pay 240euros and become an alpha tester

[Tuatha]

its 140eu to be accurate as in the price are included the game and the expansion pass...but isnt a whole lot of money anyway?
Dont get me wrong ill buy the game ,as i have done with all the other series, but for most people is too hard to spend such money to buy and help devs with the game.
Internet has brought all those companies to an instant and much less expensive access to the global market ..although game prices are too high in general.
Not to mention that broken and incomplete software are more often than ever before, although companies have been payed long before release. I hope this wont happen here as the game looks fantastic.

 

[Carsten]

MKAY ........

But welcome to the forums

 

[Susimetsa]

It is a lot of money, but in this case, alpha access was a reward for those who backed the game's development to a high degree. In order not to upset those backers, Frontier cannot really sell the access for much less than the backers paid.

 

[Darren Grey]

It ensures that only very dedicated people will become alpha testers. Too many alpha testers would result in too much feedback to handle - better to have a small, dedicated focus group.

 

[Tinman]

its 140eu to be accurate as in the price are included the game and the expansion pass...but isnt a whole lot of money anyway?
Dont get me wrong ill buy the game ,as i have done with all the other series, but for most people is too hard to spend such money to buy and help devs with the game.
Internet has brought all those companies to an instant and much less expensive access to the global market ..although game prices are too high in general.
Not to mention that broken and incomplete software are more often than ever before, although companies have been payed long before release. I hope this wont happen here as the game looks fantastic.

I think the solution here is not to buy the Alpha access then, is it not?

FD isn't forcing anyone to buy the expansion pass either. (Personally I think it is a good deal and that it will pay itself back in the long run though.)

Just buy the game itself for around 40eu which is a pretty reasonable price IMO.

 

[Tinman]

It ensures that only very dedicated people will become alpha testers. Too many alpha testers would result in too much feedback to handle - better to have a small, dedicated focus group.

Yes, this is something that will be very interesting to see how it is handled when SC gives everyone access to the alpha. I wonder if Chris have nightmares about that day! I certainly would.

 

[Olrik]

It is a lot of money..

I don´t regret a single coin I paid.

 

[govny]

simple: wait for the beta or gamma. In the last case you will only pay 30 eu and it will be out in a few months.

 

[Memnoch]

FD isn't forcing anyone to buy the expansion pass either. (Personally I think it is a good deal and that it will pay itself back in the long run though.)

I couldn't agree more and I would hope that we would get early access to any of their developments on that front, perhaps on a separate server to the live one for testing purposes.

 

[tooterfish]

its 140eu to be accurate as in the price are included the game and the expansion pass...but isnt a whole lot of money anyway?
Dont get me wrong ill buy the game ,as i have done with all the other series, but for most people is too hard to spend such money to buy and help devs with the game.
Internet has brought all those companies to an instant and much less expensive access to the global market ..although game prices are too high in general.
Not to mention that broken and incomplete software are more often than ever before, although companies have been payed long before release. I hope this wont happen here as the game looks fantastic.

Welcome.

Frontier clearly don't want a massive influx of players at the alpha stage, hence the high price. If you let this colour your perceptions of the rest of the game, well more fool you to be honest, because not being in the alpha won't affect your enjoyment of the game one iota.

As successful as Star Citizen's campaign has been, I really feel for Chris Roberts. Their alpha is going to be an absolute bloody nightmare to administer, the sheer number of players is going to cause them a lot of problems early on.

 

[vintager]

Frontier clearly don't want a massive influx of players at the alpha stage, hence the high price

This is an interesting point. Clearly e.g. Star Citizen will have considerable issues because of people knowing the exact budget (which is huge) + the expectations already being way too high. However, as I've pointed out in another thread, if you don't need any more money and even don't want any more money to avoid Star Citizen issues, why put the "Help support Elite" label on the main page?

