About EA readiness

[NikofrankoV]

We have all taken the survey... hopefully! if you didn't - go do it! Anyways! I thought I should share my thoughts.

Is Starbase ready for EA? Short answer that everyone clearly realizes - no, it's not.

With that out of the way, here I go typing away as I always do.

Long answer:

I fully expect Starbase to release into EA in SUMMER OF 2021. Yap, i am sad too :c But it's necessary, we can all see that gameloops are still lacking and even with stations, it would only add 50ish hours of gameplay even for the most dedicated players. As of now, the only game loop, is not even a "loop" as in, mine for resources -> design a ship -> get the ship -> fight.... people...? There is no end game. Yes, SSC is very engaging for some, but as we can clearly see, even the largest current factions in the game suffer from severe burnout.

So! What integral parts is Starbase still missing? Here are my top 4 picks.

1: Full faction functionality
2: Piracy being profitable
3: Network lag needs fixing
4: Economy

lets look at them individually

1: Factions
The most important, and most likely, the hardest part is: Factions. And i do not mean factions, as in only the "companies" that are already in the game, no. I mean that the full faction gameplay must be finished before EA. that includes:

-Station capture mechanics (or at least their beta)
-Faction Blueprints
-Faction ranks\roles\permission functionality finalized
-Faction finances, station tax and player "salaries"
-General faction aesthetics faction color, avatars, medals, that kind of shiny pleasantries (this on is least important of the list)

Station capture.
right now, there is no end game, not even for a single player, let alone a faction. There needs to be an endgame loop for factions before the game enters EA. The only way i see it happening is by introducing some sort of a station capture mechanic. It does not to be in it's finilized form, it can be EXTREMELY hard, but it needs to be there to provide content for people who spent 100+ hours in the game.

Factions and companies are at the core of Starbase gameplay. Imagine releasing EVE in EA without companies... wut? No, new players must be able to see, that it is an integral, important AND a fully functional aspect of the game the second they join. Faction blueprints are an ABSOLUTE must! Right now sharing BPs even inside a friendly discord group is an unpleasant chore, and as we can clearly see, a very insecure one, both Spatha and The Knight have leaked in the first 2-3 weeks of alpha. This can NOT be the case in EA! Newcomers must be able to see at least some faction BPs when they open the faction screen, or at least see their names and descriptions.

Faction roles
To be fair, i do not remember at what state SB faction roles are. But by the time it reaches EA, roles must be finished. As in: Factions must be able to control what rank can access what BPs and how much Faction funding they are allowed. Very important aspect of starbase in my opinion. Climbing the ranks of a faction should be rewarded in a meaningful way.

Faction finances
This goes without saying. What's the point of a faction? what?! FUN?! pfffft! Get out of here! Give me MONEY! Just like in the real world - nothing gets done without money. The same applies here, factions absolutely NEED their own credit accounts, station/store taxes and salaries to players. (I think factions should be able to set a "daily login" salary for it's members based on their rank)

Aesthetics
Okay, i confess, this one is not that important. I just really want a faction specific cape :3


Fewf! First point done! ONWARDS! TO PIRACY!

2: Yaaaarrr!
Harr! Fiddle di di! Everyone here, likes PVP!
Seriously though. a HUGE number of players *CHOGH* mostly fellow Russians *COUGH* are here to shoot things and not much else. The only way i see a single player who came to the game to enjoy PVP is for Piracy to become at least somewhat profitable. It's the easiest way to 1: introduce a beginner pvp game loop to the game 2: Make players feel unsafe outside of safezones. In my 400+ hours, i was only ever attacked once and even then it was just an inside joke of a faction rather than a pirate. That can not be the case in EA. Maybe increase the prices of salvaged parts, maybe introduce bounties, SOMETHING! The game really needs some pvp elements and currently it has none at all. That needs to change before EA!

