Home Gaming Valve changing Early Access to avoid backer exploitation

Valve changing Early Access to avoid backer exploitation

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Steam’s Early Access program has managed to earn itself a bad name over the years, thanks to a few terrible projects that have sucked fans dry and delivered only broken promises. It has made backing a game a far more complex and risky decision to make – a fact that Valve is incredibly unhappy about. That’s why they’re changing Early Access and making it far more strict for potential developers.

Valve is cracking down on Early Access developers, lying down some new rules and guidelines to make communication between them and their paying fans far more effective. That’s the core of the issue really, with some developers making promises they can’t keep, failing to adequately mark their games as prototypes and sometimes trying to outright bamboozle customers altogether.

Valve is saying no more, and some of their new should help mitigate some of the financial risk fans face. Developers must now avoid talking about features that don’t exist yet. This makes the vision for the game more vague, but prevents empty promise from being made.

“Do not ask your customers to bet on the future of your game. Customers should be buying your game based on its current state, not on promises of a future that may or may not be realized.”

Valve also wants to force a form of launch parity for Early Access, forcing developers to launch on Steam at the same time, and at the same price, as anywhere else. This will most likely be the toughest pill for developers to swallow, with many only migration to Steam after some success elsewhere.

“We expect Steam customers to get a price for the Early Access game no higher than they are offered on any other service or website. Please make sure that’s the case.”

The rest are quick bullet points that probably should’ve been part of the rules from the start, considering how logical they seem.

  • Don’t launch in Early Access if you can’t afford to develop with very few or no sales.
  • Make sure you set expectations properly everywhere you talk about your game.
  • Don’t launch in Early Access without a playable game.
  • Don’t launch in Early Access if you are done with development.

These should help minimize the risk of investing in unfinished games, but it won’t abolish it altogether. There are still going to be games that burn backers, but hopefully these new rules help communicate issues earlier. Early Access is a vague and imperfect model still, but Valve doesn’t want to give up on it just yet.

Last Updated: November 21, 2014

18 Comments

  1. But how do these new rules get enforced?

    I just use Caveat Emptor “buyer beware” and don’t buy anything in early access.

    Reply

    • Reid

      November 21, 2014 at 09:32

      Yeah there are a lot of early access games that seem interesting, but I either just follow them or place them on my wishlist until they have launched. Then I look at the reviews and decide from there.

      Reply

  2. Kromas, Guardian of Cenarius

    November 21, 2014 at 09:08

    I am a sucker for Early Access. That being said EA is a terrible idea.

    Reply

    • ToshZA

      November 21, 2014 at 09:14

      Winning. 😀

      Reply

    • Lord Chaos

      November 21, 2014 at 09:18

      Damn it, beat me to it.

      Reply

      • Admiral Chief Wang

        November 21, 2014 at 09:18

        Is that what she said?

        Reply

        • Lord Chaos

          November 21, 2014 at 09:19

          Yea, to the music.

          Reply

          • Admiral Chief Wang

            November 21, 2014 at 09:19

            Wub wub wub

          • Kensei Seraph No DA:I spoilers

            November 21, 2014 at 09:29

            And did you beat her to the music?
            I hope you assigned a safe word first.

          • Admiral Chief Wang

            November 21, 2014 at 09:40

            XDXDXDXDXD

    • Hammersteyn

      November 21, 2014 at 09:24

      LOL

      Reply

  3. Kensei Seraph No DA:I spoilers

    November 21, 2014 at 09:09

    I get the launch price parity but I don’t fully understand what they want from the launch time parity.

    Reply

    • Admiral Chief Wang

      November 21, 2014 at 09:17

      A symmetry property of physical quantities or processes under spatial inversion?

      Reply

  4. Admiral Chief Wang

    November 21, 2014 at 09:16

    Good!

    Reply

  5. Captain JJ the fair

    November 21, 2014 at 09:28

    That header just reminded why I’ve kakked myself so many times playing The Forest.

    Reply

  6. Captain JJ the fair

    November 21, 2014 at 09:40

    I support early access games. EA games not so much.
    But I do think a lot of these guys have some really nice ideas and concepts that would otherwise have gone to waste if they couldn’t generate at least SOME money while they finish the game.

    Reply

  7. MakeItLegal

    November 21, 2014 at 09:49

    So bf 4 was an early access until November of this year ? Or is tht alpha ? Reminds me need to delete that beta when I get home

    Reply

  8. CrasH

    November 21, 2014 at 11:35

    Its like paying full price for a very small piece of pizza and being told that if more people pay full price for a very small piece… you might get a very awesome pizza…

    Yes, it might be better than others or worth the price in the end… but here in SA we have heard soo much false promises, that Early access wont see my cash any day soon.

    Reply

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