Well they can be open and honest, tell us what's coming, keep us informed of it's progress, let us know when things don't go to plan, tell us the reason why they can't deliver what they said they would deliver and things would be fine (as long as the reasons are good and not "money").
Outside of telling us the nitty gritty details of everything that's coming, they've been doing this already for the most part. Of course they can't tell us every single thing they plan on implementing in the next three updates because the realities of game and software development in general don't allow them that level of confidence in being able to guarantee features to be delivered so far ahead of time.
I think threads like this one in the OP, demonstrate rather aptly the level of maturity/ignorance among many in the community, in terms of their expectations of what can be realistically delivered by FDev in a given timeframe. And in many ways I can't blame the community for not educating itself about the realities of game/software development, but I can blame them for making threads like this (when a feature is discussed years before impelementation only to be later changed) and then going on to complain when FDev isn't 100% transparent and open about their development plans.
Yeah, it's all the players fault for expecting FD to deliver what they say they will. You know, there's an old saying in software development. Under promise, over deliver. There's also another way to approach iterative development. In fact, it's the correct way to approach it. What you do is this. You keep the users in the loop. For example, if you realise you're not going to hit deadline x, or fully implement feature y, you give them the heads up. That way, you can avoid giving the end users any nasty surprises and you don't have to worry so much about "reprisals" from the users.
Before you ask, no I wouldn't expect every game developer to do that, but ED is no ordinary game. It was funded by players from the outset. When FD had an idea and needed money, they were very communicative. Now they have a product that's doing pretty well, the silence is deafening. That's the problem.
The bolded is key here. Contrary to your claim, ED is now JUST LIKE other games. The initial game that was funded by the players was delivered (in a form) and now they are selling a boxed product with expansions and DLC, in order to fund further development. If they are no longer beholden to backers on a crowd-funding website to pay the bills, but are now beholden to customers who buy their product software, expansion and DLC, then they will need to keep their cards to their chest to better manage the expectations of those existing and potential new customers... same as any other game developer.
We as the community shouldn't expect the same level of openness and transparency with FDev's dev plans as we enjoyed during the crowd-funding days... exactly because times have changed and those days are over.
Now, don't confuse me with one who is saying FDev can't afford to be more open about their plans. I believe they can and should, but I also believe that the community have shown time and time again how poorly they're able to manager their own expectations when even the slightest amount of information regarding FDev's dev plans are released. The sheer number of false conclusions some of these peeps on these forums jump to when a new feature is announced in an infant state, is embarassing. I'm quite surprised that FDev share any information regarding development with us at all, until a feature is tested and fully ready to be released.
Haha, be open and honest? Having a mature discussion?
With gaming communities filled with screaming manchildren?
Good joke.
This is also my position.
If things changed so a few things were different, I'd very much agree with you. But MC has been massively stripped down to the studs. Now, I'm not especially but-hurt about it since I don;t intend to be anyone's wookie, and I don;t expect anyone would want to be mine. But if this was an NPC crew update that got reduced from what was sold to what's being delivered in 2.3 I'd be very much annoyed.
Well, that's kinda the point. Things do change in software development. That's a fact of life. I would agree that FDev could possibily have been more realistic about what they felt was possible to deliver within the timeframe from the OP's quote to now, regarding MC, however, hindsight is always 20:20.
My point isn't that players shouldn't be annoyed about the fact that the MC we're getting isn't the MC that was discussed several years ago. It's that if we do get upset about it and kick up a fuss, we shouldn't be surprised if going forward, FDev are more guarded about what they discuss openly with us about their future development plans.
At the end of the day, MC in it's current incarnation is obviously a framework to lay a foundation to be iterated upon over time. So, whilst I get that after paying for this current season of updates, the MC aspect may seem like a letdown and not worth the money, this season isn't yet over and we ye still don't know the full extent of features that will be added to the game to improve what's there before this season is done. Hence, I feel it's a little premature to get our knickers in a bunch yet.
I think both sides of the coin have valid points however 1 thing i will say... imo this shows one reason why the season approach for Horizons has not imo worked very well.
i like the old addage of underpromise over deliver and that has simply not been the case here. I already put my faith in FD by paying for everything up front, and i dont feel short changed yet (so long as the updates keep coming) but IF i bought horizons based on the early dev talks - and they are advertising videos, come on................ drumming up excitement to make sales, of course its advertising) then I would now be thinking if S3 was the same that i would probably wait for a bit.
Which is why imo an upfront DLC is just a better fit going forward. FD can put all their cards on the table, say this is what we have. over the course of the next year we will tweak the rest of the game, etc but this here is the main event... buy it or dont. That way everyone knows exactly what they are paying for and then everything else done over the following 12 months will be a free bonus.
Overall, I can't help but agree with this. I agree that getting players to pay upfront for promised updates down the line isn't a good idea. I'd much rather they announce feature updates when ready and charge us for what's already there.
In terms of FDev's cash flow, they can always have a small team of devs (read: two or three), just perpetually hammering away on cosmetics, whose sales will keep the developer bouyant until the next big feature update is ready.
As a gamer and a consumer, I'd much rather pay upfront for an expansion in the full knowledge of what i'm getting, than pay for a season of content and be ultimately letdown by what is eventually delivered.
