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[Rentahamster]

Same here. It doesn't seem to matter what I ask them to do, eventually they just end up picking up and dropping logs. I am glad they are doing an Alpha, but I wonder if they jumped the gun in releasing the game in this state.

I don't think so. They clearly stated in no uncertain terms that it's an alpha, not a beta, and that you can't really do shit except help them find and identify bugs.

 

[Raticus79]

It's a real alpha, not remotely feature-complete. It's just a much earlier alpha than people are used to. If people were complaining about Starbound, wait until they see that they can't save games here, lol.

No problems here, but I won't be surprised if I see people getting bent out of shape over it.

 

[r1chard]

There's a difference between an alpha (which should mean it works, though perhaps buggily, but some of the bits might change) and this (in which the gameplay just doesn't work - not even slightly).

It gives me considerable concern about the programming capability of the developers. I'm having flashbacks to Timber and Stone (which finally, after a year, hired a competent programmer who finally fixed all the long-standing AI bugs).

 

[Jinko]

Same here. It doesn't seem to matter what I ask them to do, eventually they just end up picking up and dropping logs. I am glad they are doing an Alpha, but I wonder if they jumped the gun in releasing the game in this state.

This is what an alpha is normally like. (most normal alpha's aren't even released to the public)

If you look at their roadmap its pretty clear that most of the games features are missing.

 

[Orlandu84]

This is what an alpha is normally like. (most normal alpha's aren't even released to the public)

If you look at their roadmap its pretty clear that most of the games features are missing.

I guess I was just expecting a bit more from the initial alpha. I certainly did not expect it to be bug-free or feature complete. I did expect it to have more functionality, e.g. being able to build a whole house or wall successfully. I guess Limit Theory's combat prototype spoiled me since I could pretty much do combat and related gameplay but nothing beyond that. If Stonehearth's alphas had been at the same state, I'd be able to build any number of houses...eventually. Not being able to build any given house I expected; not being able to build any houses fully surprised me.

 

[Rentahamster]

I guess I was just expecting a bit more from the initial alpha. I certainly did not expect it to be bug-free or feature complete. I did expect it to have more functionality, e.g. being able to build a whole house or wall successfully. I guess Limit Theory's combat prototype spoiled me since I could pretty much do combat and related gameplay but nothing beyond that. If Stonehearth's alphas had been at the same state, I'd be able to build any number of houses...eventually. Not being able to build any given house I expected; not being able to build any houses fully surprised me.

I also wish it had more features, but just be sure - they didn't mislead you. They explicitly said what was going to be in it, or rather, what was NOT going to be in it.

 

[Orlandu84]

I also wish it had more features, but just be sure - they didn't mislead you. They explicitly said what was going to be in it, or rather, what was NOT going to be in it.

I fully agree that they were very upfront with what they were releasing. I was not questioning their honesty - I find their blog posts amusing and informative - I was questioning their strategic decision to release.

 

[Rentahamster]

I fully agree that they were very upfront with what they were releasing. I was not questioning their honesty - I find their blog posts amusing and informative - I was questioning their strategic decision to release.

There's a demand for it, and people are willing to pay them a greater amount of money now, for an insider look at the game, and volunteer their time to help them test it.

Win for the dev team - the get money now, they get more eyes on the early builds to identify bugs, and more varieties of systems to test it out on.

Win for the players - some people are hardcore like that and actually derive enjoyment from being a part of the early process.

 

[syko de4d]

As long as they dont start selling the game in this state directly over Steam they not doing anything wrong.

And people can start to mod a little already http://www.stonehearthkingdom.com/files/category/4-mods/

Not much there atm but a small start without any real mod tools.

 

[Raticus79]

Patch: http://stonehearth.net/2014/01/02/stonehearth-revision-12-now-available-on-steam/

Greatly optimized path finding, especially when building many structures.
Fixed a bug which would sometimes cause the game to crash when building walls.
Increased the length of a day by 50%
Added a task manager in the bottom-right corner to track CPU usage.
Removed the debug keys be default. Set “enable_debug_keys” to true in your user_settings.json file to turn them back on.

 

[maniac-kun]

So how good is it in its current state with the latest updates?

 

[syko de4d]

So how good is it in its current state with the latest updates?

still a ultra pre alpha with nearly nothing to do. Hope after the AI fix stuff real content will come soon (and a save button please!)