Planetary Annihilation's Desire to Destroy Things Enters Beta

oh boy, now its only 60 dollars.

They have come out and said they used these high prices because they did not want Kickstarter backers to feel like their contribution in the curation process was meaningless. Their stance basically is: you backed us, you get everything. If you didn't back us, you can still join in before it's released right now but you'll have to pay more.

I get that stance, though I wonder if it wouldn't be better to just reward Kickstarter backers, instead of penalizing the ones that didn't.

Still, I might get this for 60 bucks although it's hard to get a good grasp of whether or not the actual game is worth it right now. The forums pretty much only consist of discussion about the price and people who don't understand why they have to pay for a beta since 'big companies like these' need to just pay 'them' for beta testing it and such.

A lot of confusion, not enough talk about the actual game for me to make up my mind.

So... Giant Bomb... perhaps a Quick Look? I would appreciate it. I know RTS isn't your thing, but if you just mess around with it, I'm sure I will be able to make up my mind from it.

"If you didn't back us within the appropriate window you'll have to bend over backwards and take it up the bum while the backers record the whole thing on video."

That's what I'm hearing. Considering how well the kickstarter went, they should not be hurting for money to make the game. So, they are f*ing everyone else in the A for maximum profits.

Game development isn't a charity. Why should they charge less than what they think people will pay?

Woah woah woah. Ultra-libertarian free-market economic analyst Matt Rorie chimes in. Bigd145, would you care to make a rebuttal, and perhaps use some more metaphor to make your point?

Definitely want to try it, just waiting for the price drop like a normal human being. Not sure on how extensive the content is. If it's deep enough I could see a 60 dollar price tag on this thing even in beta.

@bigd145 said:

I'm totally confused by why people are up in arms about this. For one, it's a BETA. It's not the full game. Two, if you don't like the value, DON'T PAY FOR IT. This is NOT the only way you'll ever be able to play the game. Wait for the full release and buy the full game at a normal retail price.

I seriously doubt that Uber is expecting very many people to bite on the alpha and beta buy-ins. But what harm is there in putting it out there just in case one or two people do want it? Let the people who want to spend their money, and everyone else can just be patient and wait until the game is actually done.

In the mean time, chill out. I pledged to Planetary Annihilation at the basic level and don't have access to this stuff, but I don't take it as a personal offense that it's available for others if they want it.

On a lighter note, I've played about an hour of the game now, and decided to put it down...because it's almost there. There's a really awesome core gameplay here, and beta being beta, there are some bugs and quibbles that exist that I think more hardcore RTS fans could do a better service in pointing out; as a casual player of SupCom and TA, I'm content with waiting for the full release, because damn, what's there is already incredible for the short development cycle this has been through.

Uber and Mavor and the crew are probably one of the smartest collections of game developers around. It seems like they were fully able to budget their Kickstarter money properly and add preorders into that budget properly, and this is one of the most fully-realized products I've seen come out of this whole Kickstarter shebang. It doesn't feel half-complete or overbudget or rushed...it feels like a game, a real goddamn game, with typical beta issues. Incredible what they've accomplished here, and I'm looking forward to digging deep into the full release, and I really hope they make a post-mortem describing the experiment this game has been.

The game still doesnt look like it looks in that trailer.

Here is how it looks currently:

And I still think it is pretty insane to ask 60 dollars for what is essentially a beta. You can get complete and polished games for 15 to 20 dollars/euros.

This game better teach me Spanish for 60$ beta access.

I'm sure the high buy-in is to make sure that you are serious in actually beta-testing, i.e. spending a lot of time with it. I am glad it's not $80 any more, but I think I will wait and see. Seems cool!

If you want to pay $60 for a game that just entered beta you deserve to have your money taken.

I don't see the point in complaining. You don't have to buy it. It more or less sounds to me people complaining feel like they owe you and are butthurt they don't.

I promise you, as somebody who works in the games industry and knows guys that work at Uber, their kickstarter was a shoe string budget for that game. That's a lot of people that probably took pay cuts and were for sure working lots of un-paid overtime to make this thing.

The $60 price tag is three fold.

It helps fund development so they can fine tune and debug gameplay for release.

If you didn't pitch in on the kickstarter, but want to try the game early and support a great team of guys while doing it, that's how you can. (It's not a pre-order. You guys are helping to make something that would not have been made without the help and support of gamer's like you. Every made anything in your life before? Does it turn out just perfect on the first try every time, just like you expected? Ok then...)

It's less likely to piss off the early backers and whatever rewards they got that somebody else can't just get those whenever or even before them.

But the key here is there's a very small team not making a whole lot of money trying to put this thing together. This is indie development and you can support that if you want, or you can wait till the game is officially released and buy it at a lower price when it's finished.

