0:00

Yeah, who the fuck

0:02

knows what's going

0:04

to have? And

0:06

I feel like

0:08

it's a great

0:10

game. And I

0:12

think it's the

0:15

best game we've made,

0:17

we've ever made. Agreed. Like,

0:19

I don't know what that

0:21

means, right? I'm Sam and

0:23

I'm there to eat. And

0:25

this is a show where

0:27

we talk about life, business,

0:29

and working in the games

0:31

industry. Today is March 7th,

0:33

2020 vibes. Before we get

0:35

started, we have a warning.

0:37

Anything can happen in this

0:40

show, especially swears. So you

0:42

know, be ready for that.

0:44

It's going to be profanity in

0:46

this show. And we'd also like

0:48

to thank our recurring supporters over

0:50

at money grab.b.b.net. Thank you so

0:53

much for your recurring donations to

0:55

help keep the podcast going. So

0:57

we've got, oh, so many things

0:59

happening. Also, when people listen to

1:02

this episode, we are four weeks

1:04

away from lunch. Is that, yeah,

1:06

correct? Probably five. Is it five

1:08

weeks? Yeah. Okay. Because months for

1:10

some reason don't have 28 days

1:13

in that. Nobody can ever explain

1:15

why. Yeah. So we are. So fucking

1:17

tired. So we're on the tail end

1:19

of the beta. We've extended the beta.

1:22

Yeah, we've been putting up patches every

1:24

day, sometimes multiplies per day that are

1:26

so comically extensive because of course, you

1:28

know, the whole point we talk about

1:31

in the podcast was like, we've made

1:33

a lot of tools so that everybody

1:35

can shove their fingers into this pie.

1:37

You know, I mean, all it wants

1:40

to things ostensibly and from map updates

1:42

to, you know, quest updates to creature

1:44

code, whatever. So it's been very funny

1:47

because these the beta testers done

1:49

a great job plowing through the game

1:51

and giving a sense of feedback

1:53

and then we've just been spitting

1:55

out like these hundred bullet patch

1:57

notes basically every every day almost

1:59

versus. fit them in the discord

2:01

because of the text. I have to

2:03

keep deciding what to leave out of

2:05

the patch notes and rephrase so that

2:07

they are under 4,000 characters to fit

2:09

in a discord post, which, you know,

2:11

it's good, it's a lot. Also it

2:13

is four weeks in a day, not

2:15

five weeks, just, I double checked it

2:17

against the calendar. Oh, four weeks. Four

2:19

weeks in a day to launch from

2:21

when the podcast episode goes live. Oh,

2:23

for oh, from when the episode airs.

2:26

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,

2:28

yeah. from now it's closer to five

2:30

weeks. Yeah. So we are, we're just

2:32

cruising through, the beta's going super good.

2:34

Yes, we extended it to give people

2:37

some more time to finish it because,

2:39

you know, some people have like, you

2:41

know, 45 minutes to an hour a

2:44

day to play or something, and they're

2:46

like just part way through act two

2:48

at this point. They're definitely not gonna

2:50

finish it unless they kind of go

2:53

nuts over the weekend. We've had some

2:55

people who I think was like last

2:57

weekend, there was one person who played

3:00

for like 13 hours on Saturday and

3:02

14 hours. We've got two people who

3:04

played for over 70 hours. Yeah, we

3:07

got some we got a couple of

3:09

heroes who are just really giving us

3:11

lots of good data and just really

3:13

kind of once they're kind of getting

3:16

past the like to the end of

3:18

the game, then they're kind of going

3:20

back through and doing weird stuff, which

3:22

is good. One person like. is trying

3:25

to pave an entire zone with floors

3:27

to see what happens. Yeah, really testing

3:29

our save system. Yeah. So there's a

3:31

lot of cool stuff going on

3:33

with that. People are really enjoying

3:35

it. As far as bugs and

3:37

stuff like that, we're really kind

3:39

of down to the weird edge

3:41

case kinds of things that are

3:43

not super consequential and kind of

3:45

hard to replicate. There's one in

3:47

particular that we're digging into. And

3:49

it's kind of the last big

3:51

thing to wrap up before launch.

3:53

I gotta say that the overall,

3:55

I mean the overall bug and

3:57

crash rate has been almost gone.

4:00

comically low. You know what I mean? Like.

4:02

Yeah, we've had two crashes, both of which

4:04

were introduced during the beta. And then we

4:06

got to immediately figure out what was going

4:09

on and fix them the next day. It's

4:11

been doing a great job. Because again, like

4:13

we put out these patches, but we still

4:16

do our own internal QA first before they

4:18

hit beta. They've got a few things before

4:20

we managed to actually hit players with them.

4:22

But as a result. Like we really haven't

4:25

been, it's just so different from. that beta

4:27

that was like a couple weeks in December

4:29

of 2015 before the launch of January and

4:31

like we put out a patch and break

4:34

some more shit on accident you know ostensibly

4:36

try to fix something else and then it

4:38

was just this it was just this whackable

4:40

thing that went on for months actually post

4:42

lunch and this just feels so clean you

4:45

know so again we sell some bugs to

4:47

iron out but they're really not very it's

4:49

been weird how little of them there are

4:51

you know I mean yeah well and and

4:53

there's this I remember when we finished with

4:56

the first crash lands, we were using work

4:58

flowy. I'm pretty sure. I want to say

5:00

we had at least 300 days left.

5:02

left in workflow that were like important

5:05

things that need to happen for the

5:07

game to launch. And then we just

5:09

fucking had to launch it anyway. It's

5:11

that sort of like double-edged joke, right?

5:14

Where like the joke of any game

5:16

watch or product launch is always like,

5:18

well, there's a list of all the

5:20

really important things we just then didn't

5:23

do. So turns out they weren't important.

5:25

And there's like, it's simultaneously true and

5:27

not, because a lot of those still

5:29

were important. And we suffered that fact.

5:32

Yeah, so like, that's kind of where we're

5:34

at where we, you know, we hit

5:36

our triage list, we punted a bunch

5:38

of stuff to reevaluate post-launch, and then

5:40

looking at the current list of things,

5:42

it's just, it's dwindling, and then like

5:44

the severity of stuff on the list

5:47

is also shrinking to the point where

5:49

like, the game, the game feels done,

5:51

like we, it's got all the art,

5:53

it's got all the text, we're in

5:55

string lock now, where it's like, we're

5:57

not really changing any, we're not adding.

6:00

new dialogue, we're not adding new items and

6:02

stuff. And so, like personally for myself, like

6:04

the motivation to keep going through the list

6:06

of little tiny things. Oh yeah, it's hard

6:09

to keep tweaking. I'm just like, this is,

6:11

this is even matter at this point. Probably

6:13

not, but, and I think the most important

6:15

thing for us to do at this point

6:17

is to just play it. You know, just

6:20

because like, there's always something. There's always a

6:22

million things that you could tweak. and just

6:24

keep fiddling with and keep tweaking. But you

6:26

really just need to instead spend your time

6:29

playing the game to find those those like

6:31

higher level balance problems or bugs or whatever.

6:33

I think the reality though is like we've

6:35

all played it a bunch now in the

6:38

past couple weeks and for me it's more

6:40

so that I think we're entering a place

6:42

where it's probably better off not fucking with

6:44

stuff anymore. Yeah, post launch, right? So some

6:47

point you got to quit touching it because

6:49

every time you touch it, there's like, you

6:51

might break it or you kind of might

6:53

shift the experience enough. Whatever you felt is

6:56

not true anymore. And then yeah, there's kind

6:58

of no such thing as a small change

7:00

because of how interconnect everything is. So, so

7:02

you got to, if every little tweak, it's

7:05

like, okay, I got to do a playthrough,

7:07

you know, basically, I think. We're more or

7:09

less done with like the even like rearranging

7:11

insight flow and other stuff to all. Sam

7:14

had a conversation yesterday where I was like,

7:16

so I was in my playthrough and I

7:18

hit this point where I was like, I

7:20

feel like this research thing could probably come

7:23

after this one. And then we were talking

7:25

about for a while and Sam was like,

7:27

yeah, but like what happened during your playthrough?

