PC This is the kind of point of view that makes me go facepalm about some reviewers.

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Kyonshi

Kyonshi

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The whole basis of his take on the Pimps work and progress is that they dont seem to know what they're doing or what they want. That original content integration is now at a full stop because the Pimps dont have anything else to offer than the remaining Bandits. That multi-player is a mess and that they dont know how to conduct and fix it.

I mean that game's not perfect but for an indie studio, to have fared so far and still having success while being stale in regards of creativity (apparently), i'd say its pretty remarkable.

What do you guys think?

 
I know reach has been playing for a long time, several alphas at least.

I still don't agree with his conclusions, but he has played a lot.

 
I watched this earlier today and it is my understanding that he has had his ear to the ground for a long time.  I imagine he feels a certain amount of loyalty to the game that has helped him assemble a life out of being a streamer for such a long time now.  I know if I felt that the game was threatened from within, I'd likely want to say something about that thing too.  He loves this game.  You can hear it in his voice and the amount of effort he gives towards that devotion is enviable by myself at least.  I'd say that the above video was him reaching out to not just his viewers but an open letter to TFP as well.

I can't fault him for having those concerns.  Without knowing, they may even come from a place of insecurity.  I feel his view is valid, even if I am not having the same range of emotions about it that he and Rjay has.  Reach is very strong with sharing his feelings within his own community.

What I personally think is that he could use some reassurance, particularly the kind that could come from an official(tm) position.   He may be looking for answers to help not only himself, but his community as well.  They could be looking to him to light the way.   I do feel a level of empathy toward his plight.  He was not only able to buy a house but also he just moved in not long ago, and this in South Africa, which he has shared has its own fair number of economic crisis at the moment.   That would scare the hell out of me if I were to risk loosing it over anything I couldn't control.

 
Just like most of us, he only looks at it from the outside and thus the picture is incomplete.

For example, we don't know when something was a lengthy decision-making process or if something was decided at short notice. For example, Roland noted that the developers had been unhappy with the player having virtually unlimited clean water for several alphas. But we don't get to hear these behind-the-scenes conversations.

Then there is the problem that he is not a developer. He doesn't understand that tweaks under the surface are often more time-consuming than changes you see. He also seems to think that a simple switch of the engine would solve all the problems.

He also seems to only ever refer content to more models. More weapons, more vehicles and more different zombie models. I see content more as "something that keeps the player busy".

 
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RipClaw said:
He also seems to only ever refer content to more models. More weapons, more vehicles and more different zombie models. I see content more as "something that keeps the player busy".
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The "keep the player busy" content is missing though. I mean we got quests, wich do keep us busy, but are super OP at the same time and shorten the time to the point where nothing can harm us anymore by a lot.  Also they are repetitive as the traders only send you to a handfull of different POI´s even when they would have more options to choose from.

The learning by looting and the changes to jars don´t look like keeping us busy, it looks llke it´s just gonna be more RNG. The cheap way of keeping players busy. Don´t get me wrong, i like the idea of water beeing more rare. But not like that.

We will see about bandits, those might be a good way to keep us busy. If they are just out in the world and part of quests, i don´t think they will be a great challenge. Really hope they are going to raid our bases. Random, without a schedule like the blood moon ofc.

 
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pApA^LeGBa said:
The "keep the player busy" content is missing though. I mean we got quests, wich do keep us busy, but are super OP at the same time and shorten the time to the point where nothing can harm us anymore by a lot.  Also they are repetitive as the traders only send you to a handfull of different POI´s even when they would have more options to choose from.
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That's what the Fun Pimps are working on. In A21 there is a new type of quests. As far as I know, you have to defend a POI against a horde.

That the traders always send you to the same POIs must of course also be fixed but for this it also needs more high level POIs.

pApA^LeGBa said:
The learning by looting and the changes to jars don´t look like keeping us busy, it looks llke it´s just gonna be more RNG. The cheap way of keeping players busy. Don´t get me wrong, i like the idea of water beeing more rare. But not like that.
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I don't know yet if it will keep us busy or not. For that I have to test it first.

However, looting is not exactly my favorite activity. That's why I hope that the quest rewards contain a lot of magazines.

pApA^LeGBa said:
We will see about bandits, those might be a good way to keep us busy. If they are just out in the world and part of quests, i don´t think they will be a great challenge. Really hope they are going to raid our bases. Random, without a schedule like the blood moon ofc.
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I don't think they will be able to raid our bases. At least, I haven't heard anything like that.

It will probably be that they function similar to a wandering horde. A group of bandits roams the city and when we meet them they will attack us. Only unlike the zombies, they won't just run at us, they'll seek cover. They may also set an ambush.