Or you could be a whiny bitch complaining how you can't have it now, but you want it now because it's so awesome, but whaaaaaaa, why should I pay $60 for something several people have busted their asses on for the last few months and cranked out something that I could probably never make in my lifetime, even though if I just wait my over-deserving ass a few months I can buy the finished thing for less?

The video you posted was uploaded on August 11th. That's hardly recent.

I had a look on the guy's channel, and this was his newest video:

It doesn't look amazing compared to the one you linked, but I just didn't think it was fair to post an August 11th video and calling it "current". It's almost October.

Wow you're being misleading, that's nearing two months old at this point.

It's hilarious how absolutely enraged people are that they're keeping the bar to entry high. It's like someone being mad that you have to pay extra to get a better seat at a stadium.

Pure greed to charge $60 for a beta that looks nothing like actual promoted footage but they also had the gall to charge $90 for preorders? They make EA and Activision look likes saints.

The pricing makes sense to me. Their kickstarter tiers were set up so the more expensive ones $40+ (I think) gave you at least beta access. Why screw over the people who are the most dedicated to the success of the game by releasing the same thing on steam early access for much cheaper? That would probably cause more controversy than what there is right now.

So...they don't screw over their loyal backers, and they get a little bit more revenue from steam. Sure, I would do it.

Just do what we've been doing since video games have been a thing, wait until it actually launches, then buy it for its actual price.

The kickstarter was tiered in a way that, the higher the tier you payed for, the earlier you got access to the game. as such they are now charging a similar price to their tiers as the game nears completion.

Don't like it? wait until the game releases (like you should do for basically all games) and purchase the finished product for the final retail price of the game.

Well I dont want future games start charging those kinds of prices for what is basically an alpha or a beta version of the game.

Kickstarter is a way to back a game which you want to get into development. Steam on the other hand is a commercial platform where people are buying games which seem interesting.

I dont really care what the developers have promised the backers. I just dont want to see other developers start charging 60 dollars and more for betas withouth even having a chance of trying the game out first.

It's a Beta and I totally get why they are charging what they are, I backed it in kickstarter and don't regret it. I don't think your complaints are valid at all, just wait for the full game when it's 20 or so.

@rorie Game development isn't a charity. Why should they charge less than what they think people will pay?

@pixeldemon Woah woah woah. Ultra-libertarian free-market economic analyst Matt Rorie chimes in. Bigd145, would you care to make a rebuttal, and perhaps use some more metaphor to make your point?

Also just to let you guys know, the kickstarter price to get in the alpha was $90 and the beta $40. The Steam price to get in the alpha was $90 and currently $50. 10 bucks isn't that much of a screw over considering. Paying 20 bucks(like I did) got you the game after it came out normally plus the updates. Considering you were putting your trust into a company that might not deliver, or deliver a bad game(It happens) based on only how much you want the game and their track record, they have some level of justification. Not against people missing the due date to pay money to them, but that they're making a slightly cheaper cost for those who trust them somewhat blindly.

There's some argument to be had about the fact that you're paying more to get into unfinished software. Being a tester for a semi broken game and paying money for it against that you're getting into something before anyone else. But that's discussed on the recent bombcast and ultimately is up to the people paying money to decide what they want out of their games. Most developers will probably go towards what makes money while a select few will try to go their own way for whatever reason they believe in.

Regardless I think that the people complaining about kickstarter members getting all the glory need to check up on the kickstarter page and the rest are making valid points. Hope this clears up the issue at least among a few people.

Well, it's not like it truly matters right now. Offering games before they are released is still a relatively new thing. Even it they were a million bucks, it wouldn't matter. They let you play it before it's done. It's not like charging that much means you'll otherwise would have been able to play the finished version sooner. You would have to wait anyway and they are offering something so you don't have to.

That said, as this thing goes on, I wouldn't be opposed to a more... accurate? pricing model. Perhaps ask half of the full game's price in advance for alpha's and when they are officially released ask the other half. Or allow a, say, 3 hour trial. Because you really don't know what you're getting yourself into.

I've noticed the forums also only go so far to educate you on that stuff. Their is not always a clear consensus. It also seems websites haven't gotten the clue yet to bring back previews strong. Previews would be excellent for this sort of stuff. Giant Bomb does do Quick Looks for some alpha/beta games luckily. It's how I got into Don't Starve and Prison Architect.

I don't see myself paying 60 dollars for the privilege of beta testing someones incomplete game.

@corvall: I'm going to agree with the other guy. $90 for an alpha and $60 for a beta is ridiculous. It seems like they hold their beta access to be very valuable. I.e. pay your way in you cheap bastard if you think you can even touch our unfinished product. But we are too good to go the standard $10-40 for beta. No no no. Gotta wine and dine us first.