7:29

I was like, well, I mean, I was

7:32

just having fun and crafting stuff and doing

7:34

quests and doing quests and it. And it's

7:36

like. Like, did you actually hit a problem?

7:38

Like, was there actually a bad experience because

7:41

of this? And I was like, no, I

7:43

just think it could be better. You know,

7:45

and it's like, all right, like, let's just

7:47

not touch it. Let's just leave it alone.

7:50

Yeah, because there's always and it could be

7:52

better, right, for any little thing. And is

7:54

that trying to decide that? But for who?

7:56

Yeah, well, it's for who. Yeah, it's the

7:59

scale of the improvement versus the scale of

8:01

the sort of broader impact and how much

8:03

like testing is required to make sure it's

8:05

fine and all that kind of stuff, right?

8:08

And that equation starts to get really tight

8:10

as you get close to launch, because there

8:12

just isn't time, there's not time to understand

8:14

the full implications of a change. And so

8:17

the impact has to be increasingly large for

8:19

it to be worth. doing even if it

8:21

like in a vacuum is worth doing you

8:23

know. I will say I got to I

8:26

got to finally finish my playthrough on Tuesday

8:28

afternoon and again it's kind of it's they're

8:30

always kind of funny when you know when

8:32

we're doing them because we're doing them on

8:35

the clock so you're trying to you're trying

8:37

to finish the fucking thing not quite playing

8:39

it for my god that's not a hundred

8:41

percent playing it for fun no man because

8:44

you're like I got to go through the

8:46

shit. So I skipped over a bunch of

8:48

stuff, especially toward the end. It's oddly stressful

8:50

to play through a game this big on

8:53

a time limit where like you know that

8:55

and also like while you're playing it, you're

8:57

making changes and then you have to decide

8:59

like, does this mean I need to start

9:02

over? Like I'm 20 hours in, we've changed

9:04

several different things. Yeah, and it's just. Yeah,

9:06

so I did finish it and, you know,

9:08

cried like a baby right at the end,

9:11

because I was just like, well, like the

9:13

whole end sick was worked, you know, it

9:15

like does it just emotionally deliver. We put

9:17

a lot of energy to that, like, those

9:20

literally last month, right? We're getting that finished

9:22

up and yeah, I was just like, geez,

9:24

gee, you did it, it's done. It's like,

9:26

like, it's done, you know what I mean?

9:29

And like, it's like, it's like, it's like,

9:31

it's done, it's like, it's like, it's like,

9:33

it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like,

9:35

it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like,

9:38

it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like,

9:40

it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like,

9:42

it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like,

9:44

it's like It's been a long fucking time,

9:47

so I'm so excited though. I'm really, I'm

9:49

so excited for everybody to see it. Yeah,

9:51

well, and we're tired of it, but I

9:53

mean, no. Speaking of done, we've hit that,

9:56

we've hit these various milestones where like it

9:58

kind of has to be, so someone mentioned

10:00

we're in sort of initial string lock, so

10:02

there's a little room for like tweaks and

10:05

stuff up until like two weeks before launch

10:07

basically. It's effectively done, it has to be,

10:09

because we need to start sending keys out

10:11

to press, since that's also happening today. As

10:14

of recording this, we're doing kind of, there's

10:16

like multiple rounds of keys that go out

10:18

to different. groups of press and streamers and

10:20

whatever depending on like proximity to launch and

10:23

all kinds of stuff. We rely on our

10:25

PR team to make those decisions for us

10:27

so we don't have to think about it,

10:29

you know, but that it best to me

10:32

that keys are literally going out today to

10:34

press so that they have enough time to

10:36

play enough of the game that they can

10:38

put a review up on the day before

10:41

launch or launch day. So the game must

10:43

be done enough that we can do that

10:45

so that whatever they review is also what

10:47

we launch, you know, or at least almost

10:50

exactly. And we... currently can't send it out

10:52

to non-English press because the lag of Loke,

10:54

right? And so we want to be able

10:56

to do that as soon as possible, which

10:59

is why we're going to string lock today,

11:01

so that we had this final batch of

11:03

Loke going out next week, kind of on

11:05

top of the last one that went out,

11:08

so that we can hopefully be sending out

11:10

keys to non-English press end of next week,

11:12

or like shortly thereafter. So, and like we

11:14

said, that's now four weeks before launch, right?

11:17

So, we're, the time is, we're, we're, I

11:19

know, I know, we said it before, but

11:21

like, it always feels like that Wallace and

11:23

Grumman meme of him riding on the train

11:26

tracks and just laying the tracks down in

11:28

front of himself, where it's like, but it

11:30

kind of has to be that way. It's

11:32

like, we pumped at our launch to April

11:35

10 because we're like, that's, that's how much

11:37

time we need. If we look at all

11:39

the stuff that needs to happen and the

11:41

order in which it needs to happen, it's

11:44

not like, it kind of makes me think

11:46

of like back when the COVID vaccine was

11:48

going on, they did that operation warp speed,

11:50

right, where they were like, normally we have

11:53

these three stages of trials that go sequentially,

11:55

we're gonna do them all at the same

11:57

time. And if it fails at any point

11:59

on any one of those, then all of

12:02

them will stop, right? Which is dangerous because

12:04

of course the purpose of doing the trials

12:06

in sequence is safety. Right? It's like if

12:08

something really bad happens in the early trials

12:11

with like a mouse or something. You don't

12:13

do it. Like, okay, let's figure that out

12:15

before and then fix that and then do

12:17

it again before we move ahead or something

12:20

like that. Yeah. Yes a combination of like

12:22

is it given what we know about

12:24

the things that like in this case

12:26

the vaccine that like make it work

12:28

and how dangerous or not dangerous those

12:30

things we think those things are and

12:32

how dangerous not having it is right

12:34

it's the same idea like certain kinds

12:36

of like drug trials and stuff where

12:38

normally you have to do a blind

12:40

trial where somebody is a placebo group

12:42

and somebody is not, but there's certain

12:44

scenarios where you can't ethically have a

12:46

placebo group because not treating somebody for

12:49

someone that's trying to kill them right

12:51

now. Yeah. If the thing might work? You could,

12:53

but it's extreme. It's unethical. So now you have

12:55

like the science has to be worse so that

12:57

you can have the ethics be better, right? Yes.

12:59

So like, so in that case, it was like,

13:01

normally these things have to happen sequentially,

13:03

sequentially, there was a way for them

13:05

to sort of like. pull an emergency

13:07

rip cord and do them do them

13:10

synchronously. In our case, we can't, like

13:12

we can't, there's not really a way

13:14

for us to like do the beta

13:16

test before the game is done or

13:18

translate after a launch or you know

13:20

what it like. It's like how if

13:23

you want to, you know, create a

13:25

human baby, you can't just add more.

13:27

It's just going to take nine months.

