Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Khaza-R]

It's always frustrating when you don't like something but there are other people who do.

Snide comment aside, they aren't wrong. Although its hardly just a Blizzard problem but something pervasive throughout the industry. Giving developers money through pre-ordering doesn't exactly incentivize them to make a smooth and polished game at launch.

[Lahis]

Pre-ordering is completely pointless and insane these days. There is no supply or shipping problems to be worried about. You can buy the game the minute it launches and be playing it as soon as the clowns who bought it 6 months ago.

[Hitei]

Snide comment aside, they aren't wrong. Although its hardly just a Blizzard problem but something pervasive throughout the industry. Giving developers money through pre-ordering doesn't exactly incentivize them to make a smooth and polished game at launch.

This logic doesn't really hold up when games were riddled with bugs and lacked polish long before preorders became a common thing. Preorders being less popular in 2008 didn't stop Wrath from being absolutely riddled with bugs, or cutting/scaling back a bunch of planned features. Just like it didn't stop Fallout 3 from being unstable crashy garbage compared to 4 or 76.

Because, vaporware indie scams aside, devs generally don't go "oh we've reached x million units, cease all testing and development". Games that are unpolished and full of bugs would have been unpolished and full of bugs regardless of preorders being open or not. Devs generally want a game to be good and well received, and executives, despite what extremely vocal people might think, also want a game to be good and well received, because preorders are always a minority total sales, and there's no point in banking on preorders to carry your game.

Giving devs money through preorders does incentivize them to make a smooth and polished game at launch, because it gives them they are on the right track and it's okay to keep working on the things and getting them more towards a nice end product. When you tank sales (or interest), the dev is left up in the air, and feels like they shouldn't keep investing in polish and smoothing (because what is the point if people don't like the base thing?) so they start trying to hedge their bets by backing off of development of the things they've been doing (leaving them without polish) and trying to come up with some new option that also does not get full dev time, because it was started in desperation halfway+ through development.

Pre-ordering is completely pointless and insane these days. There is no supply or shipping problems to be worried about. You can buy the game the minute it launches and be playing it as soon as the clowns who bought it 6 months ago.

Pre-ordering is entirely sensible for anything that you know you are going to be buying. I have been playing the game since 2005, and have played every expansion at launch. I know that I am going to play Dragonflight at launch, so why wait until release, having to deal with it before I log on, and potentially running into issues with busy web servers or payment processing servers, or whatever other shit when I can just buy the thing I'm gonna buy anyway at some point in the next few months?

[Dracullus]

When in doubt, go for nation bashing!

Most funny is that I didn't even bought it yet and there is big chance that mr responsible consumer will buy it before me, people who must scream about it clearly are fighting with their addiction.

I just think box price has GREAT value considering how many hours of entertain it provides, especially compared to typical AAA premiere. And for sure I hate when some loser try to spoil fun for truly passionate people.

[ImTheMizAwesome]

Most funny is that I didn't even bought it yet and there is big chance that mr responsible consumer will buy it before me, people who must scream about it clearly are fighting with their addiction.

I just think box price has GREAT value considering how many hours of entertain it provides, especially compared to typical AAA premiere. And for sure I hate when some loser try to spoil fun for truly passionate people.

Damn bro, you don't have to show how much i hurt you with my words for some reason, going for "loser" insults and such.

Im still waiting for some facts from you about alpha testing(because you quoted me first for some reason) and how it doesn't matter, because all what you've been doing now is playing some sort of the "passionate" victim card, when you don't have arguments.


Another thing, comparing value of DF box to "typical AAA premiere" is really pointless, you don't get any value if you just buy the box without subscription, unless you will go for most expensive one, but if you go and buy this "typical AAA premiere" game, you get content right away, without sub.
From MMO's GW2 for example, you buy the expansion you get value right away, the amount of hours of entertainment you will get, is not based on subscription that you're not able to play or enjoy content without.
BOX literally gives you nothing just access to something you still have to pay for when it comes to WoW model.

Overall using how many hours of entertainment game provides as a base for "GREAT" value is also weird, because it would seems like the ubisoft open world games are the best ever.

You can get the same amount of value, entertaiment with the 10-20h game, just as example something like Spiderman on Playstation. ^^

[Khaza-R]

This logic doesn't really hold up when games were riddled with bugs and lacked polish long before preorders became a common thing. Preorders being less popular in 2008 didn't stop Wrath from being absolutely riddled with bugs, or cutting/scaling back a bunch of planned features. Just like it didn't stop Fallout 3 from being unstable crashy garbage compared to 4 or 76.

Because, vaporware indie scams aside, devs generally don't go "oh we've reached x million units, cease all testing and development". Games that are unpolished and full of bugs would have been unpolished and full of bugs regardless of preorders being open or not. Devs generally want a game to be good and well received, and executives, despite what extremely vocal people might think, also want a game to be good and well received, because preorders are always a minority total sales, and there's no point in banking on preorders to carry your game.

