Q4 2017 Schedule Update

Delay is cool. Better for the game's success. In the meantime, we have this amazing world to play around in! Wooo Whooo!!

 

I miss somethingt in the top 10 Prioritie list:

#1 Add-On Store Items
#2 Telethon & Items
#3 "fun holiday goodies"

imho they waste way to much time with the Add-On Store stuff, Telethon & Items and the "fun holiday goodies".
Focus on the real important stuff until the Game is release ready!

 

#1 pay the bills
#2 pay the bills
#3 pay the bills

They probably don't list in the top 10 as it should be obvious that they need to keep the doors open.

 

If someone isn't able to effectively contribute to one of the top 10 items, they are put into where they are able to be used best (which in the case of our item creators and artists, means making stuff that can be sold or fulfilling telethon goals).

 

That is part of the problem, they already spend way to much time over years with the none-critical-releaseready stuff.

 

Artists can fix artist related bugs and polish the visuals instead of making new items (and bugs).

 

I remember a time, no customer knew anything about, when a game would be launched. The games came out, no one cared about how long the developers took for it ...
After a succesful one, we liked to hear and read about a next part of a game ...
What changed?
In these years there was no platform to post disappointment. You could post it on a private forum, but who cared about?
In these years people couldn't say what they are thinking about ...

We are living in a more transparent world - this is good in a lot of ways.
Sometimes, I am thinking, after reading comments at amazon: well, what is the concerning point behind the comment?
I honestly ask this, because every comment mirrrors something a writer is concerned about.
... and there are so many reasons to get disappointed ...

As I wrote a lot of threads about "my" points (quest, journal, realism) I was concerned about, and I was thinking:
Okay, things will be done ... not today, not tomorrow, but ... may be before lunch - I mean launch
(And, to be honest: may be after!) And - ok - seeing Richard watching his Handy during Telethon don't give me the feeling he is watchful to the talk.
But do I know, how much hours of talking about THIS point lies behind him? And what things he has to do the next hours?
I could be disappointed - well, I am not. There is a man, watching his handy a few seconds
But it is important to hear and see, if someone is really disappointed.

In cases we are disappointed, there is a need we want to be satisfied.
In your post, Jens_T, I am hearing you are disappointed, because your need of trust isn't satisfied, because launch dates weren't hold.
Or you are concerned about, (possible) investors could be?
Correct me, please, if I got it wrong!

Sometimes it forces disappointment, if you write down more targets as you can fulfil.
It happens in best purposes, but at last it reads better to bring 2 more targets in a release as stated, instead of cancelling and delaying 2 ...

I am thinking, because of this, the new Q4 Schedule update is shorter as before. And the top 10 list was given out.

For me, the collected launch dates at reddit are not a reason to distrust.

The better "yes" to have more trust is the decision

The reason for delaying gives me understanding and the feeling, I can trust in people, doing their best for a project.

I have no financial intension (funny, because I am a tax accountant and IT consultant for tax software).
For me it is more important to look at the whole project, the team and the forum members:
this gives me a lot of good reasons for trusting...
And we can trust in a lot of game testers

The other decision could be to bring a game to launch like green bananas ...
How would this feel?

If a person would choose the "promised" launch date instead of considering the very important points on the list, would this be more trustful?
Would it satisfy thy and other people's need of trust?

That's just my feeling.
May be you can share it with me

 

I'm not going to state that you are going to get the offline game you dream of, or that the offline experience will be one for the history books (at least in a good way), or that everything will be wonderful at launch, or 6 months after launch - but I will say that I do not think that not seeing offline spawning rules means they won't implement them. Or that they do not want a playable offline game.

I don't think vague ominous statements like speaks volumes etc. are necessary.

Offline is near and dear to your heart, I know. And offline spawning rules is a part of that. For me I'm excited to see quest in there 13 times. This is what will have me exploring the world organically - I have held off on my mission to explore new scenes, seeking out new NPCs and new quests, to boldly go where other Avatars have gone before - because I want to experience it all in it's polished state.

