I feel lied to by companies that do Early Releases.

Foreword: I completely understand that all content is still in progress of being created. I realize that it costs money to implement many features into this game. I also sympathize with the fact that these things take time! I understand the process of debugging and testing and how valuable it is to not only the testers but the developers as well. Also, I am extremly excited to see what Shroud of the Avatar becomes at release and look forward to building numerous relationships with others in the community.

The first time I heard of an Early Release game, it was DayZ through Steam. I was excited because an open world survival MMO was relatively new to the scene and it intrigued me. Its predecessor had much success, but the fact that it was a mod left developers with the opportunity to make something huge and profitable. The original release date was December 16th, 2013. While DayZ still racks in buyers, it still remains in alpha. It is a disgusting excuse for 2+ years of development and it has been a part of opening the door to other companies doing the same thing. I digress.

Enter Shroud of the Avatar. Mind you, to see the developers of Ultima taking another shot at MMO glory is something that rattles my bones and gets me extremely excited to relive my childhood. I believe Lord British has the mindset of a true roleplaying developer and I would trust him and his team to make the next great game. That being said, the projected release of Shroud of the Avatar is set for 2015. It is 2015 and, just like DayZ, it remains in its alpha state.

I realize the developers want to add fun, temporary things into the game for its players to enjoy. But this is not the purpose of alpha testing. I know that I can't define what alpha testing should be, but I don't see it as a game within the game. Developers shouldn't be spending time making Santa Hats and Alpha-Quests. If making a game is as long as Early Access developers make it seem, then these extra addons seem unnecessary. I stopped playing Shroud of the Avatar a while back because I did not see the developers on track to keeping their word. We are one third of the way through 2015 and I do not see this game finished by 2015, let alone 2016.

I am not here to attack the developers of this wonderful game. If I can be honest, I just want assurance from them because I feel like I am being ripped off globally from companies that say one thing then give another. Alpha is not for hosting events, receiving in-game items meant for release day, and selling products. Six of the fourteen posts in the update had something to do with raising money. You hit the goal you needed 2 years ago.

So, as I conclude. Can you confidently say this game will be released in 2015? Is there still a projected timeline of events? Is this viewable to the public? How long do you expect beta to take?

I don't want anyone to take this the wrong way. I really want this game to succeed. I just get a little worried that fundraising is going to be the only rally-call of this company for the rest of its life (or alpha phase).


*UPDATE*
I have since started playing a game called Albion Online. It seems very reminiscent of UO with full loot PvP and the overhead camera with emphasis and crafting and player-growth. I am bumping this to see how the community in this game has potentially grown as well. I've noticed it is still in pre-alpha which is slightly discouraging, coming close to one year on this post.

To be honest, it seems like when this game releases, the players who have backed it so much will have so many more things compared to new players that it will feel overwhelming to those trying out the game. There are monthly gifts for continued backers that will dominate the land and give new players no chance to experience or acquire any of these things that backers have spent (literal) years acquiring.

I hope SotA is progressing, I'd love to come back!

 

The hat quests give increasing value to your account for the money you pledged (along with the pledge rewards) and probably don't take up that much time.
Other than that, i dont see the developers running any other events other than hangouts or stuff directly related to development or communicating development progress.

They have been releasing a Quarterly schedule highlighting their development goals for the quarter. Sometimes they will push something back due to complications or due to a change in priority resulting from community feedback.
They still have systems in the game that arent implimented at all yet (like fishing, crafting, book writing, brewing)


A game's release date is a prediction based on if EVERYTHING goes according to plan, and probably a little more for wiggle room. If they gave another estimate for a release date right now, it would still just be a prediction, and there wills till be people dissapointed if it isnt as accurate as they hoped.

MY personal prediction, now that unity 5 is out of the way, would be that the game will probly hit in summer 2016. If im wrong, im fine with that. Tho im nowhere near 100% sure it will be released by then, i AM 100% sure there will at least be alot more functioning systems, polish, optimization, and generally just more game entirely by then.

And as long as they continue to publicize their quarterly plans, i can totally be patient.

 

I wouldn't bank on this coming out earlier than Q2 2016. I believe the original expected date was August or September of 2014. Obviously, that's come and gone. It was then supposedly October 2015, and then mentioned again to be November-ish of 2015. That's since I've backed back in February that that prediction was made. Starr's also said that they will announce beta with a quarter in between (at least, that's how I read it - could be wrong), so if that's the case, and we're in Q2 with no mention of a beta, then we're likely looking at Q1 2016 for beta at the earliest.

