Early Access is risky. We’ve talked about it time and time again on podcasts and in articles. But the model is a hit both with devs and with customers. There are a lot of people out there who think they want to see how the sausage is made when it comes to their video games. Put a heavy emphasis on think.
Rust has always spooked me due to having one of the most vague and cryptic early access notifications that I’ve seen on Steam. Here’s a copy for your enjoyment:
“We are in very early development. Some things work, some things don’t. We haven’t totally decided where the game is headed – so things will change. Things will change a lot. We might even make changes that you think are wrong. But we have a plan. It’s in our interest to make the game awesome – so please trust us.”
That ain’t a whole lot of promises, and today the folks behind Garry’s mod proved that they’re not kidding around when they say “things will change a lot”. Today’s patch removed zombies from the game, and replaced them with what the developers are promising will be a temporary influx of aggressive animals. What will eventually replace those animals? No word, but it sounds interesting.
This change actually goes a long way in proving my theory that how much you love zombies has at least some correlation to how strong your reading comprehension is. You can’t just take away somebody’s zombies (no matter how many times you warn them beforehand that you’re entitled to do precisely that) without some repercussions. Here’s some highlights from the comments on today’s patch:
I gona delete and forget this game forever.
Removing zombies was a stupid idea, you scamed every player with a zombie game and now you delete? Are you kidding?
It’s tough to gauge how much this could actually impact the game’s following because most of the people complaining don’t actually put their money where their mouth is.
Really? This game sucks officially now, Zombies were cool, I dont want stupid clunky AI with guns running around. Look at Arma 2 and 3. Perfect example. Not playing this game anymore. Wish I could trade it off.
That last player had been in Rust for two hours when I grabbed his comment. So it’s most likely that someone broke into his house, tied up his family, and forced him to continue to play the game he so badly wished he could trade off.
Still to me this is a very interesting example of the kind of risks that you take when you style your game with an early access model. It’s also a great example of the kind of risks you take as a consumer. There’s literally nothing to stop the Day Z folks from removing zombies, turning off gravity, and calling the game complete. So if this is the kind of thing that would make you angry maybe you should be a little more careful with your money in the future.
You can see the whole mess here: http://steamcommunity.com/games/252490/announcements/detail/1389661418668577140