13:29

You got to go through the stages

13:31

of development. Yep. And so, so in

13:33

our case, it's like. if we for

13:35

example gave ourselves until i don't know

13:37

november or something then all that would

13:39

happen is we would blow up the

13:41

scope of the game more yeah and

13:44

end up right back where we started

13:46

which is still coming down to the

13:48

wire still still translating and testing right

13:50

at the end you know because the

13:52

run is you don't you don't actually

13:54

want there to be a very large

13:56

gap between you being done and the

13:58

game being launched because that made just

14:00

you're just spending money just burning money

14:02

yeah so you want to it actually

14:04

you want to be as tight as

14:06

possible you know ideally it's like literally

14:08

day up it's like yeah we're finished

14:11

with the games watch but about you

14:13

know yeah with the timeline that we

14:15

have like we actually have more sort

14:17

of comfort than I was expecting us

14:19

to have in terms of the stuff

14:21

we still need to be doing because

14:23

certain things like the beta testing string

14:25

lock and that kind of stuff like

14:28

just have to happen some significant time

14:30

before launch because otherwise it can't possibly

14:32

get done. Like the whole project can't.

14:34

But I was expecting there to be

14:36

more like, okay, there's these other systems

14:38

that don't necessarily need to go through

14:40

beta, don't require low collect, that kind

14:43

of stuff that we have to like

14:45

really shore up still, you know, because

14:47

you then take that kind of stuff

14:49

that isn't stuck behind things like a

14:51

beta test and look. And you try

14:53

to basically put that at the very

14:55

end then, right. But all that stuff

14:58

is done, right? Like it's all good.

15:00

It's all good. It's actually pretty comfortable.

15:02

Yeah. And we talked a lot about

15:04

our strategy, our overall strategy, the crash

15:06

counts too, which was like first was

15:08

the kind of the appeal and marketing

15:10

focused build out to start it. So

15:13

it was like, make a game that

15:15

looks like something you want to get,

15:17

right? Even before we had much of

15:19

the game there. Then it was, we

15:21

did that alpha, basically. proof of the

15:23

whole recipe working, like all the systems

15:25

working, and then we built the whole

15:28

rest. Also proof of a lot of

15:30

things that didn't work. Oh yeah. I

15:32

do talk about a little bit. Yeah,

15:34

I was saying that like the like

15:36

really large systemic change should really not

15:38

be what's happening in a beta context.

15:40

Yeah, we needed the alpha to identify

15:43

like the big change that happened. Yeah,

15:45

beta is, yeah, beta is refinements and

15:47

streamlined, you know, alpha is, what's not

15:49

working at all, what's working. How do

15:51

we adjust? Yeah, so something that I

15:53

think we've like leaned in to a

15:55

lot more during like leading up to

15:57

the beta and then during the beta

16:00

as we made changes. is, how do

16:02

I put this, being less stingy with

16:04

player power. So in the Alpha, one

16:06

of the things that we started seeing

16:08

was like, people were talking about like

16:10

harvesting being tedious, combat being tedious, tedious,

16:12

tedious, tedious, like, it feels like everything's

16:15

just taken way too long and it's

16:17

like way too hard. The word we

16:19

were so afraid of from original crash

16:21

scenes was grindy. We were like, we

16:23

don't want to see that word again

16:25

with crash ones too, and then we

16:27

did. we saw it. We did. Yeah.

16:30

And, and, you know, we talk a

16:32

lot about balance and how, like, we

16:34

mentioned this, I think, like, last, last

16:36

week, last week's episode about how, like,

16:39

you can have the same exact game

16:41

concept, but how you tune the knobs

16:43

completely changes the experience. And what we

16:45

kind of have discovered over time was

16:48

it like. We had our, we had

16:50

like in crashes too, we have telegraphs

16:52

that you used to capture targets, you

16:54

swinging your tool, your axe or whatever.

16:56

And back in the alpha, the telegraphs

16:59

were very small compared to what

17:01

they are right now. Yeah. Almost

17:03

all of them have been approximately

17:05

doubled. Like doubled at least. Like

17:07

it's like it's all weapons, all

17:10

harvesting tools, and that's from the

17:12

jump, right? And part of it

17:14

is like, you have to do

17:16

this thing where you think about

17:19

an RPG, you're like power curve,

17:21

where you're trying to say, okay,

17:23

where you're trying to say, you're

17:25

like power curve, where you're trying

17:27

to say, okay, where do you

17:30

want the player to start? via

17:32

some upgrades or whatever else. And

17:34

so they naturally all started very

17:36

small. It's kind of like starting

17:38

with like shitty looking rags on

17:40

your character. Exactly. To start the

17:42

game and then you get cool

17:44

looking armor later. Yeah. So and

17:46

there's also there's all the learning

17:48

stuff. Like you know, early game

17:50

for any game. Typically, it's like

17:52

there's less, less dazzling than it

17:54

will be at the end because

17:56

you're not like a ready mentally

17:58

to handle that. and that just made

18:01

itself. It's like, I think we've largely

18:03

gotten to the point of saying about player

18:05

power, but it's just like recognizing what's fun

18:07

about the game and just turning that

18:09

knob up. So it's like, it's fun. The

18:12

whole reason we did the telegraph thing for

18:14

harvesting was because. it actually does make

18:16

harvesting into a little interesting, but just a

18:18

much more interesting little mini game where you're

18:20

positioning your character. But if it tells

18:22

you, you see a cluster of plants and

18:25

you're like, I think I can catch those

18:27

in my telegraph, right? And you go stand

18:29

in position and then you can catch

18:31

all three of them in one swing.

18:34

And it's like, it's just slightly interactive

18:36

enough compared to, you know, punching a

18:38

tree, like singularly punching one tree, that

18:40

it makes it not grindy feeling, right.

18:42

to allow you to do it. The

18:44

telegraph is so small that you're effectively

18:46

single target chopping stuff anyway. Yeah. And

18:48

they might not as might as well

18:51

not even have telegraph. So it's like

18:53

it's basically I think we did a

18:55

good job one of the questions we

18:57

asked before from our internal QA. They

18:59

did their playthroughs a few weeks ago and

19:01

I said if you can just wave a magic

19:04

wand and like have a change to be there

19:06

to make the game just more enjoyable for you.

19:08

What would it be? just fundamental player things like

19:10

oh it'd be nice if I just like moved

19:12

faster like I'm just slow or like I just

19:15

you know if harvesting just wasn't super interesting I

19:17

said that was more interesting to be as vague

19:19

as that or specific something else right and and

19:21

also then asking even like just between you know

19:23

Adam Seth and I like okay what do we

19:25

given how the game is structured what can you

19:27

just guess off off like the initial launch of

19:30

the game is going to be a player complaint,

19:32

right? Yeah. As a common player to play, like

19:34

the one I see over and over and over

19:36

again. And can we just fucking not have that

19:38

be a complaint? That's essentially like a lot of the

19:40

stuff debated. It's like, okay, yeah, you can, if you just

19:42

increase the telegraph size for something like harvesting, it's just way

19:44

more fun and interesting. Baseline, it's better for us, better for

19:46

everybody else. So there's been a lot of those things that

19:48

have been like those, they're not like, they're not like, they're

19:50

not like, they're not like, they're not like, they're not systemic,

19:52

they're not systemic, systemic, they're not systemic, systemic changes, systemic changes,

