to get its benefits for tools and the other melee weapons.  The only difference was that non-strength players were paying a premium cost for that perk compared to the strength players.  It's an easy way to reduce the gulf between strength and non-strength players (in terms of stamina use at least) while addressing a suggestion that has been made many times in the past.

 

Stamina regeneration boosting items like coffee are temporary buffs while perking into Sex Rex (or in A21, any melee weapon perk) is a permanent buff.   Master Chef (in it's current iteration, will likely be changed for A21) only decreases cooking times, unlock recipes, and reduces ingredients for certain foods, it does not influence those items.  As Uncle Al has already stated, Sex Rex =/= Advanced Engineering =/= Master Chef.

wait a sec: 

 

Perk Rebalancing

• Sexual T-Rex removed. Stamina improvement now incorporated into the separate perks for each relevant weapon

 

this from 1 page of this topic.  As you see - it's removed.

 

Temporary ofc - but you can have a lot of them pretty easy - but for most time you don't have to "waste" coffe - if you drive to somewhere by minibike you don't need stamina

2 hours ago, BFT2020 said:

 

Players have been complaining about it in the past, they weren't complaining about jars specifically; but I recall a lot of posts about how survivability in the base game was too easy.  Water in A20 is trivial.  I never had a hard choice about water in the game, never had to drink murky water.  The only "hard" choice I had was whether I should venture out night to the water source nearby to fill a stack of jars to craft glue for items I didn't need that very minute.

I don't rember anything this except guys who wanted to make something in 3d project zomboid.

7DTD is trivial... BFT and you will never have to drink murky water in A21. trust me - just check channels like this shorty after released of 21 - there will be a lot of tutorials like " how to have a lot of water during 1 day!" : 

 

 

 

 

[Shado47]

16 minutes ago, Fanatical_Meat said:

Dude you don’t understand. People were saying things like Will bandits:

create new towns or settlement

can I befriend a bandit/can that bandit fall in love with me

will bandits setup traps (then some completely unrealistic traps based upon terrain or time or something a game AI will not be able to do)

Can I live in the bandit town as a crafter and help the bandits build better houses

and so on and so on.

Game AI is pretty stiff in every game. No chance the Pimps are going to build an AI that will pass the Turing test using Unity which can barely handle 20 zombies on the screen at one time.

 

Again, nothing I am talking about myself hasn't been done in Unity before or discussed as planned for the future by the devs before.

[Fanatical_Meat]

10 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

 

Again, nothing I am talking about myself hasn't been done in Unity before or discussed as planned for the future by the devs before.

Fair enough, point I wanted to make was I am very likely the guy who coined the phrase “bandits with guns” on this forum. The purpose was to tamper expectations.

I agree bandits have been delayed far too long and they really should make an appearance, we do need to have a proper expectation when they finally appear. I am confident at first bandits will be basic and not all that interesting and likely buggy that’s fine as long as they get better over time.

Edited December 15, 2022 by Fanatical_Meat (see edit history)

[Roland]

24 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

I like how you accuse me of putting words in my mouth and then you do the exact same thing, when I have basically paraphrased the old plan from the dev streams of the more complex NPCs they were meant to be from the announcements back then. But if you seriously want to tell me that no dev ever mentioned that they'd just implement them as "zombies with guns" early on (and that is also a boiled down version of their statements), then I don't know what to say.

 

When you first posted about it, it sounded like you assumed that "zombies with guns" was what they were going for as the final design. That was what I objected to. If you understand that they may be implemented in a basic form and then developed into something better then great. That is exactly the plan. Of course, from later writings it appears you don't like that model so I guess I don't know what to say.

 

26 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

And I don't appreciate your remarks of "Early Access isn't for everyone though".

 

Its nothing to feel offended over. It is simply the truth of anything. Some people like some things and others don't. You have literally stated plainly that you don't like it when a feature is released at a "good enough" state and then changed multiple times until the developers are happy with it. You want it tested and developed out of view and then released in its final form with maybe just a bit of polishing needed or optimizing. To me, that point of view doesn't lend itself well to playing a game in alpha in early access.

 

28 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

This game has not followed a conventional Early Access path at all. It has been milking the Early Access tag on steam for almost a decade. I don't know what you think you know about game development, but the development of this game has been highly unusual. Instead of it following a clear direction, the whole entire thing has been a construction site for like 9 years.

 

This game has behaved like an actual game that is in alpha development while open to public view. I have played many games that are in Early Access and most of them are NOT alpha stage games. Most of them are at the beta stage where everything is basically locked in and they just need to do final work on it. That makes for great public relations among the population who don't enjoy their games changing over time. I have also played some early access titles that are early but they do most of the iterative work behind closed doors and they don't add a new feature until it is in its basic final form. A few titles do experimental branches where they will release unfinished features that still have to undergo changes.

