My recent review and how it would look like

[mikawa]

I've made a review back in 2017. Today it would surely look completely different. At the moment, I would not publish it because it's still an unfinished product and things might still change.

But I can give you a summit of my player experiences as they are today. Perhaps it's although a kind of interesting feedback, as far as any of the developers might be willing to take a look at it.

I bought this game in early access back in 2016 after stumbling over a video made by youtuber "SideStrafe" showing a trafalgar battle with 40 ships in a battle instance. The video has over 167.000 views until today. I was stunned by the sight of all those white sails moving over the nicely animated water and the ships firing broadside over broadside towards the enemies. And I was fascinated because it was clear from the very first minute watching it that these guys know what they are doing. The ship models are historically accurate and beautifully detailed. Never before did I see such a great sailing and combat game.

From my youth on I was a big fan of old sailing ships especially the frigates in the period of angloamerican war of 1814. And some of these ships were already ingame! I was exited to see the Surprise, the Constitution, the Cherubim and many other beautiful ships. The next hour I bought the game via my steam account for 35€. Having joined Early Access for the first time, I was curious about the testing period and I thought that the developing process would take about one year of balancing and finetuning and after that we would hold a finished product in our hands. I never thought the developing process would last over three years.

Then came the open world.

The developers posted a few pictures of beautifully designed coastlines and I was curious how it would feel sailing through an open world. Since then my experience with sandbox games was nearly zero, I felt exited and enthusiastic about testing it. And we got a huge world, ready to explore and conquer. The map seems to be a historically correct copy of the carribean map in the 18th century.

The first contacts with the open world model were nice experiences for me. I joined the british nation and in the first weeks there were many interesting battles as fleets were gathering in front of the capital Kingston just to lurk there and wait for victims. Pedro Cay was a nearby port which had important materials for crafting so the journey to Pedro was always exiting. Other nations did know that and so some fast ship could always lurk behind the edge of the island. This part worked really well for me. It was a short distance to go with many surprises on the way. Every other capital had a similar important trading post a few seamiles away. It was the time of calling for help in nation chat "Hey, I'm between Pedro and Kingston being chased by an enemy Mercury. Help, please." Port battles had a simple game mechanic. Players could buy a flag in some own port which opened a time window in which the flag must be brought an enemy town. If done so, a port battle started. The problem here was that some players had great advantages of this because of the time shift between countries. In best case, there were no people online to defend the port.

So this mechanic was changed. Now it works with generating hostility by hostility missions where you sail near an enemy port to raise hostility by sinking ships. This is a good and important change in gameplay which suits best into the setting. 

Unfortunately there were other changes that don't fit very well in the game. Clans were early implemented into the game, but they never interested me much. I thought of them as a possibility of finding clanmates to sail and fight with but I preferred to sail and hunt alone so they were nothing more than a side note in galaxys history for me. But suddenly clans were promoted heavily. So heavily that they became more important than nations. Why? I never understood this change, because I always felt as part of a nation, for which I would fight. People said that's important because of RVR but I never got the reason behind this. It could be that clans of the same nation would not be friends or be even hostile (though they could not attack each other, but they could conquer ports and get benefit of it as a clan entity). Why do we need to split nations in that way? Why should a player pay taxes for buying something to another clan of his own nation? In times of war there was nothing more important than nations itself. Why clans were promoted that way by the developers is one of the things I am not capable of understanding until today. I understand it in a fantasy role play game. But in a naval warfare game this is ridiculous.

Other changes followed. Mainly they were changes either to discourage solo players or to promote clans or lately even to make small ships less worth. Another point I didn't get. At first all ships were beautifully designed then only to degrate them as useless small ships which can be thrown away since a player leveled his character so far that he can sail bigger ships. I always loved frigates. I hated line ships. This won't change even if the big ships would sink me constantly.

