162 replies to this topic

[Roadbeer]

MischiefSC, on 04 April 2013 - 05:05 PM, said:

{lots of words}

[Monsoon]

Oh good, THIS thread again!

/sarcasm

[MrPenguin]

MischiefSC, on 04 April 2013 - 05:05 PM, said:

As soon as I saw 'drinking the kool-aid' it clarified for me where the OP is coming from.

Look. This is incredibly simple.

Here is the wikipedia entry:

Software Development Cycle

Even beyond that it's not a difficult concept.

Beta means that the developer considers it largely feature complete and being released to testers to test. That's us. We're beta testers. We're using a beta product - it's not complete, there's a ton of things (CW, clans, VOIP, a ton of mechs and equipment, balancing, etc) still being developed and tested for eventual full release.

This is a beta product. PGI has been absolutely clear about that in every way shape and form. Now, if PGI had said it was a full release when in fact it was a beta product I'd say you have reason to complain.

Instead though what you've got is a product that is in beta, presented as beta and still being tested, that you are inexplicably and without reason or justification demanding somehow magically just get released complete. There is no logic or rational to your statements.

How do you think things get made? Food, cars, software, you have to spend the money to develop it FIRST. THEN YOU SELL THE FINISHED PRODUCT FOR MONEY. One nifty thing that software products (from the public beta of Apples OS X to many game titles) can do is sell access to the beta product. People are willing to pay money for an unfinished product under the hope that it will be completed. There's no promise inherent in this though.

If PGI closes tomorrow you have no leg to stand on. You paid money for a clearly labeled beta product in order to get access early.

Saying that somehow because, what, you don't want it to be I guess, MWO isn't in open beta is like saying you should get to fly to the moon. Okay. Great. You made words into a sentence. That is the only productive thing you've done.

Sorry for how confrontational this comes across but these threads, these statements are not simply wrong they are irrational.

If I tell you 'This painting is unfinished. Right now it looks like this. You can hang it on your wall and look at it and I'll come every week and work on it until it's finished. Is that worth money for you?'

If you say 'yes' and pay me and then come back the next week and say 'I bought a painting. Quit saying it's unfinished and just finish it and be done with it' then you're being irrational and foolish. You got told up front what it was and what was happening. It wasn't a surprise.

There is no magic trick here. The game only has 2 modes, a handful of maps and not even all the chat/VOIP functions out. It's still finishing up vision modes. The game isn't done, it's months from being done. The point of an open beta is to get tons of people to test it to make getting it done faster. The point of letting people spend money on things in the game is to help fund the completion of it because otherwise you need to fund it through a publisher like EA who will destroy the idea of the game and add 2 more years to the development cycle. Instead you do open beta with crowd funding through MC purchases and you let the players fund the games development in advance, leading to a faster and more indie-approach to the games creation. Better for everyone.

Listen very carefully. Please. The game is in open beta. Open beta means exactly what PGI is doing with MWO right now. MWO is in the current text book definition of the term 'open beta'. It has been referred to as being in open beta since it came out of closed beta. There's no magic. No trick. No dishonesty.

This whole concept isn't simply wrong. People can be wrong. It's irrational, illogical and shows a complete lack of understanding of the whole concept of business, software, software development, even generally how society works. It's an example of the worst aspects of postmodernism, bordering on narcissism. Just because you're feeling impatient and frustrated does NOT change the nature of reality, MWO or the meaning of the term 'open beta'.

Again, I apologize for the bordering on inflammatory nature of this post. It's not simply pointed at the OP who certainly doesn't deserve the whole brunt of it but the entire oblivious, entitlement-minded undercurrent of people on the forum spouting this same irrational, ridiculous crap.

The game is in open beta. There is no rational, reasonable debate of that. It's like arguing over it being before noon or after noon. Is it noon yet where you are? Is it before noon or has noon come and gone? You could probably get in some pointless esoteric argument over the nature of time but the reality is that it's either one or the other, pretty clearly. Saying it's not noon yet because you prefer to eat lunch at noon and you haven't eaten lunch yet so thusly it can't be noon is indicative of a disorder, not some problem with the nature of clocks, time or lunch.

This should be stickied. In fact, I'm saving this quote for future use.