who cares about your internal deadlines and your excuses "oh its so much work, oh it is so little time"

the fact is your FAILED TO DELIVER

Devs ban this guys account please. We all know its an alt.

who cares about your internal deadlines and your excuses "oh its so much work, oh it is so little time"

the fact is your FAILED TO DELIVER

Calm down, it's not that serious. Yes, it's annoying. Yes, it could have been better.

Great post and a lot of truth in there. This new monthly release schedule means we get 20 working days between updates, with a bit of lead time for QA and Sony submission. The rate of development of DUST has already over taken EVE, an MMO with an extremely matured development process and 10 years of experience to reach that point.

It is incredibly enabling for us to be able to ship new ideas out really quickly but as we've seen it sometimes comes at the cost of coming in for landing a bit hot. This doesn't excuse the issues, we will be having some very detailed post mortems on this release as to why some things were not caught earlier, but we will take it on the chin and adapt and do it better next time.

Despite the speed bumps, our resolve to making this the experience we all know it can be has never been stronger. Your feedback and patience as always is very much appreciated.

Great post and a lot of truth in there. This new monthly release schedule means we get 20 working days between updates, with a bit of lead time for QA and Sony submission. The rate of development of DUST has already over taken EVE, an MMO with an extremely matured development process and 10 years of experience to reach that point.

It is incredibly enabling for us to be able to ship new ideas out really quickly but as we've seen it sometimes comes at the cost of coming in for landing a bit hot. This doesn't excuse the issues, we will be having some very detailed post mortems on this release as to why some things were not caught earlier, but we will take it on the chin and adapt and do it better next time.

Despite the speed bumps, our resolve to making this the experience we all know it can be has never been stronger. Your feedback and patience as always is very much appreciated.

I'll be honest, I have little to no experience with MMOs, which is why I've been continually frustrated at Dust, compared to other games. I had no idea this was a common experience for MMO players. Thanks for explaining -- this does need to be stickied. People might ***** a little less if they understand the nature of Dust as being a work in progress, and be more constructive in their criticism.

Great post and a lot of truth in there. This new monthly release schedule means we get 20 working days between updates, with a bit of lead time for QA and Sony submission. The rate of development of DUST has already over taken EVE, an MMO with an extremely matured development process and 10 years of experience to reach that point.

It is incredibly enabling for us to be able to ship new ideas out really quickly but as we've seen it sometimes comes at the cost of coming in for landing a bit hot. This doesn't excuse the issues, we will be having some very detailed post mortems on this release as to why some things were not caught earlier, but we will take it on the chin and adapt and do it better next time.

Despite the speed bumps, our resolve to making this the experience we all know it can be has never been stronger. Your feedback and patience as always is very much appreciated.

You don't know how normal MMOs are made. The "incomplete game" model is actually very new western take on the F2P model. New features used to come in expansion packs, not patches. Oh, and almost all "incomplete game" projects are flopping hard. Even PS2, which I love, and admittedly uses this same model (albeit now at 15 months of consistent new content) is not as financially stable as SOE hoped, which is probably why they are focusing on making the game more accessible (optimization so lower powered hardware and consoles will run it smoothly).

Really? I think I have a pretty good idea about how these things work.

How about some real-world facts? Let's look at patch history for what is arguably the largest MMO, World of Warcraft, and let's see if they released their full game model, with only new features in expansion packs and what I would presume you meant were minor fixes in patches:

World of Warcraft release:
Version 1.1: (Nov. 2004) Release bug fixes
Patch 1.2: (Dec. 2004) 5-man dungeon (maraudon), outdoor PvP area, holidy content
Patch 1.3: (March 2005) 5-man dungeon, outdoor raid bosses
Patch 1.4: (April 2005) PvP honor system
Patch 1.5: (June 2005) Two battlegrounds
Patch 1.6: (July 2005) Raid dungeon (BWL), Darkmoon faire
Patch 1.7: (September 2005): Raid dungeon (ZG), Battleground (AB)
Patch 1.8: (October 2005): Outdoor PvE bosses, Revamped questing in Silithus
Patch 1.9: (January 2006): Two raids (AQ20 & AQ 40)
Patch 1.10: (March 2006): Weather effects & Teir 0.5 armor set quests
Patch 1.11: (June 2006): Raid dungeon (Naxx)
Patch 1.12: (August 2006): Cross-realm BGs

Burning Crusade release (expansion):
2.0: (December thru Feb 2007) Preparation & release of TBC
Patch 2.1: (May 2007) Raid dungeon (BT)
Patch 2.2: (Sept 2007) Voice chat
Patch 2.3: (November 2007) Raid dungeon (ZA), guild banks, Season 3 Arena
Patch 2.4: (March 2008) Raid dungeon (Sunwell), 5-man (MGT) & Isle of QuelGÇÖDanas daily quests