 
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RipClaw said:
That's what the Fun Pimps are working on. In A21 there is a new type of quests. As far as I know, you have to defend a POI against a horde.

That the traders always send you to the same POIs must of course also be fixed but for this it also needs more high level POIs.
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This already happens at T1. There is a ton of different POI´s and yet you always get the same few, but agreed, there isn´t nearly enough T4 and T5 POI´s. RWG needs to be adapted too for that. Right now you can be happy if you get 3 different T5 POI´s on a map.

 
My point of view is the following.

The game is in DEVELOPEMENT. They will try things. They will change things. They will probably gonna stick with some, and revert back with others. We signed up for this when we bought a game in ALPHA phase. You know, trials and errors? Why do people think its a dramatic concern when its the Pimps while AAA studios go through the same process? Why does he says they dont seem to know what they wanna do?

Its probably nothing new to anyone that they build something monumental and that some @%$# along the way didnt go as planned, right? You can think that some element is fine now and then while you make something else brand new, that previous element now interacts in a certain way that you have to change it. What's the big @%$#ing deal? Again, its a developement phase spanned over 9 years now. Technology changed. They hired new people and those folks could see that certain stuff is now obsolete, they see something better could be done, i dunno. There's so many possibilities with a completely destructible and customizable world that inevitably, you gonna come across so many unexpected issues. Your point of view of original ideas may change.

It is what it is, its not perfect. Some may find they get to the dead end, but there's still a lot of people who see endless possibilites with their own progress.

 
pApA^LeGBa said:
We will see about bandits, those might be a good way to keep us busy. If they are just out in the world and part of quests, i don´t think they will be a great challenge. Really hope they are going to raid our bases. Random, without a schedule like the blood moon ofc.
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 Could be intresting if the bandits were more intrested in raiding our houses, ie, chests filled with goodies would be their primary goal, not the player.  As in,  player placed chests adjust the value of a "gold map" depending on how filled they are. A high value gold map would attract bandits , but have no effect on zombies.

 
katarynna said:
I know reach has been playing for a long time, several alphas at least.

I still don't agree with his conclusions, but he has played a lot.
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I meant how could he have played alpha 21 long enough to draw those conclusions about alpha 21

 
ElCabong said:
I meant how could he have played alpha 21 long enough to draw those conclusions about alpha 21
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No, because this version is currently only tested internally.

By the way, I just saw that @schwanz9000 left a comment under the video that Mr. Reach pinned. In it some of the points were addressed and explained.

 
My thoughts

He is entitled to his thoughts, but that doesn't make them right.

People throw around the term development hell a lot with TFP, but I think they are overusing the phase and it doesn't really apply to TFP.  TFP set out to make a zombie survival first person shooting game in a fully destructible world.  While they are taking some time to get there, they are on track to complete a game under those conditions.  That doesn't mean things haven't changed over the development of the game.  Mechanisms that were initially thought as being what they wanted could have been chopped because it didn't turn out how they want it to.  Other mechanisms were added as they tried things out, but then decided to go a different direction based on their expectations.  Roland even mentioned in another thread that as time went on, they added more things to the game as they were learning and additional staff was hired bringing in their knowledge and experience.

For me, a game that is in development hell is one of the following:

  • Game was abandoned and never finished
  • Game was abandoned by the original developer (for whatever reason) and taken over by a new developer
  • Game has not been updated or worked on for years
  • That was promised as a specific type of game (say FPS set in x world for the PC) but changed at the end (side scroller for mobile devices)
None of these conditions apply to 7D2D.  Yes it has taken some time to get to where we are at (close to completion),  but they are an Indie game developer and the first game they worked on was this game.  This was a learning experience for them so mistakes are expected.  It's not like this game was being developed by an AAA game developer like Bethesda.

One thing he mentioned was the lack of new content being added to the game since the past iterations.  That is to be expected as they are coming close to the finish line so they are not going to be keep adding new content; instead focusing on the elements that they feel is missing and refining the existing elements (even changing them out if they don't think they are where they want to be).  Someone mentioned that he has been playing the game since Alpha 10.  He has to have racked up a ton of hours since A10.  If he has been playing so long and expecting new content every Alpha release, then he is going to be disappointed as the game reaches its final destination.