 

[Tinman]

This is an interesting point. Clearly e.g. Star Citizen will have considerable issues because of people knowing the exact budget (which is huge) + the expectations already being way too high. However, as I've pointed out in another thread, if you don't need any more money and even don't want any more money to avoid Star Citizen issues, why put the "Help support Elite" label on the main page?

Why not?

If people want to give you money, then by all means let them!

 

[tooterfish]

There's more to a game than an alpha.

Just because they want to put brakes on the demand for alpha access with higher pricing, doesn't mean they don't want more players in general.

I know it's mind blowing in this age of "early access", but Frontier seem to be mostly about selling the finished product, as opposed to the idea of the finished product.

 

[vintager]

Why not?

I don't know... For the sake of being consistent?

If people want to give you money, then by all means let them!

Well, for one, people handing over their money are Elite fans, i.e. Frontier's rediscovered friends. You wouldn't want to greet a new (old) friend with "Yep, if you have any money to spare, then by all means give it to me".

 

[Riedquat]

I didn't buy Alpha access as I don't think personally I would of been much help.

If I am being honest, If I had of bought it, it would of been because I was itching to have a go at flying and shooting stuff.

Now, if it had been £30, I may have been tempted, but I wouldn't of been much help to FD as I have no experience in alpha testing.

 

[tooterfish]

I don't know... For the sake of being consistent?

Consistent with what?

Well, for one, people handing over their money are Elite fans, i.e. Frontier's rediscovered friends. You wouldn't want to greet a new (old) friend with "Yep, if you have any money to spare, then by all means give it to me".

Well for two, I wouldn't want a couple of hundred thousand old friends with unrealistically high expectations and zero experience with software testing anywhere near my project at the alpha stage.

It's nothing personal guys, but you'd just get in the way!

 

[Darren Grey]

It's probably worth having the alpha level just removed at this stage, as it creates a bit of a bad image for the game. But at the same time if it were removed we'd end up with a flood of threads asking why people can't buy into the alpha stage!

Anyway, I'm personally glad that Frontier are concentrating on making the game instead of the optimum way to monetise the alpha testing.

 

[vintager]

Consistent with what?

One's actions should be consistent with one's motivations.
You want more people to alpha-test -> put up a "Help alpha-test" sign.
You want more cash -> put up a "Help support" sign.
You want more cash and/or you want more people to alpha-test -> put up a "Help support" sign and hand over perks along with the alpha access.
That's called being consistent in my book.

Well for two, I wouldn't want a couple of hundred thousand old friends with unrealistically high expectations and zero experience with software testing anywhere near my project at the alpha stage.

How does the amount of money you generate per month correlate with your ability to alpha-test? If anything, there's a reverse dependency here: the more you earn, the more likely you are to employ other people to test your software for you, and the less free time you'll have to play a PC game.

 

[tooterfish]

One's actions should be consistent with one's motivations.
You want more people to alpha-test -> put up a "Help alpha-test" sign.
You want more cash -> put up a "Help support" sign.
You want more cash and/or you want more people to alpha-test -> put up a "Help support" sign and hand over perks along with the alpha access.
That's called being consistent in my book.

The shop is selling more than alpha access though! Stop equating the alpha with the game, it's not.

This might come as a shock, but you can buy the full game for just 35 smackers!

How does the amount of money you generate per month correlate with your ability to alpha-test? If anything, there's a reverse dependency here: the more you earn, the more likely you are to employ other people to test your software for you, and the less free time you'll have to play a PC game.

It's not about money! It's about administrating a hundred thousand people clogging up your bug tracking system with frivolous, pointless, downright useless tickets...

There's an (very) old adage in software development: more isn't always better. And that's more programmers, who ostensibly know what they're doing.

You can't just hire more guys and expect a project to automagically go quicker, it just doesn't work like that.

 

[vintager]

The shop is selling more than alpha access though!

Well, if you subtract premium beta from the sum, the shop is selling alpha access alone for 100 "smackers", as you've put it. For us mere mortals on the continent that's ~120 euros, which is a lot and yes, it's a bad publicity and it's already damaging Frontier's image.