The trading mechanics were changed several times too. We had wipes that destroy our buildings. Ok, lets begin from scratch no problem. But after all I must say that trading is now completely broken. It mainly consists of sailing long routes for great profit but you transport goods that aren't needed for the crafting process and the important nearby trading posts vanished instead. This means on the other hand that enemy raiders have no specific locations where they can be sure to meet some traders like it was before. Raiding is now a matter of pure random. Not exiting as it was, rather boring and frustrating.

The crafting process was lately also changed. I remember the times when everyone could craft ships freely as long as he had aquired the blueprint for the ship first and he had the required crafting level. Getting the blueprints depended on randomness. Maybe not the best mechanic, but it worked somehow. Then we had a time where the blueprints were removed and permits introduced for line ships. This was made because the amount of 1st rates ingame was incredibly high so we needed a reduction. It worked well but then it was tweaked with permits for nearly all ship types and the need for combat marks to buy a permit. Combat marks are given as reward for PVP. Then they added AI missions where you could get permits directly or for combat marks. Some ship permits are only avaliable per missions where you can get randomly a rare permit. Given the fact that durability of ships were reduced to 1 and the consequence of quick loss of ships this is quite ridiculous and as bad as random drops of blueprints were before. But given the fact that after receiving a random blueprint you got the chance to craft this ships constantly, you can now craft only one ship for one permit. A very bad idea, that makes crafting way less attractive and frustrating. If you count the fact, that special woods for ships were way more important in PVP as they were in former times and the fact, that these woods are now only available in one port in the whole map, this is much more ridiculous.

The last change was to introduce a certain amount of redeemable ships. You can buy DLC and get a redeemable ship per day. Maybe a last try to raise some money for the unneccessary long development process and a try to give players ships when they have no woods or no permits. It is the least attractive way of doing this. And the least charming too. As a long term player I feel kind of betrayed. I spent money for something that was only quarter-baken. I spent money to be able to trade, craft, fight, sail. And now everything in this game is restricted. In my opinion this game lacks testing, intense testing of the developers themselves. If I learned something about OW sandbox games in the past years, then it is that these games need intense testing by the developers, because without it they cannot feel what a player feels. And then they make decisions which are not objective. They make decisions which are very subjective, influenced by a few loud and louder shouting players in the forums. Lobby thinking is here at its best. But I have to understand. Solo players have no lobby. Solo players are not wanted. They're not worth a penny.

Player frustration in this game is extremly high. I remember there were better times and this is really demotivating. Since latest patches, the game has also taken a strange direction in PVP combat. It seems now that you only can succeed in this when you have ships made of rare special woods (which are practically unable to get) and rare special upgrades (which you only get if you are good in PVP). So the game relies here heavily on luck and on unaccomplishable requirements. All  things we learned in the past that should be avoided. No we have them. Even more massively than ever before.

My feedback during the long process of development was unheard by the developers. At least this is what I assume. My hopes were others I must admit.

Now, what you get for your money is a game in which the developers had put an immense effort to bring sailing ships of the 18th to early 19th century to life. They reconstructed them from old plans, drawings and paintings in a historical accurate way. They could really have looked like this. They succeded in creating an unique game. The sailing simulator used in the instanced battles is great and with this game I learned how sailing works from the basics to advanced technics. This game gives you an authentic feel as a captain in historic sea wars era.

Be aware that you get drawbacks in all other aspects.

The crafting, trading, grinding, hauling and clan related tasks are often boring and unsatisfying. They require a great amount of free time to fulfil and aims at unemployees, retirees or similar people with (too) much free time. I regret very much seeing a game with so much potential in such a poor shape. When you buy this, be aware that you have to buy almost all DLC to be able to play it somewhat properly. Do not assume that you can play this easily. You need tons of hours to learn the basics and to learn how to fight successful against other players. The overall cost of this game is 131,22 € at this moment. This is far far more than I ever had spent on a computer game. Under reconstruction aspects one may consider it appropriate, I consider it to be the most exeeding money amount I would ever spend on a single game. And it isn't finished yet. If someone asks me, how I would proceed with this, I must say, I don't know the answer. Not now.