19:54

like, like, like systemic changes, like, like, like systemic changes, like,

19:56

like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like,

19:58

like, like, like, like, like, like, stuff. It's not

20:00

like we got rid of telegraphs. We

20:03

just changed how we were thinking about

20:05

them. Yeah. Where it's like, where it's

20:07

like it, the problem is if you're

20:10

using a telegraph as a means of

20:12

giving the player power by making the

20:14

telegraph bigger, then if you start it

20:17

small, then it just fucking suck. It's

20:19

not the same as like a number

20:21

getting bigger. Where you're just like, I

20:23

did more damage, right? It's, it mechanically

20:26

changes how you can interact with the

20:28

world. if you're if your telegraph is

20:30

bigger than it's easier for you to

20:32

hit enemies while not standing in their

20:34

telegraph right if your telegraph is super

20:37

short then you have to risk yourself

20:39

and put yourself in harm's way because

20:41

you got to get closer to the

20:43

enemy right and so so eventually we

20:45

should play where we're just like never

20:47

mind telegraphs are just going to be

20:49

useful and fun and big and cool

20:51

right out of the get-go and we

20:53

will give the player power in Well,

20:56

like it's similar to like how we,

20:58

you know, how we do the sort

21:00

of the difficulty modes, right, where it's

21:02

not that every aspect of everything, it's

21:04

not that telegraphs are smaller or bigger

21:06

or things are, do more damage and

21:08

take more, take more damage. All we

21:10

did was just change, like, things are

21:12

faster. Change some speeds. Yeah, just change

21:14

some speeds. Like, again, identifying the part

21:16

that actually, like, represents the interesting and

21:19

fun part of the challenge, and tweaking

21:21

that rather than everything else. Because I

21:23

think this idea of, like, because we

21:25

still could have had it so that

21:27

also telegraphs tend to get bigger as

21:29

the game progresses to, like, give you

21:31

more powers, right? But the starting point has

21:33

to also be good. Yeah, and in some

21:36

cases they do. So like the, what we

21:38

did for example for the chopper that you'll

21:40

notice when you play the game is that

21:42

like it, it basically just gets like a

21:45

bit wider. Like it's kind of like an

21:47

arc in front of you. And so it

21:49

just becomes, but it starts pretty big. Yeah,

21:51

exactly. And then it just starts good too

21:54

and then get better. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

21:56

And then even just stuff like just this

21:58

past week, we took some. we did kind

22:00

of like an audit of some of the

22:03

items that are like come came kind of

22:05

late in the game and we're like can

22:07

we shuffle things around so that you can

22:09

just have these things sooner yeah is it

22:12

really a problem to not have them at

22:14

the beginning you know yeah just because It's

22:16

more fun. Yeah, if you if you get

22:18

these things earlier, then it's just more fun

22:20

things to play with. And like back when

22:23

I did my first playthrough, which is now

22:25

probably two months ago or something like that,

22:27

we had like a lot of these trinkets

22:29

that were just stat stick trinkets basically.

22:31

It's just like, oh yeah, this one

22:34

just like gives you haste. That's just

22:36

that's what it does. And then alternative

22:38

we have these interesting trinkets that are

22:40

like, like, like, like, when you get

22:42

you poison the enemy or synergistic trinkets.

22:44

Yeah, when you deal fire damage, sometimes

22:46

you go crazy, you know, stuff like

22:48

that. And I found myself completely ignoring

22:50

the statistic trinkets. Yeah, I did too.

22:52

I'm like, yeah, I'm like, who gives

22:54

those shit? Like, give me something cool.

22:57

I give me this thing that like,

22:59

you know, your poison sometimes makes more

23:01

poison and then I just roll

23:03

poison like crazy. Like that's. That's

23:05

interesting, right? And so Sam and

23:07

I had a conversation, I think

23:10

it was like right before the

23:12

start of the, like the weekend

23:14

before the start of the beta.

23:16

I was like, I want to,

23:18

I want to, I want to,

23:20

I want to rip these out.

23:23

I want to rip out these

23:25

stat and stick trinkets and just

23:27

put in, just put in, just

23:29

put in some cool effects on them instead.

23:31

multiple items in the same set, then you

23:34

get a set bonus that adds on top

23:36

whatever you're doing. Most of the trinkets were,

23:38

it's just that there was, we had, we

23:40

had, we had created on purpose a whole

23:42

group of them that were just supposed to

23:44

be statistics. The idea being like, they're still

23:46

useful, you know, depending on the build, but

23:48

it turns out that like being useful, but

23:50

it's not interesting, yeah. Synergy is a natural

23:53

color. It's like, oh, number go up, like,

23:55

oh yeah, this, this, this trigger, it gives

23:57

me, it gives me, more electric damage, more

23:59

electric damage. It's like, fine. It's like, yeah,

24:01

but this one makes it so I explode

24:03

when I joke. Yeah, so who gets this

24:06

shit about this other one? Yeah, I'm fine.

24:08

So we went through and just looked at

24:10

every single one of those statistic trinkets, put

24:12

them into sets and got rid of their

24:15

passive effects and gave them new interesting effects.

24:17

Like, one of my favorite ones is one

24:19

of the, is like pretty hard to

24:21

use. It's just, it's called the self

24:23

motivator. And originally it was just like,

24:26

like, it gives you some run speed,

24:28

it gives you some run speed. That's

24:30

it. That's just what I did. Now

24:33

just a thing where whenever you kill

24:35

an enemy you get a stack of

24:37

motivation and you can get 15 stacks

24:39

of motivation and every stack gives you

24:42

haste and juke recovery. Juke recovery is

24:44

your ability to like help. It's the

24:46

cool down of your dodge basically. So

24:48

so whenever you kill an enemy you

24:50

get motivated and if you take any

24:52

direct hit at all you'll lose all

24:54

your stacks. So this is now like

24:56

an early game item. Yeah, I use

24:58

it now just because once it gets

25:00

going and you're just like a fucking

25:03

machine guy. Because it gives you a

25:05

lot of haste. It gives you a

25:07

shit load of haste. It's a great

25:09

tension builder, right? Early game. It makes

25:11

you a big and it makes comment

25:13

really big and it makes comment really

25:15

interesting, right? Really game. Yeah, because it's

25:17

like this little mini game of like

25:19

you can as many kills as you

25:21

can or you'll see a group of

25:23

small enemies. I could just wipe them

25:25

out and get some motivation stacks. Because

25:27

the motivation just, it doesn't time out,

25:29

right? It just, it lasts for like

25:31

two minutes. So it's kind of like,

25:33

you get quite a bit of leeway

25:35

with it. Yeah, and so like that,

25:37

but like having that much haste and

25:40

having an item like that early in

25:42

the game is very different vibes wise

25:44

from what we had before. It's very

25:46

easy early game. If you. If you

25:48

figure out good combinations of items, if

25:50

you explore a lot, if you go

25:52

find some of the hidden things that

25:54

are around the first act, you can

25:57

get pretty strong, pretty early. And then

25:59

from there... previously. Yeah, I was having

26:01

it previously was like act one was

26:03

more or less like the whole act

26:05

we kind of considered trading right where

26:07

it's like by the end of it

26:09

you have like full a full set

26:11

that you could put together whatever but

26:13

there's not like a lot going on

26:15

on the combat side. Not a lot

26:17

of diversity of options. Yeah and so

26:20

now it's like we pulled we pulled

26:22

enough of those things forward then not

26:24

just like making entirely new ones which

26:26

we did right before the beta but

26:28

also just this last week we pulled

26:30

a few of the things that just

26:32

they were coming late game. But yours,

26:34

like, there's still cool stuff to unlock

26:36

late game. But the problem with late

26:38

game stuff is that, of course, you

26:40

don't get you used to use it.

26:42

So we're like, let's just pull a

26:44

few of those forward. We'll shuffle some

26:46

things around. And so now you get

26:48

some, you get one of my favorite

26:50

gadgets, like early. very early just by

26:52

like walking over to it right in

26:55

the mantel just go pick it up

26:57

it's just laying there and it's like

26:59

it's flashy as fuck it's fun to

27:01

play with and well then it adds

27:03

the element for the variety of kinds

27:05

of players that exist in a real

27:07

because like betas are not the same

27:09

as you know real long trip but

27:11

one of the big reasons is because

27:13

people don't have the internet to turn

27:15

to when they were like how do

27:17

we like really crush the first act

27:19

you know that kind of and reward

27:21

you for just like covering every square

27:23

inch of the land, right? So for

27:25

people who love that play style, like

27:28

finding all the easter eggs and all

27:30

the fun stuff, you're gonna find some

27:32

shit that like just, you're like, holy

27:34

shit, this is cool, right? That changes

27:36

how you think about how combat works,

27:38

makes you a little overpowered, even for

27:40

a while, like, it does, like, I

27:42

wanna do like the most intense fun,

27:44

like out about stuff as quickly as

27:46

possible, you can go check the internet.

