Love Goes Into Alpha, Proves Internet Full Of Jerks
An upcoming MMOG title I have been looking forward to with a lot of glee is Love, the one-man-band game currently in development by Eskil Steenberg. Everything, from the game's engine to the graphics renderer to the AI, has been developed from scratch solely by Eskil, a pretty monumental achievement when you consider the small armies behind the development of games like World of Warcraft or Warhammer Online. Eskil recently released an alpha client of the game that, while not actually playable, would be used to generate hardware statistics as well as tell him the level of interest for the game. That level was apparently 11, because days later the first playable alpha client was made available to interested customers.
"Customers" is the operative word here because Love boasts what I believe has to be a first (save perhaps outside of Second Life, oh snap); to access the alpha client you have to purchase a 30-day voucher for a fee of 3 euros.
While this is pretty unorthodox, it necessitates repeating: this is being developed out of pocket entirely by one person who has to cover the servers and bandwidth in order to actually offer the game. And 3 euro comes out to roughly six USD, so this is really a pittance. It's also a decision-- either pay to check it out now or wait for the full version. When most MMOG alphas and betas are under NDAs and offered to selected individuals and not the public at large this offers a pretty unique opportunity for players to see the game a lot earlier than they normally would, even if its state is in flux.
Nevertheless the complainers have been out in full swing, "outraged" at paying the price of a Starbucks frappuccino for early access. I wouldn't normally take the time to complain about something like this myself but I really have difficulty with the increasingly pervasive mentality of entitlement that stretches across the internet. It's also doubly upsetting given that Love is entirely the work of one person, a fact that keeps getting ignored by more and more whiners.
One comment on Eskil's blog, in particular, was the most ire-rising for me:
I hope you plan to do something for the players that you are requiring to pay to test your game, even if it is as simple as as not wiping their accounts or giving them name selection priority at live. These testers will likely be your most loyal fans, and you requiring them to pay money to alpha test the game can and will be taken as crass and unappreciative of their time.Your post about not guaranteeing that playtime will carryover to Beta seems to indicate that you do not plan to do so, and thus that you do not respect the time they are donating to polish your unfinished product. If that is the case, you may want to look into hiring a more experienced business manager to filter your company's interactions with its customers. Maybe you can use the money you earn from the first-ever "paid alpha" (which FYI, you just invented).
Really now.
Personally, I grabbed a voucher the moment I saw they were available, and even though I didn't have the slightest idea of what I was doing and died too many times to count the game is just amazing to look at. The entirety of it is procedurally driven and the art style of the game is deeply impressionistic, like walking through a Monet painting. For six bucks it was worth it to me, if only to finally whet my appetite for a game I've been excited about for months.
Hopefully the people complaining the loudest about this slight get some perspective; hopefully further this unnecessary aggression doesn't dissuade Eskil from continuing development in the face of a hostile minority. I know I'm extremely eager to play the full game and can't wait for its completed release.
mixvio
Posted to MMOs, Miscellany on 2 October 2009
· Comments (9)
Other stuff like this: complaining, entitlement, eskil steenberg, love, mmog, PC
So basically, what you're saying is that rather than hiring testers, it's acceptable for software developers to have their testers (not even beta testers, but alpha testers) pay them, and you actually hope that this business model succeeds.
Would you have been this enthusiastic if this business model were being applied to, say, "X-Men Nemesis 4: Apocalypse Of The Imperfects 2"? If not, do you realize that this makes you a fanboy rather than a journalist?
I see both Mixvio's point and yours raindog469.
On the one hand it is ridiculous for someone to need to pay to be the tester for a game. Typically testers get paid for their work, not the other way around.
On the other hand this particular game, Love, is a self-funded project by a single person. Eskil isn't a company, and simply cannot afford to hire a team of testers. And since the game is an MMO, servers need to be maintained, and the cost will add up. Most of the time indie developers ask for donations to help fund their games, it just so happens that a donation to this game also gets you access to the alpha build.