Maybe other players will share their expericences here too. I'm curious.

[Alvar Fañez de Minaya]

If my level of English would allow me, I would have written something very very similar to the one exposed by you ... So I join your explanation ..... My appreciation of the evolution of the game is very similar to the yours ......I bought the game in December 2015, and I was playing continuously until end of 2017.. Now I wander through the PVE server waiting for the final release  and if it's worth re-engaging or I stay definitely in PVE ......  Now the game is much more complex, it requires much more time and it is much less fun than a few years ago ... The game has been made to suit those who can devote more hours to detriment of the most casual players .... Okay, I'm not complaining ..... The game has ended up targeting very few players, and for me, in a game with such a gigantic map, you need at least 2,000 players to that is playable and fun ....... I do not know if 500 hardcore players will be enough for this game to be fun ..... Time will tell .....

[Teutonic]

Through all the faults that NA had back in early 2016 - I'd rather erase everything and go back to that then the current game we have now.

[Alvar Fañez de Minaya]

3 minutes ago, springby said:

to me it seems like the idea of the game is pvp but not in an arcady way. i think many (most?) players launch  game, setup their ship and undock only to look for targets to fight. if there is no fight they sadface and dock and whine about it (exaggeration promote understanding)

there is not many active players currently. its harsh to judge the current game version based on this. i want to try this version with a lot more players.

I understand you perfectly, and maybe, this is much better game than 2 years ago ain't talking about that...... The big problem is to find 2000 People that can play 8 hours a day...... If 2000 people can play that...... Super..... But....

IMO is so difficult to find 2000 hardcore players....... To have a population of 2000 players, you need 1500 casuals...... 

[mikawa]

Regarding long term playing: The game has to provide mechanics which makes it worth playing even with 300-500 players online (which is already a lot regarding the gap it fills). In low times we would not have more players. The last 2 years we didn't have more. In high population time it could go up maybe 1000 or 1500 but this are very rare times. There are stats which underline this from other sandbox games.

[HachiRoku]

Thats why I never made a review. Its pointless for now. Reviews for alpha should be disabled if you ask me. The community has to much influence over the devs. I remember being in SORRY and lord vicious would ask us to spam negative reviews with our alts if something did not go his way. Thankfully many didn't care to much to do it. Now LV has told Sid that the devs tried to bribe him. I wish I had the evidence to prove otherwise. I guess @Silfarion @Otto Kohl @Milkman van Swallows as former sorry officers could confirm that I am speaking the truth. 

[HachiRoku]

1 hour ago, Teutonic said:

Through all the faults that NA had back in early 2016 - I'd rather erase everything and go back to that then the current game we have now.

I wouldn't even though I preferred the game back then. Leeway and sailing is better. Combat is better in a sense but repairs and chaining is bad. Masts were always broken. The current issues we personally have ingame would be simple to change. There is just no willpower to do it  

[toblerone]

1 hour ago, HachiRoku said:

Thats why I never made a review. Its pointless for now. Reviews for alpha should be disabled if you ask me. The community has to much influence over the devs.

If a developer chooses to make people pay for early access, they must be disposed to bear the consequences of paying testers not liking the game.

[Norfolk nChance]

@mikawa

I did enjoy your review and seriously think others should do the same. The insight and evolution of the game is fascinating from an others point of view. I joined a little after you March’16 and Open-World was up and running already. In fact, it was one of the things that attracted me to the game but not the main pull.