27:48

Yeah, I think I think I think

27:50

now in act one there's I don't

27:52

want to say I don't say exactly

27:54

how many but there's a healthy handful

27:56

of items that you can just go

27:58

get you can just go fight. If

28:00

you know where they are you can

28:03

just go grab them. Right. What else

28:05

like the design change of like being

28:07

like we're introducing the concepts of combat

28:09

to you in act one and we

28:11

kind of. like pace it out and

28:13

our mostly folks can do is kind

28:15

of the almost just the idea of

28:17

combat you know and then later come

28:19

like the all the fun like trinket

28:21

weird gadget stuff right but instead now

28:23

it's like oh no actually get glimpses

28:25

of that significant glimpses of that earlier

28:27

but what comes later is like really

28:29

being able to act on sets because

28:31

at the beginning there's not enough more

28:33

and more items yeah because you can't

28:35

really assemble your sets yet at the

28:38

beginning and you only have partial sets

28:40

for everything And then as you go,

28:42

you start making decisions like, because now

28:44

you've seen everything in action already, like

28:46

to some extent. And then you start

28:48

deciding like, ooh, I'm going to go

28:50

on and fire, whatever. And so, so,

28:52

so even though we're giving you some

28:54

of that stuff earlier, the way that

28:56

the players can end up approaching it

28:58

is fundamentally different between action and action,

29:00

again, I think a lot of the

29:02

focus on the betas, it's combination of

29:04

saying, okay, confirmation, like, like, like, drop-off

29:06

rates and stuff like that. And Cresciones

29:08

too, at least in the beta context,

29:11

is performing well above Crescen's one on

29:13

that, like on those metrics. So that's

29:15

like, how many players are still left

29:17

after one hour, right? Two hours. Yeah,

29:19

five hours. It's doing very well compared

29:21

to the original, and which is just

29:23

looking at steam metrics. And we explicitly

29:25

tried to find testers testers who have

29:27

multiple devices. yes right and so so

29:29

the steam metrics for the for the

29:31

beta are far out performing original crash

29:33

lands but that's with a subset of

29:35

people who are purposely splitting their time

29:37

between steam and other and other platforms

29:39

yeah I mean their total playtime in

29:41

the game right is not is more

29:43

than actually being captured on steam yeah

29:46

yeah yeah yeah yeah I gotta say

29:48

they're like I feel very good about

29:50

the game in terms of all the

29:52

changes we made. It's just getting more

29:54

and more fun. We're getting a good

29:56

good response from the testers both.

29:58

like anecdotally and also

30:00

in the data. However,

30:05

because of how things went down with

30:07

level head. Oh yeah, same. I now

30:09

have this thing in the back of

30:12

my mind where I'm just like, I'm

30:14

just waiting for the other shoe to

30:16

drop. You know, where I'm like. Yeah,

30:18

if it doesn't. Does it even matter?

30:20

Yeah, I'm like, I played through this

30:22

game now several times and it's actually

30:24

hit a point where like up until

30:26

recently Baldur's Gate 3 was kind of

30:28

my like, I got an evening to

30:30

chill out. I'm going to boot up

30:32

Baldur's Gate and just kind of kind

30:35

of play that I I've tried that

30:37

a couple of nights these past couple

30:39

of weeks and then I ended up

30:41

just going back and playing Crashlands 2.

30:43

Yeah, actually on that note, because you

30:45

finish your play through that you had

30:47

to do to get through the whole

30:49

game. I started my second playthroughs because

30:51

that's been doing a lot of like

30:53

restarts. I started my second playthrough being

30:55

of last week. And of course, there's also been

30:57

a fuck little changes have happened to make the

30:59

game better. But I don't think that was the

31:01

main reason why I was having like twice as

31:03

much fun the whole time that I was playing.

31:05

Like and I was similar. Like I was like,

31:07

I was like, I was still kind of because

31:09

I felt like I should keep doing playthroughs. I'm

31:12

going to keep on doing that. But that was

31:14

pretty nominal. It was mostly because I was like,

31:16

I get to like, I get to spend my

31:18

work time. You know, just enjoying it. Just like

31:20

playing this game. And this game is actually very

31:22

fun. Well, I finished it and I I ran

31:24

a particular set combo for basically the whole game

31:26

ran the void or the arbiter set. And

31:29

so I finished it and I was expecting,

31:31

fully expecting because again, like who work on

31:33

this fucking thing for four a half years.

31:35

So my internal expectation was like, once I

31:37

do my like official playthrough, that I'm probably

31:39

going to be like very over it. Yeah.

31:41

Yeah. I got I'm done with this game.

31:44

Yeah. But I was like, well, yeah, exactly.

31:46

I literally a slayer comp, though, the moment.

31:48

The moment I finished my playthrough, I was

31:50

starting to think about my next one. The

31:52

moment. Yeah. Yeah. So I mean, so again,

31:54

like, yeah. And so but because of because

31:56

of the unpredictability of you know, of the

31:59

the games market. Like, I can't

32:01

trust anything, man. Yeah, I'm

32:03

optimistic, but of course I'm

32:05

worried, just because like... That

32:07

could end up being the

32:10

last game we make, you

32:12

know? Yeah, who the fuck

32:14

knows what's going to have?

32:16

And I feel like it's

32:19

a great game. And I

32:21

think it's the best game

32:23

we've made, we've ever made.

32:25

Agreed. Like, I don't know

32:27

what that means, right? We

32:30

absolutely made a thing that was worth

32:32

making. And no matter what the outcome

32:34

is, I'm glad we made it, and

32:36

I'm glad we took the time required

32:39

and spent the money required to do

32:41

it. And it might just also be true

32:43

from a business standpoint, given that it

32:45

doesn't pan out. That doesn't pan out.

32:47

And if that... If Crashions 2 is

32:49

the game that we end up sinking

32:51

the ship on. Honestly, I'm really glad

32:53

it was that one, because if it...

32:55

What a way to go? Because the

32:57

thing is, like, if Crashions 2 can't

32:59

succeed, we cannot be successful. That's... in

33:01

my opinion. I don't think there's a

33:03

way. There's not a thing we could

33:05

have done instead. There's not a game

33:07

we could do next, you know, that

33:09

like is the thing that was like,

33:12

oh, it was because we didn't make

33:14

a game in this genre, like it's

33:16

some bullshit, right? It's just that the

33:19

game's market is impossible to intentionally succeed

33:21

in, right? Well, yeah, I'm actually more

33:23

worried about the middle, the middle, the

33:26

middle case. Yeah, I know I agree.

33:28

if it completely flops it's like oh

33:30

okay yeah like that's a clear signal

33:33

if we land in the middle you

33:35

just you don't want to be well

33:37

because because then what's next I think

33:40

it's exactly well it's not even a

33:42

treadmill it's that if we to put this

33:44

much effort in and make this good of

33:46

a thing to to just not go

33:48

under right then what does that mean the

33:51

next thing has to be to keep

33:53

us from going under has to be at

33:55

least as Well, no, it's not about

33:57

quality, though. Yeah, you know, it's about it's

33:59

about It's about meeting the market

34:01

with something that people want. But

34:03

this is also the best we

34:05

know to do to meet the

34:07

market. So like, if, if we

34:10

can. Well, there is, there is

34:12

one thing, but I feel like

34:14

there's a big survivorship bias on

34:16

it, which is multiplayer, right? Because

34:18

like, if you look at a

34:20

lot of the games that, that

34:22

really kind of like, go, go

34:24

gangbusters, right? You got held divers,

34:26

you got, you know. Well, I

34:28

think, I think multiplayer unlocks the

34:30

next tier of, it unlocks the

34:32

next tier of like the ceiling

34:34

of success, right? Right, right. But

34:36

it does jack shit to the

34:39

floor. Correct. In fact, well, it

34:41

creates a negative feedback loop as

34:43

well as a positive one, right?

