I am a very early supporter of pantheon, i pledged in the kickstarter and when that failed directly after that. I am following the game closely and i am getting worried.
There are 9 races. Each race should have their own starter region. We saw 1(!) of those regions in a pretty unfinished state. A second one is being developed since last year, all we saw so far is concept art.
I don't doubt that the devs are working hard and indeed we see the fruits of that work in the streams, which are pretty impressive. But when i count the work that has *not* been done so far (as far as i know) it's staggering. I understand that further zones (after the elven starter zone) will be faster to do. But how much faster? Half? That would still mean 3 and a half years for all the races alone, not speaking of all the other content.
Now it could be that behind the scenes a lot more is already there in an unfinished state. That a lot of other starter zones and other zones are developed in parallel. the problem here is: We just don't know. What we know is that alpha was supposed to be end of last year (of course it wasn't promised, but hinted at). And now, 10 months later, even in the september newsletter, there isn't even a *hint* of a new alpha date. What happened? I am simply worried. Did they promise too much? Should pantheon shrink down for the start in order to have a working game faster?
I am not proposing that it's all a scam, i don't believe that. But as an early supporter (alpha) i feel i am left too much in the dark. Is pantheon in trouble? I understand (being a dev myself) that committing to a time is hard. But non committing to any time can lead to feature creep and not enough pressure to actually release. I think you should give us a ballpark time for alpha at least and *really* try to stick to it.
I am worried.
Yeah not worried, I can understand how you could be worried, but I'm sure a ton of their attention is in the vip forums and feedback and simply not as much in the community forums, not saying they aren't looking, but the testers and reading what people are thinking that have actually played their game deserve a lot more attention than people who havent, it's really that simple, does it sucks to a point yeah it does, but at least they are listening to the right people, which are the ones that have played their game.
And also making post like these only open up people casting around more doubt and negative posts which was proven last week by many, so again I understand you might be worried but I'd keep it on the low, if it were me, because as soon as you even let that door even become remotely cracked open, some people will blow the door wide open and throw all their negative feeling come out of it as well.
I'm not at all worried.
I do think they may have bitten off more than they can chew with what they think they'll have finished within the next year or so, but still, even if the timeline is exteneded, I'm not worried about it. I like their motto "It'll be ready when it's ready."
Worried? No.
A bit concerned? Yes.
I understand the reasons for not building hopes up too quickly but I think they could be giving a bit more information about the intended timeline than they are.
If anything I see more room for information about the release date than about alpha - contradictory as that may seem.
If they say they hope for alpha by the end of the year and miss it that unleashes a near future wave of pessimism. If they say they hope for alpha by the end of next year that unleashes an *immediate* wave of pessimism. Silence may be best.
But if they said their internal timeline is release by mid-2021 although many things could push this forward or backwards this gives more weal than woe (old Wizardry 1 reference). Not as soon as some hope but few of us still hope for 2020 and it gives the feeling that they have a plan and see a road to success. If they miss it by a bit - no one will be too upset at the time since release will still be near. If they miss it by a *lot* they have worse problems than how this looks.
All dates made up of whole cloth to illustrate the point. I expect alpha between the dates I mentioned. I expect release ....when the game is ready.
((I don't doubt that the devs are working hard and indeed we see the fruits of that work in the streams, which are pretty impressive. But when i count the work that has *not* been done so far (as far as i know) it's staggering. I understand that further zones (after the elven starter zone) will be faster to do. But how much faster? Half? That would still mean 3 and a half years for all the races alone, not speaking of all the other content.))
A legitimate concern - but focusing on getting everything to work perfectly in a limited number of areas is wiser than focusing on getting everything to work poorly in all areas. I expect alpha to cover a few races and a few areas. Not all of Terminus. I expect it to be relatively smooth and relatively attractive as befits a major *public* step forward (not all people will honor the NDA punctiliously and this is why they are delaying alpha until it looks really good). I expect remaining areas and remaining races to be worked on during alpha so that beta will cover a much larger part of Terminus. I hope that if release comes before every race and every class and every area and every game mechanic is ready that they release without any areas or features that would look like garbage and simply say these will come later.
Could Pantheon be in trouble? There is a non-zero chance this could still all fall apart. Nothing is assured, especially when dealing with a crowdfunded endeavor. Hell, even games with the financial backing of a publisher(s) can have problems *cough* Vanguard *cough* EQNext *cough*.
So am I worried? Yeah, I am. I joined this forum in February 2015 which were put up after the Kickstarter. We're well past 5 years into this and not yet in Alpha. That is worrying.
