Is there any benefit to the community or game itself when it comes to the modern, AAA early-access model?

[YoungBlade]

AAA games like Suicide Squad and Starfield have started launching with "early-access" where you pay a premium to be able to play the game starting a few days earlier, often over a weekend as the game is set to launch on a Monday or Tuesday, so those with work or school are further incentivized if they want to play it over a weekend. This feels almost predatory to me for a number of reasons.

 

First, the game is effectively in beta at that point, but it is not sold this way, especially given how PC games tend to feel like they're a beta release on Day 1 anyway, but as Suicide Squad showed, this can be particularly bad in early-access, as there can be fundamental flaws that prevent you from even playing. If the game was presented as a beta product, this would be more understandable, but you're paying a premium for what is supposed to be early-access to a finished product.

 

Second, it segregates the player base from the get-go. Early in the life of the game is a critical time for fostering the community, but this puts players instantly into two different "teams" based on mindset and money, especially for multi-player games. Those who advocate for waiting for release often view the premium for early-access as almost scam-like, and can shame users who paid for the early-access. On the flip side, those who paid for the early-access can behave smugly, sometimes shaming those who didn't pay for "being poor." On a small scale, this conflict can divide friend groups. Nothing about this helps to grow a game's community and fan base, and all it does is instantly create a more toxic atmosphere.

 

Third, the system simply preys on impatience. You're paying a premium because you couldn't wait a week or so. A week that, if you do wait on, you'll be rewarded by getting a more stable game, as Day 1 patches are incredibly common now. So not only is someone being punished monetarily by paying this premium, but they are also punished with an inferior product in terms of the actual game due to the increased number of bugs and problems. You're being tricked into being an unpaid beta tester, only it's worse, because you actually are paying extra for the "privilege."

 

In all of this, the only benefit I can see is to a short term gain in profits for the company selling the game. And it's really just a short term gain because, honestly, I think it ends up hurting profits down the line. Not only does the early-access system itself harm player relations, the buggy experience seen by those who use early-access can turn off players before the game actually launches. And those reviews and player testimonials live online forever. If someone searches "Game X review" they may well find a rant from someone who played in early-access complaining about all the bugs, especially if the review embargo lift for the game is after early-access starts, as an early review will likely get lots of attention.

 

So this whole system seems to be both anti-consumer and, in the long run, harmful to the profits of the company as well. And I really can't see any benefit here for the game itself, nor for the community that the company would, in theory, be wanting to foster around the game to grow its player base.

 

Is there something I'm missing here? Are there any upsides to this type of early-access that I'm not seeing?

[jaslion]

3 minutes ago, YoungBlade said:

 

Is there something I'm missing here? Are there any upsides to this type of early-access that I'm not seeing?

Nop literally just for money

 

All that may be a upside is people thag preordered may cancel because they know from the testers the game sucks

[Zando_]

7 minutes ago, YoungBlade said:

Is there something I'm missing here? Are there any upsides to this type of early-access that I'm not seeing?

Money. For online games, a bunch of real players, but not the full peak player count, would definitely help with stress testing, and you piss less people off if your services fail. But you can do the same with an open beta so it's not an argument for the preorder early access thing. 

[WereCat]

No. They are just taking advantages from the indie launches with no benefit to the consumer. 

Not saying that all indie early-access titles deserve this either but certainly single devs or very small teams live or die on this model. Not AAA studios that have millions of $ of budget. 

[Shimejii]

Its basically them getting paid for beta testers instead of doing it on their own. Many more people will have the chance to find issues and report before the launch, but if this is abused to much it can and will kill games.

[YoungBlade]

1 minute ago, Zando_ said:

Money. For online games, a bunch of real players, but not the full peak player count, would definitely help with stress testing, and you piss less people off if your services fail. But you can do the same with an open beta so it's not an argument for the preorder early access thing. 

Well yes, but generally with an open beta, you aren't paying a premium. Sometimes, you even get a discount. But in either case, you are given the expectation that it's a beta. Whereas a gamer may not view "early-access" as being "beta software" even when that's what it really is - so it can be deceptive, rather than "open beta" which is at least honest.

 

Just now, WereCat said:

No. They are just taking advantages from the indie launches with no benefit to the consumer. 

Not saying that all indie early-access titles deserve this either but certainly single devs or very small teams live or die on this model. No AAA studios that have millions of $ of budget. 

Well, indie studios tend to do this in a much more symbiotic way. They offer a discount for what is clearly marked as an "alpha" or "beta" version of the final game, and you usually get at least a month if not several years of early-access to the game, which to me is a more reasonable time period for someone to say "I don't want to wait that long for the final product." The players also often get to be part of a collaborative experience of creating the game, as they get to see it earlier in development and can even shape how the game turns out. Mincraft is a great example of this system working well. KSP is another.

 

The AAA version feels much more parasitic than symbiotic to me.

[PDifolco]

AAA "early access", for a few days before public launch, is just a money grab

When it's done by indie studios it lasts for months or even years (hello BG3) it really help to fund and finish the game 

[Holmes108]

Well I disagree with you on points 1 and 3. 

 

1: In your example you're talking about a very short window of early access. When you're talking about early access when it's only days early, the "beta" aspect is irrelevant to me. it's almost certainly the same code as day 1, or close enough.

 

It's a slightly different discussion to me when we're talking about true beta early access, for games released months and years in advance though. This is entirely different. Though I still don't care all that much, as long as it's very clear what you're getting.

