Early Access: When will it stop?

oXYnary

Look, I know, I have heard the comments about Greenlight and Early Access supposedly changing. When though?? It's becoming almost an embarrassment to release your title only on Steam. Especially if you do Early Access. While there are plenty of great Early Access Games out there (a few made by members here), the bad publicity of the crap is ruining it for everyone.

What really gets me? How the hell did Zen Fish Simulator get through? Killjoy already has the craptacular Air Control on it. Which it at least initially was using copyrighted music they stole from a Bandcamp musician. They have gone a step further with this one by stealing music from film this time.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxNqXwGBjMs"]ZEN FISH SIM - The NEW Worst Game Since Air Control - YouTube[/ame]


Is the whole Greenlight to Early Access an auto process? Why is there absolutely no checks or balances before allowing a game to be sold?

I mean cmon, look at this. Fetish Games... Really?

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wppr9Hb4PiM"]GENDER BENDER DNA TWISTER EXTREME - Aw Here Goes - YouTube[/ame]

Fuiosg

I agree, Valve has really dropped the ball and it's making steam look like the android market. Not to mention it's putting a bad taste in everyone's mouth for an otherwise legit idea of prefunding games.

Black_Stormy

Yeah the bar for acceptance is very low. My mod recently got greenlit and we were all so excited. But now we're seeing more and more that it's not that great an acheivement. It's kind of a letdown really.

SuperFranky

Lack of control from Valve is what really killing the whole idea. I hope they do something about it soon, because right now it's a hot mess.

NegevPro

I'm not entirely sure how the system works but with the current setup, it seems like it's impossible to NOT get your project greenlit. Votes don't expire and I'd imagine you just need a certain amount of votes to get in, so theoretically speaking, every submission will make it onto Steam at some point, and that is very alarming. Years ago, getting on Steam was a life changing event, now the market is so saturated with garbage that most developers are probably making nothing from it.

I think the issue stems from the fact that users can vote for everything they can find the time for. People will likely feel guilty for not letting a game developer have a chance at profiting off of their game, and so they'll end up upvoting everything they see. I try to limit myself to 5-6 votes a month so that I only upvote the best looking projects, but even I'm guilty of upvoting games that look cool that I wouldn't purchase myself.

Makkon

You guys realize they stopped Greenlight and are no longer curating it, right?
http://indiestatik.com/2014/01/16/greenlight-2/
http://www.pcgamer.com/2013/02/09/valve-gabe-newell-steam-greenlight/

tynew

Makkon wrote: »

You guys realize they stopped Greenlight and are no longer curating it, right?
http://indiestatik.com/2014/01/16/greenlight-2/
http://www.pcgamer.com/2013/02/09/valve-gabe-newell-steam-greenlight/

That just looks like they want to phase it out. I can go on greenlight right now and put a project up. They also let in another 50 games on August 2nd?

NegevPro

They haven't really "stopped" it though. I can launch Unity, create a cube with a basic character controller, and pay $100 and I can submit "Doob Simulator 2014" to Greenlight and hope that people who chuckle once at the name will upvote. Nothing is stopping me from doing any of that, in fact, you can just submit a concept and get around the $100 fee. You could go a step further with a garbage game and start an indiegogo campaign for it too, kind of like what the guys who made "Rock Simulator 2014" did.

Valve has already acknowledged that Greenlight in its current state is broken and problematic, but it seems like they have made no attempts at fixing the problem. Given their track record when it comes to fixing basically anything, it's fair to assume this problem will keep going on for quite some time.

gsokol

Yeah, I'm worried that the lack of quality control is just going to flood steam with shit games and over saturate.

Imagine if the XBOXLive indie games marketplace wasn't a separate thing on the 360. You would be digging through 100s of booger picking simulators to find any decent games.

Shrike

Valve is killing of PC game distribution as we know it. Soon Steam will be like the app store, with unending stuff to dig through and you have to rely on spotlights and whatnot to be seen. Valve has the monopol and they abuse it (how surprising)
The prices will drop towards zero and free to play will be the norm, you already can barely sell your game the normal way with 1$ a dozen at humble etc.

Also its the peoples fault, if everyone keeps shoving tons of money into obvious frauds like DayZ, you can be sure that others will follow the example and grab onto some quick cash.

eld

Shrike wrote: »

Also its the peoples fault, if everyone keeps shoving tons of money into obvious frauds like DayZ, you can be sure that others will follow the example and grab onto some quick cash.

Just because you are unhappy about how something is developed doesn't make it a fraud.

Two Listen

On one hand, yeah, it would be great if people weren't able to get lame shit on Steam so easily and all of the games I had to look at where awesome. On the other hand, it's not exactly hard to ignore early access titles or games you think are shit. Steam had a bazillion games on it prior to Greenlight that I never cared to look at, either because I just wasn't interested or it didn't look that great. Having more of them doesn't change the way I judge and decide to buy games.

oXYnary

Shrike wrote: »

if everyone keeps shoving tons of money into obvious frauds like DayZ, you can be sure that others will follow the example and grab onto some quick cash.

You had me to that. DayZ updates every month. You might not like its speed of development, but that's your personal expectations. Which btw are not based on the normal speed of game development.

Please separate your rant with games that actually deserve to be called out as crap and obvious money grabs. Example: Earth 2066. One of the few games Steam actually took off the market.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHhbvDhPU7U"]EARTH: YEAR 2066 - Prepare To Vomit Everywhere! - YouTube[/ame]