The Draw

Previously I’d played EvE Online for many, many years. Watching my three-year old daughter leave for college and get married type of time investment. Spreadsheets in Space was an apt nickname for the game. Trading, construction, arbitrage asteroid excel sheets was a wet dream. The PvP (low-Sec) I loved and really enjoyed. Then I saw a YouTube advert for Elite-D or Star Citizen. This led to a Naval Action YouTube… and this killed EvE for me…

Both Elite and Naval Action combat models differed from EvE. A well-crafted spaceship with all the mods and my skill knowledge in a frigate against another frigate boiled down to just an exchange of numbers. That was it in essence. Naval-Action you damaged different parts of a ship that then affected its performance. Knock-out a mast and it slows down; however, you can’t really do this in space… You can’t knock-out a starboard thruster… There is a bit more to EvE’s model than this but Naval-Action’s model seemed fascinating.

PvP EU/US or PvE…

Although I’d developed into a hardcore low-Sec player I still adopted the EvE method of learning the game and started on PvE(Hi-Sec). Here I started to climb the Ranks in GB nation and trying to understand the crafting and game economics. Both @Fluffy Fishy and my future clan leader @Drunken Marauder helped me cap my very first AI ship.

The group EPIC missions became a big draw run by Drunken Marauder. He founded ELITE and asked me to join. The clan to 50members and when the large fleet RvRs started with clues and hints, it was a brilliant time. The struggle in my early days was that crafting grind. I built my first NA Excel sheet called “Norfolk nChance at Sea”. It was hard work, but not to the depth of EvE sheets.

http://www.navalactioncraft.com/

This site above was my Bible. In them days Blue Print drop rates became the thing. The excel sheet and this site helped me develop a small crafting guide for the clan.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=821902779

Am not sure when it was maybe around June’16 to October’16 (9.96 was Oct’16), but the game had gone quiet. Numbers fell on PvE and I started to wonder about PvP. Asked Drunken Marauder if I could setup Elite on PvP EU and US with a small team. EU was simply too hard for us as a new group to get a foothold. The US server was much easier.

PvP US Oct’16

Politics was a new thing for ELITE and it was player content driven, the GL FORUM a must read. The dominant clan was BLACK pirate. However, they were neutralized by a Care Bear Alliance between GB, US and the Dutch, this leading to a stalemate down the road. The Port Battle system and the political voting system became the new issues. We made friends with CKA and other Brits who gave us valuable advice to starting our clan. The FINE woods and extended knowledge trees were starting.

We as a group knew how to fight together properly from PvE with TS3. However, we needed to learn how to PvP. I brought in a clan program to start stalking and attacking BLACK clan members in our green Connies. It worked with @Neverdead Ned and @TheLoneWolf sinking me and @flipper687 dozens of times. What we started to realise was other players ran in fear of PvP or avoided it. In fact, when they did engage played poorly together as a team group. They simply hadn’t had enough practise, looking down on the PvE server ‘Care Bears’ but we knew how to play together in battle.

Feb’17

Accusations also started to rise regarding cheating using bots and the emergence of ALTs. I used an experiment without an ALT to manipulate the aggression mechanic at BLACKs expense.

https://forum.game-labs.net/topic/18955-experiment-two-complete-regarding-the-case-of-the-aly-charles-hunter/

The next problem was D-DOS suspects and some super accurate players. This was solved with a Wire-Shark product very quickly. However, March’17 saw the unravel of the Duplication scandal. What made me mad was how many players knew about it and kept quiet. I warned @Ink I was going to publish a guide how to do it to devalue the technique. It was taken down and a patch fix was later deployed. At this point I came to the realization players were no longer testing, but actually playing the game…

Mid’17 I bought an ALT to give extra funding to the Dev’s, the only vehicle possible. I’d used ALTs a lot in EvE and it was part of the games structure. I wrote a guide on the whole ALT subject matter. The Game would run out of money if it didn’t embrace, promote and control them my thinking.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=917654264

Here we start to see the Dev’s pointing to a completely different build model, possible wipe and a possible NA style arena game…

And so on…

 

Is the product better than in 2016/17…? I’d say yes, but actually not by three years’ worth.

