Giving access to streamers is a slap in the face.

[slupie]

People say this to sound smart always like its something super technical and difficult and us plebs would not understand. The reality is that the actual good feedback that does change the game and does actually find balance issues, exploits and bugs, and design issues, as always with PDX games releases, is the one players give once the game releases and everyone can actually test it.

Yes, QA might be good at catching bugs that would otherwise cause crashes so that is what counts to them as a "polished release". But the issues which mud PDX releases are usually the ones brought up by the actual players which "magically", nobody found before despite running "betas" and having QA and what not.

So having 5 guys giving supper well thought out technical reports is very useful. It will never be as useful as 5,000 people finding all the bugs, balance, and design issues that no professional team could ever just because of lack of capacity and scale.

I just hope this time is right and we dont get yet another release mudded with issues because, once again they refused to give access. I really hope that the only issues with the game are the ones being reported by the youtubers and the community, for the first time in a PDX release and it is super smooth and there cannot be negative feedback after release. But I doubt it.

And im not saying the game won't be good. I know I will love it no matter the balance issues or bugs it has. I just know they will get a shitstorm because of it because other people dont see past that and are looking for any excuse to crap on PDX and review bomb their products and be proven right on their crusade against "Paradox shitty practices". I know releasing games as a beta/alpha does not look "professional" or "flashy" or like a "respectable triple AAA company". But it is a safe bet.

I just reaaaally hope I am wrong and with just the few people they have they find all the balance issues and bugs by release and its super smooth. But after seeing the state the the game was given to youtubers with GLARING issues that anyone playing 10 hours would have picked up, forgive me if i lose a bit of confidence in their strategy of "only a super small tight circle of people will test the game".

As someone who does software testing professionally, I can guarantee that giving access to 5000 people would cause a logistical nightmare. Even getting people to properly give the all the necessary information to debug correctly would be a problem.

I'm sorry to say this, but yes, there will be bugs and balance issues in the initial release. Any video game, but especially one as complex as EUV, will have those problems.

However, I don't think it will be as bad as you're worried it will be. EUV seems to be in what I would call the "friends and family" stage, where the internal release is exposed to a small number of outsiders who aren't directly part of the development team, allowing for fresh new feedback. Although you might not believe it, a small number of people (especially content creators with experience breaking/mastering similar games) can shake loose a huge number of bugs, balance issues, and other general feedback, while being easier for developers to act on due to the more intimate nature of the release. We've already seen a lot of the feedback given in the various videos acted up on and resolved.

That said, I do think that Early Access would be a viable solution for PDX, but I also think Early Access games need to be designed around that from the start which in many ways is actually the opposite of the PDX release and development cadence.

 

[Vohen]

On one hand, that was a great marketing campaign, with a couple dozen videos of gameplay and many dozens more of Q&A, comments and such.
On another, their announcement got leaked by pure negligence of one of them, spoiling the big day in a way.
So I dunno if I'd call it an absolute success, as far as the announcement is concerned, but it was pretty close imo.

With that said, for both the dev team and the community, I cannot see this as anything other than a win.
Feedback is on another level, now that we've seen many of these systems in action.
And one of the coolest things from this for me is the approach Generalist Gaming is going for here, as he is the spreadsheet guy, his content is going Mariana Trench deep into what he saw, already making the first steps into theorycrafting of high level play (focused on the economics).
Of course, much of that will change with future balancing, but this gives a baseline from which numbers can be tweaked.
Too bad he's the only one I've seen with this approach, with the others being more generic "let's plays" and commentaries, but still, seeing how the Byzantines or France plays is nice anyway.

So, overall I call this a gamechanger for PDX, hopefully this becomes a new standard.
I fully believe Imperator's fate could've been differend had they done this, but alas, it really seems we had to sacrifice an Imperator to get a good EU game.
Not to mention the honestly tepid releasss of CK3 and Vic3, I know they are in a much, much better place now, but had they done this, their releases could've gone much smoother as well.
EU5 isn't out yet, so I don't know if the release will be a success, but so far the arrows really are pointing in a good direction.

 

[Rule Britannia]

I have over 2k hours into EUIV, most of which was within the first five years... to be a college student again... Anyways, I take offense to the idea that streamers gain early access to the game. I cannot think of anything more boring than watching streamers.

So why not just offer an early access version of the game? Usually Early Access games on steam are discounted, but I'd pay full price. Hell, I'd pay a little extra even. Point is, as someone who has been here since EUII and gave over a quarter year of my life to EUIV, I find it insulting to be passed over for a few social media narcissists.

I do not think it is a slap in the face. Would I have loved early access, yes of course. However, I do understand that they might not want to give everyone early access. What I am unhappy about is that they took away early access for the streamers so that they cannot produce a steady stream of content for us to watch together us through until launch.

 

[Cuke]

Didn't DiabloIV have an early access weekend before release?

Yes. Why?

*It must be pointed out I loathe DiabloIV for forced MP and level scaling

Forced MP was introduced 1.5 years later in the expansion. Level scaling also had a location min level at the release. Thankfully it was cut.

 

[Lord Lambert]

What I am unhappy about is that they took away early access for the streamers

ikr????

 

[Noblenoob]

I have over 2k hours into EUIV, most of which was within the first five years... to be a college student again... Anyways, I take offense to the idea that streamers gain early access to the game. I cannot think of anything more boring than watching streamers.

So why not just offer an early access version of the game? Usually Early Access games on steam are discounted, but I'd pay full price. Hell, I'd pay a little extra even. Point is, as someone who has been here since EUII and gave over a quarter year of my life to EUIV, I find it insulting to be passed over for a few social media narcissists.

To be completely honest I feel like I understand the reasoning behind this view point but I also understand Paradox's reasoning behind the move. It works functionally to generate hype for the game, but it does feel a little raw for the majority left out. The more I think about it the more I think that additional concrete information would calm the situation, such as release date etc. But I'm happy regardless to see more content on the game in general, here's hoping we get even more official information soon!

I think the moment that triggered me the most personally was when I saw a youtube video where the person in question was boasting about having so much time with paradox titles, and the top time spent on one of the games was only like 400 hours. Though yes I know that the large group of those that have had access to the game do have many more hours spent on these titles. (I can't recall the video or influencer in question sadly but I recall ranting briefly lol)