Another thing mentioned was the cooking bot and boiling water.  Yes, that happens when you are working on developing new things.  You try things out in different configurations, but then later on go back.  There could be a ton of reasons for doing that (balance issue, problems the mechanism, even simply not having a solution until someone else - maybe a new employee - comes up with something the team didn't think of before).  It reminds me of the #DiggingZombiesGate.  TFP had digging zombies in the game, but then removed them because they were not working the way they wanted them to.  It didn't mean that the idea of zombies able to dig down to you were removed so you can avoid them simply by digging a few meters down and putting blocks above you (i.e. minecraft), it just meant that they needed fixed and TFP were planning on bringing them back if they could fix the issues they had.  However, people want to believe that TFP have these meetings where they are specifically targeting their playstyle. 

And on a final note, he mentioned that he doesn't think they should be updating the models.  That's his opinion and he is welcomed to it.  But just playing the game between A19 and A20, the impact the models updates has been on the game has been great.  The level of detail and work that TFP staff has done on updating the models (and adding more "clutter" to the world) is just...well, greatly appreciated by this gamer trying to reach 4k hours in 7D2D.

 
FINALLY,

someone with a viewership says the things many of us have been saying all along!    I agree 100% with everything he said.  100%.  The graphics or the POI's don't need any further adjustment at this point.  And the systems just get changed, not improved.  Yet, that's what we continue to get...more graphics and more POI's.  Aside from the player model, everything is pretty much fine and has been for quite some time.  Look at how janky the player model is compared to the zombies.  It's TERRIBLE.

And for the obviously ignored point he made, the #1 point he made...multiplayer servers.  They are terrible now.  They've only gotten worse.  I have almost 4k hours at this point and ALL of them have been on multiplayer servers.  I haven't played since some time in A19 because they have gotten so bad.

Just my 2 cents: TFP is largely disengaged from the community at this point.  It's good to see schwanz in here, but he still ignored the mess of multiplayer (don't forget the browser, too!)  The game owners seem to have gotten their money and aren't reinvesting into real improvements.  Networking is where it's at now for a game like this, and if you can't play this game reliably with friends, then you are alienating a HUGE part of what used to be your base.

Imho there was never more charm to this game then back around A16 when survival was tough.  Now questing makes the game pretty much over by level 30.  The world was more barren then but now there's so much loot that you have to go back to base after an hour or so.  There have been improvements, but poorly implemented.  More POI's?  Fine, there have been enough for a long time now.  Zombies?  Graphics were fine a long time ago, pathing and behavior are still predictable and boring.

I keep checking in to see what they change but I haven't seen anything that warrants me or my friends coming back to the game.  In fact, more of them keep leaving because multiplayer is so bad.

 
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He says they are putting forth less and less "new content" with new Alphas. - Well no kidding, they're almost done with the game. So yea, not they are replacing the old simple models and making it look better prior to going Gold.

He says he has issues with servers he runs - How much you want to bet he is running over the amount of players the game is designed to support?

First no cook pot then cook pot then removed and now it's back.  - Cook pot wasn't removed, you could make water without it but it was super slow. Disingenous point on his part.

 
Sometimes, people like to act like they are involved in company meetings and have visibility into the workflow and know exactly what's being done in closed doors.

 
For almost 10 years there have always been short-sighted people predicting the crash and burn collapse of this game and the end of TFP. 
 

They have been wrong, they are wrong, and they will be wrong. The server issues are simply due to the necessary cross-platform infrastructure changes for the future of this game. Playing a game that is still in development is going to mean there will be periods of time where some things don’t work. 
 

If players of large MP servers love the game as much as they claim then they will be back when everything is done and running well again. That is what I see time and time again— people who for one reason or another had to shelve the game for a year or more due to development issues come back and absolutely love playing again when those issues end. Every alpha release has been bigger than the previous ones precisely because this game draws people back in addition to attracting new. 
 

Sure, some become disenfranchised because they don’t like design decisions or just finally grow bored (like with ANY video game) but the actual measurable evidence overall is that of growth. 
 

TFP is in a very good place. They are finishing up this game and have started preliminary work on two new games as well as on bringing the full version of this game to consoles with cross platform compatibility to PC servers. And, most importantly, they are doing all of this without over extending themselves as a company. 
 

The same people who rage that TFP is taking so long because they are lost would rage that TFP is rushing the game because they’re surely about bankrupt if TFP finished up the game more quickly.  These people always see the worst possible scenario and present it as the facts.

 
schwanz9000 said:
I did what I could to address some of his points. We've got a lot of things going on behind the curtain that will need time to fully polish before Gold.
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I appreciate the opportunity to look behind the curtain and I am grateful that you continue to work on the game and improve it.

I may not always agree with decisions of the developers but that's just because everyone has a different play style. One of the best features of 7 Days to Die is that you can mod it so easily. So you can change the game the way you want it to be.

 
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