Wrath of the Lich King release (expansion):
3.0: (Oct thru december 2008) Preparation & release of WotLK
Patch 3.1: (April 2009): Raid dungeon (Ulduar), Argent Tournament daily quests
Patch 3.2: (August 2009): Raid Dungeon (ToC), 5-man (ToC), PvP battleground (Isle)
Patch 3.3: (December 2009) Icecrown Citadel
Patch 3.3.5: (June 2010) Ruby Sanctum Raid

Cataclysm release (expansion):
4.0: (October 2010 to November 2010) Preparation & release of Cataclysm, world revamp
Patch 4.1: (April 2011) 5-man Dungeons (ZA, ZG)
Patch 4.2: (June 2011) New Firelands Raid
Patch 4.3: (Nov. 2011) 5-man Dungeons (CoT, ET, WoE), Raid Finder feature, Transmogrification item customization, Void Storage shared inventory, Darkmoon Faire Island zone, Dragon Soul Raid
Patch 4.3.2: (Jan. 2012) Cross-Server Raids

Mists of Pandaria release (expansion):
5.0: (Aug. 2012 to Oct. 2012) Preparation & release of Mists of Pandaria
Patch 5.1: (Nov. 2012) New world PVP conflict and factions, Brawler's guild pvp system, Battle Pet upgrade feature, new scenario challenges
Patch 5.2: (Mar. 2013) New zone Isle of Thunder, new Raid Throne of Thunder, New world bosses, new scenario challenges, Sunsong ranch iterations
Patch 5.3: (May 2013) New battleground (DG), New Arena, new scenario challenges, quest campaign escalation

(For those players who never looked at WoW, a "Raid" is a large 10-40 man dungeon to "kill the dragon")

* * *

So even looking back all the way to 2004, which I would argue hardly qualifies for "very new western take" on the "incomplete game model," you can clearly see that the original WoW release was shipped, much as modern MMOs are with a "ship-ready" version of the game that Blizzard's developer team then iterated on and released content via patches, with major content being "shipped" from expansions, as I explained in the OP. I'll admit that there's a trend toward larger, more content-rich patches, but the idea that a patch is used to introduce something new to the game is hardly new.

I just as easily could have pulled Eve Online's patch history (link) or EverQuest's (link) as well, and we'd have seen a similar development history, but the point is that MMOs development is done in a similar fashion (and EverQuest goes back to 1999). Now, if you were referring to the "freemium" sales model, where players get the product for a nominal cost and can opt for in-game upgrades with real-world funds, well I would agree that that sales model is somewhat new, but patches as a source of content for MMO players? Not so much.

After reading through several posts about patch woes, I really wanted to take a moment and write up a PSA on patch days, what they really mean, and what your expectation should be.

First, please don't read this like I'm writing high-and-mighty. I just want to explain some finer points to players who may not be familiar with "typical" MMO patches, a category which I'm sure many a Dust "traditional" FPS player falls into.

Ok, so patch days on an MMO typically introduce new features, objects, shinies, etc. into the game. In a traditional MMO, say World of Warcraft, this would mean new bosses, weapons, etc. How this applies to Dust is that we'll get new weapons, maps, equipment, etc. Features of the game will expand (new matchmaking), while we may get new or reimagined weapons or equipment (scanner!).

BUT, patch days are notorious for having LOTS of problems! This is typical! It doesn't mean that CCP has crappy programmers or they didn't bother to test it or they wanted it to fail or whatever tinfoil hat theory we come up with. It all boils down to how the game is developed vs other, "traditional" shooters:

• In a "traditional" shooter like Call of Duty, the developers start by spending a lot of time building the game, testing it, polishing it, etc. and end with the game's release. Then, once the game is released, it is essentially "on autopilot" while the Devs begin that process all over again for a new map pack or a new game altogether.


• In Dust, however, the development table is more akin to a traditional MMO than it is to a shooter like Call of Duty. Really, what this means is that MMOs go through a smaller initial release but instead of the Devs stopping work on it and shifting development toward a new expansion or game, they continually update their work through mid-cycle patches. Patches sometimes bring new features, which we got this time around with new matchmaking and maps, and normally include minor adjustments. But due to the "ongoing work" nature of an MMO, Devs will test their patches and get them "ready," but sometimes it is hard to predict how the changes will actually work, given that they can't shut the game down for several weeks to test it. The patch still may include issues that they'll be able to continually "hotfix," or apply a small fix to a bug that popped up when the patch hit the server. In 1.4's case, you can see hotfixes for the matchmaking and squad deployment issues. Again, THESE ARE NORMAL! In an MMO, it's not as important that the "disc copy" of the game is 100% (and, honestly, its not even common now that disc games are 100% when shipped). Once the patch is applied on patch day and goes live, issues map pop up, and hotfixes are issued for the next few weeks to get that patch into a good place, then the Devs go to work on the next patch and then expansion, etc.

