Stardate: 24204.2

Today, we bring news regarding the future of Star Trek: Infinite, a journey we've embarked on together with a lot of excitement.

Sadly, we must inform you that Star Trek: Infinite will not receive further updates.

Together, we've explored distant worlds, faced formidable adversaries, and created a community bound by a shared love for the Star Trek universe.

We want to extend our gratitude to those who have been the backbone of this journey. To the incredible team at Nimble Giant whose dedication and creativity made Star Trek: Infinite a reality. Working alongside such a talented group has been a privilege.

Equally, our partners at Paramount deserve a world of thanks. Your support and insights have been an invaluable resource, enriching our development process and enabling us to craft the game that stands before our community today. Your commitment to this project has helped us navigate the vastness of the Star Trek universe with authenticity and passion.

Lastly, we cannot express enough gratitude for you, our community, for your support, enthusiasm, and dedication. Your engagement, feedback, and passion have been the driving force behind this adventure. You've built more than just a player base; you've forged a community of explorers united under the banner of Star Trek.

Though our journey in updating Star Trek: Infinite concludes here, the universe we've created together remains. The legacy of Star Trek: Infinite will live on through you, the community, and the adventures you continue to share.

Thank you for being a part of this incredible voyage, live long and prosper.

 

[m_spencer]

Also tried to gat a refund, but it was declined by Steam. Played the game more than 2 hours.

Yeah so, same, I left the game open apparently because there's no way I ever played that game for more than an hour or two.

Here's my perspective on this...

I've spent thousands with Paradox. I've been a loyal HoI4, Vic3, and Stellaris player since all of those games launched, and previously HoI3 and HoI2.
I've been your perfect customer. I've bought all the DLC basically at launch, I've bought the season passes, I've supported PDX's development efforts.

And I was suckered by STI. After years of playing STNC, I naively thought NGE would bring needed changes to the engine to make it a better Star Trek product, and perhaps we'd see mods like STNC move over to, basically, an updated version of Stellaris with more Star Trek-like mechanics. Just a better fit.

Instead, we got a half-baked generic game with AI-generated art, pitiful content, and bugs that were just never addressed or fixed.

And I'm supposed to blame... Embracer?

This is a major publisher L in a long line of recent L's for Paradox, and no, I'm not viewing this as just a failure by the publishing side of the house.

You've burned me forever over $30.
And the response in other threads is "well that sounds like a conversation you need to have with Steam."

I'm pissed, and it will affect my future purchases from PDX in general. It doesn't matter if it was a PDX or Embracer-developed game - as the publisher, Paradox knowingly put out a critically flawed, incomplete product with no plans for support after it failed to garner any daily active users.

Predatory publishing practices and inability to take responsibility mean I am, unfortunately, going to be much more skeptical about anything coming out.
So, no Millennia, no Life By You, no more Victoria 3 expansions, no Tinto, and no CS2. All over the $30 for the scam game that PDX could easily refund all of us, because they've no doubt written down the loss in their financials already.

 

[Herrebrugh]

AI-generated art

Really? I didn't spot that...

 

[SAS]

Yeah so, same, I left the game open apparently because there's no way I ever played that game for more than an hour or two.

Here's my perspective on this...

I've spent thousands with Paradox. I've been a loyal HoI4, Vic3, and Stellaris player since all of those games launched, and previously HoI3 and HoI2.
I've been your perfect customer. I've bought all the DLC basically at launch, I've bought the season passes, I've supported PDX's development efforts.

And I was suckered by STI. After years of playing STNC, I naively thought NGE would bring needed changes to the engine to make it a better Star Trek product, and perhaps we'd see mods like STNC move over to, basically, an updated version of Stellaris with more Star Trek-like mechanics. Just a better fit.

Instead, we got a half-baked generic game with AI-generated art, pitiful content, and bugs that were just never addressed or fixed.

And I'm supposed to blame... Embracer?

This is a major publisher L in a long line of recent L's for Paradox, and no, I'm not viewing this as just a failure by the publishing side of the house.