34:45

Because it can't stand alone for

34:47

like the handful of players who

34:49

like it. I think about like

34:51

if, if questions do doesn't do

34:53

well enough. for us, it's less

34:55

so, I think it's more so

34:57

just saying that it just means

34:59

we need to re-examine our approach

35:01

about how we choose what we're

35:03

building. Yeah. Well, there's also, there's

35:05

a cost benefit question, right? Because

35:08

like, if, so questions too took

35:10

over four years to make, a

35:12

huge portion of that was tools

35:14

development. And like we're talking about

35:16

when we went into the Alpha

35:18

in October 2023, we still only

35:20

had the first one third of

35:22

the game. And that was actually

35:24

true until January of 2024 when

35:26

we started working on Act 2,

35:28

right? So we basically built two

35:30

thirds of the game in the

35:32

last year, at least in the

35:34

quarter of the year. And the

35:37

first three years was the first

35:39

one third of the game. Which

35:41

is how almost all game development.

35:43

ever works, right, is always, it's

35:45

always that, like, seemingly out of

35:47

balance thing of, like, the first

35:49

huge fraction of it is figuring

35:51

out how to make it, figuring

35:53

out, sign, figuring out all this

35:55

kind of stuff, and then a

35:57

mad rush, now that all that

35:59

stuff is figured out to them,

36:01

put it. to put it all

36:04

together, yeah. Yeah. That's always how

36:06

it works. But the relative, like,

36:08

proportions of those, how long the

36:10

overall thing takes, all that kind

36:12

of stuff, dramatically depends on all

36:14

the decisions that we make about

36:16

what is this thing that we're

36:18

trying to make in the first

36:20

place. I think something is like,

36:22

yeah, Crashions too, may not do

36:24

well enough to more at four

36:26

years, right? Yeah. or even three

36:28

years. Which is, which is completely

36:30

feasible. Then, then it might actually be

36:33

extremely profitable, right? Because again, like, it's

36:35

a cost benefit. Yeah, if the game

36:37

does mediumly, right, and then we throw

36:40

all the stuff away that we learned

36:42

to make it. Just do something else.

36:44

Like, yeah, we're just fucked, right? That's

36:47

kind of what happens there. So yeah,

36:49

I agree that there, the middle path

36:51

is still, you know, feasible, given. Again,

36:54

we're always saying take the long view,

36:56

right, which is, like you're saying, to

36:58

make crash lands too. We made all

37:01

these decisions because we were trying to

37:03

make crash lands too, which required so

37:05

much stuff to do. But we then

37:07

did all of that stuff with an

37:09

eye towards the future of being like,

37:11

well, we need it to be easy

37:14

to add content to games, specific for

37:16

crashes too. Yeah, sure. But the system

37:18

that we built is not inextricably tied

37:20

into what crash lands too is too

37:22

is. It's a more generic conceptual way

37:24

of thinking about it. Same deal with

37:27

most of the tools that we develop

37:29

there. They're just kind of like live

37:31

alongside the game. You know, a couple

37:33

to it certainly in a way, but

37:35

in a way that's extractable so that

37:37

we can bring that stuff forward. And

37:39

honestly, because of how big Creshens to

37:41

it was, they'll work a lot better

37:43

in like almost any other game, whatever

37:45

the next game is, because they won't

37:47

have to. If we made like a

37:49

rogue leg like or something like a

37:51

rogue leg or something. I know like

37:53

I know for a lot of a

37:55

lot of game developers there's like an

37:57

imposter syndrome thing where they're like all

37:59

everybody So much better than me, I'm

38:01

just faking it, I don't really know

38:04

what I'm doing, you know, like that

38:06

kind of stuff. That's not where I'm

38:08

at with any of this. It's more,

38:10

I don't, I have extreme confidence in

38:12

our ability to make a really good

38:14

game. And we did that. And we've

38:16

been doing that. But I have no

38:19

confidence in my ability to predict. how

38:21

that will now correlate to some kind

38:23

of an outcome. Yeah, and the best

38:25

thing is like, we'll never get to

38:27

have that. Yeah, we'll never get to

38:29

have that. You never get to know.

38:32

You never get to be like, this

38:34

is gonna do great. Like, you just

38:36

can't say that, because you don't know.

38:38

Part of the learning that too is

38:40

like, is on it. Like, we're getting,

38:42

we've gotten better at engineering, gotten better

38:44

at better at engineering, gotten better at

38:47

better at better at design. like trying

38:49

to make a game that's very appealing

38:51

right from a lot of those high-level

38:53

decisions yeah and so because it's not

38:55

it's not really about making a good

38:57

or you have to extend your idea

39:00

of what makes a good game really

39:02

which is like it's not really just

39:04

the mechanics it's not the art it's

39:06

the combination of everything that makes it

39:08

so it's an appealing thing that a

39:10

that the market actually wants it's more

39:12

like a successful game this is a

39:15

good game right because there's even stuff

39:17

like over the course of the next

39:19

five weeks it is I wouldn't say

39:21

likely, but it's becoming more likely that

39:23

countries who, you know, we've localized the

39:25

game to be able to sell it

39:28

in those countries, are pissed off at

39:30

the United States by that point, and

39:32

something happens where there's a boycott of

39:34

all-American-made products, right? Like, that's happening. Typically,

39:36

people think about this in terms of

39:38

physical products and stuff like that. But

39:41

we, you know, there's a chance that

39:43

we get caught. the grinder on that,

39:45

you know. There's a lot of things.

39:47

There's a lot of things that can

39:49

happen. And there's always because our biggest

39:51

market for crash lands is China. It's

39:53

China. And so there's we've always been

39:56

operating under a risk that any time

39:58

China can like. be like, you know

40:00

what, we've been kind of letting steam

40:02

slip through here, but we're not going

40:04

to anymore, right? And so we've always

40:06

been offering that risk, but it is

40:09

definitely the case right now that that

40:11

risk is much greater than it has

40:13

been in recent history. So we're, like,

40:15

it's one of the, you know, dark jokes

40:17

that I'm now finding myself making is like,

40:19

well. If money still exists when we launch

40:22

the game, I think it's going to go

40:24

well. And that's kind of a wrap. But

40:26

it is absolutely the case that through no

40:28

fault of road, having made like, having spent

40:31

four and a half years of our lives

40:33

and our team's lives, creating this thing that

40:35

we know is really good, it could end

40:37

up because of the market conditions, political problems

40:39

that now we can't fucking sell it and

40:42

we have to go and now we can't

40:44

sell anything even. If that's the world we

40:46

find ourselves in when we launch this

40:48

game, it doesn't matter what we're doing.

40:50

Right? There's either. We and many people

40:52

are in trouble. And then we got

40:54

to figure some things out. Yep. Yeah.

40:56

So it's I think we've also got

40:58

this thing. You know, our prior team

41:00

is made compiling this list of all

41:02

these reviewers and stuff who have expressed

41:04

interest in, right? And it's a big

41:07

list, which is great. Certainly, you

41:09

know, level heads list. I don't

41:11

think even existed. Yeah, there was

41:13

nobody. Literally nobody. I don't know

41:15

if we mentioned this on the

41:17

podcast. We joke about in Charlie

41:19

sometimes how like level head doesn't

41:21

have a metacritic score. Because we

41:24

couldn't get four reviewers to play

41:26

it. Like, which is like 97%

41:28

positive on steam. And we couldn't

41:30

get four professional reviewers to play

41:32

the game. Like, it's just not.

