…and I’m back! I took a two month jaunt into New World (and currently FFXIV) while patiently watching for Last Epoch news in my Discord feed. Other things aside, the new patch really sounds fantastic. In particular I can’t wait to try out the new Druid and crafting systems…
That said, watching Amazon and Blizzard suffer through one issue after another the last two months made me wonder just what EHG’s standard for MP release is. This is just me thinking to myself, but the biggest names in the business couldn’t get it done, so is EHG’s goal/standard to do better than them? Certainly a noble goal, but is it realistic?
Anyway, I’m just going to throw the below points out there to open up discussion. I suspect a lot of people will want to defend EHG and/or disagree with my ideas, but I still think it’s worth debating, particularly given the complaints I read about MP not coming out in 2021.
- FOCUS FOCUS FOCUS ON MP
While the last two patches have been loaded with content, I still maintain this is almost a disservice to the overall development. Why? Because if you think of the current cycle as still “in testing”, and MP truly as a (future) CORE system, it just means every bit of this content will need to be re-tested with MP in place. It’s ultimately loading more and more additional work onto a team which already has limited resources. Not to mention the amount of hype and energy being put into “releasing” the patch, to me feels more like an expansion of an already released game. I appreciate the efforts on the one hand, but also feel it may be draining resources on the other.
I’ve said it before, but if I had any say in development, I would lock everything down (except maybe things like artwork and music, etc) and have everyone able to, put other things aside and focus on getting MP “ready” (whatever that means). If this game is truly serious about being a MP game, and it sure sounds like it, it needs to be tested on a larger scale starting LAST YEAR. Since we can’t actually go back in time, then still the sooner the better…
- INCREASE SCALE TESTING (WITH NDA) NOW NOW NOW
I keep hearing this tired old excuse about being afraid of reputation hits. Well that’s what an NDA is for. Keep the numbers down to something manageable and have some serious NDAs in place if you are really that afraid of fallout.
But I would also offer that given what I’ve seen in New World and D2R, some negative press is not the end of the world if your game is good enough. And frankly I have faith that THIS game is indeed good enough. I feel like the developers are proceeding like they are paralyzed by fear, and speaking as someone who has made many life choices that way, I don’t think it’s healthy, and in their case, really not necessary. So what if the first few attempts at larger scale MP bring crash bugs, or we can’t login due to a 5 hour queue? That was New World’s release for the first two weeks. Then two months of bugs on top of other bugs, NW is really still in beta, but people still love it because it has some really good core systems and gameplay in place.
While I don’t condone or encourage this kind of “release”, it seems like it’s just incredibly hard to figure out what a ton of people are going to do to a game. And that’s precisely why you need to test with the most amount of people you can, sooner rather than later. In EHG’s case they can still do it with NDA protection if they want to.
- DON’T BE SHY TO ASK FOR MORE MONEY
This is kind of dumb and may be controversial, but I thought I’d say it anyway. I love this game and I believe in these developers. If for some reason they need, say another $50k to get MP testing rolling, feel free to charge me and 499 other volunteers $100 each to be your guinea pigs. UNDER NDA. I’m pretty sure you’ll have enough takers.
P.S. Please don’t get mad at me and eliminate my submission to be a tester.