You've burned me forever over $30.
And the response in other threads is "well that sounds like a conversation you need to have with Steam."

I'm pissed, and it will affect my future purchases from PDX in general. It doesn't matter if it was a PDX or Embracer-developed game - as the publisher, Paradox knowingly put out a critically flawed, incomplete product with no plans for support after it failed to garner any daily active users.

Predatory publishing practices and inability to take responsibility mean I am, unfortunately, going to be much more skeptical about anything coming out.
So, no Millennia, no Life By You, no more Victoria 3 expansions, no Tinto, and no CS2. All over the $30 for the scam game that PDX could easily refund all of us, because they've no doubt written down the loss in their financials already.

On the Discord the game developers, not PDX, specifically stated there was no AI art.

 

[Oleg V.F.]

In March 2024, Beacon Interactive inc bought part of Saber Interactive from Embraer Group, which includes Nimble Giant Entertainment. The Stellaris engine was used in the development of Star trek Infinite. As far as I understand, the rights to the Stellaris engine belong to Paradox Interactive, which means that the future fate of this game should be decided by Paradox Interactive itself. The interesting thing here is that the developers from Nimble Giant were fired even before the sale part of Saber Interactive, which included Nimble Giant. Which, most likely, came as a surprise to the publisher Paradox Interactive itself. The question is, what will Paradox Interactive do in this situation? But one thing is clear that from January 2024 to the present day, there have been no positive changes in the game due to the current situation, and the company has chosen to remain silent, creating the ground for negative feedback from users of the game. Did Paradox Interactive choose to blame the failure of the game on those who bought the game in the hope of getting a good game and stop further development of the game?

 

[Carighan]

A half-baked product. Where's the refunds?

But eh, the game contains what it did when you paid for it?

Depending on on where you bought it you might be able to refund it via that store, but it's exactly as baked as you decided was worth shelling out cash for it. If that's not enough and you would like to request a refund for it, that doesn't track at all with still having paid money for it, no? The state of the game was well-known at release, and reviews backed how it was okay, but nothing more than that.

 

[Oleg V.F.]

But eh, the game contains what it did when you paid for it?

Depending on on where you bought it you might be able to refund it via that store, but it's exactly as baked as you decided was worth shelling out cash for it. If that's not enough and you would like to request a refund for it, that doesn't track at all with still having paid money for it, no? The state of the game was well-known at release, and reviews backed how it was okay, but nothing more than that.

Are you trolling? Feel the difference between a game with support at the time of release and a game with bugs without support in the crisis? At the moment when the game was purchased, was it known that this crisis would come and the game would lose the support of the publisher?

 

[Chufu]

Steam is not giving any refunds and refer to their policies, which is less than 2 hours played and owned less than 14 days. In my case I played the game for 73 min, put it down, because I wanted to give it some patches, then come back to it, but now I keep reading it's basically dead, studio closed and game will not receiving any further updates, great.

So because I own the game for more than 14 days, Steam is not refunding me and the game is still buggy in some bits, so my motivation to play through is a bit... not there, especially if I could instead just put my time into Stellaris, which is a more "smooth" gaming experience from my point of view.

But that's not my point, my point is that I am owning a dead game now that will not receive any further updates and I can't get a refund for it either.

This has definitely an impact on any further purchases from Paradox for me personally. Especially if Paradox decides to not grant any refunds either.

 

[SAS]

Knowing Stellaris had dev working on the game engine how was ST not developed to take fixes from that engine into their game? The fact the fleet builder was bugged in ST but fixed in Stellaris many patches ago was a let down for me.

 

[MYstIC_G]

Stardate: 24204.2

View attachment 1093679
Today, we bring news regarding the future of Star Trek: Infinite, a journey we've embarked on together with a lot of excitement.

Sadly, we must inform you that Star Trek: Infinite will not receive further updates.

Together, we've explored distant worlds, faced formidable adversaries, and created a community bound by a shared love for the Star Trek universe.