Am I still hopeful? Yes, absolutely yet that hopefulness is tempered by a healthy dose of concern. It is my responsibility as a supporter to continue expressing my concern when I feel it is warranted but to also express my support when that is also warranted.
Let me also note that there are worse things than a game going in the right direction but taking more time than we or the developers wanted or expected.
There are games out there that I could have chosen to invest my emotional capital (as well as some money) into that are going in the *wrong* direction more slowly than expected. Such as *cough* Ashes of Creation *cough*.
Not that making excellent time going in the wrong direction would be any better.
Sometimes wiating is the hardest part. Project Faerthale is an all-hands-on-deck chapter of development for VR. With a polished zone to show off to the world, almost all criticism of lack of progress should be silenced. But if this is rushed, and not as polished as we would like, then that could have dire implications for moving forward with the complete product.
That makes this current period of production pivotal. I don't care so much if there is a lack of communication right now because we have been told that would be the case. Now is not the time to be worried.
Contrary to Vandraad, I am not worried. And for that matter, I'm glad this isn't Vanguard or "EQNext" - LOL.
I may be stupidly optimistic
but I think it already has all or almost all start zones
obviously they are not going to show them this is an exploration game much of the magic is to discover things as you play and they will not let us do that by streaming each zone to show that they have done it
i'd agree that vr has fallen about a year behind schedule.
if i was a betting man, the reason would involve doing some heavy modifications to the unity that set it far behind.
i'm no software genius, but i'd assume it's the same issues i'd get if i was trying to plop a ferrari engine in a soccer mom's minivan.
problems not anticipated comes up like having to reinforce the frame.
need stiffer suspension
need stabilzers for body roll
have to lower the van
need wider tires
replace fuel pump with a high performance vacuum
etc etc
who really knows man, but if i was pr i'd be hush about it. the average consumer always blows negativity out of perporation and causes unessassary stress for devs. hell if i was chris rowan i'd make it law that anyone working on the game don't touch any social media outside of kilsin(pretty sure he's something like pr). excuse my spelling i don't use any auto spelling correction. i'm just a poor pleb that can't afford such luxuries speaking honestly.
Pantheon did have a lot of artwork done early on, but it virtually was all scrapped from what I can tell and they started over.
It doesn't make sense to be building art and levels if you don't have a workflow or immediate plan for how it would work out. A significant amount of the work they are doing is behind the scenes and under-the-hood coding that once is done, is done.
They are also operating with only a handful of artists. Of course, they need more, but again, see the first point I made. Once PF is completed they will have a fundamental difference of how to build the game in place. At that point and only then does it make sense to scale up their artist and world builders to flesh out the world.
I've said early on I would be OK if they only shipped Kingsreach and Reignfall and then add Whitethaw in an expansion. We would just have to wait for a few of the races though.
While there is much to be said about the topic and i agree and disagree on both sides im going to be short and sweet with my opinion. I have said it before but, lack of transperancy does not equate to lack of development. Unforunately all we are doing is speculating.
I'm not worried in the slightest - We reveal work as it is ready to be viewed by the public and there is a lot more going on behind the scenes than what the public see and as with any game development company, we have to keep our cards close to our chest and make sure our reveals are of the quality and standard that we hold ourselves too, being a smaller company has its hurdles but nothing we can't overcome with a bit more time. :)
To reference one of Dortea's statements, I have divested my emotional capital elsewhere while simultaneously continuing to support PRotF. I'm confident the game will release... eventually. In the interim of that I have directed my emotions in another game.
And if the game doesn't release I'm only out a couple hundred bucks but had some good conversations/debates out of it; and when I was emotionally vested, it was really fun having hope for a great game again. I still have hopes for PRotF, but without giving them thousands of dollars to participate in Pre-Alpha work there is no real feedback we can give that can make a difference. I'll get excited again when/if I have a chance to participate more.
But I'm not worried.
Fragile said: I want to know why VR just can't be brutally honest with us, the pledgers, with the status of the game. All of the "internal dates/goals" are horseshit that do nothing but keep us in the dark - guessing and pooling up lots of animosity that could be easily resolved. A simple, "We are aiming for X date, but if Y doesn't get finished, we will have to push. However, we just finished up Z system, so check that box!"Mostly? Because they seem to have a problem with dates and/or estimates, in general..