41:34

the again as far as we

41:36

talk a lot about looking at

41:38

the data the beta feedback and stuff and

41:40

being like are we getting positive signals are

41:43

we getting negative signals and then trying to

41:45

guess the trajectory of stuff based on that

41:47

it's like it's kind of the same with

41:49

the press which is like we've got a

41:51

lot actually a lot of interest right from

41:53

press outlets from big press outlets which is

41:55

great it's still just like it's still not

41:57

of course anything yet because you still got

42:00

see if they actually produce anything. So there's

42:02

that next hurdle to get over. Well, and

42:04

we're in a situation where we're talking, like

42:06

we mentioned earlier in the episode about how

42:08

there's like this one last weird bug that

42:10

we're tracking down. It's in there. And we're

42:12

sending out keys today. And we'll just have

42:14

to let them know. It should be like

42:16

PS. Yeah. And the way that this bug

42:18

manifests is like, it doesn't break the game

42:20

in a way that's obvious, but it does

42:22

have unusual consequences that can be confusing if

42:24

it happens. And so then it's like, well,

42:26

if a reviewer hits this bug, they won't

42:28

know that they've hit it. It's just that

42:30

stuff will, stuff will be a little less

42:32

good. Some specific things will be weird. And

42:34

then we have to, like, we have to

42:36

weigh the decision right now of, like, do

42:38

we, we've figured out that this is there,

42:40

this bug is there, which we figured out,

42:42

like, yesterday, do we just go and send

42:44

it? And yeah, we're just going to send

42:46

it. We're just going to send it. We're

42:48

just going to send it. We're just going

42:50

to send it. We're just going to send

42:52

it. We're just going to. We're just going

42:54

to send it. We're just going to send

42:56

it. We're just going to. We're just going

42:58

to send it. We're just going to. We're

43:00

just going to. We're just going to send

43:02

it. Even internally, like we've had, like I've

43:04

played hundreds of hours of the game, our

43:06

QA has played for thousands of hours. We've

43:08

had a hundred people going through the beta

43:10

and they're putting dozens and dozens of hours

43:12

each into the game. And nobody outside of

43:14

our internal team has picked up on this

43:16

bug. Yeah, not until this past two weeks,

43:18

I think during full play groups. Yeah, I

43:20

saw it last week for the first time.

43:22

Yeah, Sam saw it and Jen saw it.

43:24

And I think that's it. That's it. Yeah,

43:26

neither you can expect to see it. I

43:28

haven't seen it. Which is crazy because it

43:30

feels like it happens relatively. But also, it

43:32

is one of those, it's a subtle enough

43:34

thing that it's, it's one of those that

43:36

like, it's one of those that like, it's,

43:38

it's one of those that like, it's, it's

43:40

one of those that like, like, it's, like,

43:42

restart the the game or whatever, like, like,

43:44

like, like, like, restart the game or whatever,

43:46

like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like,

43:48

like, like, restart the game, like, like, like,

43:50

like, like, like, like, like, restart the game,

43:52

like, like, like, like, and it's hard to

43:54

notice. And so it's in that living in

43:56

that in that space of like we actually

43:58

don't know how common is except that it's

44:00

definitely uncommon, but we don't know. is it

44:02

like literally is uncommon is it the evidence

44:04

it says which is it's happened twice in

44:06

literally thousands and thousands of hours of playtime

44:08

or is it actually happening like all the

44:10

tens of times or even more often yeah

44:12

is there like a 10% chance per hour

44:14

that it happens or is there a 10%

44:16

chance per hour that it happens or is

44:18

there a one in a thousand chance per

44:20

hour of people that happens because of the

44:22

nature which is like these are my these

44:24

the books I hate I hate them most

44:26

is the ones where you're just like the

44:28

is negligible on the play experience of sort

44:30

of the takeaway to me. Like it can

44:32

make some stuff confusing or it can like

44:35

kind of break some stuff but we've got

44:37

enough work rounds. There's enough padding in there

44:39

that it's not. You literally cannot even notice

44:41

it happening. I think the thing, I think

44:43

the thing that sucks, what it does specifically,

44:45

or like that a person would notice or

44:47

I guess not notice, is that in corrections

44:49

too, in the dialogue system. we have the

44:51

ability to have a dialogue with lion actually

44:54

just be a little emogee right so that

44:56

and so we like pepper that throughout throughout

44:58

Quest dialogue and stuff we're like characters talking

45:01

to each other and then we just like

45:03

reacting they'll react it's our version of of

45:05

in an Indian soap opera when somebody says

45:07

something and then the camera zooms in really

45:10

hard on somebody else's face while they overly

45:12

enthusiastically immote it's like that And it's very,

45:14

it's delightful, and it also helps, like, it

45:16

sets some tone things, it also helps you

45:19

understand what's going on. But I think, to

45:21

me, the main theme is that there's the

45:23

charming, just the charm aspect of it, that

45:25

if somebody who does manage to hit this

45:28

really early, and we have no evidence that

45:30

somebody could even hit it early, but it's

45:32

not or standing of it, it seems even

45:35

more unlikely than. a lot more likely than

45:37

hitting it later, right? But if they never

45:39

even saw that system, that's the part to

45:41

me where I'd be like, that does fuck

45:44

with like their perception of what the game

45:46

is. Well, and the other thing is that

45:48

is that when this bug happens,

45:50

for the remainder of your

45:53

play session, characters will not

45:55

properly look at each other

45:58

when they're in conversation. right?

46:00

Yeah. And of course, like, if we're

46:02

talking about, if let's say this bug

46:04

is still present when the game launches,

46:06

and you get a thousand reviews come

46:08

in, and like five people saw that

46:10

bug, but they didn't notice, they didn't

46:12

care, or whatever, right? Or even if

46:14

they did notice, and then they're like,

46:16

you know what, the game was great,

46:19

except sometimes characters didn't look at each

46:21

other, thumbs down, right? Like for the

46:23

people who cared about that. Their review

46:25

score would be diffused out across all

46:27

the rest of the player base, right?

46:29

But when we're talking about sending it

46:31

out to a small number of press

46:33

and YouTubeers and stuff like that. You

46:35

want it to be perfect, that's the

46:37

problem, right? When you send it to

46:39

people, it's just hard. It's really hard.

46:41

Yeah, because they have an outsized impact

46:43

on people's understanding of. the whole experience.

46:46

Yeah, because if the dice roll just

46:48

lands a certain way, like if you

46:50

get 10 professional reviewers to review your

46:52

game and one of them hits this

46:54

bug, right, then it's like, well, there

46:56

it goes 10% of your, if they

46:58

notice and care, right? That's the other

47:00

thing that's like. if fucking annoying about

47:02

this bug is that it's extremely rare,

47:04

hard to notice, but also, it's not

47:06

the kind that just like sometimes happens,

47:08

whatever. It's the kind that when it

47:11

happens, the game is now flipped into

47:13

broken mode, where it's like that. It'll

47:15

just be like that for all your

47:17

quests until you reload. And so if

47:19

you don't notice it and note, which

47:21

again, you wouldn't, if you don't realize

47:23

what's just going on, and then also

47:25

realize, I can just like restart, then

47:27

I'll be fixed that I'll be fixed

47:29

right. Then I'll be fixed right. Then

47:31

I'll be fixed right. Then I'll be

47:33

fixed right. then like you just have

47:35

like a degraded experience the whole time

47:38

but you don't know that's happening you

47:40

know like the thing it's like there's

47:42

there's an easy workaround that I could

47:44

just throw in there that would fix

47:46

it post hoc right which just be

47:48

like hey like whenever you open the

47:50

the in-game menu we'll just just destroy

47:52

all the quest objects that are laying

47:54

around right that'd be easy because if

47:56

they're not allowed if they're not supposed

47:58

to exist if you're going to identify

48:00

a point where it's not supposed to

48:03

be happening, definitely. Yeah, then I can

48:05

just, I could just brute force. Honestly?