View attachment 1093680
We want to extend our gratitude to those who have been the backbone of this journey. To the incredible team at Nimble Giant whose dedication and creativity made Star Trek: Infinite a reality. Working alongside such a talented group has been a privilege.

Equally, our partners at Paramount deserve a world of thanks. Your support and insights have been an invaluable resource, enriching our development process and enabling us to craft the game that stands before our community today. Your commitment to this project has helped us navigate the vastness of the Star Trek universe with authenticity and passion.

View attachment 1093681

Lastly, we cannot express enough gratitude for you, our community, for your support, enthusiasm, and dedication. Your engagement, feedback, and passion have been the driving force behind this adventure. You've built more than just a player base; you've forged a community of explorers united under the banner of Star Trek.

Though our journey in updating Star Trek: Infinite concludes here, the universe we've created together remains. The legacy of Star Trek: Infinite will live on through you, the community, and the adventures you continue to share.

Thank you for being a part of this incredible voyage, live long and prosper.

It's outrageous that you're giving out refunds for Cities Skylines II but burning all of our goodwill because we're a smaller install base not making as much noise on the internet.

Do better Paradox, treat everyone the same.

 

[Carighan]

Are you trolling? Feel the difference between a game with support at the time of release and a game with bugs without support in the crisis? At the moment when the game was purchased, was it known that this crisis would come and the game would lose the support of the publisher?

Why would you pay for the game though if you do not enjoy what you got for your money?

As in, the only result of this happening should be that you never actually buy the game. Respectively if you don't feel it's worth the money without enough bugfixing and DLC, that you only buy it once it got all those things.

Why would you pay money for something that, by your own account, is not worth the money and with no guarantee that you get anything for your money in the future? But if you paid that money, then from a consumer perspective clearly the product you paid for was, at the time of purchase, worth the money asked for it. Hence it not becoming more should not negatively affect your evaluation of your purchase, after all you were - clearly - already happy to buy it?

 

[m_spencer]

Why would you pay for the game though if you do not enjoy what you got for your money?

As in, the only result of this happening should be that you never actually buy the game. Respectively if you don't feel it's worth the money without enough bugfixing and DLC, that you only buy it once it got all those things.

Why would you pay money for something that, by your own account, is not worth the money and with no guarantee that you get anything for your money in the future? But if you paid that money, then from a consumer perspective clearly the product you paid for was, at the time of purchase, worth the money asked for it. Hence it not becoming more should not negatively affect your evaluation of your purchase, after all you were - clearly - already happy to buy it?

No, I really disagree with this.

This was supposed to be a good IP acquisition for them, the first Star Trek strategy game in over a decade. It came advertised with a new studio that acted super engaged despite some red flags (they had never seen Star Trek until they took on the contract...), and many of us bought into this as a potential new Stellaris... branch? At least that's what I figured it would be.

We have walshicus's phenomenal STNC mod for Stellaris which expanded upon the already excellent STNH mod to reach Star Trek Encyclopedia levels of content, but, at it's core, all the mechanics are still based around the core, anarchic and free-form Stellaris game model.

Now, they didn't promise us a new way forward, but they sure did hint at it. The possibilities with an experienced tailored towards Star Trek seemed to be worth venturing the $30. At least they, during the dev diaries, had shown every indication that this would be an ongoing effort that they'd, in good faith, try to get right! And NG did act in good faith, at least in everything I saw.

But that's not what happened. We got skeleton content, a game that barely made sense in terms of playthrough, that didn't keep me entertained for more than 45 minutes. But still, there's a chance, hey, it just came out! It'll get better!

A couple of half-hearted patches later, daily active users essentially 0, and ST:I being rightly considered a Paradox-inflicted STI in modding communities, the developer had gone silent and the PDX project manager was nowhere to be found, either. Then, we find out Embracer had disemboweled NG, and Paradox had abandoned the game.

