Wiping, To Keep You Fresh

Says the guy unwilling to roll with the punches coming his way...

This is what we informed of. Wipes and a game that is constantly in flux. This is the stage of development that we are at. And guess what? It is working.

New content is being added, and bugs are getting squished. Exactly as planned. If you have a problem playing the game like this, then maybe you should stop playing until stage 2 of beta. Your blood pressure may thank you.

 

Actually, that's not true.

Wipes are only necessary if you lack the time, effort and/or resources to properly integrate updates into the pre-existing save files.

My only assumption at this time is that Chucklefish would rather spend more time and effort making updates that greatly impact the nature of the game, as opposed to smaller ones that have little impact, because half of the time is spent on integrating the patch.

 

You assume too much for knowing so little.

 

Guy makes joke, dooshbag signal goes up, thread fills with very serious people making what they think are NOT pointless and tedious arguments. It makes me wonder how such humorless mooks even enjoy a creative game.

Wipe all you want devs! You will never prevent me from turning my home base into a landfill and my ship into a garbage scow! I wants all the stuffs!

 

I calls 'em likes I sees 'em.

 

Might I offer you a pair of glasses.

I've restarted my character more times than there's been wipes. My last restart was actually due to character corruption, even.

I've accepted that as annoying as it is it's a necessary evil.

I do however understand that to expect such a mindset from hundreds of thousands of people is absolutely ridiculous.

 

I would at least like a little bit of notification, at least an attention notice in the forum informing.. that way I know to make amends. That way its not like I'll going to go back and play.. Oh... well shit. That way i know if I i'm going to Lose a char, or items It wouldn't bother me.. I'd rather be informed of the wipes then getting sucker punched. Its not really the wipes that bother me.. more of fact we're left in the dark.

 

Dude. They changed map generation. So you have a choice. No wipe and no new map content or wipe and new map content.

 

Imagine if there was a "mind wipe" and the game made you forget you played the last patch. Now that would keep things fresh.

 

The wipes are a double edged sword.

For a public game, even in beta, causing your players to have to spend hours starting over is very frustrating and annoying. The matter manipulator is very slow to break anything, and going out at night is mostly for the brave.

From a development standpoint, the wipes are understandable. The best way to ensure the updates work and players don't get many issues with them is by starting fresh. Back when Minecraft was in Alpha/Beta, new world generation changes meant you either had to restart the world to get the new things, or you had to venture ever further just to get the world to generate the new things in new world chunks, which also resulted in funky splits between the old and newly generated chunks.

If this were a fully released, non-beta status game, then yes, the wipes are completely unnecessary, unless there was something game breaking within player files that had to be purged, but something like that is unlikely to ever be an issue.

As far as being compensated for the wipes. I think the added content is the compensation. Nothing special beyond that should be expected.

 

I kinda like the wipes. After every wipe I start the game with a new race, and since I go to random places instead of retreading ground... I keep on finding new things I wouldn't have otherwise. Besides... its a Beta. The point is to help test the game. If everyone is running around with top tier characters, then item progression up to that point isnt being tested.

 

It'd be more acceptable if it was a free beta. But it's a paid for beta.

 

Why should that make a difference?

 

One of the wonders of the land of "Early Access".

Also, don't lie, even if this was a free beta we would see complains anyway.

 

I wonder when "early access" changed definition to "alpha tester"?

In BF4 for example, you get release quality early access... Or perhaps other people get delayed access, lol.


If you pay for "beta" access, you basically expect your money to do something besides frustrate you. I'm pretty sure I'm done with this "beta" test until it actually hits beta, what the devs call phase 3.

 

I do not like Steam's name "Early Access". It implies things that are not true, making it sound like we are just getting access to the full game ahead of time.

Chucklefish has never even implied this would be anything other than a rapidly changing beta early on. Unfortunately, that information did not make it across clearly enough on the Steam page.

 

"Votes in poll & see's results."

I wouldn't have expected anything less. I'm happy the majority are good with wipes.

 

It pretty much didn't make it across at all. Most of the people who learned of the game via Steam thought it was good to go and paid money to play early for a late-Beta game, like most of the other Early Access games. Turns out, the game is late-alpha instead.

Whoever figured out that they could get people to pay to test instead of paying them to test is a genius.

 

Just remember Rule #1 in EVE Online: "Do not fly anything you cannot afford to loose." Then tweak it for Starbound and its "Don't gather or build anything you are afraid to loose." Write it on a post-it and leave it on your monitor for the remainder of the SB Beta.

 

^ this.