So when should we wait for BB5?

Phoenix Point
21

It takes a considerable amount of time to get a backer build ready and working. Each new backer build we release potentially takes development time away from the finished game.

There was never an explicit promise of how many backer builds there would be, just that there would be early access (which there has been).

I can’t help noticing that you’re very hung up on Epic and external funding. That doesn’t really have any relevance.

As I’ve said before, the person originally working on the roadmap is no longer with the company. We do have someone new, but they have a hundred other things to do. We’re still an indie company of the business side of the team (non-developers) is only 4 people. We’re just months out from launch and we have a lot to do including getting all of the rewards ready.

We would love to have the roadmap up to date, but it just isn’t a top priority right now. In addition to that, roadmaps are always meant as a guide and often change constantly. This is why you will find most studios are vague with dates or information, some choosing not to give any at all. As soon as you give a date or show something in a roadmap, people see that as a promise, expect it and then get disappointed.

You mention yourself that trust can be broken by breaking promises - so this is another reason not to provide information which may not end up being accurate by launch.

3 Likes
22

Yesterday my telephone “told” me to check out some new model images for PP for the 2 remaining factions through my Google feed. They looked interesting so I checked the forums to see if there was any info on a BB5 as there was a suggestion that it was happening. There wasn’t, and your response tends to give me the impression that there will not be.

Not the end of the world.

I am not hung up on external funding as you mentioned for the reasons you may think. I couldn’t give a damn about epic exclusivity in all honesty and the extra money has probably paid for more staff, better development and that is beneficial for me personally as I will receive, one would assume a more polished product at launch.

What did “irritate” me were constantly changing BB declarations. Firstly your CEO in a video, if I remember correctly, said that we would receive a backer build every 3 months from launch to completion, while the kickstarter was happening, the kickstarter was a success making 2 million€ or something.

At backer build 3 we were told that you would need more time and that it would be in 6 months. I don’t think anyone complained. At backer build 4 we were told that we would have to install a new launcher and that it would not be available on Steam at launch, a lot of people complained, arguably excessively, I was not one of them. My only gripe was that I wanted a few graphics settings, (in BB5 which never came) as at the time my laptop was struggling to run it at high settings. I have a new laptop. Problem resolved.

Since BB4, which was the time in which you got extra funding there has been no work on any future builds for backers (it seems) when one would assume that having extra money, staff etc would at least give you more resources to do stuff like continuing to produce backer builds as you said you would in the original kickstarter.

I get it. You are concentrating all your resources on making a AA title, BB’s take up time and resources and your PR guy left and for some reason was not replaced. You now have a deadline and a lot of people are expecting a lot from the final game. Must be stressful.

I get angry about climate change, global wealth inequality and people who treat animals badly.

I get miffed when I want to play a game, or backer build and I can’t when I was given the impression that I would at a certain date.

End of rant. Back to work.

1 Like
23

Well this is not the responce to the substance of your last post. But I have 2 questions.

  1. Will it be possible to trade and steal from independent havens? Their missile launcher looks really neat. I hope it won’t be exchanged for the NJ version.

  2. If first armors available to the player will have 0 armor value just with some other properties like additional stealth, perception, accuracy and speed modification, maybe some poison resistance? Or will they all start with at least 1 armor value on each armor part?

24

I would also see more content before launch date (less than two months away).
They could at least make some videos showing and explaining some more of the content not shown yet.
This is a big reason why I am skeptical about buying this for awhile.
Although the combat does look awesome!

25

Release 3 sept, 1 month.