This isn't good faith. The product was presented through its development as something they both wanted to get right, and seemed to be a passion project for them. Instead, we got half-baked content on an old version of the engine, an embarrassment to the IP, with PDX basically ghosting the customers after the product had been misrepresented.

What does all of this mean?
PDX have surely written this game down as an irretrievable financial loss under tax code, so their financial liabilities are probably a little less.
Only a couple thousand people probably bought this game, so that's not a giant financial liability.
Some people must enjoy this game, because they still play mobile games, and some people want that simple Star Trek 4X and want to see Ent-D go pew pew with their Picard leader.
But, PDX should approve, with very few restrictions, a full refund for customers who request it. It's the least they can do, after an unmitigatedly embarrassing release, limited to no support, and an abrubt, prompt execution of the project. I bear none of those people, nor PDX, any ill will, but this is one you kinda have to take on the nose for reasons of customer relations, and doing the right thing.

Hey, they did it with CO and CS2, a *much* more popular title.

 

[Carighan]

No, I really disagree with this.

This was supposed to be a good IP acquisition for them, the first Star Trek strategy game in over a decade. It came advertised with a new studio that acted super engaged despite some red flags (they had never seen Star Trek until they took on the contract...), and many of us bought into this as a potential new Stellaris... branch? At least that's what I figured it would be.

Now, they didn't promise us a new way forward, but they sure did hint at it. The possibilities with an experienced tailored towards Star Trek seemed to be worth venturing the $30. At least they, during the dev diaries, had shown every indication that this would be an ongoing effort that they'd, in good faith, try to get right! And NG did act in good faith, at least in everything I saw.


But that's not what happened. We got skeleton content, a game that barely made sense in terms of playthrough, that didn't keep me entertained for more than 45 minutes. But still, there's a chance, hey, it just came out! It'll get better!

But the purchase was not for an ongoing subscription, or explicitly for "this game as it is + these fixes + this extra content". it was for the product at the time of purchase.

That is, there's 3 scenarios here:

* You pre-purchased the game. In which case your purchase indicates you were okay with the idea of the game being sold for that amount of money, independent of the actual game. Any further development automatically has no impact here, since the original development never did, either. Just the marketing material and sales stuff.
* You bought on-release. Since reviews and previews had already taken an "it's okay, but nothing to write home about"-tone, you were clearly happy with that, for the money asked. I don't see how stopping development matters when you were okay getting Y content for X money, and you still got Y content now?
* You never bought the game (but your post disagrees I would say), in which case... yeah I can see the disappointment, because it's the same as mine. The game was not worth the money asked to me, and now it'll never be. But that's okay, there's more games out there than I got playtime, so eh, someone else gets the money.

What I don't get is this idea of purchasing based on the potential that you might feel your got something worth your money in the future. You can just not pay the money until that state is achieved, no? Because the more companies see how sales tactics and marketing matters, not actual development, the more they'll do it. Do you honestly believe dev diaries aren't carefully tweaked marketing elements, meant to appear however professional or amateur as the publisher wants them to appear to sell that particular product?
(because that's all they are, marketing tactics)

We can't expect this situation to ever improve if we keep re-affirming publishers that these under-develop + over-market tactics based on people happily paying for unreleased or unfinished games are the way forward. Vote with your wallet: Buy the games when they're actually in the state where you get what you want for your money.

 

[Carighan]

Are you trolling? Feel the difference between a game with support at the time of release and a game with bugs without support in the crisis? At the moment when the game was purchased, was it known that this crisis would come and the game would lose the support of the publisher?

Hold on, you were only okay paying money for the product on the baseless assumption with absolutely no legal guarantee or recompense that it would be expanded in the future?

As in, you intentionally and willingly bought a product you, in the state it was in at time of purchase, did not enjoy and did not feel was worth the money asked, entirely because the manufacturer told you "Ah don't worry it'll get better in the future!"... and you didn't just wait for that future to come around before buying?!

What are we doing? As a species? Where did we step wrong if we let hype and marketing drag us around by the nose like that?