48:07

We should do that if we know

48:09

that has no side effects. Yeah, maybe.

48:11

Yeah, that's the thing is like, I

48:13

could do that, but the problem is

48:15

not knowing the source, right? Yeah. Because

48:17

digging through the code and trying to

48:19

be like, what are all the possible

48:21

combinations of scenarios? How is this happening?

48:23

Yeah, because, like, like, way back in

48:25

the day. our means of fixing bugs

48:27

was like, I'm not sure why that's

48:30

happening. Let me just add something to

48:32

the end of it, right? Which is

48:34

like we had, in the original crash

48:36

ends, we had a deborking step of

48:38

loading into gameplay that would literally just

48:40

look for the consequences of

48:43

certain bugs that we knew about and

48:45

just try to undo them. Yeah, this

48:47

is the, this is one of those

48:49

things that I feel like, I got.

48:51

a software engineer like on occasion has

48:53

to do but any one of them

48:55

will mock you relentlessly like any time

48:57

you make a decision like this where

48:59

you're like I just can't fucking figure

49:01

it out so here's here's my look

49:03

at it's like the COVID vaccine right

49:05

where you're just like okay if the

49:08

game you know hypothetically games coming out

49:10

in three days I got this list

49:12

of things to fix I I could

49:14

take the whole day trying to find

49:16

where this bug is happening. And I

49:19

may be wrong, right? But I do

49:21

know that whenever the bug happens, this

49:23

one specific outcome occurs. So if I

49:25

just stop that outcome, guaranteed. Then I

49:28

can move on and we can get

49:30

the game out. Actually, I think it's

49:32

a fail-safe, right, to me? It's a

49:35

fail-safe. I think there's an even cleaner

49:37

fail-safe, but we'll talk about that offline.

49:39

Yeah, but they all just say that

49:41

the debate is going well. We're kind

49:44

of, kind of, kind of the... the

49:46

wrap-up numbers I think next week with

49:48

now once it finishes finish on Monday.

49:50

We've got a few more things. Just

49:52

a few more things to knock out.

49:54

Yeah, we're entering into the into the

49:56

tenuous sending out lots of keys and

49:59

then hoping nobody... breaks and embark. That's

50:01

my next anxiety. And hoping the

50:03

game doesn't get leaked and hoping,

50:05

hoping, hoping. Because there's a lot

50:07

of trust that happens at this

50:10

stage where like you put four

50:12

years of your life into something

50:14

and then you just got to

50:16

start handing it out to people

50:18

and hope that everything goes well.

50:20

Yeah. It's one of the interesting

50:22

things too about the current state

50:24

of the games of the industry

50:27

around game development. the streamers, the

50:29

YouTubeers. The streamers, the streamers. Yeah, I'll

50:31

just kind of love that or the press

50:33

society, you know, but like visibility of a

50:35

title external to the game itself, which has

50:38

been the deprofessionalization of it, right? Because like

50:40

in the very early days of games, like

50:42

you'd open up a physical magazine that you

50:44

bought, right, to like learn about what games

50:47

are coming out and stuff. And then later

50:49

on with more internet stuff, right, then there

50:51

would be like websites that made money and

50:53

paid journalists to research and write about these

50:56

things, right? And then that was where you

50:58

got your news or, you know, bloggers that

51:00

you liked, but either way, like, kind of

51:02

trusted entities that did this basically for a

51:05

job. that you could kind of being like,

51:07

yeah, they know what an embargo is. They

51:09

understand why it's really important, right? And so

51:11

they'll, you know, they'll respect an embargo, you

51:13

know, like all that kind of stuff. And

51:15

that's kind of switched over to, and I

51:18

don't mean this in any kind of like

51:20

a derogatory way, but I switched into a.

51:22

just a non-professional sort of context where most

51:24

of the visibility comes from streamers and and

51:26

people who are doing still like they're doing

51:28

their thing as a job but it's not

51:31

the same as doing game as journalism

51:33

as a job right they're sort of

51:35

doing games journalism as like a feature

51:37

of their job right and some of

51:39

them especially ones that have been around

51:41

longer and stuff like they become more

51:44

professional over time but their like popularity

51:46

and their access to viewers all that

51:48

kind of stuff is completely decoupled from

51:50

how recently they've gotten to the business

51:53

and how professional they are and all

51:55

that kind of stuff and so many

51:57

of them just don't even know about

52:00

this kind of stuff, right? So you end

52:02

up in this weird territory where we're like,

52:04

okay, we need to start sending things to

52:06

people with embargo dates and whatever, but you're

52:08

like, but do we know if these people,

52:11

like, can you trust the specific people? Well,

52:13

even like, understand that this matters, right? Or

52:15

if we say, please, like, we want to

52:17

limit, you know, pre-launch game content if you're

52:20

streaming or whatever, like that, right? will they,

52:22

if they're in the middle of a day

52:24

long stream, will they give a shit? Will

52:26

they just blow past that? You know, just

52:29

keep going? Because, you know, they got

52:31

other stuff that they care about. And

52:33

the, what we want to happen is

52:35

not necessarily top of mind, right? Yeah.

52:37

Well, it's basically just a, it's a

52:39

social contract, right? Which is that if

52:41

we send out a game with an

52:43

embargo, you know, which just means like,

52:45

like, you don't talk about, don't publish

52:47

your stuff about the game until this

52:49

game until this date. If somebody breaks

52:51

the embargo, then that person is

52:54

kind of now suspect, right? So

52:56

like other games will now be

52:58

more hesitant to send their codes

53:00

to this person who broke the

53:02

embargo because that kind of gets

53:05

talked about. And so it's really

53:07

just like a, it's just a

53:09

social reinforcement mechanism that's built on

53:11

trust and sort of like community

53:13

standards. Yeah, getting pushed out if

53:15

you're somebody who breaks the rules.

53:18

But there's no way to prevent

53:20

it. in advance. It's, you know,

53:22

it's like, it's like any kind

53:24

of like law enforcement thing, right?

53:26

Like you can't make a law

53:29

and then stop stuff from happening.

53:31

You just have to catch it

53:33

after it happened. There's a joke.

53:35

I've ever seen this as a

53:37

cartoon, which is like a 911

53:39

operator who's taking a phone call

53:42

and they're saying it's a boo

53:44

like, wait, nobody is being murdered,

53:46

that's impossible, murder is illegal, murder

53:48

is illegal. Yeah. So that's the

53:50

way it works. And so we're kind of

53:52

entering into that into that trust phase. Yeah, but

53:55

all right. Well, I guess we got to wrap

53:57

it up here. We got we got stuff to

53:59

do. But. to to fix keys to send and to

54:01

send and all that stuff. it there. So We'd

54:03

like to wrap it there. We'd like to

54:05

thank our producers Fat Bard and putting for

54:07

putting the podcast together and thanks to our

54:09

community moderators who keep our Discord running.

54:11

To get more involved in the in the Butter

54:13

just go to podcast just go to .net where we

54:16

have links to the links to the a way

54:18

for you to donate donate, to the podcast

54:20

to the podcast If you haven't yet, head on

54:22

over to on over give Steam, and a ends to a

54:24

Go to the app store and pre a

54:26

wish list, head to Google the app, and app, -register. go

54:28

to the app, If you you do all that stuff,

54:30

it'll help boost the game of the

54:32

charts and help it have a successful launch

54:34

have appreciate it. Thank you all for listening.

54:36

it. Thank you next week. listening. See you next week. Bye. Bye.