Greetings, Heroes!
There are a lot of articles written on the Internet about “Pros and Cons of Steam Early Access” both for the game itself and for the players. Today I would like to share with you my thoughts about the upcoming Early Access of Hero's Story and how this may affect the game.
Firstly, I am sure that in my case Early Access is rather good than bad. Some players are waiting for the game from 2013, and after a series of transfers, failures and frost, it is better to release the project at least in some state than not releasing at all - otherwise Hero's Story risks joining the “cool games that the world never saw”.
Secondly, Early Access will help get feedback from you, dear players, and make the game better. For example, now I think that there are more than enough dungeons, and they are well balanced, but in fact, maybe there are not enough treasures, or the enemies are too strong. There are questions about the design - is it convenient to control the game, does it run correctly on different machines, and which FPS it produces.
Thirdly, in my case (I remind you that I work alone) this is a good way to successfully continue and complete the project from a financial point of view - because I still do not plan campaigns on Kickstarter or similar sites for my projects. Having released the backbone of the game in Early Access, I plan to add new game zones, enemies, quests, and perhaps even game mechanics.
Finally, Early Access can be bad because the game will come out raw and scare away the audience. In the bottom line we have:
Pluses:
+ The price of the game in the Early Access will be less
+ Players will be able to play the game earlier
+ Ability to influence the development process
+ Free updates
Minuses:
- The game may be less stable
- The amount of content in the first versions can be much less
These are my thoughts. What do you think? Let me remind you that Hero's Story Early Access is scheduled for September of this year.
Stay strong! Your faithfully, Silentplaygames.