(edit)
To re-iterate, I'm not at all happy that this got dropped. I just question who buys a product they don't deem fit for purpose - and openly declare so - but still pay for it, then turns around and is unhappy that it is, indeed, unfit for purpose.

We really need to stop giving publishers this pass. Don't buy the game on the assumption that it'll get fixed in the future. Buy it once it indeed got fixed. That doesn't, however, change what a shame it is that this will never get fixed.

 

[Oleg V.F.]

What I don't get is this idea of purchasing based on the potential that you might feel your got something worth your money in the future. You can just not pay the money until that state is achieved, no? Because the more companies see how sales tactics and marketing matters, not actual development, the more they'll do it. Do you honestly believe dev diaries aren't carefully tweaked marketing elements, meant to appear however professional or amateur as the publisher wants them to appear to sell that particular product?
(because that's all they are, marketing tactics)

You are talking nonsense because the released game had some potential and the possibility of developing content in the future, until they abandoned the development of the game. Any pay add-on is a way to monetize this very potential in the future, which may appear in the game during development. Your reasoning is false and primitive. And your lack of understanding of simple things and the desire to convince otherwise speaks volumes.

Hold on, you were only okay paying money for the product on the baseless assumption with absolutely no legal guarantee or recompense that it would be expanded in the future?

As in, you intentionally and willingly bought a product you, in the state it was in at time of purchase, did not enjoy and did not feel was worth the money asked, entirely because the manufacturer told you "Ah don't worry it'll get better in the future!"... and you didn't just wait for that future to come around before buying?!

What are we doing? As a species? Where did we step wrong if we let hype and marketing drag us around by the nose like that?

In your opinion, it turns out that the user who bought the game does not have the right to receive a high-quality product or to refund money spent on a low-quality product if the developer refuses to further develop it and eliminate errors in the product. You are talking banal nonsense because your opinion is not reasoned. Have you noticed that most people disagree with you? And your position is already clear to me, since you are trying to whitewash the publisher/developer and denigrate the buyer, leading a discussion that the buyer is to blame for his own troubles.

 

[Haakon_XIII]

If I buy a product that does not work well, that does not do what it is expected to do and that has errors, under European law I have the right to have it fixed for free or exchanged for one that works well. If it were a washing machine or a car, no one would doubt that there has been insufficient support seeing how the game is and no one would say "the game contains what it did when you paid for it?". The answer is NO.

 

[Oleg V.F.]

If I buy a product that does not work well, that does not do what it is expected to do and that has errors, under European law I have the right to have it fixed for free or exchanged for one that works well. If it were a washing machine or a car, no one would doubt that there has been insufficient support seeing how the game is and no one would say "the game contains what it did when you paid for it?".

It follows that Paradox publisher and Steam Store violate consumer protection laws by refusing to return to the buyer hard-earned money spent on goods that turned out to be of poor quality due to the fault of the publisher /developer, which indicates the fact of fraud on the part of the store or publisher.

At the same time, in this situation, it is not me who should initiate in the Steam store a refund request, but the publisher Paradox himself should return the money to the customers and at the same time apologize to them. Which, in fact, was not done. Everything else that some people give out here is demagoguery. Upon violation of their rights, and buyer has the right to sue and request compensation for violation of their rights by the publisher or store. The more appeals to the courts, the faster something will change in the Steam store for the buyer. In fact, the 2-hour limit on the launch of the game is a way to deprive us of the right to a refund, which they are currently using.

 

[Carighan]

In your opinion, it turns out that the user who bought the game does not have the right to receive a high-quality product or to refund money spent on a low-quality product if the developer refuses to further develop it and eliminate errors in the product. You are talking banal nonsense because your opinion is not reasoned. Have you noticed that most people disagree with you? And your position is already clear to me, since you are trying to whitewash the publisher/developer and denigrate the buyer, leading a discussion that the buyer is to blame for his own troubles.

That's not at all what I said, and you should be able to parse that from my posts if you actuall read them, sorry.