When RG thanked the community for being patient when they were 50% behind schedule, Starr joked that it was "more like 100%" in the last Hangout. Will it launch? I imagine it will, but it'll launch into some pretty frenzied waters in 2016.

 

Consider that we are about 2 years into development now. Some games have taken 5+ years.

That last I heard was devs "hope" to release at the end of this year w/ Beta this summer. There is a LOT of content that is still left to go in and they're not sure they can get it all in before the year is out. If everything goes smoothly my prediction would be spring '16.

They've been as open and honest as you could ever hope a developer to be.

 

It's not in alpha, it's in pre-alpha. They have been completely up front with us about ever content delivery delay, give us quarterly updates, answer questions every post-mortem interview. . and as long as they give us a working, completed, bug-less game in the end then what does it matter?

 

Fair concern.. You'll find lots of speculation regarding release date. Personally I speculate SotA E1 will be released in first or second quarter 2016. If you carefully read the EULA you'll find they have up to a year after expected release date before they are obligated to return kickstarter funding, so I loosely read that to mean it could be as late as Q4 2016. However, you can rest assured the developers have commented more than once that financially the dev team is not strained to push the release closer due to budget constraints. While it's a tad bit frustrating, the party line is still that SotA will be released when it's ready. I am sure fundraising for SotA will long continue after all episodes are developed. For better or worse it is what will help them push out maintaince releases, and keep a development staff. Overall I'm happy with the fundraising approach.

I've been having fun experiencing SotA progress through the development process, so I'm not necessarily anxious for release like I can imagine some people are. For me the biggest downside in playing during dev/test is the occasional player/lot wipes that have to occur, but it comes with the territory and should be expected

 

Development of any major project is fraught with difficulties, delays and unforeseen events. In this part of the world anyway, major government developments are routinely at least a year or two late and massively over budget. By the way, transitioning to Unity 5 was and still is a huge undertaking!

Faced with this scenario, a game designer could either release the game as and when advertised, resulting in a buggy, incomplete and unsatisfactory product (Ultima 8 and 9 anyone?) or press on until the product is perfect. I'll take the second option any day.

It is true that it does take significant time and effort for the devs to generate a new release each month for us to play and experiment with. One could argue that if they just kept their heads down and "got on with it" the game would be here sooner. Three powerful arguments against that proposition:
1) Being a crowd-funded game, we are paying the bill for the game's development. The devs have "contracted" - or at least promised - to "show their work" on a monthly basis. This keeps us in the loop, and we can see how and in what direction the game is going. It would be incredibly unreasonable for them to say "Thanks for your money, now get lost and we'll tell you when the game is ready".
2) Crowd testing shows up bugs and issues that were not foreseen or found in initial limited testing. Problems can be fixed early and much more easily than if things fall over after a major launch.
3) We get the chance to interact with the devs and influence game development. Many features currently in the game - and some planned for future inclusion - are there solely because of the community and its involvement. In a sense, we are building this game as much as the devs are.

My opinion: the game is proceeding well and will be awesome. I cannot guarantee it will be released in 2015, but I feel it will be soon after that at least. And it will be worth waiting for.

 

It matters because you are paying for a game that wipes every 2 months. That's a little ridiculous if you ask me. You shouldn't make a prediction if you know it is going to be more than 2 years off. Come on, let's be a little reasonable here. If you want a video game that erases all of your progress then you're in luck. They can be as honest as they want. After enough years of idling by, people will get fed up and their money will begin to feel wasted.

 

I love this stage. No stress. Few power gamers. Few cheats. No trying to keep up because in the end the next wipe is coming.

Release. Hang out with friends. Find bugs. Release. Hang out with friends. Find bugs.

If you play each release you do see the massive advances being made.

What's the hurry?

 

RELEASE 17, April 30, 2015:

• Polish & Performance: We will continue the work we started with Release 16 to improve overall polish and performance in the game. We will focus not only on improving frame rate but also lowering load times. We may also spend some time on usability issues.
• Maps: Perennial Coast and Grunvald will continue to be expanded.
• Steam Achievements: Players will now be able to earn Steam Achievements.
• Player Owned Town Test: We hope to have our first example of a Player Owned Town in the game with the PaxLair Metropolis.
• Crafting: Crafting will now have events that occur during the crafting process that the player can interact with to influence the results.
• Creatures: Our bestiary will expand to include various Human Enemies (mages, archers, etc.), the Phoenix, and Zombies!
• Player Titles: Players will now be able to display their title in the game.
• Street Signs: We will begin placing street signs in major towns.
• Player Wipe: We will be wiping all game, property, and player data for this release because of some fundamental changes to item architecture.

