Fourth Expansion?

[DevildogFF]

I read the interview you all did with Adam Solo of Spacesector.com and I know you're hard at work on a fourth expansion (instabuy for me), but you stated that you thought you'd be done by the end of 2013. Obviously, that is not the case, but I'm curious about what's in store for us and if you've released any official information.

Obviously, I've done some searching, but I was unable to find anything more than vague references. Can you please give us some spoilers and maybe an updated release window?

THANKS!

PS: I've sunk hundreds of hours in to DW in all its forms. You guys are awesome!

[Icemania]

Agree it's time for some teasers from Matrix.

I'm still very much in the camp of preferring a big and bold Distant Worlds 2 (which is more deeply moddable from the start).

I really like what the GalCiv3 team are doing with progressively providing more information about the game in advance.

[Mad Igor]

spoil 2 much,and the game won't deliver "wow" at releas.
NEVER reveal more than 20% content of the game.
and always hide big pieces,but give teasers about it.
take DA3 for example. it know that i will be open world,that i will play as a special force templar and there will be sieges,there will be morrigan and such,but that's just like 10-20% of the content(including mechanics) and i'm already wet and want it.
reveal more and i'll be like "cool,but meh,maybe when there will be 60%~ sales on steam)" because i already know what to expect from the game.
BUT that's just me,the man with 10 year of gamming. new gamers maybe less caring about "wow" effect and will buy more if they will know more (like show all pokemons in the game,and kids will buy it. show none and no one will buy it)

[Icemania]

I don't think we've quite hit 20% yet Mad Igor. Or any previous expansion for that matter!

[feygan]

ORIGINAL: Mad Igor

spoil 2 much,and the game won't deliver "wow" at releas.
NEVER reveal more than 20% content of the game.
and always hide big pieces,but give teasers about it.
take DA3 for example. i know that i will be open world,that i will play a special force templar and there will be seages,there will be morrigan and such,but that's just like 10-20% of the content(including mechanics) and i'm already wet and want it.
reveal more and i'll be like "cool,but meh,maybe when there will be 60%~ sales on steam)" because i already know what to expect from the game.
BUT that's just me,the man with 10 year of gamming. new gamers maybe less caring about "wow" effect and will buy more if they will know more (like show all pokemons in the game,and kids will buy it. show none and no one will buy it)

Have to disagree there, all too often aspects of games are kept quiet when they could only add to the anticipation of the product. If there is a overall storyline then sure keep that all under wraps, but as far as game features go the more open you can be the better.

[elanaagain]

agree with Feygan

[Mad Igor]

to his each own as i already said it.
old gamers prefer something unexpected(no,not land strafe ships like in rome 2 pre patched),because when you play games for 10+ years,there are few things that can surprise you,and SURPRISE what is entertaining (like a good twist in the storyline).
this is the same reason why i love and was hooked up by DW. it was new to me. gameplay,automicromanage mechanis,economy and so on. it's cold and dark,yet it's full of rusprises,you never know what to expect in the next system. exploring unseen what is entertaining ! and if you saw it in some dev post,then what is there to explore ?? nothing,and nothing to explore means there is nothing to surprise you.

[Deathball]

ORIGINAL: Mad Igor

to his each own as i already said it.
old gamers prefer something unexpected(no,not land strafe ships like in rome 2 pre patched),because when you play games for 10+ years,there are few things that can surprise you,and SURPRISE what is entertaining (like a good twist in the storyline).
this is the same reason why i love and was hooked up by DW. it was new to me. gameplay,automicromanage mechanis,economy and so on. it's cold and dark,yet it's full of rusprises,you never know what to expect in the next system. exploring unseen what is entertaining ! and if you saw it in some dev post,then what is there to explore ?? nothing,and nothing to explore means there is nothing to surprise you.

I've been playing games for about 20 years and in this age of full price alphas and casualization I want to know as much as possible about a game before I buy it because buying a game for 50€ that I won't play more than 2 hours is financially irresponsible. If you have your own opinion thats fine but don't present it as some universal "old gamers like this".

As to the expansion, so far we know its called DW Universe, they're beta testing it and it'll focus on modability. Since the call for beta testers went out back in early October I imagine it would be released early 2014.