The game a couple of years ago was a lot of fun compared to recently. This is not because of the economy, combat model, Seal Clubbing, ALTs or graphics. The RvR was player driven content whether for good or bad reasons… @Lord Vicious and SORRY, East v WEST or Care Bear Alliance. The post Port Battle reports done by @Sir Texas Sir were a simple MUST READ as was @Jeheil Letter to the King… It was larger community player base that built the content.

The Dev’s need to replace that missing content.

 

The Future

I will write a REVIEW Day1 at launch. I don’t think its fair before hand or the sale of DLC content for that matter.

In my amateurish opinion, the focus should be all around the Launch and how its handled going forward. We need to keep players interest for longer to turn them into that Junkie. The Rank promotion systems needs changing its way too quick and is seen as a CREW hurdle without any feel of achievement. Lengthen this process.

Questions...

How many clients have bought NA-OW? 100k to 200k (this includes ALTs)

How many have bought DLCs? Who knows…but DLC route is here to stay before launch?

The Current Customer Base is what 3,000 players (guess)

The Old Player Base that no longer plays but will give it ago post launch…?

It’s not 200,000 – 3,000 = 197,000 old clients, 25,000 (guess)?

How many brand-new players do we expect launch Day1 to Day30?

Three target groups, Category1 Current Players, Category2 Old Players (by far the largest group) and Category3 the New-Player (the smallest group).

Put simply GL needs to target all three-post wipe. Keep them interested long enough to buy into the DLCs. We are ONLY focused on Category1 players at the moment in my opinion.

Sorry for the length, blame the wine

 

Norfolk

 

Edited April 17, 2019 by Norfolk nChance

[Vizzini]

still enjoying the game, could be better and there are things I don't like, wouldn't change my review as I have gotten my moneys worth imho. Would i have told others to buy in the past , yes  Right now I would tell them to wait until release

I would think twice about investing time in something during development though

[Nelsons Barrel]

I reviewed this game already back in the days of 2016. The biggest flaw of this project was from begin the missing 'big picture' as I called it. Starting an early access title and not knowing what the actual finished product will be can't work out. You will always disappoint a chunk of your buyers and those will clearly state it out loud. The development process exactly looked like I expected it. 3 full years of going back and forth edging every single group of players resulted in lots of negative reviews and a dramatic loss of players. Only a group of hardcore players, one could call them addicts, stayed, stating their opinion of how this game has to look like, neglecting the truth that as players their opinion would always be biased to their gamestyle. A developer that might have been too close into discussions with those instead of just creating one vision, he followed some loud but actually minority opinions. Passionate critizism was answered with bans, leaving only some weird kind of people in this forum that does not replicate an actual image of the overall playerpopulation. And now we see this project becoming one of those 'never be done'-projects, developers that run out of money forcing them to sell pre-release DLCs to keep afloat, resulting into more difficulties ingame- and review-wise.

Would I recommend this game? I played it a few thousand hours with multiple accounts each, I enjoyed a fair bit of this time, but was disappointed about the development changes a lot of times. Seeing a game become a huge timewaste just to promote people to stay online, selling it as some kind of content... Well, I was addicted back then too, so I didn't mind so much. But for somebody with a real life? Unsustainable. So no, of course my review is and will stay negative. Stay away from timewasters like these. Stay away from early access projects that dont state a clear roadmap for the big pictures the project shall become.

For me Naval Action will stay in memory as a project in which its devs simply overestimated their own skillset to create a game people actually want to play. Creating it is more than to just prototype a combat simulator, you need knowledge in economy (ingame and real life), basic gameplay mechanics, marketing, public relation skills (how and how much do you interact with players), an understanding that the average player cannot stay ingame for 8 hours a day and the fact that MMOs are a premier league of game, most challenging and definitely not the kind of game you want to start with in game-business.

[Slim McSauce]

May 31, 2017 @ 1:19pm

 

This review has gone from initially good, to previously bad, to now good again, here's why.

The new 10.0 wipe/update has breathed new life into this game. Its much more MMO like instead of MMOlite. The reason I say this is that before 10.0 its was EXTREMELY easy to get gold/ships. People were sailing first rates like nothing. Gold wasn't an issue.

