Comments suggest commercial exclusivity shenanigans - ie perhaps the ‘early access’ label does not count as ‘launched’ for exclusivity timing purposes.
That smells like some disingenuos obfuscation. I doubt IGN are reviewing anything other than whatever the current version being pushed by Epic is. Is that ‘years worth of additional work’ accessible on Epic (as a beta branch?), or an internal build?
I agree with some of the things in the review, in particular the lack of documentation on things.
That lack of documentation is understandable and expected given they are still building a lot of it out, but it’s still not too good.
And dinging it for not having the advent when that has been announced and the game launch screen says it’s coming is pure silliness by ign.
The complaint about early game battles is a bit on point tho, as well as the way that a good tutorial campaign could really solve both issues (documentation/learning systems and early game enhancement). It is Since which has never had a campaign to 3,so I don’t expect it, but some directed scenarios could help.
The other thing I’m noticing in my first game is that when I went looking for fleet management information (because I remembered it from previous versions), is that it was removed, not just undocumented (per what I read in the forums)
As such, fleet battles suffer from blob stack of doom issues, and your only battle tactics are fleet composition, and maybe a special ability or two.
It really seems to need some better tactical battle options, maybe some ways of flanking, or other tactical options. As is, it’s kind of just throw your stack into battle and watch the spreadsheet calculations play out.
But it is my first game, and I’ve maxed out everything and am mostly in clear out the solar system phase, so all getting a feel for it.
One final note, the review said it is buggy, I wholeheartedly disagree. What’s there certainly appears to be working great and I’ve had zero crashes in 8+ hours of play, and nothing has such it to me at all as not working. There could be something, especially in the areas I haven’t touched in a single game, but I’ve noticed nothing.
Didn’t they do the same thing with GalCiv 4?
It’s not though, since you don’t see that splash screen unless you buy the game. The store page says three factions, not two factions with one more coming soon. I’d argue it’s not even pedantry - the fact is one third of the listed factions are not currently present. Marketing isn’t that hard - just say two factions with a third coming in a free update in August.
I did not follow GalCiv 4, so don’t really know.
So they removed the early access tags to start the countdown on epic store exclusivity clock but the game isn’t actually finished yet, and only IGN put out a review for it?
What in the world.
This is all too common for Stardock now, take EGS money, release game on EGS in an unfinished and pretty terrible state, use Epic for EA , release on Steam when complete, eventually offer steam keys to the Epic Guinea pigs.
Basically added an extra step of having to use the EGS to their EA program.
I probably mentioned it in this thread already, but I learned my lesson with GC4. Especially since they didn’t initially offer Steam keys for EGS buyers and I ended up buying the game twice.
Just another reason I don’t bother with EGS, although in this case it’s on Stardock and not Epic. I’ll just wait until the game is actually done (in terms of 1.0) and buy it on Steam.
I asked about this a couple of weeks ago, but it’s for sale on the Epic Games Store without any sort of disclaimer about beta, early release, early access, or being incomplete. Furthermore, there have been ample opportunities for the developer himself to clarify in this thread.
So unless I’m missing something, it looks to me like version 1.0 or its equivalent is currently available and should be treated as such. If Stardock intended it to be received any differently, seems to me that would be on them for not making it clear on the Epic Games Store.
Anyway, what a depressing outcome. As someone sitting squarely in the target audience (i.e. massive fanboi for the first game), I have no interest in this sequel given its apparently unfinished state, and I can’t imagine this confused release is going to help Sins 2 find an audience going forward. : (
That EGS page is…really misleading. I agree. Dark pattern?
I suspect if Stardock openly said this, it would void their agreement or the means to get future EGS monies, or not count towards winding down the exclusivity, and they know most of their customers won’t use EGS.
If Stardock played Epic on this, I kinda have to admire the business decision, but it has mislead customers.
That said, given Stardock’s history, there’s pretty good odds it will end up finished.
Press should all review it now as final release based on the lack of disclaimers on EGS. Who cares what the devs say on message boards? Super deceitful to foist on EGS hoping word doesn’t get out.
Tom, I have been following the discussion but as the developer I can’t comment one way or the other on the Epic matter. Brad issued official statements to both IGN and PCGamer on May 2nd. My focus is on the game’s design so I’m happy to discuss and answer questions in that domain.
Pyperkub did bring up some design elements yesterday I wanted to discuss but I felt it was inappropriate to interject that into the Epic/IGN discussion. I probably should not have addressed Woolen_Horde’s comments when the Epic discussion began 18 days ago. If I’m asked directly on any game design specific things I will do my best to answer.
Thanks. I’m not really a discord user, so I expect a lot of info is more readily available there.
That makes sense and I absolutely sympathize with your situation here. You’re a hero to me for the work you and your team have done, and I hate that you’re all put in this position. But as a customer who really really wants to play the things Ironclad designs, and who furthermore wants to wait until they’re “finished”, it’s confusing, frustrating, and discouraging.
And I can only imagine how it must feel for y’all. : (
Sorry I’m tired and I’m not sure if that’s a request for more info here or if you would prefer to search/ask through discord despite not begin a regular discord user, or neither. If you want a less painful discord solution, I could do a 5 minute screenshare on the new fleet system and some new tactical options. I admit without a tutorial (forthcoming) I can understand the “blob stack of doom” and “spreadsheet” comments.
Thanks Tom and sorry about the confusion, frustration, and discouragement. The best I can do to make it right is to continue to improve and support the game over the long term.
No worries, I just wanted to thank you for staying engaged here. I’m having some fun figuring it out and regaining my Sins legs after years and years of atrophy.
You should enjoy your weekend!
I do need to figure out how to boost the supply limit tho, and hopefully have it balance appropriately . I can see it being an issue in massively large maps as well as the endgame mop up. RTS endgame is always tricky - it was a huge flaw in Total Annihilation that was better handled in C&C with the Ion Cannon and Nukes. Both in terms of whittling down stacks of doom and preventing turtle stalemate. The Starbase overload self destruct, suicide bomb might be a good strategy against the attack of doom but AI players don’t seem to have tried it.
Hmm. Some good tips here on what makes for a good tutorial:
New video out focusing on the differences between 1 & 2
Edit - Pt 1 is here. I recommend watching them both!