Game Development: Haven & Hearth on Steam

[mrM]

Please do feel free to enlighten me (a Steam noob) about what Early Access actually means, and why it would be good for Haven.

I believe early access exists as a way to support developers ($) and test as they develop a game. A soft launch of sorts. And a way to manage buyer expectations.
Reviews are handled differently (quote from Steam Support page - these reviews will be tagged with 'Early Access', but will still be visible to other players.)
A little more leeway tends to be given to negative reviews if the buyer considers the game is Early Access.
Personally I've bought and played many great games that were (and still are) early access over the years. I probably would not have considered buying them if they were released as a 1.0 version with reviews of bugs/QOL issues. As another guy said it would be hard to recover from any large amount of negative reviews from a full launch.

I've really enjoyed playing this game over the years and would hate to see any picky (Overwhelmingly Negative) steam reviews kill it.

[khajios]

Especially in the survival/crafting style games, people tend to be a lot more forgiving of games with the early access title.
Many of them spend years with this title and only come out when they do something major like a console release, some large update, the game gets associated with a major publisher, etc.

For a recent example, the game 7 Days to Die recently made a big thing about leaving early access. Its a zombie/horror themed voxel world game with survival and crafting elements, that got around one major patch a year. The game was perfectly playable, has a pretty large mod scene, and would get fairly substantial changes with each major update (with a few minor updates coming through the rest of the time).
They had the same eternal alpha status until they wanted to publish on consoles. Post golive, they are still doing 1-2 expected major patches a year, in pretty much the same scope as before. We all got to be surprised when instead of Alpha 22 we got 1.0

Some people will avoid games with the early access tag because they have been burned by games that never get completed, but for most everyone else early access just means "The game is in active development, expect changes and some jank"

[Dawidio123]

I've really enjoyed playing this game over the years and would hate to see any picky (Overwhelmingly Negative) steam reviews kill it.

Surely, no pvp group will do everything in their power to scare away steam players and farm negative reviews to spite the fact they are being forced to play through steam with all the horrendous drawbacks it brings, thinking that if they manage to make the game dead on the steam world there will be a new non-steam world so they can once again play there.

But of course if the victims see "early-access" they won't leave a negative review lmao.

[Drownin_DaSea]

glubglbuglub hgggrk mmmmmmmmmmmnnmmmnmnmmm hnnnhuh hnnnhuh blrglbglrgbarblgelabge....ack!

translation: "surely this mess of a game, which has been in "Eternal Alpha" for 15 years, won't be left to rot in Early Access for any significant amount of time!

[mrM]

.

Surely no pvp group that has 100 alter egos on the forum of a 'dead game' would have anything better to do right? Why don't you guys go play rust or something?

[jpjpjpppjp]

Doing a Steam release to get more attention on the game is fine.
However, please make sure everything is done so that it is as successful as it can be.

You really only release the game on Steam once, and it will be where most new people will see the game and try it out. Therefore, it is best to have everything ready and as best as it can be before launching it on Steam.
If the Steam release is a failure, why even bother to release it in the first place? So everyone who tries it knows not to play the game ever again?

Here's a list of what can impact the Steam release:

Poor new player experience - UI and tutorials
UI and the initial learning experience should be improved to be as best as possible. Most people will give up easily, won't tolerate learning Haven's learning curve.

Poor new player experience - Player on player interaction
Is a tricky topic as open pvp will always have implications on new player's interactions regardless of how much it is changed to accomodate for this.
Partial solutions should be looked into but it's not a major priority.

Server stability
An always online game not being online on launch is not the best first look for a new player. Please ensure stress testing is done as well as prepare a plan B and a plan C in case the main world gets too many players. Be it improved servers or hosting another world that is linked through the ocean. The MMO market can be very unpredictable and the game can get a lot of new players, at least for the first few days.

Current playerbase disillusionment
Ensure the current active playerbase is happy with the Steam release or at least neutral. These are what are going to give the game a bump on wishlists and active players in the beginning. To have people willingly move to the Steam version, it should offer a better experience than what we currently have.
For example: Market integration with hats; Steam trading cards; Steam backgrounds; Steam Workshop for addons and clients; Steam Achievements; Better account and alt account management with a single Steam account.
What not to do: Release Steam only worlds as it will likely only sour the playerbase, essentially forcing them to play on Steam. Not to mention being completely separate accounts.


My Recommendation:

Make sure the game is ready to be on Steam, regardless of how long it takes, the release only happens once.
Release workshop tools, let custom clients be moved into Steam Workshop and host tests for players to use them.
Be it either a test server (which probably won't get much attention) or on the active world, In case Steam and Seatribe accounts are allowed to connect to the same world.
Supporting the Steam client as an option to play the same world as our current launchers is the most ideal scenario as it would allow the Steam version be properly tested, achievements, workshop, etc... before it gets into the wider public.
This could be done by hosting a Beta branch on steam and giving access to current players. Alternatively a playtest version could also be hosted.
A playtest is also a good way to soft launch the game as people can sign in and developers can allow access to a determined amount of players, doing staggered access giveaways and preventing the servers from dying.
Some UI and new user experience updates should be performed to get it as ready as possible for launch.
When the Steam version is deemed stable, an Early Access launch can happen along with a wipe. There is NO reason to do a proper full launch, Early Access gets same visibility and Haven and Hearth is not complete, it is eternally in Alpha.
Include more images on the Steam store page as well as more videos as one is (if I remember correctly) not good enough for the Steam algorithm. I suggest doing or having someone do a simple early game speedrun walkthrough up until claim/pallisade. The current video gives the game's vibes but doesn't really show or explain how it plays and how the progression happens.

If it takes too long to prepare this Steam release, please do not push it, do smaller wipes, test the new wipe cycle, have the current players test the Steam version and have it completely ready for release.

Right now, from what I have seen, it looks like this Steam release is set for failure, not success.
Simply doing a w16 and just releasing it on Steam while letting players choose to play with Steam or Seatribe accounts would be setting it up for a neutral outcome.

[Flushin_DaToilet]

*flush*

[Noid]

Not offering a migration scheme to the existing players who have been supporting and collecting hats/tokens all these years is utterly disrespectful.
Haven community anger will reflect on the Steam page/game 100%. Why setting yourself up to failure like this?

[Redell]

Just make server selection at char creation so we dont get stuck with needing a steam account to join S1

[SnuggleSnail]

heavy world 8 monetization vibes except jorb speaks corporate now

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