There have been lot of posts and claims that FD doesn't have 100-ish people team working on ED. While it has always contradicted by regular FD claims of having such big team for game, I think I realize now that discussion is not about how big team works on ED. We have what FD says us, and we have some assertments like FD being publicly traded company so they can't lie about that kind of information on regular basis.
However, I think it is not the point people try to make there, it just shows limits of Internet as discussion platform. Most of people claiming this seems to be saying such things:
* Game is not what I wanted it to be / what I expected it to be / I don't enjoy it - well, this easiest and in same time most hardest thing. If you don't like a game like at all at fundamental level, it really does not matter how much people working on it, is it. And while people associate bigger teams with "AAA game development", which most likely means scripted and fully voice acted and cut scenes galore, ED was never meant such game. No directly involved story line for everybody or any such developments, open world - do whatever you can do, and so on and so forth. Open world games are always this contraversional - people either love them or hate them. And sometimes amount of money spent on it matters, and sometimes it matters little. In the end, if you do not enjoy such games fundamentally, ED isn't gonna cut for you;
* Game updates are too sparse and not frequent enough - this is most subjective and in same time most honest opinion we can all give. I personally feel OK-ish with updates, but I definitely wish there was more "content" and more frequently. Some people say it is totally unacceptable, and some are fine with it. I certainly enjoy the game, so for me it is just wish that might get fulfilled some day. But if someone is waiting for new feature or improvement, I understand his unease about tempo of development;
In conclusion I think none of that even means anything about size of the team. We just discuss actual output. And it is quite obvious that most of us would like to have more ED in a year. So that all being said, I think FD really should increase size of team developing ED - because we want more ED updates to be released more frequently. I hope they do. I hope that recent David side note about happening will really leave some impact on how much they can release a year.
IMHO alot of folks have made their statements very clear. FDev's actions have been very clear as well and (as feared) produced the expected results - for all to see.
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The game hasn't become in many parts what the Kickstarter/DDF envisioned and promised. In a few cases they realized the original goals but in many others the implementation fell miles short or were quite bizarre.
That naturally lead to consequences, as the title now technically held features - but realistically it didn't. Two poorly implemented features are commonly worse than one properly implemented one.
Depth of Gameplay. 80000LY wide - 1/4inch deep. Minimum Effort. No love or attention to Detail. Wrong direction. Lack of imagination. Obvious "That'll do, now let's hype & monetize it" moments. You know the drill.
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Game updates are too sparse and not frequent enough - This is actually quite objective. Very much so.
3 months and merely a new CopyPasta PewPew Ship, some more PewPew toys, some generic Blue Structures for "The Player Puzzle Minigame race" aka Guardians (they probably went extinct because they puzzled themselves to death), 3 blue-light special "Guardian" SLFs and a few low-grade Engineers for Colonia with time-sink/time-waster/material-waster mechanics baked in.
A few bugfixes very likely on top - a few new bugs guaranteed on top and a boatload of urgent issues guaranteed unaddressed as well. Standard release cycle basically. Again, nothing new.
The reality is in everyone's face. Maintenance mode still applies while FDev invests in other Projects. Minimum effort, minimal keepalive development, max. monetization and miking the stone til it stops bleeding.
It chugs along like a comatose patient connected to tubes and a few machines. Every once in a while, a Doctor checks on it. Every once in a while, the bed gets new sheets and the patient a slightly different dress.
Yes, those are technically "Updates" but that's it.
Fundamentally, we're stagnating. Nothing moving really forward in areas there it really counts & matters, give or take. By now, I sense that not even the few new mechanics tossed at Mining or Exploration in Q4 could do anything about that.
It's all really that simple.
Can't go glacier-paced maintenance mode with a title that was already a full year behind on lack of content and depth without tanking the consequences head-on eventually. Doesn't work, one cannot cheat reality.
Well, we're here and V3.2 looks like yet another Core Game/QOL dud. So much for V3 Beyond - unless they got one hell of a surprise with a
huge Q4 to make up for another lost half year.
