Game News Dead State Early Access demo to launch on February 12th, save/load included

[Infinitron]

Tags: Dead State; DoubleBear Productions

Shortly after Dead State's 35th Kickstarter update, the game showed up on Steam with a release date of "Coming Soon". Here's what its Early Access description said:

Dead State: The First Seven Days - Early Access Demo Coming Soon!
Dead State: The First Seven Days is an early, WIP preview of the first week of Dead State's gameplay - an opportunity to prepare your strategy for the full game and help us test and polish the full Dead State experience. You'll meet some of your initial allies, explore a dozen or so locations, and settle into your base of operations, the Shelter. There are several solid hours of gameplay in the Early Access alone, and it barely scratches the surface of what the full game will provide.

Q&A:
1. Why is our game in Early Access?
We are releasing on early access to show our progress to Kickstarter backers/pre-order customers, as well as to bring the pre-release game to potential customers who supported us on Greenlight and have been asking us to bring a version of the game out on Steam. We would also like to get feedback on this earlier revision of the game so that we can improve the game for release.

2. How long do we plan to be in Early Access?
Our current goal is no more than 3-5 months, though we would like to release the final game as perfect and bug-free as possible.

3. What is the current state of the game?
The game is about to enter Beta internally, though we may decide to take extra time and revamp some of the current systems and assets.

4. What features are we planning to add to the game?
Right now, we're working on getting additional content/areas/art into the game, revamping some of the GUIs, and working on improving AI. The biggest missing features right now are Save/Load, final intros/endings, our final XP system, some skill/perk functionality, and animal NPCs, but these features along with many others are planned for future updates.

5. What is our pricing strategy during and after Early Access?
Early Access will be discounted to $24.99 until release, at which point the price will be $30.

6. How can the Steam Community help us during our development process?
We will be monitoring gameplay feedback from the Community, tracking technical issues, helping players with bugs/issues, and making sure players are kept informed about changes and release info.

From all of us at DoubleBear, thank you for your support and enjoy Dead State: The First Seven Days!”
​

Sounds good...wait, no Save/Load? Well, no worries about that, because it seems DoubleBear saw the Codex's wailing and gnashing of edgy teeth and got spooked, because they released an additional Kickstarter update a bit over a week afterwards that reassured:

A quick update – I know everyone wants this update to say “we’re launching today” but we had to put that off for another round of testing. We’re merging in our save/load system into the build to make it easier for players to get through the many hours of the demo, which will have the side benefit of making it easier to test for the team and some of our volunteers. We’re also adding in a few other items we’ve been working on, such as time of day lighting and turn order elements to the new combat GUI. If there are no issues with save/load, we’ll do one more round of progression testing to make sure there are no other showstoppers or outstanding issues, then we’ll package the Early Access build for release and work on getting it up to Steam.

It won’t be too much longer of a wait (as I said last time, we were already saying early February was a possibility), and as always, we will let you know the minute we start sending codes to backers. Thanks for your continued patience.​

Phew, nerdrage averted! The reason I'm posting this today, however, is because the game's Steam page was updated this morning, informing us that the demo's release date is February 12th. They have not, however, edited out the part about there being no Save/Load functionality. You might wanna take care of that, guys - it could lose you lots of sales.

 

[felipepepe]

Releasing it without save/load was indeed a retarded idea... when people stay too long focused on something, they sometimes lose sight of the bigger picture and do shit like this. Luckily they were listening and quickly changed it.

 

[commie]

But...but....this is vapourware, or so the resident faggots were telling us!

 

[Karm Veland Morelake]

Another zombie game, rejoice, the incline is here

 

[Infinitron]

Oops, I may have posted this too early: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/70755535/dead-state-the-zombie-survival-rpg/posts/742420

I think they're a bit too worried about DRM-phobic Steam-haters, heh.

 

[Excidium]

But...but....this is vapourware, or so the resident faggots were telling us!

That was before they got money for nothing

Another zombie game, rejoice, the incline is here

You asshole

 

[felipepepe]

I think they're a bit too worried about DRM-phobic Steam-haters, heh.

Isn't it regular practice to give BOTH Steam and DRM-dree copies to backers?

 

[Infinitron]

I think they're a bit too worried about DRM-phobic Steam-haters, heh.