 

I agree that 7 Days to Die is not like a lot of other games in Early Access. They actually took the Alpha label seriously as well as the Early Access concept and so we have had the ability as gamers to watch the full process of a game that was truly in alpha stage progress over time and change. That is exciting for those who can adapt with the changes. For those who don't it must be torture.

 

35 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

And you asked me for an example of a system that has been redone from scratch?

How about the Crafting System. It used to be a 5x5 grid and was completely changed.

Maybe it is not technically "from scratch" since some recipe amounts and some backend code might have been carried over, but in that case consider my initial claim to be "exaggeration to get the point across".

 

Well if you're going to admit that you were just exaggerating to get a point across then there isn't really any need to show how your claim was mistaken. You already know you were mistaken and were purposely mistaken in order to make a point about something.

 

But, regardless, here is what crafting has undergone over the years:

 

Started as a spatial grid system like Minecraft where you were forced to place ingredients in the grid in the correct spots.

Changed to a spatial grid that had a list where you could search your recipe and select it and the grid would autofill so nobody had to memorize grid patterns.

Changed to just a list system. When it changed, the recipes for the most part remained the same-- as did the role of crafting in the game. The change was purely visual.

Some recipes got more ingredients making them more complex now that they didn't need to fit into a grid.

Workstations beyond the fireplace and the forge were added

Books with crafting recipes were added meaning the players couldn't craft all recipes at the start.

Weapons could be crafted from parts made in molds

Weapons could be crafted from parts but parts were changed to only being found in loot.

Quality was introduced and crafting multiple of the same thing increased the quality of that thing when you crafted it

Parts had quality tiers and the weapon was a combination of the parts' quality tiers

Parts were removed and weapons were uncraftable.

Recipe books removed and recipes were integrated with the perk abilities

Weapons were made craftable again but from regular materials

Parts were returned and weapons craftable again but now parts were recipe ingredients and had no quality

Recipes removed from the perk abilities and learned by finding magazines

 

So crafting has gone through a lot of changes but in all cases it was changing one thing at a time or returning to something tried previously but in a new way. Even your claim that they went from grid to list all at once is false. They were slowly adding lists to supplement the grid until it got to the point that they realized the grid was just holding them back. There was no sudden overhaul start from scratch moment.

 

You can offer another example if you wish but since we both know your claim was just an exaggeration there isn't really a need.

 

 

[Doomofman]

[Jost Amman]

1 hour ago, Shado47 said:

I don't religiously follow here, but I remember long dev streams of Joel discussing the bandits. Does that count?

FWIW, I can confirm at some point he said what you remember.

[Shado47]

57 minutes ago, Jost Amman said:

FWIW, I can confirm at some point he said what you remember.

 

Thank you.

1 hour ago, Roland said:

You can offer another example if you wish but since we both know your claim was just an exaggeration there isn't really a need.

 

I mean having slightly exaggerated for the sense of getting my point across does not invalidate my claim in any way. Just because small amount of code might have been carried over when some systems were redone, it doesn't mean they weren't basically redone "from scratch", unless you wanna be hair splitting and claim that my original point was that they started over completely from 0 several times, which it was not. I just thought it'd be obvious that even if something gets completely redone, prior elements can occasionally be repurposed. The only reason I didn't write it out in this much detail to begin with was that I thought you'd get what I meant without me having to write a whole paragraph just to give a basic definition that should've been obvious to begin with.

 

I could also say "nobody likes to paint their base in pink", when it'd also be obvious that nobody in that scenario doesn't mean 0% of users, just that the amount of users would be very small. I thought that just went without saying. I stand corrected. If this is the level on which we're going to poke holes into each other's arguments, and if I had too much spare time and nothing to do, I'd go back and do the same for every response you have written. But since I'm not a fan of hair splitting, and I have better things to do... lets not stoop that low.

[Roland]

1 hour ago, Shado47 said:

I mean having slightly exaggerated for the sense of getting my point across does not invalidate my claim in any way. Just because small amount of code might have been carried over when some systems were redone, it doesn't mean they weren't basically redone "from scratch", unless you wanna be hair splitting and claim that my original point was that they started over completely from 0 several times, which it was not.

 

You are correct that your slight exaggeration doesn't invalidate your claim. It is your inability to produce an actual example that does. I already showed how we started with grid crafting where you had to from memory fill in the grid spaces correctly and then that was changed to grid crafting but with a searchable list and when you selected the item you wanted to to craft from the list the grid would auto fill and then that was changed to simply using list crafting without the grid. By time we got to the list style crafting the game was practically using list style crafting with just a grid visual. Nobody was filling in the grid any more. They collected the number of each needed material, searched the list, and clicked on the name. Then the grid filled automatically and people clicked on the craft button to start the process. It was definitely an evolution of small steps and not some huge sudden change where just a bit of the old code was carried over.

 

The only example you've given me so far is (without exaggeration on my part) not the tiniest bit representative of completely starting over. It is an example of how features in 7 Days to Die have evolved over time-- and perhaps to people who don't follow the development religiously it may seem suddenly totally different  since they skipped a few iterations while playing DayZ or something.