Now the game is much more challenging and player driven. Just like in EVE it takes time to get a new ship, in NA it takes time to get a new ship aswell. As how it should be with MMOs. 

Many people are spoiled with the pre 10.0 version of NA. It was much easier as a lone wolf to get anything you wanted. Now it requires a clan, and teamwork to amass gold and loot. IMO it's a lot more fun and diverse. 

Some of the negative reviews bring up good points, such as heavy initial grind, but a lot of them are people who are use to the laid back, casual NA that they had pre 10.0. They will get that when Naval Action Legends comes out this summer (Free for all NA buyers)

That being said, yes getting out of the first ships will take the most time. But after that gold is much easier to acquire. If you enjoy games like E.V.E, Arch age, POTBs, or just enjoy the age of sail setting, then I reccomend you pick this up. Its a fun game that has a lot to offer, and from here will only improve.

0 Comments

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Of course patch 10 will always be my favorite version of NA. For me, that's when NA OW stepped out of being just a buffer for instanced combat and became it's own game in itself. The OW was challenging, everyone actually had to work together so their nation could get somewhere. It wasn't like today where you could spawn ships in willy-nilly, every single ship was crafted and there was a modicum of respect to that. There was higher value placed on everything, no one was so rich they could not give a hoot about their actions. Everyone struggled but in the struggle we found our bonds. It was fantastically brilliant just how much people geared towards teamwork. Population was only slightly larger than it is now but then we had 100s of people showing up to PB's, because the capture of ports for their supplies was immensely important and somehow everyone, even  the new players knew that. A PB was something everyone in the nation was involved in, not just a clan. Man I wish we could go back to that time and flesh it out more, not have gone back to easy-mode so quickly. There was something so psychologically rewarding with how the game played then, nowadays the motivation is combat medals, but back then there was something bigger in our minds.

Edited April 12, 2019 by Slim McSauce

[Simon Cadete]

The game was better 3 years ago. We had a lot less features but there were no restrictions apart form rng blueprints for ships and loot. Everything else was possible as long as you wanted to do it. I'm sure that having a population of 2000 online makes a huge difference and hides a lot of flaws but the game itself was just better and more exciting. You could be a trader, crafting was much better than now and being a ship builder was actually pretty relevant, you could just go on hunting or do rvr. Pve was simple and rewarding.

Repair once in battle was a better system, buying flags for port battles ( it had its flaws, yes) was much more exciting because you would log in and messages would pop up about a flag bought for a port and you could have immediate action if you chose to (trying to catch the flag carrier was always fun).

Crew management, the tutorial and the teleport / tow system were the only features that made the game better.

There are many reasons why the player count has been free falling and we could spend hours debating them but I think that it is fair to say that the game was BETTER in 2016 and it is not worth buying in the state it is now.

I seriously doubt the developers will cancel all the changes they've made to the game so what you got right now will be the finished version of the game and even if we get a temporary small boost in player numbers on release it will go down again until its just the streamers playing the game.

[Farrago]

OP’s “review” is well thought and fair. It’s also a good history of what many players have experienced.

I don’t understand why some say they won’t write a stream review until after release. Aren’t they taking our money before release? I’ve edited my review twice changing the text and my recommendation.

[derekticus]

As mentioned by many others, the success of this game depends on the size of the Player-base - how many Players will play the game consistently beyond say the first few weeks they try it. 

This games' potential strength lies in the draw of the nostalgia for the "Age of the Fighting Sail" -  it draws men and women, old and young.  So, theoretically, the Player-base could be HUGE.  And the beauty of a SandBox game is that people get to play in and with the game in their own way, coming up with their own agendas and means to a sense of accomplishment.  (This is my way of saying that NOT all Players will be hardcore PvPers).