RELEASE 18, May 28, 2015:

• Maps: Our goal is to get the Grunvald Region near completion and begin work on the Quel Region which includes scenes like the Etceter Mines.
• Spells & Skills: The combat schools of Shields and Light Armor will expand, and more combos will be added to the game.
• Housing: Fences and Walls will come online as new customization options for player property.
• Player Owned Towns: We plan to start the official submission process and begin implementing more towns.
• Crafting: Crafting skills will start to come online, and be used during crafting to modify results.
• Creatures: Our creature list will continue to expand with Chaos Demons and Wisps.
• Combat: The cover system will be introduced that modifies attack and defense values when you (or your target) are behind cover.
• Overworld: Roving encounters (patrolling creatures) will now appear on the overworld map and can be engaged (pulling you into a scene) or avoided if you wish to sneak past.
• Emote “Teaching”: Emotes will now be teachable to other players. Some emotes (like the ones tied to pledges) will only be teachable by the original owner. Teaching will be done via secure trading a consumable item that adds the emote when used.
• Localization: We will begin crowdsourcing the translation of the game into various languages.
• Player Made Books: Players will be able to write in blank books in the game, and share them with other players.
• Customization: Clothing and Armor will now be dyeable.

RELEASE 19, June 25, 2015:

• Maps: We hope to get the Quel Region near final and start on the Midmaer Region.
• Spells & Skills: Chaos Magic and Ranged Combat will expand to include more spells, and more combos will come online.
• Housing: Property ownership will now incur regular fees (unless you are using a tax free deed from a pledge). If the fees are not paid, the player will lose their claim, and their possessions (including the house and decorations) will be moved to their bank. Note: We will provide more details about timing, payments, etc. near the end of R18.
• Crafting: Tailors and Alchemists will be able to begin crafting Taming Collars. We will also be adding more Cooking and Alchemy recipes.
• Pets & Taming: We will expand pet functionality to include the ability to tame creatures.
• Creatures: Dragons will begin appearing in Novia! Burninating will begin. All hail Trogdor, the Burninator!
• Combat: Guilds will now be able to declare war on each other.
• Customization: New armor and clothing items will appear in the game.
• Musical Instruments: Players can play music in the game with a variety of instruments.
• Player Owned Vendors: Players will now be able to place a Vendor on their property to sell goods.

We continue to be incredibly thankful for the support we receive from this amazing community. While the funding you provide makes all of this possible, it pales in comparison with the faith you have in us, the feedback you provide us, and the content you are making for everyone to enjoy. We are humbly grateful, and we cannot wait to see you again in New Britannia!
Before I go, I wanted to include an excerpt from my original post about our Early Release Schedule that is important to set the framework for our ongoing schedule:

​

As a crowd funded and crowd sourced project, we feel it is incredibly important that we provide our backers with information and access well before game studios would normally do so in a traditional development model. Traditionally, the players are given information and access only after the development team has already decided exactly how things will be done, and at times, even after it has already been implemented. By the time the public normally has access to the product, there is usually no time to meaningfully react to the public feedback.​

​

Shroud of the Avatar is different than the traditional model, as we intend to offer our backers extremely early access to information and even the game itself. With that said, we also want to be very careful that we only provide access to portions of the game when they are ready for a wider range of feedback. If we can play it internally and we know it is not ready, then there is nothing to be gained by having a wider audience come to the same conclusion. In fact, it could be quite damaging to do so.​

​

Our strategy over the next few months is to provide you with focused and iterative releases of content. Your feedback during these releases will be critical to making the final product the best it can be, and we appreciate that you are all so willing to devote your time to helping us. With each release, we will have specific tests we will ask you all to make. As we get closer, we will send instructions on how to download, install, report bugs, etc.​

*******After each release we will review the results and reevaluate the plan including the duration of availability of each release. Please note that game data will be wiped periodically during early access.​

​

It is important to note that all dates, durations, and deliverables are subject to change*********************************​

