The new credit meta (20M a MINUTE) (Clickbait but you'll click it anyway)

[S3B4ST13N]

But you see, I do software dev too, and you accept ALL bugs that can be reproduced/IDed. You also plan to address ALL bugs. It's not a matter of fixing the show stoppers, getting RTW out, and maybe fix some more later. You fix them ALL, you have a timeline and a plan. If you address bugs some other way, there might be a problem with your methodology. In the last few months, we've seen a number of rather large, economy-breaking bugs, and the FDev "response" has been to disable the relevant sections of the game. These weren't deep bugs intrinsic to the game design, engine, etc. In the case of passenger missions, or this one, it would be fairly simple to make some basic catch statements to prevent/constrain this.

Granted, and I agree - they all need to be fixed; but when you work on a schedule and don't want to keep pushing things out; you have to make sacrifices. No dev likes to have bugs in his product; but you can't fix everything right away. I hate releasing code I know has bugs in it; but most times I don't have the luxury to get them fixed. I look at them after we release something and begin our next sprint planning session.

Time constraints, other work, release schedules, managers who think bug-ridden software is acceptable for release and so on all play a part.

 

[Mr_Foxhound]

It seems that whenever FDEV try to be nice to players, like giving better commodity rewards or spawning more skimmers to kill, it never ends well.

bad design = undesirable bugs

 

[Maka Gucci]

[video=youtube;qoy7ARLZB-4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qoy7ARLZB-4[/video]

 

[Canoe]

For those of us who want to do missions to make credits, to expand and increase our fleets, it's either spend what little spare time you have in an evening to try and push through paltry rewards and grind, or in my case, log in, stare at the missions board for three minutes, and then log out to do something else.

FDEV, you're not making people play more by killing every opportunity to make reasonable amounts of credits, you're making people play less, or not at all. Which would you rather have?

 

[Deareim]

Hi everyone,

Just a quick note to let you know that we will be temporarily removing mining missions from the game, until we're able to implement the next patch and set of hotfixes (I will let you know when the patch is coming as soon as possible).
Thank you for identifying this issue and bringing it to our attention. We have already identified a fix for it, and that will be coming in the next update as mentioned above.

For those interested, the issue is due to the introduction of the new mission reward choices, which is a large scale change that touches on almost all mission templates. Thanks for your patience while these are offline.

Did you remove the bulk passengers missions ? As it is almost impossible to find those anymore. Allies or not with faction.

 

[Deareim]

Dunno about Frontier; but when we release a product for BETA, we look at all the bug reports; determine what (if any) are priority and with what severity. Only the biggest, most severe issues we work on before release. The priority is to get a MVP to the customer (not my preference, but I don't make the rules).

After release, then we get started fixing bugs and what not.

That's just how we do it though.

No offense but in which activity are you working ? Because in mine - retails - bug cost millions so we don’t sit on bugs. It is even impossible to think we would release something to our customer with known bugs.

 

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

Did you remove the bulk passengers missions ? As it is almost impossible to find those anymore. Allies or not with faction.

They should be back since 3.0 launch.

 

[babelfisch]

No offense but in which activity are you working ? Because in mine - retails - bug cost millions so we don’t sit on bugs. It is even impossible to think we would release something to our customer with known bugs.

I don't know where you are working but it's clearly not in 99,9% of the software industry...

 

[Hellakitty]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qoy7ARLZB-4

I wish Ant would do an unfiltered video. The frustration creeps ever so slightly into his voice a few times during that video, and as much of a professional as he is, I bet biting his tongue about his true feelings is becoming a little soul destroying.

 

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

No offense but in which activity are you working ? Because in mine - retails - bug cost millions so we don’t sit on bugs. It is even impossible to think we would release something to our customer with known bugs.

There's huge difference between various sectors of industry regarding QA. Entertainment software this complex definitely can't be expected to be fully fixed before release. Said that, last year demands FD to invest into kickass CI team to catch out corner cases their algorithms produce.

Also skimmer case and reward exploit case differs. Skimmer case was just PG algorithm gone together in one perfect setup. Not much a bug, but impact from other defects (board flipping) and a bit too fast respawn algorithm escalated this. It is undesired effect and frankly those are hard to get right - without some serious investment in CI and integrated testing.