oneADseven, 2017-09-25: http://pantheonmmo.com/content/forums/topic/6904/pre-alpha-alpha-period/view/post_id/128266 [ I couldn't find the source for this quote ]
"Here is a quote from Kilsin back in January: Kilsin - 01/06/2017 Pre-Alpha is a stepping stone to helping us catch some glaring bugs/issues and helping us set up Alpha testing, it won't for a huge testing period but it will be a very important one, maybe a few weeks/month or two at max then into Alpha"
Brad, 2016-08-21: https://www.frailage.com/index.php/131-aradune-ama
"Timetable for Alpha/Beta: Nothing too specific or set in stone, no, because the most important thing is that we are ready, that the game is ready. Remember, alpha and beta are not like early access, where by design a portion of the game is sold to people. Alpha and beta for us is all about people helping us test the game, the mechanics, the features, the content. If enough of the features and mechanics are not present, or if there is not enough content, then starting bringing in outside people would actually do more harm than good. It would frustrate the tester and it wouldn't provide us with much useful information. So the answer is when we're ready, and we hope to be by the first quarter of next year [2017], but again, no promises."
...
"We want to be in full testing for a full year -- it helped EQ launch in a solid, fairly balanced way, and we want this for Pantheon as well."
Brad, 2017-09-13: http://pantheonmmo.com/content/forums/topic/6904/pre-alpha-alpha-period/view/post_id/127109
" All I can say is this right now: I feel strongly that one of the reasons EQ was successful was that we had a nice, long beta. With Pantheon we don't use the term 'beta' in the same way, however. It's more specific. With Pantheon I can say that Pre-alpha+Alpha+Beta will equal a nice, long period during which we will tune, take feedback, tweak, enhance what needs to be made better and yank anything that seemed like a great idea but when exposed to real players just doesn't pan out. "
Kilsin, 2016-07-18: https://www.pantheonmmo.com/content/forums/topic/3723/game-status/view/post_id/58099
" We have said many times on these forums, in podcasts and streams etc. that testing is not ready and will be hopefully announced early next year [2017] but that is still not set in stone. As we have also said before it is just too hard at this stage of development to give time frames or even estimations since being unable to meet them disappoints many people, so instead we just work our butts off and announce news when we have it, that won;t change until we get further into development or receive investor funding. "
Kilsin, 2017-02-26: https://www.pantheonmmo.com/content/forums/topic/5397/beta-information/view/post_id/96978
" There is no set time length for any testing phase, we will continue testing until we feel the game is in a good place and ready for the next testing phase or for full release, but it is impossible to predict when that will be or how long it will last. "
Kilsin, 2017-02-21: https://www.pantheonmmo.com/content/forums/topic/2213/where-is-my-beta-download/view/post_id/95418
" Pre-alpha is soon, we are working out butts off to get the game ready for that amount of people and getting everything into the game that we need tested, once it is ready, we will announce it with plenty of warning for people to take holidays/time off etc. as previous stated. " [Pre-Alpha 1 started Dec 6, 2017]
FAQ, 2016-09-08: http://web.archive.org/web/20160908191055/www.pantheonmmo.com/game/faqs/#q45
" What are the approximate timeframes for Alpha, Beta, and commercial release?
There are many variables involved and developing a massively multiplayer game is not an easy thing to do. Our goal is to be in alpha and beta in 2016, and to release the game in 2017. But this is not set in stone, and the above dates are subject to change. "
Brad, 2016-08-17: https://www.reddit.com/r/MMORPG/comments/4y7sd0/i_am_brad_aradune_mcquaid_cco_for_pantheon_rise/d6lmjt6/
" Can you provide any sort of timeframe for alpha/beta?
... we hope to be by the first quarter of next year [2017], but again, no promises."
Kilsin, 2017-10-02: https://www.pantheonmmo.com/content/forums/topic/7004/pre-alpha-mentioned-in-the-stream/view/post_id/129464
" We don;t have a timeframe for PA1 or Alpha/Beta, but PA1 is to help us set the game and servers up for large amounts of people and to help crush and game-breaking bugs that would affect large amounts of people, so however long it takes to get a stable build running minus game breaking bugs is how long Pre-Alpha will last, it may be only a month it may be longer but we won't know until we get in and test. "
None of this makes me think the game is moving along much at all one of the last couple of streams had a lot of gray boxing it's cool it's pre-alpha. but it's been almost a year since they tested a pa test. They haven't don'e a stream since April. They could at least show us those gray boxes are gone nothing special just shows that the game is moving forward. They could send a team into the reckless mage and show that the ai has been fixed. My concern sits the same as the OP. We have how many races and they shown us only 2 starting areas.. I would be ok if they explained more on each races starting area and gave us only a couple screenshot of tothe starting areas of other races that way they keep stuff hid but lets us see it's moving along. Hell We still haven't even seen all the game models for all the races. We have seen concept art but nothing else. Like lest see the ones we have not seen? So ya I'm wondering if the game is moving forward or dieing.