So, knowing how patches work in an MMO context--mainly that MMOs represent an ongoing work--it is normal that patch days bring in with them problems to the game, and our expectation as players should be to realize these things happen and that the dev team is committed to getting their game in a good place.

Just a bit of history but patch days used to take whole MMOs offline for several days or bring in game-breaking changes that Devs would scramble to get fixed in the following weeks. I guess as some of us have played MMOs for a while, patch days are routine events for us, and we realize how they work and set our expectations accordingly. As an MMO player, I realize that patch day problems will be fixed, just given a few days to a week or so, and that unlike my expectation that (AAA title) will be shipped in pristine shape, I know that MMOs are continual works in progress that get love over time.

To my "traditional" FPS friend, though, he didn't understand why "the new map pack" caused so many problems until I explained to him in very much the same way I explained to you above. Once he realized that Dust is an ongoing work, and that Dust-as-an-MMOFPS means that there will continually be development and interation on it, I think it clicked with him how cool it is that there'll always be new things and changes happening in Dust.

I hope this clears a little of the patch day confusion up to our traditional FPS friends. Please just bear with the issues you notice in the patches guys, as problems they create will be fixed. It's just hard to forecast sometime how a patch will affect the game when it goes live, since they can't turn off the game for several weeks to test it out, like they could with a game that's "on autopilot."

You have a serious problem with understanding the difference between content and mechanics.

In your original post you talked about features and not content or mechanics. And features can be both and more.

It is funny to see how you twist your own words to suit your opinion. But that's to be expected from grumpy old Noc. Yeah and i don't miss you in IRC :P

I'm very snippy. Now get off my lawn.

Looking in the dictionary I see there are alternate definitions (I exclusively use feature as facet, but I have now discovered the additional, much more generalized meaning of attraction). I now understand and apologize that I made a poor word choice that created confusion but the point still stands - selling games in a known non-functioning state is a very new phenomenon. "Content lite" is not the same thing as "incomplete game".

sighs i wish dust were a content light game atm instead of an incomplete game lol

Great post and a lot of truth in there. This new monthly release schedule means we get 20 working days between updates, with a bit of lead time for QA and Sony submission. The rate of development of DUST has already over taken EVE, an MMO with an extremely matured development process and 10 years of experience to reach that point.

It is incredibly enabling for us to be able to ship new ideas out really quickly but as we've seen it sometimes comes at the cost of coming in for landing a bit hot. This doesn't excuse the issues, we will be having some very detailed post mortems on this release as to why some things were not caught earlier, but we will take it on the chin and adapt and do it better next time.

Despite the speed bumps, our resolve to making this the experience we all know it can be has never been stronger. Your feedback and patience as always is very much appreciated.

*snip* Your feedback and patience as always is very much appreciated.

CCP Nullarbor, the epic rate of fixes after the patch, a PSN patch in 24 hours being a key example, really stands out as a massive improvement in how things are handled recently.

RESPECT for that.

I'll be honest, I have little to no experience with MMOs, which is why I've been continually frustrated at Dust, compared to other games. I had no idea this was a common experience for MMO players. Thanks for explaining -- this does need to be stickied. People might ***** a little less if they understand the nature of Dust as being a work in progress, and be more constructive in their criticism.

Great post and a lot of truth in there. This new monthly release schedule means we get 20 working days between updates, with a bit of lead time for QA and Sony submission. The rate of development of DUST has already over taken EVE, an MMO with an extremely matured development process and 10 years of experience to reach that point.

It is incredibly enabling for us to be able to ship new ideas out really quickly but as we've seen it sometimes comes at the cost of coming in for landing a bit hot. This doesn't excuse the issues, we will be having some very detailed post mortems on this release as to why some things were not caught earlier, but we will take it on the chin and adapt and do it better next time.

Despite the speed bumps, our resolve to making this the experience we all know it can be has never been stronger. Your feedback and patience as always is very much appreciated.

I am on a break from Dust at the moment, mostly due to my own Skirmish fatigue & just playing the same maps over and over getting boring to me. Seeing these new maps arriving has sparked a new interest in Dust. However I am waiting for the inital pain of patch deployment to dissapate before I return to try it all out. That and Payday 2 has got me by the balls!

don't we all ;)