soxinthebox
Member
Why are you getting upset over this?
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Starbound developer Chucklefish refusing refunds for preorders? (non early access)
- Thread starter FunkyMunkey
- Start date
Why are you getting upset over this?
LurkerPrime
Member
I've played four hours of Starbound (in total) since early this year, before some of the later patches - did I get my money's worth?
The dollar to time played "value" is a feeble myth, perpetrated by bad games. Something like Starbound shouldn't need to rely on it.
You don't remember the Terraria development cycle before they hit v1.0?
For a while, they were releasing weekly. Then they scaled it back to once a month for a good couple of months.
As for how Chucklefish was doing it, they had public release updates that happened all the time, like every other day.
But then people complained. People wanted more "meaty" updates. So they changed the updates to where any official updates would come when they felt it was good and ready.
Then people complained. They wanted updates FASTER. Devs didn't want to rush, so they had the opt-in "experimental" builds.
Aaaaaand then people complained. Again. They wanted updates EVEN FASTER. So now, we have the opt-in nightly builds, along w/ the experimental (but more or less stable) builds, and then finally, the official builds.
On a related note, all those posts you see on the blog about the stuff they're working on? That's all in the nightly builds. If you actually want to see any of that, you have to go nightly.
I get upset a lot, you should see my occaisional posts in the OT about Starbound. My blood pressure on average is about 200+ (that's not a joke).
Passionate about the game, and yes, fan-boyish to a degree.
You should go try the build that's updated daily. It's a whole different beast these days.
Scrooge McDuck
Member
Yes he did. Stated right there in the OP.
One neat trick I learnt is to read the entirety of a post first before replying. Even if you found something upsetting by as soon as the second sentence, the rest of the passage might provide rational context to the offending line. And by the time you're finished, you'd cool down a bit anyway.
Leafhopper
Banned
People really do try to do with every game at some point huh?
Lactose_Intolerant
Member
Pre-orders can be canceled.
Chucklefish called it a pre-order with beta access. Game was said to come out in 2013. Person paid for pre-order. Pre-orders turned into early access. Now Chucklefish doesn't want to give a refund to people that paid for the pre-order saying they have been playing the game and it has lots of content.
Sounds like this whole business happened before Early Access became popular.
Unfortunately, they called it a preorder.
Chucklefish called it a pre-order with beta access. Game was said to come out in 2013. Person paid for pre-order. Pre-orders turned into early access. Now Chucklefish doesn't want to give a refund to people that paid for the pre-order saying they have been playing the game and it has lots of content.
Sounds like this whole business happened before Early Access became popular.
Unfortunately, they called it a preorder.
Like why do people even dooming whey nah, ya know?
LurkerPrime
Member
I have no recollection whatsoever of my early Terraria days. All I know is that it was a neat, fun looking game - a 2D block-digging/building x action/adventure game, and it felt engaging and complete in its own right. Then it updates and got bigger, and bigger... and larger... and larger still. During these updates, Terraria retained its feeling of completeness.
Starbound has had a different development cycle - it started by promising the world and sky above it.. and then delivering some of it, while going back to the drawing board for a lot of it. Then noteworthy development stopped, and there were no banner updates to draw me back. That's what I know.
Really, they aren't as comparable as one would think... The pixel-art guy (Tiy?) is probably the only reason there's such fervent comparisons between the two to begin with.
Yeah, I wasn't even aware of it before this thread. I'll definitely consider it.
Leafhopper
Banned
I-I didn't get any of that.
Yeah, that what I said about your post :/ What did you mean?
Y'know, you do realize I'm talking about FunkyMonkey. Not the dude from Reddit, right?
I was upset when FunkyMonkey made the v1.0 comment. I calmed down. Then I asked if he, FunkyMonkey, asked for his money back.
Yes? Not really arguing against the reddit guy's right to his money back?
Dammit. Well, not editing this out. In case people were getting confused.
LurkerPrime
Member
You're ordering the product before it is officially released. It is pre-ordering.
It's just semantics... or maybe pedantics(?!), I'd say.
MetaGAF: not for the uninitiated.
Not sure about that.
At the moment, Re-digit doesn't seem motivated to dig down on Terraria 2. Burned out maybe.
LurkerPrime
Member
The logical progression of the Terraria-Starbound saga is for the Terraria dev to splinter off into another company and make a deep-sea game which features digging, swimming, space travel, and inter-dimensional travel. The game would have to be called Interdimensia.
Y'never know... y'know?
This sort of fanbase reaction is incredibly predictable. Confidence in their ability to handle is a part of the decision that should be considered before releasing beta software that is indeed beta or allowing early access. Once you start accepting payment at that point it's simply grossly irresponsible to not have a roll-out schedule that should be exagerrated well beyond what you actually expect it to take so you have no doubt you can meet your milestones.