But, if a more casual Player can not Craft most of the Ships because of a Random Permit drop system, and, if they feel like they will be instantly attacked by veteran Players the moment they sail out of their Nation's home Port; MANY casual Players will choose to never play the game again.  Which will put huge downward pressure on the size of the Player-base, which can then put the game into a "numbers death-spiral."  If the game is TOO HARDCORE, it will drive casuals away.

Potential Fixes: 

1)  Seal-Clubbing at Home Ports should give NO Combat Medals.  Each Home Port and around ALL Free Towns there should be a sizeable Zone in which Players get no rewards for PvP combat. 

2)  Permits, especially for 4th Rates and below, should be readily available in Admiralty Shop.  And, Permits for the other larger Ships should not be Random drops -  Missions should state:  "Reward will be a Permit for X."  Or, alternatively, "Reward will be a 1st Rate Permit."

3)  The Rare Woods should have more drop points, so they are more readily available to Players.  And maybe Non-Clan Players should be able to extract a smaller amount - maybe increasing the overall price and lengthening the "delivery time" once the logs are paid for.

4)  Enhance the PvE Server to make the Map less static -  either through some form of Player generated Port Battles (as discussed else where in the Forums) or through "Randomly these 12 Ports are switching their National ownership this week."

This game could potentially end up as a great one!

[Norfolk nChance]

8 hours ago, Farrago said:

I don’t understand why some say they won’t write a stream review until after release. Aren’t they taking our money before release? I’ve edited my review twice changing the text and my recommendation.

 

@Farrago

You make a fair and good point. When I write a suggestion or idea or eventually a review, I always try to Qualify and Quantify my statements. Always have, that’s just me.

This idea below is about the actual launch. Go straight to the last post by myself. Have a look at the STEAM link. Two bad review POSTs on Apr12’19 from The Shadow & DRG.

https://forum.game-labs.net/topic/28817-idea-the-big-wipe-equalizer/

They might be two different players and they are quite right to express very bad pointers to the game. The issue is neither review qualifies or quantifies their statements in time and place. This magnified by 14k and 15k total hours played and each have played the game for nearly 200hours within the last two weeks.

Think if the game launch is March 2020, and how do you think it will look a month before D-Day? The two Reviews above could be very spot on or way off the mark. The number of hours played is what gives these two weight. Will ‘The Shadow’ & ‘DRG’ update and edited their respective reviews if the game mechanics improve or even worsen further has diligently as you do @Farrago?

The only refence is the date posted, but you also need to watch how many hours they played in the last two weeks. I bet they are still very regularly take 200hrs of game worth content out EVERY two weeks from now till launch. Is that fair then to give it a bad review? The example of course would work both ways, if they were GOOD reviews etc. Its why I might have a bit of sympathy for @admin with 30,000 hours of game content delivered in early access for USD80 paid and accumulating 400 hours additionally every two weeks. Or am I just a fanboy?

 

I personally will probably make a review a month prior to launch and edit that post launch. This simply because its in EA and I don’t know the future. I’ve no crystal balls…

 

 

Norfolk nChance

[Farrago]

On 4/13/2019 at 8:56 PM, Norfolk nChance said:

The only refence is the date posted, but you also need to watch how many hours they played in the last two weeks. I bet they are still very regularly take 200hrs of game worth content out EVERY two weeks from now till launch. Is that fair then to give it a bad review? The example of course would work both ways, if they were GOOD reviews etc. Its why I might have a bit of sympathy for @admin with 30,000 hours of game content delivered in early access for USD80 paid and accumulating 400 hours additionally every two weeks. Or am I just a fanboy?

 

 

 

I personally will probably make a review a month prior to launch and edit that post launch. This simply because its in EA and I don’t know the future. I’ve no crystal balls…

You make good points as you do with most everything you suggest and write here. Thank you, by the way, for your passion for improving the game. o7

Steam is fairly limited in how it displays reviews and how accurately we can interpret the reviews. It's time for me to update mine again but in reality, I'm not sure it matters.