Considering the circumstances, a delay is completely understandable, however their communication on this has been abysmal. They are fuelling the constant whining of the community by consistently overpromising and underdelivering, they set unrealistic deadlines, announce them, and then wait to announce a delay until the last possible moment, when they could have saved so much face by simply being transparent a week or so earlier.
Unreal Engine Subverse [v0.9] [Studio Fow]
- Dec 9, 2017
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They didn’t set a date until now though. Folks assumed November because they said they were aiming for it, but that was not a guarantee. Every other update has had a date announced weeks in advance, so if it was gonna be the end of November, we’d have heard something earlier in the month.
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Don't want to sound like some hater, but to me it seems Subverse is dying if not agonizing already. My pessimistic prognosis is, we can consider ourselves lucky if we get one more update after Fortune, and another one if gods and the universe allow that to happen, and that's it. If things keep going as they are now, the final version never happens. Would be glad to be wrong, though...
True they said they were only 'targeting late november', but by the same token, from the situation the dd describes they should have known pretty quickly that was not feasible, and the fact that the delay is almost 4 weeks proves that. They had every chance to be transparent with the community and announce a delay much earlier. They chose not to. It fits a pattern of really poor communication that has been an issue ever since early access began.
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its 2 weeks and 5 days, but guess we gotta exaggerate for some reason. Just for the heck of it I went digging to see at what points they'd securely announced a date:
Ela - announced on October 10th for October 25th
Taron - stated to be on track February 21st, confirmed for March 11th on March 2nd on twitter
Sova part 1 - Twitter post stated end of the month May 23rd, arrived May 30th (it may have been listed in the first trailer, but that sadly didn't stay up on youtube, only temporarily on one of the staff's channels)
Sova part 2 - announced June 21st for July 25th
From the lowest being about a week, to the earliest being a month, they always give you a secure date ahead of time. Could they say something sooner, sure. But at the same time, history's shown what they tend to do, so the closer it got to the end of the month, the more it should've been apparent they weren't gonna make it. So all we could do is wait to hear why. And they explained themselves pretty fairly.
That the delay is really short in comparison to even most AAA games (need we remember how many times Cyberpunk's date was pushed, and that was for a 'complete' game) and this is relatively nothing. We'll have to wait and see what how the next hiring wave goes, but many folks will be taking breaks for the holidays, so we'll see how the state of things are in the new year.
Also that 'pattern of poor communication' is pretty much how FOW's operated since the beginning. Far back as the patreon the usual posts were wip, wip, wip, trailer, release. No random chit chat, they just work until there's something to show.
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They're probably spending more money paying shills for damage control than their own staff, no wonder why half of them have left.
Remember when the game was announced, how they wanted to do an "old-school gaming experience" and they made fun of modern gaming with it's micro-transactions? Their kickstarter page still says "Estimated delivery: Jun 2019".
More than 3 years after their "estimate" and the game isn't halfway done, they've lost more than half of their staff and they're going to sell merch...
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- Jun 30, 2019
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They will definitely complete this project. It will take a long time, but finished. Otherwise, if they screw up, it will hit their reputation very hard.
- Jan 15, 2018
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^ Wouldn't shock me if this is the case. Hope to see them at least be able to finish the project for the sake of the people who backed it, though.
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I think its a little too soon to be hitting the panic button. The departures were unfortunate, but we don't really know the context behind them. But they've also said they're looking to replace the lost teammates, its just not feasible right now cuz of the upcoming holidays. So we'll have to see how things are looking in the next dev blog, which'll likely be January's since December's the update.
And to activate the always faithful, secret paid employee mode: I'm sure DC would sooner make the rest of the game himself with the core team than let a project go unfinished
And to activate the always faithful, secret paid employee mode: I'm sure DC would sooner make the rest of the game himself with the core team than let a project go unfinished
- Mar 23, 2018
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It just means what they make will take a bit longer than the usual committed schedule. Til they get more staff, that's not a difficult trade.
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VValen you are the definition of the dog in a burning building saying "this is fine" Look around you man.
I remember, a couple years ago, when Final Fantasy XIII was released after years of development hell, that someone "leaked" that the dev team was around 180 artists and 20 programmers. No wonder why FFXIII was a beautiful audiovisual experience, but a game you "watched" instead of a game you "played".
Looking at this game's "dev diaries" at a whole I've noticed a trend. Everyone's an artist. New sounds/SFX, new lighting, lip syncing, new waifu models, cool explosions, but... who's ACTUALLY MAKING the game? If they've lost more than half of their staff, how many programmers do they have left? I can only identify one, HungryJJ, and he/she is new to the team.
And the sad thing is, they could just add scenes to the Pandora system (after all the sex scenes are completely separated from the "gameplay") and delay the game updates until they get someone to make them. After all, the "core" StudioFOW expertise was in making porn movies for years, right?
right?...
...unless the people who left are the "core" StudioFOW artists.
Only time will tell.
PS: The DD18 said "Please check out our new features overview video for an indepth look at what’s coming up in Subverse’s next major content patch in November!" The new DD19 says "we are setting the release date of the Fortune chapter to December 19". Those are quotes from their own website. Don't keep your hopes up, there is no more confirmation that the update will be this year than the last time.
Looking at this game's "dev diaries" at a whole I've noticed a trend. Everyone's an artist. New sounds/SFX, new lighting, lip syncing, new waifu models, cool explosions, but... who's ACTUALLY MAKING the game? If they've lost more than half of their staff, how many programmers do they have left? I can only identify one, HungryJJ, and he/she is new to the team.
And the sad thing is, they could just add scenes to the Pandora system (after all the sex scenes are completely separated from the "gameplay") and delay the game updates until they get someone to make them. After all, the "core" StudioFOW expertise was in making porn movies for years, right?
right?...
...unless the people who left are the "core" StudioFOW artists.
Only time will tell.
PS: The DD18 said "Please check out our new features overview video for an indepth look at what’s coming up in Subverse’s next major content patch in November!" The new DD19 says "we are setting the release date of the Fortune chapter to December 19". Those are quotes from their own website. Don't keep your hopes up, there is no more confirmation that the update will be this year than the last time.
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Maybe, but ya’ll are overreacting I feel. Like they announced a drastic change in design, or signed up with EA xD
Departures are a concern, but it’s not a cliff, it’s a bump in the road. Have to wait to see how they deal with them.