Well no fun to feel lied to, and just walking in to this game it could be difficult to understand 'hey what's the holdup'? Those of us who have been here for a while do know what it is. So Shrouds has increased in pledged amount and pledge deliverables over time, getting more funding than I believe was expectected, and the hold up, well and funding, it is partly because of us that this has happened, and also unknown things happen. We asked for more and always ask for more, more, more, and different sometimes. That's the thing with a game being made this way. If no one is giving feedback about each thing getting designed in a game except the development team, that is different, and perhaps easier in a lot of ways to get the product created. Now a days most games have alphas and betas and sometimes when the feedback is not favorable, game developers have to correct or go back to the drawing board. That has definitely happened here on things. So we understand this and there is no way I want to allow this game to be released without all the special touches I see possible. We have 5 episodes to add features, content, and land mass so that is wonderful. This game will continue to get embelished upon also. So notice above, a disclaimer for the quarterly update, plus on the releases they do try to throw in surprises if they possibly can. So it is a choice we make to back a game, or play a game. Of course we never truly know until we've played it, which we have not of course. I am in agreement about 2016. I don't think we'll be ready before that.

 

Well, it is an alpha (or "pre-alpha" if you're buying into the marketing they and other EA games dish out), not a full-fledged game. It wipes for a reason: testing. That has to be understood, first and foremost.

Why veterans and grandfathers of the gaming industry, both single and MMO genres, couldn't foresee being pushed back as far as they will be on top of focusing on things like street names while other features need immediate attention and discussion, I dunno'. That'd be the real question to ask.

 

You might be surprised at how quickly all the parts come together once all the parts are working individually.

 

This is actually discussed in the Caverns weekly newscast http://thecaverns.net/Podcasts/echoes-from-the-caverns-04-17-15/

Wipes are necessary, because as the game structure evolves and more content is added, the newer data is incompatible with the old. In many cases the devs write a quick snatch of code to enable something to happen, albiet poorly (we all know the pricing structures and crafting system is "in" but seriously unbalanced). So when they get the time to flesh all that out properly the old code has to be deleted. They hold off wiping until they have to.

 

Xanthirius, great post! Thank you for voicing your concern, I'm sure many are feeling the same way and it certainly should be addressed.
I, as well as many other backers have visited the Portalarium offices to witness their passion and dedication to this project first hand. I know this method is different, but without the backing of a huge publisher, some inherent changes to the development process are necessary. The monthly release model is definitely unusual for Alpha state, but in order to share the development process with a crowd funded source, it really does make sense. Being able to iterate on a monthly bases will continue through launch, as work towards the next episode begins on the QA server.
Without the community involvement, the team would be holed up, completing the original design with no opportunity for feedback from its backers. None of us want that.

 

It's not quite that simple though... Everyone joining now should be aware the game is in development. There should be no expectation that your Avatar's progress is going to persist indefinitely. I guess if you're not used to the development process it might be jarring, but you must bridle your enthusiasm. Wipes used to occur every release. Releases used to only be open for a weekend. Go even further back and jumping and swimming were a SotA novelty. Kids these days and their once every now and then progress wipes! *shakes walking cane violently in the air* Hang in there dude

 

@Xanthirius I don't entirely disagree with what you are saying. I think there is some amount of risk in leaving the servers open. It has the possibility of promoting gaming fatigue if wipes are frequent. I know the dev team is aware of this because they are very sensitive to requiring wipes. Starr has said in the past they want to minimize how often wipes have to happen, but needless to say they still have to happen occasionally. Just don't burn out on these pre-releases

 

The original estimated delivery date on Kickstarter was October of 2014, not 2015. If what you are saying about refunds is accurate (I'm not convinced it is), there would be serious issues this fall.

 

There are developers who use EA solely to profit from indefinite timelines (some ditching projects entirely).
I can assure you that Portalarium are in the business of finishing projects

It is important however that you state where you are seeing the 2015 deadline, as this is likely not a guarantee, just a goal.

 

Ah interesting. I guess I interpreted it to mean the time when we were presented with the EULA.. I vaguely remember being told release was sometime in 2015. I may have misinterrupted the EULA (or TOS), but I when I read it many months ago something to that effect jumped out at me. Let me know if you end up reading it and find something different.

 

I'm not sure there would be such major issues even if this were the case - presumably if KS backers wanted the refund they would lose all perks associated with their account, so many would not bother pursuing it as they're still into the game; and there are many backers like myself who came to the game long after the Kickstarter/have upgraded and bought add-ons etc, which would not be affected by any KS refunds as those pledges were all through Portalarium. Might be a slight financial dip and administrative hassle, but unlikely to have a huge impact on the game's development imo.