This is going to be an even bigger issue now that certain company's marketing departments have decided to start labeling release candidates access as "alpha tests" and demos as "beta tests." If you get mass market appeal you're going to get more and more people thinking stuff like the Destiny "beta test" is actually a beta.
Can't splinter, out of the original team, there's only one guy left who worked on Terraria, and its the guy who was in charge.
Really have no idea who/how many are on the Terraria dev team now. If anything, he can take a break and make the rest of the team work on Terraria 2.
I don't pre-order games very often, but I pre-ordered Starbound because I through it was an interesting premise and wanted to help support their development. I did however, pre-order under the original premise that the game was to be released in 2013. As of today, the game still falls short of what I originally expected. It's definitely made me be a lot more cautious about what I put my money towards and be a lot more hesitant with putting money towards something that has yet to be released.
FunkyMunkey
Banned
I only made the v1.0 comment to elaborate for anyone who wasn't familiar with the situation
Jiminy Cricket. Didn't mean to upset you. And yes I have.I'm also hopped up on some booze right now, so I'm probably going to forget most of tonight anyway.
You asked, so, did you get it back?
I've had a couple myself haha. No, not yet. I'm not confident but we'll see.
Leafhopper
Banned
Oh, about how people trying to get refunds for stuff they didn't like. It seems like it always happens.
I only made the v1.0 comment to elaborate for anyone who wasn't familiar with the situation
I'm also hopped up on some booze right now, so I'm probably going to forget most of tonight anyway.
You asked, so, did you get it back?
scytheavatar
Member
Yeah sounds pretty straightforward to me that this guy deserves a refund, the idea that early access = game being released is nothing short of shocking. So I have no idea why some guys are defending the Starbound developers.
Lactose_Intolerant
Member
There was an issue where X360 Minecraft owners couldn't use local multiplayer in the game if they dont have a HDTV, and you really didn't know this until you actually tried it. Mojang was refusing refunds.
Microsoft stepped up and did give refunds (with the restriction being that as long you didn't have and HDTV, you'd get the refund).
Yeah, I don't remember it ever being said that you were buying a preorder with Minecraft. The wordage I remember is something like "you are buying an alpha/beta with free access to updates."
Chucklefish probably should have changed that word as soon as possible. Even now, it still says preorder, when you're actually buying early access. If they're not refunding on that basis, then that's not right at all. It made sense to say preorder back when they put it up in April or so of 2013, when there was no access at all, but certainly not anymore if this is their policy.
Also one thing to consider is that they offered it at a much lower cost for preorders and then ramped up the pricing as it got closer to release and it was well known that they were doing it. I want to say I paid about 12 dollars for the game in July 2010 and it ramped up as they got close to release. Starbound is not doing this as far as I know.
A lot of the law is in the wording. Starbound was not initially sold as Early Access. It was sold as a full price pre-order that comes with early access.
They have repeatedly missed many of their promise dates and after the initial month the development crawled to a near halt. They are nearing a year past the original release date. People have the right to start cancelling their pre order if they are unhappy. Time playing the early access etc is all out of the window. They never sold early access they sold and promised a full game to those early backers who they sold on the promise of a preorder.
Early access can create a problem where it takes pressure of devs both Financially and from a customer waiting to play point of view. The devs start getting lazy and dead lines start sliding with ease. Day Z standalone is a great example. Since release development has been extremely slow, at it's current pace that game is going to take 2+ years to finish and there will be better alternatives available by then. The devs actually benefit from the slower pace since they are still making a ton off of early access pretty much every time they release a small patch that generates hype again, and they will make a ton more from the sales push they gain from the "full release".
It's a vicious circle that people should know they're asking for when they check that Early Access disclaimer on Steam. But shit like this is a different beast when developers use the phrase "pre order" and then continue to miss key dates and have little to show for it.
They've already made most of their money off this product at this point so why not just let it wallow on the back burner in a state of incompleteness while they pursue their other project (which is coming along just fine by the way). It's unfortunate for everyone involved and I think people should understand the dangers of early access better but Chucklefish has made mistakes in their messaging that make them look very, very shady.
They have repeatedly missed many of their promise dates and after the initial month the development crawled to a near halt. They are nearing a year past the original release date. People have the right to start cancelling their pre order if they are unhappy. Time playing the early access etc is all out of the window. They never sold early access they sold and promised a full game to those early backers who they sold on the promise of a preorder.
Early access can create a problem where it takes pressure of devs both Financially and from a customer waiting to play point of view. The devs start getting lazy and dead lines start sliding with ease. Day Z standalone is a great example. Since release development has been extremely slow, at it's current pace that game is going to take 2+ years to finish and there will be better alternatives available by then. The devs actually benefit from the slower pace since they are still making a ton off of early access pretty much every time they release a small patch that generates hype again, and they will make a ton more from the sales push they gain from the "full release".
