Alright, well I can't wait! I am a sucker for good graphics and I really like the Unity engine, it can have some nice lighting, and this looks like it could be pretty damn cool, so good luck!

I have joined the forum and broken my lurker silence to show my total appreciation and support for this port. It's long overdue and I hope it brings new life to something with such gaming potential as is the SCP universe.
That said, I think you should follow the mantra of releasing early and often, with a big disclaimer of "work in progress". Not only you will be free of the burden of it being "good enough" or "complete enough" for release, which will eventually turn into unnecessary pressure for you, but I will also get to play it, which is already becoming an unbearable desire of mine.

Johnman wrote:I have joined the forum and broken my lurker silence to show my total appreciation and support for this port. It's long overdue and I hope it brings new life to something with such gaming potential as is the SCP universe.
That said, I think you should follow the mantra of releasing early and often, with a big disclaimer of "work in progress". Not only you will be free of the burden of it being "good enough" or "complete enough" for release, which will eventually turn into unnecessary pressure for you, but I will also get to play it, which is already becoming an unbearable desire of mine.

I totally disagree with that. If you release it early, sure, you can get it out to more people, but if the game is broken or unfinished, people will already have a bad opinion of it. I feel that this should be released when it is finished. Or very, very close to finished.

SyphenTV wrote:

Johnman wrote:I have joined the forum and broken my lurker silence to show my total appreciation and support for this port. It's long overdue and I hope it brings new life to something with such gaming potential as is the SCP universe.
That said, I think you should follow the mantra of releasing early and often, with a big disclaimer of "work in progress". Not only you will be free of the burden of it being "good enough" or "complete enough" for release, which will eventually turn into unnecessary pressure for you, but I will also get to play it, which is already becoming an unbearable desire of mine.

I totally disagree with that. If you release it early, sure, you can get it out to more people, but if the game is broken or unfinished, people will already have a bad opinion of it. I feel that this should be released when it is finished. Or very, very close to finished.

Well, that is a way of seeing it, and I get what you mean. But I think that is more related to how you portray your game.
You can't deny there is a release model that works in iterations, and it works (Minecraft being perhaps one of the foremost examples). I think it's a matter of being clear about what is being released. If your releases follow a modular pattern (build 1: food mechanics, build 2: inventory and containers, build 3: night/day cycle or whatever) and deliver complete self-enclosed features for people to play around I don't see why it would be negative. On the contrary, as long as it is clear that it's a work in progress, the critique can help you move in the right direction or give you encouragement to keep going.

Of course there needs to be a solid base before releasing a first alpha build, but many developers fall in the trap of never considering their project "complete enough" for others to see, and in the worst cases projects end up abandoned. Of course it's not always the case, and in any case it's a matter of what the developer feels more comfortable with.

Also, there are some projects that by nature should be very close to complete before being released, and that's story-driven games, for obvious reasons. I think what danielmus is doing on YouTube, releasing videos showing off newly implemented features, is very similar to the model I'm defending. It serves a very similar purpose of getting feedback, but allows him to keep the game close to his chest.

In any case, and whatever you decide to do, danielmus, I'm quite happy.

Johnman wrote:

SyphenTV wrote:

Johnman wrote:I have joined the forum and broken my lurker silence to show my total appreciation and support for this port. It's long overdue and I hope it brings new life to something with such gaming potential as is the SCP universe.
That said, I think you should follow the mantra of releasing early and often, with a big disclaimer of "work in progress". Not only you will be free of the burden of it being "good enough" or "complete enough" for release, which will eventually turn into unnecessary pressure for you, but I will also get to play it, which is already becoming an unbearable desire of mine.

I totally disagree with that. If you release it early, sure, you can get it out to more people, but if the game is broken or unfinished, people will already have a bad opinion of it. I feel that this should be released when it is finished. Or very, very close to finished.

Well, that is a way of seeing it, and I get what you mean. But I think that is more related to how you portray your game.
You can't deny there is a release model that works in iterations, and it works (Minecraft being perhaps one of the foremost examples). I think it's a matter of being clear about what is being released. If your releases follow a modular pattern (build 1: food mechanics, build 2: inventory and containers, build 3: night/day cycle or whatever) and deliver complete self-enclosed features for people to play around I don't see why it would be negative. On the contrary, as long as it is clear that it's a work in progress, the critique can help you move in the right direction or give you encouragement to keep going.

Of course there needs to be a solid base before releasing a first alpha build, but many developers fall in the trap of never considering their project "complete enough" for others to see, and in the worst cases projects end up abandoned. Of course it's not always the case, and in any case it's a matter of what the developer feels more comfortable with.

Also, there are some projects that by nature should be very close to complete before being released, and that's story-driven games, for obvious reasons. I think what danielmus is doing on YouTube, releasing videos showing off newly implemented features, is very similar to the model I'm defending. It serves a very similar purpose of getting feedback, but allows him to keep the game close to his chest.

In any case, and whatever you decide to do, danielmus, I'm quite happy.

I give applause to you. I'm not going to argue, I agree with you. But that whole comment was the most thought out thing I've ever seen.

SyphenTV wrote: I give applause to you. I'm not going to argue, I agree with you. But that whole comment was the most thought out thing I've ever seen.

Damn, someone telling you this on the internet is like a once in a lifetime thing! I'm humbled!

Johnman wrote:

SyphenTV wrote: I give applause to you. I'm not going to argue, I agree with you. But that whole comment was the most thought out thing I've ever seen.

Damn, someone telling you this on the internet is like a once in a lifetime thing! I'm humbled!

First off, thank you very much for your support on this project! I'm very humbled that you broke your lurker silence to give support!
That being said, both you and SyphenTV have made very good points about the idea of "when?" when it comes to releasing the first build, at the moment the game is terribly un-optimized (As I have found out while testing on the terrible school computers we have here), so I'm going to fix up some stuff, possibly add a little bit of Occlusion Culling if I can (Objects don't render when not being looked at). I've also learnt a lot more about modelling so I'll be able to merge a lot of stuff together and hopefully increase the speed overall. So there is still a long way to go before the game is in a good state to consider releasing it, I've had a couple of closed testers who get around 30fps, which I want to try and fix (Since low framerate causes some bugs in the game).

It is true that a lot of developers never consider their game to be in a "complete enough" state, doing the YouTube updates means I can show the current state of the game (Or a new feature), without having to worry about it not being complete enough to have released a version instead! All in all, the first actual playable version will probably be some form of demo, or at least an early alpha of a demo of the story-type mode being added. That demo will allow people to survey most main mechanics at once and give feedback/bug reports where needed. Though again, there's still a long time to go until I can even think about releasing anything!

Thanks for your support, ideas, and feedback guys Indeed it was a very well thought out comment!

I think this is what regalis should make containment breach on.

And a question... HOW DOES REGALIS USE GODDAMN BLITZ3D?!?! I JUST DON'T GET HOW IT WORKS!

Simple answer: He has skill with the program.

Child Muncher wrote:Simple answer: He has skill with the program.