What I am saying is that when you buy the game, you pay X money for Y product.

Now there's two outcomes here:

* You get what was advertised as being sold to you. If the developer then immediately stopped working on further additions, you should be perfectly content if maybe quite disappointed, but hey after all you got what you paid for, and you certainly deemed that worth the money since you paid for it.
* You did not get what it said on the tin. The game was buggy/broken or the listing was entirely marketing fabrication, genuinely being lies. In which case yes, you should absolutely get a refund, but I assume most people would get that refund immediately with how easy it is nowadays?

More specifically, the buyer could have - trivially, in this case - avoided the trouble at all because it was well known at time of purchase that the game did not live up to epxectations and would need more work. Since we now know no such work will be coming, no purchase was ever made, and hence no refund is necessary. Right? Or alternative, a purchase was made based on false promises, and hence a refund was issued. Right?

What I don't get is a) pre-purchasing the game having no clue how it'll actually work out (and having no legal guarantee towards anything), b) sitting on that purchase in the face of the game being unfit for purpose instead of refunding but then also c) being angry about it.

So no, I'm not "whitewashing the publisher". I think they're factually incompetent like most bigger publishers are and I can't wait for them to go under, assuming the devs can find publishing deals that value their actual work more than Paradox does. I however also think that while the publisher is responsible for screwing the game up, the buyer is responsible for buying the broken product they could clearly see was broken. The two are not mutually exclusive, and it's disingenuous to present it as if they are.

 

[Carighan]

It follows that Paradox publisher and Steam Store violate consumer protection laws by refusing to return to the buyer hard-earned money spent on goods that turned out to be of poor quality due to the fault of the publisher /developer, which indicates the fact of fraud on the part of the store or publisher.

At the same time, in this situation, it is not me who should initiate in the Steam store a refund request, but the publisher Paradox himself should return the money to the customers and at the same time apologize to them. Which, in fact, was not done. Everything else that some people give out here is demagoguery. Upon violation of their rights, and buyer has the right to sue and request compensation for violation of their rights by the publisher or store. The more appeals to the courts, the faster something will change in the Steam store for the buyer. In fact, the 2-hour limit on the launch of the game is a way to deprive us of the right to a refund, which they are currently using.

Yeah that'd be sensible.

I wish there were legislation that while there is no obligation to expand a game post-release, there is one to fix bugs or issue a publisher-side voluntary recall and refund the money if requested. It's not a trivial issue in the case of software (since unlike with consoles, possible influences from outside hardware are massive and complex), but it'd send the right signal if we had legislation like that: You can't just release a broken game and push all your money into marketing to make people pre-purchase it so you don't ever have to fix it.

(independent of the fact that nobody should be pre-purchasing ever, and in particular not from Paradox)

 

[Oleg V.F.]

the buyer is responsible for buying the broken product they could clearly see was broken.

I do not agree, you are cheating, because before buying the game you cannot officially try it out and it is not possible to understand in 2 hours how broken the product is. You don't understand that Games are a complex intellectual commodity, and every released game will contain errors. Any errors are usually fixed by the developer over time. The refusal to further develop the game and its support is what should have led to a refund to customers. The game is a complex commodity that cannot be repaired like a thing in a repair shop. The responsibility here lies entirely with the publisher of the game. Customer reviews are the opinion of an individual player about the game and nothing more, but it is not a qualitative indicator of the state of the game. Only the publisher/developer knows about the state of the game! The buyers can can report a problem in the game, and it is the publisher's responsibility to fix it by involving the game developer in solving the problem.

You continue to do what you did before, trying to shift the blame on the buyer in one way or another, talking about general things that are not relevant to the specific situation.

 

[corestandeven]

Almost one month later after Dev Log #13, and it is still not on the Steam Store page for ST:I. Why could that be? At this stage it cannot be an innocent mistake. One might even suggest you are being dishonest, hoping to get a few sales from customers who are unaware the game was abandoned.

Dev Logs 1-12 were all posted on the Steam Store page, so why not #13?