Giving devs money through preorders does incentivize them to make a smooth and polished game at launch, because it gives them they are on the right track and it's okay to keep working on the things and getting them more towards a nice end product. When you tank sales (or interest), the dev is left up in the air, and feels like they shouldn't keep investing in polish and smoothing (because what is the point if people don't like the base thing?) so they start trying to hedge their bets by backing off of development of the things they've been doing (leaving them without polish) and trying to come up with some new option that also does not get full dev time, because it was started in desperation halfway+ through development.

And yet we are dealing with the same company that just released the absolute travesty that was Reforged 3 years ago so the skepticism is entirely warranted compared to when WotLK was released. Pre-ordering can be okay when the developer has their own ethics that prevent them from releasing shoddy, unstable products. However in the case of Blizzard or even Bethseda, you cannot fault customers for not wanting to just hand them over money in good faith that they might actually deliver this time.

And as far as the industry goes, I think you're seeing too much in terms of extremes. Its not pre-ordering means that a developer can totally scam you now that they have your money. The larger issue is that mediocrity and passibility becomes the norm for standards. Releasing something just good enough to keep consumers coming back for more. Pre-purchasing isn't the only issue here, because we saw this behavior from massive developers even more it was widespread, but it has contributed to the issue.

[Lady Atia]

Spotify TOS doesn't let me play it on radio. CDs I can use.

All music transferring into Spotify and Amazon is fucking dreadful for this hobby.

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Atleast MoP was still on CD.

What the hell is a radio? Don't you have a phone? Or a pc? You can play music there, you know? CD's are an old medium and they are creating just more waste, spotify is far better ...

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Pre-ordering is completely pointless and insane these days. There is no supply or shipping problems to be worried about. You can buy the game the minute it launches and be playing it as soon as the clowns who bought it 6 months ago.

Wow, another great reply from you. In case you missed it, the pre-order has a limited time pet this time, and you also get the collectors edition items instantly if you pre-order. Both are reason enough to get it already. Besides that, I know I will play Dragonflight, 11.0, 12.0 and everything beyond, because I love the game. So there is literally no reason not to pre-order it. Oh, also, Dragonflight looks great already, as did the last 2 seasons of Shadowlands.

[Makorus]

Spotify TOS doesn't let me play it on radio. CDs I can use.

All music transferring into Spotify and Amazon is fucking dreadful for this hobby.

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Atleast MoP was still on CD.

I mean, no, you can't use CDs either. Public performances need express consent from the copyright holder.

Just because you can doesn't mean you are allowed to. This thread is just baffling sometimes.

[Worldshaper]

Pre-ordering is completely pointless and insane these days. There is no supply or shipping problems to be worried about. You can buy the game the minute it launches and be playing it as soon as the clowns who bought it 6 months ago.

TIL having a disposable income and knowing you'll be trying out the expansion of a game you like means you're a clown.

[Lahis]

I mean, no, you can't use CDs either. Public performances need express consent from the copyright holder.

Just because you can doesn't mean you are allowed to. This thread is just baffling sometimes.

We have paid the public performance fees to Teosto and Gramex. We literally have the express consent from copyright holders. You don't operate a radio station on actual FM waves without all of your shit in order.

However the TOS of Spotify, Amazon or any digital platform prohibits their commercial use, which makes them completely unusable as a source. Under our licenses, no such limitations exists for any physical media though.

[Hitei]

And yet we are dealing with the same company that just released the absolute travesty that was Reforged 3 years ago so the skepticism is entirely warranted compared to when WotLK was released. Pre-ordering can be okay when the developer has their own ethics that prevent them from releasing shoddy, unstable products. However in the case of Blizzard or even Bethseda, you cannot fault customers for not wanting to just hand them over money in good faith that they might actually deliver this time.

And as far as the industry goes, I think you're seeing too much in terms of extremes. Its not pre-ordering means that a developer can totally scam you now that they have your money. The larger issue is that mediocrity and passibility becomes the norm for standards. Releasing something just good enough to keep consumers coming back for more. Pre-purchasing isn't the only issue here, because we saw this behavior from massive developers even more it was widespread, but it has contributed to the issue.

And you think that the reason Reforged is bad is because it had preorders? Do you see the problem here? Your entire argument has completely veered away from talking about bugs, polish and preorders and is now just "I don't like that thing" or "it's mediocre", because preorders are a non-issue.

It's not that "pre-purchasing isn't the only issue here" it's that they aren't an issue to the objective quality issues full-stop. You literally just reinforced exactly what I said: there are just companies who were going to produce a mediocre game to begin with. Bathesda doesn't produce games bugged to all hell because preorders exist, they produce games bugged to all hell because they have buggy engines and a lot of ground to cover for quality assurance. Their most recent games (and so the games most prerdered) are significantly more stable and less buggy than their games a decade ago.