[Mad Igor]

i never said about universal(i should mention,that i was talking about gamers with big and long gamming expiriance,not just play a game every year and call it oldfag),nor i did said anything about bugs,i said about INTENDED features. i didn't said it straight,but no need to be a sherlock to see that.
if you care about quality,there are always review sites with rating.
poor games usually have tons of red feedbacks where all major bugs are pointed out.
plus there is demos(not always,but sometimes they are) i have major drop of interest in the game that is spoiled hard,but also next to no interest in the game,that have NO info about it.
if you play games for long and every existing genre,then new games happens to be repetitive,and you want some entertainment,which is not possible while you know 2 much about the game and already can predict rest of the gameplay,and most of the time when you got the game it's as you think it would be,then all fun just vanish.
i still play DW only because it's unique,there are just NO games like it arround (SINs is not DW,similarity only in the color of space)

[Icemania]

Mad Igor, I suspect the vast majority of this forum has a lot more than 10 years gaming experience. My 5 year old is already a boss in Clash of Clans (amongst other games) and the little turkey was giving me tips the other day ... he'll have 10 years gaming experience before he finishes puberty! I mean no disrespect, my point is that the target audience needs to be considered when selecting what approach to take as a developer, and the target audience for Distant Worlds is clearly not inexperienced gamers.

I agree very strongly with what others have already stated. I would also prefer to have vastly more information available up-front and indeed at least some opportunity to comment on planned key features. There are plenty of examples where this is increasingly common, consider Galactic Civilisations 3 for example. When done well, this can greatly encourage a more active community to support the game and help the developer in making informed feature selection decisions.

By all means be selective about what is revealed and what is discussed. But to stay quiet and the rely on the almost non-existent reviews of Distant Worlds would be the worst possible approach to take for this game.

[DevildogFF]

Some really good points have been made and I think it's just time:

Give us some information!!!!

[DevildogFF]

Oh, and to add my two cents, I've been gaming for about 25 years. I'm only 31.

[Canute0]

Don't give us informations !!!!!!!!
Finish the game and surprise us.

[PsyKoSnake]

One of my best game.

[DevildogFF]

I'm going to keep posting until we get SOMETHING!

[Mad Igor]

lol,you just totaly ignored most of what i worte excpet "don't give us info" or i dunno.
i said 20%~ is prefectly ok,so game ownt be spiled so much,that you'd know about it like you already played it.
i find those 20% perfect just beacuse most of the games IF spoiled above it tend to drop my interest.
and let's not forget,that most of the ppls that own DW games don't even bother to register on the forum,so there probably more than just me with this point of view. with 20% YOU(as you want more info than just that) won't be fully satisfied with that,but you will get enough of info to get the picture of what game it will be without taking out suprisemuthafuka stuff.
devs also can give hints or teaser that don't directly show or point out anything.
plus this will generate a lots of trafic to the forum and speculations will overflow (which can generate more interest from other ppls).
PS: those 20% just for avarge amount of game content. if game is REALLY big with content,then 20% will be far from covering anything but i yet to see that game. and let's not forget,that almost all games have listed "features" which is TEASERS. they don't spoil almost nothing,but point to stuff that will be in the game.

[hewwo]

I just want to know what and when! Everything!

[Spidey]

Igor, I think the problem is that you're basing everything off of what you personally want. YOU find 20% perfect, but what about everybody else? You don't like any kind of spoilers about the gameplay but what about everybody else? Let's not pretend that what you want is also what everybody wants, okay?

i find those 20% perfect just beacuse most of the games IF spoiled above it tend to drop my interest.

I find those 20% useless because it simply doesn't tell me enough about what I'm paying for. I want to know what kind of gameplay I'm investing in and I want to know if the difficulty is based on button dexterity, cookie cutter approaches, or on mental acuity. And I say this as someone who has played PC games since 98.

[Plant]

You come here, denigrate kids, call yourself "oldfag" (what is this, I don't even), and then superimpose your own opinions in the guise of representing other people.

[Testmann]

Please guys, stop arguing about your menstruation cycles, and unify in all our craving for infos about the next espansion!

Because they've given us 5% of any info so far, so I suppose nobody is satisfied with that.