@rorie: So maybe we can get a nice little quick look Rorie :) ?

people are buy this thing for 50 dollars its number 1 on the steam sales chart for a day or 2 i will just wait for the release get a full game and pay half the price

I agree the pricing is ridiculous. I'll never pay it. It's not for me, it's not for you, it's not for a LOT of people. Maybe it's for someone, but I don't know them. But who cares? Why does just the fact that it's out there make anyone mad? It's NOT the price of the final game.

And it's very clearly about not screwing over their Kickstarter backers, not about some imagined elitism. In the Kickstarter, higher tiers of rewards enabled this early access to unfinished versions of the game. I think it would be really bad form for them to promote this early access to unfinished versions of the game to the public at a lower price when they asked a higher price in the Kickstarter. Uber is doing right by their customers, the very people who helped make this game possible by supporting it in the Kickstarter, and it boggles my mind that people are getting upset by it.

Want to play the game but don't want to pay the high price? The wait for it to be done just like almost every other game that has ever existed since video games existed. Is that so much to ask?

Like free demos once the game is released?

The price is £40, you get all the trinkets you got on the Kickstarter with it. They're selling it through Early Access, a service specifically for games that aren't finished yet, and the fact that it's in beta, and will drop in price at release is clearly marked. If you want to preorder the game without beta access, go to their site. You'll get a steam key at release. There's no reason they can't sell their Kickstarter tiers through Steam Early Access, and there's no reason you should feel compelled or annoyed if you don't want or like it. Really tired of seeing people bitch.

I upgraded to the alpha tier after getting the beta tier during the kick starter. I've not played much, but I like the extra goodies I got from this, watching others play, and knowing I helped fund this huge game, and made their lives and budget not so barebone. If you don't feel like that, fine, fair enough, just wait for the final release. It's not hard.

Lets all buy Supreme Commander 2 in Steam for $13 instead. :)

Now that's an awesome trailer.

They aren't screwing over anyone. Games aren't a need, and $60 isn't even excessive. Stop being an entitled twat.

If EA did something like this, people would be grabbing their pitchforks and starting petitions. Hell, people were up in arms when Starcraft 2 cost $60. Nowadays you pay that much to access a beta, which means the game is probably still pretty broken, it doesn't have the production value of a full retail game of such caliber, yet we give them the benefit of the doubt despite these awful practices.

It's funny. A while back I started a thread asking what people thought of early access games that you need to pay for and if they could be reviewed. Pretty much everyone said 'of course not'. They are not finished, not officially released and can't be judged yet.

It's funny how if that's how it is, then why does everyone seem to care so much about this? This game isn't officially out, it's still in early access and when it's officially released it'll be a regular priced game. But still everyone is up in arms over the price and how we don't even know if it's good yet.

I'm just saying. If you think you can't review a game (judge its quality and cost) then you also can't say it should be cheaper. You're basically saying 'just wait' on the judgment so then: do that. Just wait until it's out and then decide to buy it or not.

Right now, this game is lag city.

And why exactly do you have to buy this game? I'm sorry you've been forcibly robbed. You should leave the internet if you're so vulnerable you have to buy every beta that you see just so you can get online and complain about it. If you didn't buy it you make no point and your post serves no purpose. Buy the finished game if you want the game.

The entitlement the people here and on other forums have is literally disgusting (and I'm not directing all of this at you, trafalgarlaw). I'm not sure how clearly they have to state beta access all over the page before people get it, but apparently being able to type doesn't mean you can read. If you don't want something you shouldn't get it. If you aren't sure what something is you should research it. If you can't research it and you don't want it you shouldn't go out of your way to trash it.

A BETA is meant as a ways of BETA-testing a game by releasing it to the public. Why on earth do they charge people to beta-test a game for them? It already was stupid to see this gen promoting participating in betas as a preorder bonus or some other purchase incentive, effectively using beta participation as a commodity. It completely undermines the purpose of a beta and only serves as an early demo now. Companies like these deserve to be called out on their bullshit, whether they're indies or AAA-budget developers.

Imagine if Activision charged $60 for a beta in the upcoming Call of Duty. People would be up in arms, grabbing semi-automatic pitchforks to marsh down the sewage of the internet.

You could always do something totally unreasonable, like wait until the game is released and then play it.

Seriously what's your problem here? They're completely transparent to their reasoning and the price is only going to get lower by the time release rolls around. The game isn't fully released yet and people like you are rife with this sense of entitlement that you're owed a beta for a low cost when you could just wait for the game to come out at a lower price instead.

@nardak: As many others have said, it's to support its' kickstarter backers. Once it's released I predict a price drop.

I know the game isn't finished, but whenever I see chuggy framerate in official footage, I get involuntary flashbacks to the nightmare that was my previous PC.

Update to those watching this game. Massive patch just came in - the game's fully playable now. Had a pining for some more Supreme Commander so I bought this last night. It's awesome. Hard as hell and micro out the ass, but it's pretty fun. The developers put up this yesterday: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09CjiUTnpK0

Still $60 though...