Isn't it regular practice to give BOTH Steam and DRM-dree copies to backers?

Of the final game, yes. Of Early Access, no.

 

[Roguey]

They're giving an awfully short notice.

But...but....this is vapourware, or so the resident faggots were telling us!

It still could be. Even Cleve released a demo. It's my belief that its vaporware status would be guaranteed if not for early access sales potential. Even with the extra money, who knows?

 

[Infinitron]

They're giving an awfully short notice.

Trying too hard. Why the fuck would you need to give "notice" to release a demo? Besides, the actual notice was given on January 21st, except that they didn't have an exact date.

 

[Roguey]

Trying too hard. Why the fuck would you need to give "notice" to release a demo? Besides, the actual notice was given on January 21st, except that they didn't have an exact date.

Sorry, I was referring to the "If you don't want Steam, tell us before Wednesday" notice.

 

[cherry blossom]

Brian is being quite retarded about it, tbh.

Game pitch: "Hey, we promise you this awesome zombie game and it will be DEE-ARRR-AM FREEE"

Update #33453579394543: "Hey, we know that we PROMISED that the game would be DRM-Free but if you REEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAALLLY want it to be DRM-Free, you better tell us NOW or you'll be stuck with a Steam copy LOL"

I can't help but find myself wishing some misfortune on them after such a stupid handling of something so simple.

 

[Infinitron]

Brian is being quite retarded about it, tbh.

Game pitch: "Hey, we promise you this awesome zombie game and it will be DEE-ARRR-AM FREEE"

Update #33453579394543: "Hey, we know that we PROMISED that the game would be DRM-Free but if you REEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAALLLY want it to be DRM-Free, you better tell us NOW or you'll be stuck with a Steam copy LOL"

I can't help but find myself wishing some misfortune on them after such a stupid handling of something so simple.

Well, what other Kickstarters have generally been doing is setting up a web interface/backer portal where you can select how you want the game - Steam key or GOG key. Dead State seems to be too small time to bother setting one of those up, though, so I guess instead they're just giving out the Steam key by default unless people contact them and specifically request otherwise.

The funny thing is that for those games that have backer portals, there are probably thousands (perhaps even tens of thousands) of backers who don't bother to read KS updates and haven't registered to the portals. They won't get anything.

 

[SuicideBunny]

The funny thing is that for those games that have backer portals, there are probably thousands (perhaps even tens of thousands) of backers who don't bother to read KS updates and haven't registered to the portals. They won't get anything.

i'd wager it's not thousands but hundreds at most and only on the lower tiers as well and they'll get their stuff as soon as they bitch to support when the game/product/whatever comes out.

 

[Infinitron]

The funny thing is that for those games that have backer portals, there are probably thousands (perhaps even tens of thousands) of backers who don't bother to read KS updates and haven't registered to the portals. They won't get anything.

i'd wager it's not thousands but hundreds at most and only on the lower tiers as well and they'll get their stuff as soon as they bitch to support when the game/product/whatever comes out.

I don't know, Obsidian seem pretty desperate to get people to register in every update since they opened their portal:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/obsidian/project-eternity/posts/732064

Welcome! First things first: if you have backed Pillars of Eternity but not yet completed your order on our website, please do so as soon as possible. Even if you have an all-digital order, we need information from you to make sure you get everything you are supposed to. If your backer tier includes an NPC, item, portrait, or other custom piece of content, an early response will make it easier for us to work with you on your designs and preferences. As always, we appreciate that our backers have made Pillars of Eternity possible and we want to ensure that you get your money's worth.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/obsidian/project-eternity/posts/719969

Hello, everyone. Like everyone here at Obsidian, I hope you had a great holiday season and were able to gorge on lots of treats and good food. This week I am going to go over a bit about the new Backer Portal (please log in if you haven't already), give a general update about where we are in our production, and show off some of the cool things that are happening in the game. In our next update we will be taking a more detailed look at some of the classes in Eternity.

He even bolded the "please". Ouch!

 

[SuicideBunny]

might have something to do with how late they were in implementing one and the iteration it went through and the fact that a lot of people who actually register seem to be confused as to how to properly use it....

