Rock Paper Collapse

[Shumbok]

First great Preview in
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/05/14/gods-got-game-skyward-collapse-trailer/

[x4000]

Awesome -- Craig Pearson is a great, great guy.  Sweet writeup.

Though it's 1.0 that's coming so soon, not a beta...

[Mick]

Arcen seems to be the only indie developer that gets raked over the coals for not having AAA graphics.

[x4000]

Not true, although it feels that way sometimes.  In some places it seems extra recreational to rake us over the coals, but so it goes.

Cliff Harris has awesome graphics in Gratuitous Space Battles, for instance -- way better than anything I've ever done -- and he's had his graphics dismissed as terrible many times, too.  To my amazement.

Actually, most indie developers that I know have some frustrating war stories about similar things.  And heck, you can't start a Minecraft video without someone complaining about the graphics but going "but look at this awesomeness anyway!"

Anywho, this is why I don't read RPS comments anymore, though.

[Teal_Blue]

I am guessing at this point, that the best answer to this frustrating question, is simply to keep making games and keep plugging away. I hate listening to all the comments run things down when i think that the art is as good as any of the other indies i've seen... Bastion, Vessel, VVVVVVVV, Capsized, FTL, etc... just my opinion of course, but its like some of these people don't play games for the gameplay, which of course can't be touched in an Arcen game. 

Anyway, keep yer chins up! and Keep plugging away! 

-Teal

[Mick]

That's probably true. I just know that my experience as a player of indie games is sometimes frustrating in the opposite way. I see players give way too much slack toward games that are buggy and unfinished, with their forum-citizens telling anyone who dares complain about how awesome the potential of the game is (typically after release, so not in a beta state where this would be somewhat acceptable). I didn't pay for a game that is potentially awesome, I paid for one that I thought was awesome.

It bugs me when Arcen gets flak because you guys are just way better about dealing with the issues in your games. You actually respond to concerns and fix bugs.

So maybe I'm fanboying a little bit, but you guys deserve it. It's nice knowing that if I report a problem with a game the developers will listen, instead of hiding behind an army of fans who will verbally castrate me for daring to point out an imperfection.

EDIT: And I'd like to point out that I think the art is awesome in this game. I don't mind the lack of unit animations. The turn summaries would just take forever if you had them anyway. It'd be about as fun as watching a little 5 second battle take place every time you rolled the dice in Risk. Cute at first, but you'd get tired of it extremely fast.

[zespri]

Arcen seems to be the only indie developer that gets raked over the coals for not having AAA graphics.

Ever played Din's Curse? =)

[Mick]

Arcen seems to be the only indie developer that gets raked over the coals for not having AAA graphics.

Ever played Din's Curse? =)

I tried it, didn't really care for it (not really because of the graphics though).

However, I do think a good rule to follow is that if you're going to have weak graphics, don't use 3D.

[KingIsaacLinksr]

Case in point: Miasmata is a game that gets a lot of forgiveness due to potential and being indie. Still not sure why it does...

[Mick]

Case in point: Miasmata is a game that gets a lot of forgiveness due to potential and being indie. Still not sure why it does...

Ah yup, that's on my pile of purchases I regret (a pile which is a bit too big for my liking lately).

[YoukaiCountry]

Case in point: Miasmata is a game that gets a lot of forgiveness due to potential and being indie. Still not sure why it does...

Maybe because they nailed it on the environment graphics? Hmm, it goes back to graphics again... Hopefully that's not it!

About Skyward Collapse, I was actually impressed with the way the game looks, but as long as the gameplay is good who cares. That's what your games are about anyhow.

[Greywolf22]

I just wonder what these folks would have been like back in the Atari 2600 days.  Adventure is still (to me any way) one of the best games ever made, and the main character in that game was a square

[x4000]

Cheers folks, again I can't express how much we appreciate the support.  This sort of thing gets to me on a very personal level, to the point where I literally have to take anti-anxiety medicine around the time of releases, and that's WITH skipping reading most public comments and reviews.  There are few things less pleasant to me than releasing a new game (expansions are fine, though).  Public speaking doesn't hold a candle to it; I'd gladly do that all the time, by comparison, heh.

Anyway, the reason it's so stressful is that it's always hard to know what general reception is going to be.  It's always something we're really proud of, and (these days) always something that a core fanbase builds around in alpha and beta.  But then you get things like the Shattered Haven fiasco with a lot of press seemingly writing it off for it's "side quests" (WTF, that's the actual game) while others that really play it more talk about how it's possibly our best title.

It's always this huge leap, like jumping out of an airplane, and it's terrifying rather than exhilarating when the result really has a material affect on your future.  Putting your career and the careers of your staff in the hands of people who have often been dismissive or overly negative in the past, you know?  That's the game and so I play it, and ultimately I wouldn't trade it in.  But holy !@# is it stressful.  You can't help but wonder if the haters are right when the "consensus" isn't in on a game yet, you know?  With AI War it's easy to ignore because that's well-established as awesome.  If someone doesn't like it, it's just taste.  Same with Tidalis, and to a lesser extent the Valley games.  But for a good 3-6 months after any new game comes out, it doesn't feel like that at all.

Hopefully someday this becomes less unpleasant, but so far no joy.  I absolutely love making games and there's nothing I'd rather do; and the unpleasantness of this still isn't enough to push me away from the industry.  But good grief, I could use a little more sunshine in my life around release times.

[Professor Paul1290]

However, I do think a good rule to follow is that if you're going to have weak graphics, don't use 3D.

It depends. 2D and 3D have different criteria for what qualifies as "ugly".

In 2D you're not going to get bitten for lack of detail as much, but you can get bitten for style. If you're going to have more detail in 2D there are more annoying "unsaid rules" regarding what you should and shouldn't do and that's why most alternative 2D styles in games tend to be low detail.
In 2D you can often be criticized for being "ugly" and not know exactly what you are doing wrong. A lot of the notions regarding what is "good" aesthetically in 2D are rather entrenched and finicky, and aren't always apparent until you've already stumbled head-first into them.

I find 3D is actually more forgiving in that specific regard. Yes there's a lot that can go wrong with 3D, but usually in 3D you're more likely know what you're doing "wrong" and where you need to go to fix it (relatively speaking, there's a lot of vagueness in that but not as bad as 2D).

To me it's like trying to choose between the guy who doesn't ask for much but can be a very picky and a lying bastard at times vs. the guy who asks for a lot and is hard to please but isn't quite as picky and stays pretty honest.
Both don't sound good so it's up to you to choose who looks like the lesser evil.

[mrhanman]

RPS' and IndieGames' commenters really seem to automatically hate Arcen for some reason.  I thoroughly believe that you could take a masterpiece of gaming (something akin to Super Mario Bros. 3), slap Arcen on the title screen, and those people would piss all over it.  Without bothering to play it, of course.

If you clinically marvel at the herd mentality, it becomes much less infuriating.  Then again, I'm just a member of the 'Arcen' herd, so what do I know?

To me it's like trying to choose between the guy who doesn't ask for much but can be a very picky and a lying bastard at times vs. the guy who asks for a lot and is hard to please but isn't quite as picky and stays pretty honest.
Both don't sound good so it's up to you to choose who looks like the lesser evil.

What an odd analogy.