It's a vicious circle that people should know they're asking for when they check that Early Access disclaimer on Steam. But shit like this is a different beast when developers use the phrase "pre order" and then continue to miss key dates and have little to show for it.
They've already made most of their money off this product at this point so why not just let it wallow on the back burner in a state of incompleteness while they pursue their other project (which is coming along just fine by the way). It's unfortunate for everyone involved and I think people should understand the dangers of early access better but Chucklefish has made mistakes in their messaging that make them look very, very shady.
Funny this is, this may likely happen.
davepoobond
you can't put a price on sparks
They should refund him. If it quacks like a duck and looks like a duck, it can't be an eagle.
The game is not released. They say its in early access/beta. They say there is more content in it than a fully released game.
WHICH IS IT? You can't have it both ways. You can't have a perpetually incomplete product that is complete.
They are also arguing arbitrariness of 1.0 and then saying "well that's not how we feel 1.0 should be"
HUH?????????? You can't blame "1.0" for being arbitrary and then completely turn around and say "this is what 1.0 means to us and it means something ambiguous that no one knows"
The game is not released. They say its in early access/beta. They say there is more content in it than a fully released game.
WHICH IS IT? You can't have it both ways. You can't have a perpetually incomplete product that is complete.
They are also arguing arbitrariness of 1.0 and then saying "well that's not how we feel 1.0 should be"
HUH?????????? You can't blame "1.0" for being arbitrary and then completely turn around and say "this is what 1.0 means to us and it means something ambiguous that no one knows"
This is what really bothers me about Early Access, developers feel so comfy in it, they never want to leave. Same for Prison Architect -- it's great that they keep developing new features but I'd rather see a fully playable, bug-free V 1.0 first. It's not like leaving Early Access means they can't develop new features anymore.
Hey guys, Starbound dev here! I posted in the Starbound thread, but I'm around if you want to know anything.
Just to address the original point, the original estimate for release was 2013, but when it became clear this wasn't going to happen we opened up an early access beta to those who pre-ordered, with the full release included in that price. Understandably we offered refunds at the time to those that weren't happy with this, but it's not something we'll do seven months later.
Just to address the original point, the original estimate for release was 2013, but when it became clear this wasn't going to happen we opened up an early access beta to those who pre-ordered, with the full release included in that price. Understandably we offered refunds at the time to those that weren't happy with this, but it's not something we'll do seven months later.
Morphine_OD
Banned
The game is already highly playable and has tons of content. 1.0 is just a number, no refunds needed.
Why be scared? If you can't handle the risk then don't buy into it. I've bought into dozens of Early Access games and the only one I've felt ripped off by was Towns. That's pretty good odds considering I enjoy playing in progress builds and seeing a game come together.
dark_inferno
Member
Starbound got its last real update like... half a year ago. And cutting the whole story content and say its 1.0 is just pure bullshit.
1.0 is a complete game with all the promised features and not a game that is functional and missing like 3/4 of the content that was promised.
1.0 is a complete game with all the promised features and not a game that is functional and missing like 3/4 of the content that was promised.
I think the guy probably does deserve a refund after reading through everything.
I don't care if the developer 'feels' there is enough content to warrant a full release at the moment. They, themselves, don't feel the game is complete, which is why they're still working on it. So the game is factually incomplete at the moment.
Like the guy said, if he'd bought in during Early Access, it'd be a different story, but he *PRE-ORDERED* it and wants to cancel his pre-order, not just get a refund for his Early Access game because he didn't like it.
I don't care if the developer 'feels' there is enough content to warrant a full release at the moment. They, themselves, don't feel the game is complete, which is why they're still working on it. So the game is factually incomplete at the moment.
Like the guy said, if he'd bought in during Early Access, it'd be a different story, but he *PRE-ORDERED* it and wants to cancel his pre-order, not just get a refund for his Early Access game because he didn't like it.
How was he supposed to know in 2013 that you'd push the release date back to 2015? You definitely started selling the preorder before early access.
FunkyMunkey
Banned
Wouldn't people be even more entitled to a refund seven months later? Or has there been an arbitrary line drawn at the end of 2013? The game remains unfinished and the goals of the original description for the game that I (and others) preordered, have not been met.
Agreed.
PS: That's not me on reddit that I quoted in the OP, that's someone else. But I agree with him/her completely and have emailed Chucklefish asking the same.
The problem I have with this is from what I can tell, he redeemed the Steam code. To me, that's accepting the Early Access version of the game. In my eyes it stopped being a preorder when it became a tangible product redeemed to his account like any other Early Access game is.
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