 

[Roguey]

I don't know, Obsidian seem pretty desperate to get people to register in every update since they opened their portal:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/obsidian/project-eternity/posts/732064

Welcome! First things first: if you have backed Pillars of Eternity but not yet completed your order on our website, please do so as soon as possible. Even if you have an all-digital order, we need information from you to make sure you get everything you are supposed to. If your backer tier includes an NPC, item, portrait, or other custom piece of content, an early response will make it easier for us to work with you on your designs and preferences. As always, we appreciate that our backers have made Pillars of Eternity possible and we want to ensure that you get your money's worth.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/obsidian/project-eternity/posts/719969

Hello, everyone. Like everyone here at Obsidian, I hope you had a great holiday season and were able to gorge on lots of treats and good food. This week I am going to go over a bit about the new Backer Portal (please log in if you haven't already), give a general update about where we are in our production, and show off some of the cool things that are happening in the game. In our next update we will be taking a more detailed look at some of the classes in Eternity.

He even bolded the "please". Ouch!

Scroll down a bit on that second link.

That said, use of the portal is not mandatory. We can still fulfill your pledge manually if you're not comfortable with signing up. I will confess that it makes it easier for us, but we want to make sure everyone is comfortable with the process, and I definitely respect your concerns.

It's more of a "please don't make us do a lot of extra work."

 

[Awakened_Yeti]

does it really take this long to make a game with TBS combat against fucking ZOMBIES? .. how many variations of "shamble, swipe, groan" are there??

but wait! NPC IGUANAS! shit man that takes years of coding to get the reptile behavior nailed down with sufficient realism

 

[cherry blossom]

You forgot to take into account the reptilian personalities; those NPCs who will scheme against you, manipulate others against you and screw you over when you least expect it.

 

[Awakened_Yeti]

You forgot to take into account the reptilian personalities; those NPCs who will scheme against you, manipulate others against you and screw you over when you least expect it.

yeh, i'll believe it when i see it in-game... in about 7 more years i guess

 

[Roguey]

does it really take this long to make a game with TBS combat against fucking ZOMBIES? .. how many variations of "shamble, swipe, groan" are there??

but wait! NPC IGUANAS! shit man that takes years of coding to get the reptile behavior nailed down with sufficient realism

At least three people from the team are also working on AoD, including the lead programmer (no other programmers have actually been named). I'm sure that's slowing them down quite a bit.

 

[lebe frei]

Q&A:
1. Why is our game in Early Access?
We are releasing on early access to show our progress to Kickstarter backers/pre-order customers, as well as to bring the pre-release game to potential customers who supported us on Greenlight and have been asking us to bring a version of the game out on Steam. We would also like to get feedback on this earlier revision of the game so that we can improve the game for release.
We are a business and we want more money. Early Access can provide a lot of that.

Is that so hard to say?

 

[cherry blossom]

99.5% of our backers so far are okay with Steam or have asked for it. It was easier to ask backers to opt-out, otherwise we would have thousands of messages to go through.

:facepalm:

Of course you would think that 99.5% of your backers are so far okay with Steam when you make it a condition to opt out of it so anyone not keeping up with the news and hence not sending a message to opt out would be taken for "ok with Steam", regardless of whether they really are ok with Steam.

What the fuck kind of logic is that?

And why are they so retarded that they can't simply use the default Kickstarter survey tools for this? Goddammit Brian.

 

[Infinitron]

99.5% of our backers so far are okay with Steam or have asked for it. It was easier to ask backers to opt-out, otherwise we would have thousands of messages to go through.

:facepalm:

Of course you would think that 99.5% of your backers are so far okay with Steam when you make it a condition to opt out of it so anyone not keeping up with the news and hence not sending a message to opt out would be taken for "ok with Steam", regardless of whether they really are ok with Steam.

What the fuck kind of logic is that?

And why are they so retarded that they can't simply use the default Kickstarter survey tools for this? Goddammit Brian.

I know that the default Kickstarters tools are notoriously inflexible. Personally I've only ever gotten two Kickstarter survey emails, both back in mid-2012. Maybe I've been backing the wrong projects, but it seems people just don't like using them. There's a reason all the big guys create their own portals. Perhaps MLMarkland or ksaun could explain the details.

 

[tuluse]

I think you can only do one kickstarter survey per project, ever.