Features not on the list that are near and dear to other's hearts are probably fishing, brewing, (more) agriculture, character slots, custom avatars, POT Tools (me) - POT Tools were announced years ago, and the image these were sold with shows housing off the docks... still not there - but at least I see questing in there which was more important to me. And performance performance performance is good (even though I love new features, fluidity is super important).

I just don't think offline is any more, or less, likely to see work based on this surface level document for Q4. Nor are other things that I don't see on the schedule.

I -do- applaud your commitment to championing the SP and Offline game in the face of adversity and I know this was probably a gutshot reaction - similar to my own initial reaction -on not seeing particular features each quarter that you and I would want to see.

 

I try not to be disappointed - but the difference is that all KickStarters and many of the players that "bought" pledges for an unfinished product did so because they trusted the company's vision and communication. Trust is the most important asset Portalarium has. However good the reasons given are, constantly revising timelines doesn't instil trust in the ability to manage a project. In my field of business any project- or plant manager that would have delayed release for two, three years would have been replaced. Now, this is a small software business but still they collected $12M by selling a vision and relying on trust.

I am concerned because they need constant inflow of cash to fund their work, cash only flows if people trust in a return (financially or fun-wise). I am concerned both because I am an early kickstarter who spent some money and more so because I spent a lot of time bug testing and discussing. I care because I hope to see a successful game release that will be fun to play. Otherwise I write off my investment and will be smarter not spend so much time on unfinished products.

 

I love how the game dev experts come out of the woodwork to explain what Portalarium is doing wrong.

 

If the Kickstarter backers wanted those modes, they should be viable, otherwise there should only have been friends and multiplayer modes offered.

 

... and I like how comment experts come out of the woodwork to explain how game dev experts come out of the woodwork to explain what Portalarium is doing ...
Well, more than this,
I like comments which can be transformed in a positive force - to have a successful game which is about (the path of) love(!) ...
And yes, concerns are really important - and a great challenge to transform it in a positive way
--> Back to the woodwork: is it maple or ... ?

 

Some artists are really great designers, but not necessarily very good at streamlining or cleaning up various bugs. I do agree with you though that I'd rather get what we have working glitch free than continuing to add more stuff, but if the artist isn't good at fixing the bugs or skeletons on the created items (not saying this is the case, but from some of the mods I've played with in other games this can be a major headache) then I'd rather have them doing what they are talented at rather than attempting to fix something and potentially making it worse (though I'd expect playing around they'd be able to learn the right way to fix things up... ).

 

Yes. I would have to go with maple.

 

Yes, many of us kickstarter backers want those modes.

 

That's what I was thinking of. And you confirmed it:

I didn't invest so much money.
But from my feeling I can confirm:
The game was, is and will be fun to play.
(Okay, decay isn't my friend, but decay isn't all )
MY view is: I like(d) to see and take part in the game progress. It is something I never got before in my (game)life
For me the whole process - includinig forum and community - is successful.

Beside this, I really understand all concernings about the financial situation.
I am in good hope, because after a good release there is no more barrier to produce Episode 2, 3 ... 9...

 

Lovely quilted black maple. Tables, chests, dressers, and chairs made of this is what we need in game (or dungeon stocks and racks... but that's kinda depressing to get beautiful wood all gunkified)

 

You can't announce a certain game with certain modes and features, collect money up front and then don't deliver or only deliver half-heartedly.

You can't announce a "basically single-player game with the option to play online", collect money up front, then neglect this and deliver a MMORPG.

 

I disagree kickstarter backers getting whatever they want. But I do agree that anything promised should be delivered, especially if it was crucial to their funding. SP/Story/Questing experience I believe was crucial to their pitch. So if the story does not approach the story of U4-U7, then it's falling short of their pitch. I've never seen them say they won't provide the SP experience and I've seen no retreat from offline features - such as saves/respawn rules/hp tweaks/economy balance/companions/etc. that will be different from the online version where you can have an assist from friends.