You skepticism was warranted during Wrath. When Vanilla was full of bugs and lack of polish, and then BC was full of bugs and lack of polish and then Wrath was also full of bugs and lack of polish. Not now, when, your feelings on the fun value of systems or the likeability of story content aside, the expansions are infinitely more stable, infinitely less buggy and have significantly more polish put into them.

[Makabreska]

It's not that "pre-purchasing isn't the only issue here" it's that they aren't an issue to the objective quality issues full-stop. You literally just reinforced exactly what I said: there are just companies who were going to produce a mediocre game to begin with. Bathesda doesn't produce games bugged to all hell because preorders exist, they produce games bugged to all hell because they have buggy engines and a lot of ground to cover for quality assurance. Their most recent games (and so the games most prerdered) are significantly more stable and less buggy than their games a decade ago.

OOOOOOF!!! Bold statement, considering their last game was F76.

[Lahis]

OOOOOOF!!! Bold statement, considering their last game was F76.

Can't wait for Starfield to be absolute dumpster fire on release.

[ImTheMizAwesome]

Can't wait for Starfield to be absolute dumpster fire on release.

can't wait for my ship to get bugged and dissapear in space, with lasers shooting from my nipples because of that.

Many games are bugged to all hell becuase they have underpaid or shitty QA or not QA at all, its not the engine, if someone favors the preoders then the preorder money should go for good QA, but big companies are cheap and it doesn't.

I don't see logic in preordering either and i just leave this short and funny video in here.

[Makabreska]

Can't wait for Starfield to be absolute dumpster fire on release.

Eh, I'm sure MS slapped them/will slap them into shape. Also, Starfield is a genre they have been doing for decades, not some live service MMO they had zero experience with. But of course it will be bugged a lot, since Bethesda likes when modders fix their games and add content to them.

[Teriz]

It's always frustrating when you don't like something but there are other people who do.

It’s honestly getting weird; We now have posters on a WoW-centric forum going after other posters for having the audacity to preorder the next WoW expansion!

Strange times indeed.

[Dracullus]

It’s honestly getting weird; We now have posters on a WoW-centric forum going after other posters for having the audacity to preorder the next WoW expansion!

Strange times indeed.

Let's not pretend it's something new. For some people only argument for "wow is bad" is "no one plays it and game will die soon" (of course there are also people woth constructive criticism that are welcomed). So no wonder they go apeshit whenever there is big hype around game.

[Edlarel]

*Snip*

I disagree with that video only on the basis that if it were true, they would more than triple the number of preorders. But yeah, I'm going to play anyway, and I have money now. No promise I will in 6+ months.

[Nymrohd]

The value proposition of a new WoW xpac is just good. An xpac is packed with as much content as most AAA game and that's without the repeatable content. If it gets boring after, sure, quit. But you will get your money's worth from the release.

[The Stormbringer]

What was shown in the trailer was way ahead of those past expansions tho.
Most zones were shown with mobs and npc in it. They already knew the story of each zones and shared it with us.

Also no borrowed power is gonna give them a lot of more time to do other stuff.

SL had to test conduit, soulbinds, legendaries, covenant skills and classes covenant skills for every spec in the game.
+ thorgy power.

That's a lot of time invested.

There is none of that in DF.

Really? I didn't see them showcasing dungeons and battlegrounds like they have in past expansions. All I saw was some zones and a couple of monsters.

What lesson is it you want them to have learned? They is no indication that Dragonflight will have two major patches only and there is no indication they haven't put proper time and effort into Dragonflight. The only lesson you are teaching Blizzard is that haters will hate for any reason they can find. Even if they don't have any evidence to back up their hate.

There isn't that much to test. Standard questing content and balance of basic talents. Dragon Riding is the only advance system that we know about that would require extensive testing. Remember they listened and remove borrowed power.

The indications are everywhere, you just have to look at Shadowlands. Maybe I will be proven wrong, and if I am, I'll be pleasantly surprised. It may shock you but I actually want the game to be good. The problem is the precedent set with Shadowlands.

And we are back to square one. How do we know that SL being shorter wont be to DF benefit?

Primarily the poor showing of Shadowlands as well as the severe lack of information on Dragonflight itself. But also, Blizzard's track record. They have shown time and time again that they keep dropping the ball. I've been burned far too many times to expect them to put out something great, so instead I'll wait to see what they actually make, and view everything until then with a cynical eye. If they start releasing quality stuff on a regular basis, then they could definitely change my opinion. I used to be a huge fan, after all.

How does the Alpha test of the expansion being short have anything to do with post-launch content?

The Alpha and Beta being short typically means things aren't being well tested, which leads to a jankier, poorer quality game. Maybe there will still be 'quantity' if they intend on rushing things, but it won't be quality.