As for reward issue - again, it is a bit random, not that predictable, but this is something they should have thought about. Again, not exactly a bug, but minor defect in design.

Industries where almost all bugs are critical operates under strict design and spec rules. Crafting and testing design and algorithms are much easier as they are quite determined in their outcome. Not so in perfect chaos systems which most open world games abide.

 

[Deareim]

I don't know where you are working but it's clearly not in 99,9% of the software industry...[/]

What is software industry for you ? Or we are talking about industrial software where you can have millions simultenous people connected on it ? Me, the second option.

 

[Deareim]

There's huge difference between various sectors of industry regarding QA. Entertainment software this complex definitely can't be expected to be fully fixed before release. Said that, last year demands FD to invest into kickass CI team to catch out corner cases their algorithms produce.

Also skimmer case and reward exploit case differs. Skimmer case was just PG algorithm gone together in one perfect setup. Not much a bug, but impact from other defects (board flipping) and a bit too fast respawn algorithm escalated this. It is undesired effect and frankly those are hard to get right - without some serious investment in CI and integrated testing.

As for reward issue - again, it is a bit random, not that predictable, but this is something they should have thought about. Again, not exactly a bug, but minor defect in design.

Industries where almost all bugs are critical operates under strict design and spec rules. Crafting and testing design and algorithms are much easier as they are quite determined in their outcome. Not so in perfect chaos systems which most open world games abide.

I agree with you but even for a small company, the QA should be done differently than the actual one.

 

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

What is software industry for you ? Or we are talking about industrial software where you can have millions simultenous people connected on it ? Me, the second option.

If that software follow strict code paths and protocols it isn't much of comparison with game like ED.

 

[Deareim]

They should be back since 3.0 launch.

Are you sure ? I see mass VIP but no bulk.

 

[Vasco Sapien]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qoy7ARLZB-4

Progression is a thing in ED.
The grind is a thing in ED.
Progression exploiters are a slap in the face to the progress felt and experianced by those who progress, no matter how tediously by legitimate and honest means.

 

[Deareim]

If that software follow strict code paths and protocols it isn't much of comparison with game like ED.

There is a core, a standard. But then you adapt it to your needs.
For ED, it seems more a problem of processes then the rest.

 

[babelfisch]

What is software industry for you ? Or we are talking about industrial software where you can have millions simultenous people connected on it ? Me, the second option.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meltdown_(security_vulnerability)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectre_(security_vulnerability)

Just saying...

 

[BDelacroix]

No offense but in which activity are you working ? Because in mine - retails - bug cost millions so we don’t sit on bugs. It is even impossible to think we would release something to our customer with known bugs.

When I worked at EA, it was the same. There was a process. Bugs happen. Near release time they are evaluated, quantified and someone determines if they are game breaking or not. Game breakers are fixed. The rest are patched later if possible.

Where I work now, bugs happen. We surely don't want to release with bugs but it happens. Again, post release bugs are evaluated. Sometimes they warrant an emergency release, but often they are moved to the next update.

 

[Deareim]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meltdown_(security_vulnerability)

Just saying...

???

 

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

I agree with you but even for a small company, the QA should be done differently than the actual one.

*Should*

QA is amazingly hard to get it right and more complex software gets, more "interesting" (read as incredibly hard) is to get it 100% correct.

You wonder why big publishers loath big experimental games, or why Mass Effect 4 original concept got axed by EA? Because they saw where it was going - unmanageable mess due of code path scenarios almost impossible to walk trough. And that's for single player game.

Or why they love this standardized open world approaches they use in their series? Because they are tried and true methods. And even then they break in hilarious ways.

We are so used to escalation of software complexity, while people who do CI, who do unit testing, your devops and you QAs are despairing with promises done by devs and marketing people. It is surprise it runs so well at all.

But I will repeat - if I would had a chance, I would definitely apply for FD CI (I think they were looking for someone in that position) team. They need it badly, especially for their gameplay design changes. Sandro and team won't be iterate trough all logical and even illogical scenarios cooked up by cunny and resourceful players. It is CI, server side and syssec people job. That's why they get paid.