Nowhere does the kickstarter page or pitch say "basically a single-player game with the option to play online". I know this is a line from an interview, but there were tens or hundreds of mentions of multi-player specific features in the kickstarter and interviews as well - I would argue that the majority of the pitch was multi-player.

So boiling down their entire pitch to that one line misrepresents the campaign.

I do not disagree that the SP campaign should be strong - whether played online or offline. And they have committed to numerous offline features. I -do not- think that they cannot provide the offline experience we would want by launch - and probably not achieve the experience they would have wanted back when they did their kickstarter pitch - when I first saw the way they chose to implement many of the NPC towns I was dismayed (sorry I posted it in dev+, this is from April of 2014). My concerns in that thread were never resolved, and to me the towns do -not- live up to my initial expectations.

But ultimately I feel they are delivering on many and most of their promises, and I hear good things about newer quests and areas going in. I still refuse to touch quests until things are polished and most expected sidequests are also in-game, tested, and polished - perhaps several months after launch. I almost never buy a game until 3-6 months after launch because I don't want to "play" them in a buggy state and get a sub-par experience compared to if I had waited longer.

I think that it is unfair to take one line from an interview and continuously boil down the entirety of the kickstarter pitch and campaign, deep dives, interviews, etc. to one line from an interview, "basically a single-player game with the option to play online." I don't know the context of the quote not having seen it in awhile, though I know you've provided the timestamp before.

They did not "announce a basically single-player game and collect money upfront" - if that was the pitch, then that is what would be on the kickstarter page, and not a line as an excerpt from an interview.

This is what the kickstarter page says:

Spoiler

Shroud of the Avatar is the “spiritual successor” to Richard’s previous work in the FRP genre. Our primary objectives are to tell a story even more compelling than Ultimas IV-VII, create a virtual world more interactive than Ultima VII, develop deep rich multi-player capabilities beyond combat akin to Ultima Online, and offer a bold new approach to integrate them with “Selective Multi-Player”.

• Shroud of the Avatar is infused with rich storylines, deeply integrated into game play, developed by Best Selling Author Tracy Hickman and RPG legend Richard Garriott.
• Players will adventure in an interactive world where their choices have consequences, ethical paradoxes give them pause, and they play a vital part in weaving their own story into the immersive world and lore surrounding them.
• Shroud of the Avatar is a Selective Multiplayer game, allowing players to choose how they want to play! Whether in Single-Player Offline mode or any of three online modes, the main quest line will provide greater than 40 hours of focused, story driven content.
• Shroud of the Avatar can be played as an offline DRM free solo experience or online, where our servers will enable player to player transactions, group finding, patching, streaming of dynamic content, and exploit prevention.
• Built using the Unity Game Engine, Shroud of the Avatar will support Win/Mac/Linux for official launch.
• Players can specialize in a wide range of combat and non-combat skills, provided by a robust, classless skill system, and full-featured crafting and housing mechanics. Play the way you want to play, molding your character into the hero, anti-hero, or artisan you want to be!
• Shroud of the Avatar: Forsaken Virtue is the first of a 5 game series of full-length, stand-alone games (each using the same game system), referred to as Episodes 1 through 5. Estimated availability of Episode 1, Forsaken Virtues, is October 2014, with Episodes 2 through 5 estimated for subsequent yearly releases.
• Shroud of the Avatar is a “buy-to-play” game that, once purchased, does not require a subscription to play!

 

What the heck is going on? Is this like the fourth of fifth time the release date has been pushed back? I worry for the future of the game if we get told one thing and then are told another. I was planning on buying some accounts for a ton of friends on steam but now I'm going to look foolish since I told them the game would be released in Q4!

I'm an investor, Portalarium. What is going on over there?!