Rhaeg wrote: ↑Sun Oct 31, 2021 6:10 pmso why not just be clear and say that development is on hiatus for a while.
You are assuming that this is the case, but an assumption is just that, an assumption. Why do you expect them to say something that might not be true?
You thinking that progress is too slow and that it could only mean they aren't actively working on it, is in no way connected to what the developers are actually doing.
They made a specific statement that there would be a break coming up for the AO-DLCs. They didn't define the exact length of the break, nor is it customary to do so. That didn't stop people from complaining about a lack of information for the next AO-DLC less than two months later, as if the people who complained couldn't be bothered to check the last statements that had been made.
Rhaeg wrote: ↑Sun Oct 31, 2021 6:10 pmSo does this mean the release of the Pacific DLC is no longer on schedule for a 2021 release either? Now that does surprise me, since it's being made by other people.
There has never been any word on when the Pacific DLC would come out. You can't say that something is no longer scheduled for 2021 when there was never any statement that said it was scheduled for 2021 in the first place. People just jumped to conclusions and assumed that the Pacific DLC would fill the void that the break of the AO-DLCs would cause. One cannot hold a developer responsible for things he never said. Maybe it could be argued that it would have been beneficial for Slitherine to make it abundantly clear that the next release would take a while, but it is hardly unusual to keep things vague when dealing with something entirely new, like the Pacific campaign.
Would it be nice to get a patch as quickly as possible to fix obvious issues, or to get a new DLC soon? Yes, but it isn't always obvious what dealing with these things includes.
Would it be nice for Slitherine to be a bit more forthcoming with information? Yes, but if there is nothing to say yet, then there is nothing to say. In your post, you criticise them for rarely giving information, but also for being too vague. Those two things are basically polar opposites. If they have nothing to report, they can either say nothing at all - which by your account isn't good - or they can give vague remarks, which by your account isn't good either. Well, what exactly are they supposed to do if neither option is good?
This game has way more frequent DLCs than most strategy games, and no, that's not because they are "easier to make" either. Yet some people freaked out when there had been little news two months after the last DLC came out every - single - time. And they also freak out when there is little news after it had been stated that there would be a break. By the look of things, you might think this game hasn't seen an update in two years or so and everyone is worried whether there will be anything new at all, instead of the five DLCs that have been released in in about one year, with multiple announcements for the future. There are very few games for which you can be sure that there will be more additional material than for this game.
Maybe it's just me, but from my experience with various developers of strategy games and their fan boards it seems like fans are getting way too demanding and entitled when it comes to this stuff. Developers develop things, which they then offer to customers so they can buy it. But somehow this gets twisted on the head, and fans demand that developers cater to their wishes and push these DLCs out as an endless stream, with no regard to those who have to develop them. As if the fans are the ones who get to decide when something is supposed to come out. You don't see this with movies or new songs / albums. The artist gets to decide when he is comfortable to release new stuff, or tell people about it. It is neither useful nor particularly motivating for someone to get berated all the time, just because they dare not to constantly inform someone who isn't entitled to get any information in the first place. Keeping people updated is a nice bonus, if you have the time to do it and enough stuff to talk about. It is not in any way mandatory to do so just because some people think they deserve it.
I can understand wanting to see new stuff, I'd love to hear about the upcoming releases as well, but it's hardly like they are purposefully sitting on things they could tell us. No company just twiddles its thumps instead of giving out information that is available and which would be beneficial for them. It's been less than four months since the last DLC, for most games you wouldn't even have heard about the next expansion yet, and you definately wouldn't have gotten any information that went beyond being extremely vague either.
Maybe it's because IT-development is my field of work as well, but to me this impatience in regard to new material just feels odd. The last thing you want, is for developers to feel pressured to get something done quickly, because that rarely turns out well. Doing so usually results in cutting corners or doing something quick and dirty. That might not always even be an issue on first glance, but it can come back to bite you later on.
He is reading.
we're not quite ready to reveal more about it, but we're getting there. Stay tuned, patience will be rewarded.