 

You are the one who started with the premise that the Pimps are frequently restarting features from scratch and completely changing them into something else. I think that is a false premise. I think your actual premise is that you believe that a video game studio should figure out what they want to do and implement that and not change it. You can correct me if I'm wrong but you've already posted at least twice the sentiment that TFP should hold on to features and get them in their best form before releasing them rather than their "good enough" form.

 

1 hour ago, Shado47 said:

The only reason I didn't write it out in this much detail to begin with was that I thought you'd get what I meant without me having to write a whole paragraph just to give a basic definition that should've been obvious to begin with.

 

lol...You've already admitted that you were exaggerating your claims on purpose and now you expect people to understand what you actually meant when you were purposely misleading us on your meaning in order to drive home a point? What is the point you were trying to make, btw, that needed you to mischaracterize the way features have been developed? Since TFP is constantly completely redoing features from scratch.... _______________________________________________! 

 

A) They don't know what they're doing!

B) They don't know what they want!

C) They have no plan and are just making it up as they go!

D) They are ruining features that were perfect with new features that suck!

E) All of the above!

F) Other!

 

We hear such conjecture from time to time but it is all guesswork because the people who accuse don't really know. They are just guessing based on.....what? Why, it is based on the false premise they presented as fact that TFP constantly is completely reworking their game from scratch. So what is your point? What is your guess about TFP business practices that is based on the idea that they just throw away what they had before and start over and completely change it to something else?

 

And can you provide an actual example where this happened since crafting isn't actually one?

Edited December 16, 2022 by Roland (see edit history)

[Shado47]

5 minutes ago, Roland said:

purposely misleading

 

No, I wasn't purposely misleading. But since you obviously can't read between the lines, and are resorting to basically kindergarten level techniques to "win" a debate that was never about winning, I'm done with you.

[Roland]

17 minutes ago, Shado47 said:

 

No, I wasn't purposely misleading. But since you obviously can't read between the lines, and are resorting to basically kindergarten level techniques to "win" a debate that was never about winning, I'm done with you.

 

I have been completely straightforward with what I know to be true being on staff with TFP. I have given facts about how Crafting was changed and I am asking questions to give you an opportunity to clarify and make your point known. You have been exaggerating for effect and making assumptions and guesses about TFP's practices and procedures. I'm not sure what you mean by "kindergarten level techniques to "win" a debate" but I'm guessing snidely telling someone they can't read between the lines (AKA you're too dumb to comprehend) is probably something like what you are accusing me of doing. Yet where did I do that?

 

I'm not trying to win the debate just to win. It is important that an accurate view of the development of 7 Days to Die forms the basis of any discussion. You came here already assuming things that are factually not true. So how can there be constructive discourse until the foundation it is going to be based on is settled? Yet you refuse to listen. You would rather hold tight to your assumptions as an outsider than listen to facts from an insider. 

 

You started off saying that I was being condescending. What I was actually being was authoritative on "How TFP develops" but maybe you thought I was just giving my own opinion and making out to be like my opinions are more valid than your opinions-- hence, condescending. But if you have opinions based on erroneous assumptions and then have the opportunity to learn actual facts from someone who is privvy to what has been going on why not set your old beliefs aside and actually listen and learn the truth? You don't trust my word? You don't believe I'm actually on staff? You don't want to know the truth?

 

Fine. Take the ball and go home.

Edited December 16, 2022 by Roland (see edit history)

[Roland]

So lets look at another false assumption that is often brought up (You don't have to answer Shado47, I'm using your statement as an example):

 

4 hours ago, Shado47 said:

It has been milking the Early Access tag on steam for almost a decade.

 

What does this even mean to milk the Early Access tag? Is the Early Access tag a badge of honor that adds prestige to a game in the eyes of some gamers? Is is a shield behind which developers hide so they don't have to fix bugs? Is it simply a descriptor of games that aren't considered finished?

 

What does TFP gain by keeping the game in Early Access? Why not release and then continue development as DLC updates post release?

 

I think the problem comes down to how a person views Early Access. A lot of people are suspicious of it and think that it is just a marketing scheme for some soft crowd funding. Is remaining in Early Access really a huge benefit that a studio can "milk" perpetually? 

 

I invite everyone to go look at Subnautica on steamlists and look at what happened when they announced they were leaving early access and releasing as a final game. Look at that spike and then tell me that remaining in EA is the real benefit.

 

If TFP was really about manipulating EA and using it to market themselves they would have left it back when they released the console version and reaped the benefits of their coming out event.

 

Of course, then people would notice the game isn't really done...

 

I can tell you as a fact that TFP is using Early Access the way it is intended. They are not hiding from reports of buggy gameplay. Their development, bug fixing, optimizing has been constant these past 9 years. Remaining in Early Access until the game is truly and fully done is the right thing to do.