Early Access Should Be Alpha

Over the last few weeks, I’ve closely observed the Steam Early Access launch of a game. Regardless of the game in question and whether that one game specifically was ready for EA or not - I strongly disagree with the general sentiment, that games in alpha state should not be in Early Access. And there were tons of negative reviews saying “feels like an alpha, should not be EA” or something along those lines. And sorry for putting it that bluntly, but that argument is complete bullshit. There’s just no way to sugarcoat this.

If you read my post On Kickstarter you already know my stance on this - but if not, here’s the gist of it:

If you want to purchase a finished game to play it, do NOT back it on Kickstarter, do NOT buy it in EA, do NOT pre-order it, do NOT purchase on release day. Game publishers are in the business of making money. Their primary job isn’t to make games (let alone good ones). They only do that, as far as they can’t make money without it. That’s why they love things like loot boxes, gacha, pay-to-win, energy mechanics, battle passes, whale hunting and all other kinds of predatory and exploitative monetization. And they are very happy to play you for a sucker!

Remember that great game you played in your youth? We literally just bought the IP, made some third rate studio-for-hire create an uninspired sequel that plays nothing like the original, but crams in all the monetization we could think of! Now quickly purchase, or you will miss out on that exclusive pre-order bonus and the must-have experience of paying for a game, before review embargo ends and the truth about the game comes out!

Always wait for the reviews.

And by “reviews” I mean those of the actual finished 1.0 release product. Not “previews” of unfinished versions of the game.

That doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t back any Kickstarter ever, or get any game on EA ever. But the reason has to be a different one. It’s perfectly fine to support a developer you like financially - by basically donating money to the cause. But always be aware, that in that case you are not buying a finished game. You are supporting a developer to make a game - at a point in time when even that developer themselves might not actually know, what the final product will turn out to be like. There are not guarantees you’ll get anything near of what you expected. And you have to understand and be okay with taking that risk.

If you want to buy a game to play as a finished product - only ever do so after you’ve read independent reviews. If you want to support a developer you like, that’s perfectly fine, but be aware of the risk you are taking.

Do NOT support ANY publisher schemes to make people buy first, to only learn what they will get later.

Now suppose, publishers discovered a method - to make people pre-order and pay full price ahead of a game’s release, and ahead of the review embargo being lifted.

Side-note: Pre-order is a misleading twist of words. Because it definitely is a pre-purchase. If you pay full price in advance, then it’s not a pre-order. In the past, you used to be able to reserve a copy in a brick-and-mortar store (or also on Amazon) - by putting down just a few bucks as deposit, or even for free. That’s what a pre-order is.

Beta tests used to be completely free in the past (sometimes, in the very past, they ask for shipping costs - but that would be at cost and not generated a profit for them). Sometimes these betas would be open to all, sometimes invite only - but always free. Now imagine, publishers found a way, to kinda make people pay for joining a beta test. Basically, they figured out, how to drive up pre-orders, by making the beta test invite a pre-order bonus. So… if you pre-order the game now - then you’ll be invited into beta. Don’t do that! Do not pre-order, even if beta-invite is a pre-order bonus. Wait for the reviews.

Now, being the sneaky bastards that they are - they don’t even call it “pre-order” (which should be pre-purchase), and don’t call it beta, or invite or pre-order bonus either… They just call it “Early Access”. And that’s a total perversion of what Early Access is supposed to be.

Early Access is not supposed to be a scheme to drive up pre-purchases by making beta-invites be a pre-order bonus.

Here’s what Steam says about Early Access:

Early Access Game Get instant access and start playing; get involved with this game as it develops.

Note: Games in Early Access are not complete and may or may not change further. If you are not excited to play this game in its current state, then you should wait to see if the game progresses further in development. Learn more

And if we click on that “learn more” link:

As a gamer…

• Be the first to play exciting new games
• Discuss and give feedback
• Help test and report bugs
• Play the game as it develops

Get immediate access to games that are being developed with the community’s involvement. These are games that evolve as you play them, as you give feedback, and as the developers update and add content.

When you buy an Early Access game, you should consider what the game is like to play right now. Look at the screenshots and videos to see what the game looks like in its current state. There are a lot of ways a game can go as it develops over time, so if you aren’t excited to play the game in its current state, then hold off and wait until the next update–it shouldn’t be far off.

Beta is defined as the final phase of development before release, after the game is feature complete and enters a feature-freeze. That means, the game is basically completely implemented and all the release features are fully there - but might still need balancing, bug-fixing and polish.

At the moment a game does enter Beta, it stops (or pauses) evolving - and feedback and discussions about game mechanics and similar stuff can no longer affect things. The features of the game are intentionally frozen. A beta can show that the game still needs changes, and when that happens the game is often delayed, and those changes are made, without developers explicitly stating that the game is going back from beta to alpha again. But technically, they are unfreezing the feature-set to make changes to it, and that technically means, they are going back to alpha, because it’s only beta, when features are frozen.

So all of that talk about watching the game evolve, seeing it develop, and giving feedback - all the talk about the games current state (and it’s currently available features) - only makes sense, if we are talking about alpha. None of that applies to a beta.

And that leads me to my conclusion:

Every Early Access game should be Alpha. (And beta should just be free.)

Saying that a game shouldn’t be in EA “because it’s alpha”, that’s just complete bullshit. That’s basically demanding that publishers do their greedy little pre-order shenanigans. Do NOT support that. Instead demand they make their betas free, their review embargoes shorter, and that they allow people to have access to reviews before putting down money.

As to how early or late in it’s alpha phase, a game should go onto EA, that’s an entirely different topic. A game still can be way too early and way too incomplete for EA. But in my mind there is no doubt it should be alpha and thus incomplete. The question only is “how much” incompleteness is the right amount. And I don’t think there’ll ever be a clear, universal answer for that. Keep on debating that - but never say, that “alpha” games shouldn’t be in EA, and that only beta games should be allowed. Don’t turn EA into a pre-order scheme.