There is also the fact that Eskil is not asking people to pay to test the alpha version for him. The server test that he wants to perform is a free download. The paid download is for people to actually have a chance to play the game, which the free server test did not let them do. This is different from asking for alpha testers since Eskil is not requiring people to send in detailed bug reports on issues that they find or any other actual work. It is simply a demo of a very early version of the game.
Personally, I'm not a fan of the way Eskil is going about it by having people pay to access the alpha. I'm a much bigger supporter of free demo access with the option to donate so that I can actually play the game and make sure that it's worth funding before I put down the money to support him. But considering that this is an MMO, and servers are costly, I can understand why he needs to charge for actually playing the game. I just worry that it's one more hurdle that will prevent the game from getting the mass audience that it deserves.
Normally, I would agree with raindog's train of thought - but as this game is being fully developed and funded by a single person, I feel like this is an acceptable exception.
If paying for a voucher really upsets you so much, then don't pay for it. It really is as simple as that.
It's only fair to get offended by pricing if it affects something you've already invested in.
@raindog469: It would only be fanboyism if X-Men were also made by one person.
As others have said, I think Love is most definitely in a category of its own. I plopped down the cash for it happily. I just don't see this as some great affront to players.
Now if EA were to do this I'd tell them to go pound dirt.
I agree with what others have said. There really is no basis for comparison, this is simply a good way for him to recoup his loses to date, and even just the servers probably set him back a pretty penny that's probably about the size of his life savings. He's doing what usually takes entire teams of game designers to do, I imagine there are a number of people out there boggling, scratching their heads and wondering how the fuck he's doing this. Seriously, I wonder too, it's no small feat even getting this far. If this money makes it more likely he can see this through then I'm all for the idea.
raindog469:
"So basically, what you're saying is that rather than hiring testers, it's acceptable for software developers to have their testers (not even beta testers, but alpha testers) pay them, and you actually hope that this business model succeeds."
--
Well no, I didn't really say that anywhere.
As others did a great job of pointing out already, there's no way to compare Love to a title developed by a full team. It's a game created and run entirely by one person. If EA did this I'd be rightly irritated by it, but it would still be the choice between paying for early access or waiting for the full release. A recent game I've also been looking forward to, Gratuitous Space Battles, allowed people access to a testing beta of the game if they preordered early. People gnashed their teeth about that, being asked to pay upfront before a demo was even released, but it's a similar concept: if you want to play early, pay for it. If you don't, it's perfectly acceptable to still just wait for the full release.
That's not his business model, either. He said that eight thousand people downloaded the test client in the few days it was open, but even if all eight thousand of them went ahead and bought the alpha tokens, the 3-euro a piece wouldn't cover the bandwidth and server costs to provide them access. He still suspects he's going to be losing money on this, even charging people a small amount, but it's helping to cushion the costs. I don't really think it's that unreasonable, and people who disagree can simply wait for the full release. Even if I had logged in and hated it (and I suspect that most of my first 30 days won't be used anyway until the other users get a better idea on what to do and pass that knowledge on to those of us like me that don't have the time we want to experiment) I still would've thought it was worth the 6 USD.
Finally, I wouldn't be so lofty as to attach the journalist title to myself. ;)
Paying to participate in a closed test is not a new thing. Many games require you to have a FilePlanet subscription to participate, which costs money. Is this not paying to test? Some games even require you to pre-order, this is even worse in my opinion.
As a game developer, I am deeply impressed by Steenberg's epic efforts. I am downloading the game and I will gladly pay because I simply WANT to support him.
I understand that these are my personal reasons, possibly not valid for other individual, but I don't really understand why anyone could be bothered by him asking for some support, specially when I am pretty sure that many of these complainers paid twenty times more to play other games without giving a thought to it. I mean, he is not pointing a gun to your head to pay, isn't it? Don't you want to pay? That's Ok. The game is called Love... let's spread that word, please.