3: Network Lag
Oh boy. Well, you all know this is a problem. Starbase can not go into EA with the current state of combat. Not at all. Have you seen the unedited Boltcrackers Tournament videos? Holy bob! It's painful to watch! Literally! It hurts my eyes! Until starbase can reliably handle a fight between 10 reasonably sized ships, it can not enter EA. The trailer you released showed hundreds of ships! Imagine peoples reactions when they see the combat with 20 people! No. This has to be addressed before the game becomes available. 100%

4: Economy
Ecenomy needs to be finished before game enters EA. Not finalized.... finished. Meaning, you need to be able to sell whatever, to whomever. I need to be able to set prices and taxes on my station. Want to buy a gun, but station prices are too high? - i ask people in chat to sell you one! Want to buy a cool ship you saw me fly? No problem! That will be 10 mil credits! A living and breathing economy is one of the main selling points of the game, even if it will have it's exploits and weaknesses, it HAS to be there.

A.... crap... how was that saying... A.... A.... A good game is evntually good? But a bad one.... crap... uuuhmmm... shuks... i forgot it...
You know what i f****** mean! Ugh, the last cider was a mistake...

Thank you for reading! Hopefully this was a bit of help to... anyone?
Keep at it devs! You rock!
Well, that's about all i wanted to say in regards of Starbase EA readiness. If you have anything to add or object, please do!
Please leave responses, i need artificial validation for writing walls of text! Please! I have been in quarantine for two weeks now! Halp!

 

[TGess]

The faction stuff is somewhat questionalbe but I agree on the economy. Snadbox MMO without working economy is like WoW without mobs, just loses all the sense.

 

[Meboy1000]

The faction stuff is somewhat questionalbe but I agree on the economy. Snadbox MMO without working economy is like WoW without mobs, just loses all the sense.

The faction stuff is absolutely necesarry, a massive amount of the gameplay revolves around factions, currently the only thing "companies" do is display a tag and create a chat section, we need a bank account specifically very badly. Dont forget we are talking about how it needs to be for EA, when thousands upon thousands join at once.

 

[MyrddinE]

The only way i see a single player who came to the game to enjoy PVP is for Piracy to become at least somewhat profitable. [...] In my 400+ hours, i was only ever attacked once

The primary reason PvP is rare is because population is low; you never encounter people outside the safe zones. Also there are no bases, gates, or other points of interest outside safe zones that cause players to congregate organically. Once more players are in the game and these POI exist piracy will shoot up even with the current (low) rates of compensation. With two huge mechanics (population, unsafe POI) that encourage conflict yet to exist I don't think it makes sense to worry about how common PvP will be yet.

 

[JoelFB]

Thanks, these are all agreeable points. We're working on all of these.

The saying you were looking for, the one that we also like, is probably this:

"A delayed game is eventually good, but a bad/rushed game is bad forever."

See here for some later reflection. This is of course a bit subjective and there are some exceptions, but generally delaying is almost always the right choice, at least for the game quality. This applies more to "normal" game releases and less to an Early Access like Starbase, but even in Early Access it must be the best possible version of the game, because most players will not care or believe in future promises. It must be good right then at release.

Also I should perhaps elaborate on the survey a bit: While many would like to explain their thoughts and ratings in more detail, that isn't really as necessary as it feels. We're using the survey to get numerical data over a period of time. We actually want to get low ratings right now, because that means future updates have room to grow, and we can see the progress in a numerical sense as well.

We did the first test survey in June, and now in early November there's a very logical increase in the ratings. I'm not sure if we want to publish these, but maybe I'll reflect on them later, maybe after EA release or so. The results will always be slightly biased (more positive than the actual release time players, who will probably not be willing to spend a lot of time until forming an opinion), but we still have a lot of room for improvement even for our Alpha players. We'll see how the upcoming features change your thoughts next month or so!

- Joel, Frozenbyte team, developers of Starbase

 

[NikofrankoV]

Thanks, these are all agreeable points. We're working on all of these.
- Joel, Frozenbyte team, developers of Starbase

Hm, I feel like publishing, or at least talking about the increase in survey ratings would be a good little piece of info to add to the monthly news. Like, you can just say, "we made good progress here* here* and here* while this* and this* still require quite a bit of work" I feel like that would add more clarity and trust for the people waiting for EA. But, obviously, it's up to you guys.

P.S.
I like how you signed your credentials even though they are all in your pfp

 

[JoelFB]

I didn't remember this was the Alpha forums, so added the signature out of habit for people who might read it without knowing.

We'll see about the publishing of the survey results. It's really for us internally to keep track of the overall progress, but I see why it would be interesting to players too... Maybe I could pick a few of the most important questions. So let's see when it's time to close it (a week or two I think, before the big waves anyway).