 

3: I'm not overly concerned on 'preying on impatience'. People can spend their money how they please. 

 

Re: Number 2, 'dividing the community' can be a concern for sure, in particular when there's PVP competition. I don't care about shaming people for being poor, or shaming people for paying for EA. That's childish shit. But there can be genuine concerns of getting a 'head start' in a competitive game. I appreciate that people may not be a fan of that. But I suspect once a few weeks go by, this advantage is mostly in the rear view mirror anyways.

 

So yeah, I don't think I care that much. They can release the game as they see fit, and we can spend our money the way we see fit.

 

I've appreciated getting to play something early. I've gotten hundreds of hours out of 7 days to die. It's literally in "Alpha" still I believe after something like 8 years lol. It's pretty stupid, but I don't really care what they want to label it. 

 

On the flip side, I've possibly robbed myself of some joy in other games. I got bored of Valheim before all the biomes were released. Not sure if I'll ever make it back. I enjoyed V Rising, but they released a massive build update requiring a world wipe. I haven't gotten a chance to go back and play that again. Not sure I will. But I also feel like I got my money's worth out of both of them. 

 

I'll use those 2 examples as reminders for myself. I try and figure out how feature complete the game is, and then decide if it's worth it to me. 

 

There's such an immense backlog of great games for me to play, I don't sweat any single release, to be honest.

[YoungBlade]

29 minutes ago, Holmes108 said:

1: In your example you're talking about a very short window of early access. When you're talking about early access when it's only days early, the "beta" aspect is irrelevant to me. it's almost certainly the same code as day 1, or close enough.

I'm guessing you didn't hear about the Suicide Squad early-access issues. Players literally couldn't play the game due to a bug. And these are players who paid a premium to get early-access that they were never able to properly use. That's ridiculous, and is something that should have never happened. The fact that those players weren't given partial (or even complete) refunds for this is ridiculous. They were instead just compensated with 2,000 "Luthorcoins" of in-game currency, which costs the company basically nothing.

 

Starfield also had issues with the early-access system, where players couldn't actually play when the early-access time started, needing to do things like restart their console and leaving it unplugged for 5 minutes as a fix to get it to work. Which is not as bad as Suicide Squad, but also something that shouldn't happen when someone is paying a premium.

 

So, no, it's not always the same code as Day 1. Often, those who do early-access end up getting a worse experience than those who play Day 1.

30 minutes ago, Holmes108 said:

3: I'm not overly concerned on 'preying on impatience'. People can spend their money how they please.

This seems like just a fundamental difference in values. To me, creating a system that incentivizes bad or self-destructive behavior is a moral wrong. It's like selling loot boxes - it's just legalized gambling and it adds nothing of any value to the game. Which you may be fine with if both parties are consenting, but to me, it should not be encouraged, and I have no problem if regulators want to outright ban it. I don't know that we need to go that far with early-access, but I think it should be pointed out that it's a bad thing to try to take advantage of psychological weaknesses - be that with gambling or early-access.

42 minutes ago, Holmes108 said:

Number 2, 'dividing the community' can be a concern for sure, in particular when there's PVP competition. I don't care about shaming people for being poor, or shaming people for paying for EA. That's childish shit. But there can be genuine concerns of getting a 'head start' in a competitive game. I appreciate that people may not be a fan of that. But I suspect once a few weeks go by, this advantage is mostly in the rear view mirror anyways.

You may find it childish, but the issue is that, when it comes to a community, you would be only one member of it. If you want to foster a community around a game, then because such mentality exists, whether it bothers you personally or not, it is something that you may want to consider. After weeks or months, the amount of people talking about it will be small, and any competitive advantage gained in a PvP setting will be greatly reduced, but the damage may have already been done if it drove people away from the game at the get-go. The game may never grow to its full potential as a result of that initial atmosphere.

[thevictor390]

I'm not saying this offsets the negative points, or that the model is overall beneficial as a whole. But if you were looking for one actual benefit, splitting up the "launch rush" of the game into two groups surely can help make for a smoother launch. In that way it very much is a beta test. It is possible to identify issues and make improvements before general launch, or simply spreading the load alone gives the servers a better chance at holding up.

[Holmes108]

37 minutes ago, YoungBlade said:

I'm guessing you didn't hear about the Suicide Squad early-access issues. Players literally couldn't play the game due to a bug. And these are players who paid a premium to get early-access that they were never able to properly use. That's ridiculous, and is something that should have never happened.

 

I did not, and that absolutely sucks. But call me cold hearted, if that was your number 1 or even number 2 reason for pre ordering alone, I don't have a ton of sympathy. It's just an unfortunate occurrence. I think the early play should be a small fringe benefit, not some massive entitlement. All my personal opinion, of course.

 

1 hour ago, YoungBlade said:

This seems like just a fundamental difference in values. To me, creating a system that incentivizes bad or self-destructive behavior is a moral wrong. It's like selling loot boxes - it's just legalized gambling and it adds nothing of any value to the game.

 

Yeah, I guess we just disagree there. Well, maybe not entirely.  I'm more open to that topic when it comes to minors, to be sure. But for adults, I'm less concerned. But even for the sake of that discussion, I think loot boxes are a world apart from a few days early access. By that logic, any preorder incentive is immoral, and that's a step too far for me.

 

Loot boxes/gambling is a trickier, more complicated subject though that I'm not trying to dismiss out of hand.