I wouldn't care as much about paying $60 to beta test if the game actually launched past the first time I played it. If they are going to arbitrairly make the game win 10 only halfway through development while the store page still says win 7, I expect a bit more than a refund.

You probably misunderstood me. I was referring to other games not yet on gog. And I was pointing out that for me, other issues are more important than the price.

I am Polish and i am playing Baldur's Gate 2 in English and doing just fine. A B2 knowledge of English should be more than enough to understand what's going on. You could even understand much of it on B1

I can understand his issue. Not my case, but I can understand why and I can sympathise. Content localization gets much more attention in western Europe. When a game gets localized for Europe, it usually means German, French, Spanish, maybe Italian. Those are the most often used languages for localization in games. I bet his english is good enough, but since Germans always had the choice, being fluent in english wasn't a requirement for them. For eastern Europe localization doesn't happen as often (though Polish had certainly started to show up more frequently in the last years). Most of the time English was the only choice for us, so we had to invest more effort and improve our english so we could enjoy media content. It's easier for us, because eastern europeans play in english anyway, since we usually don't have the choice. With time, we got used to being delivered content in english and it's a non-issue for us. But it is not the same for Germans. So... yeah. I get where he's coming from. I sure hope Wizards / Hasbro takes this into account and they localize the game in as many languages as possible for a proper European release. Though this may require some serious extra budget, so who knows.

Yeah no one is holding a knife to my throat. That's why I likely won't buy it at all. Or wait until its on sale for $15 with all DLC like it will inevitably be. This game isn't being sold as pre-order, it's being sold as in development.

I'm not interested retroactive justifications that aren't even in text on the store page. cheers if that lets you feel better about lax decision making I guess.

Consider this as preorder with bonus beta access.

I won't buy "final products" ever, if it is Fallout 76 or Anthem like. But I'm happy with Larian's "in development".

Dude, if you don't agree with the price in EA, don't buy it, and for sure, make your grievance (which is yours, personally) known, but there's no need to insult people who do make the choice to buy it - if you're just wanting to shout into the void, fine, but I don't think you're going to win anybody over with your current tact.

I'm afraid Early Access are here to stay. When the games are so enormous and complex, there are no chance in hell, that developers can iron out all the bugs before release. For console it could be a easy task, but with the tens of thousand of combinations of hardware and/or software in the PC market, the game will be delayed. Over and over again. Just look at CDPR and the Cyberpunk 2077. Gamers goes mad just for a few weeks of extra waiting.
But full price (and/or nothing extra) for joining EA of a game, is not a wise move, in my opinion. Conan Exile gave EA-customer a unique armour set.

For those who are wondering...

Early Access (in development) only has ACT 1.
ACT 1 is almost as big as the whole Original Sin 2.
Some Twitch streamers I follow have 50+ hours and still haven't finished ACT 1 and still on their 1st playthrough.
Some of my friends have 100+ hours and still haven't finished ACT1.

Although there are people who claimed to finish the game in about 20 hours, the current content of BG3 is still a lot. Especially for an Early Access game.

There is also replayability. Without spoilers, I watched a few different streamers following different paths and the outcomes were significantly different. The "Choices matter" isn't as simple as you make person A happy or you get reward B. The outcomes change the entire regions. Passing or failing a simple check can alter the course of the journey significantly.

Also also there is the legendary Animal Handling and Talk to the Dead abilities which change some sections of the game entirely (some hilariously).

There are also tons of bugs. Even tho only a few of them were game-breaking so far, they can still be annoying.

So to those considering to buy my suggestions would be;
1. If you support Larian and want this game to be as best as it can be, buy the game and opt-in bug reports. The game also has tons of content.
2. If you are not a supporter but want an early peek of the game, watch Twitch streamers before buying.
3. If you are not a supporter and can't handle bugs, or you want to experience the most bug-free version, wait for the official release.

I've got mixed feelings about Early Access. I think it became a bit of exploitation for getting early revenues and free beta testers at the same time. In the older days, Beta testers would get the early version of the game for free (and possibly some other rewards) as they are actually providing a service to the developer. Pre-orders for software were also not really acceptable. Nowadays the game is just "sold" and lo and behold a proportion of players become active beta testers.

On the other hand, prices of games (in general/on average) have reduced, or at least not increased (IMHO).

For a game like BG3, I was happy to pre-order EA simply to support Larian. I've had a quick peek and left the game, because I can really only afford to play it once properly due to time constraints - and I want to have a complete experience. Also, you must clearly be enjoying the combat side of things more to be able to contribute to early access - as you will be fighting the same battles and doing the same quests again and again. By the time you get to the full game, you will actually want to skip over all the EA contents and go straight into the sections which were left out.

The fact your first paragraph has to actually be explained to people is part of the problem. Larian has done something virtually no other Developer has done, to such a major degree, that it legitimately raises questions about business ethics.

I don't have a problem with Early Access / In Development programs.

I have a problem with the good faith they were created under being casually tossed to the side, as evidenced by the subsequent removal of any sort of incentive for the consumer to support the developer in the first place.

It's been replaced with mouthbreathing justifications of "shut up and don't buy it. You're lucky you can buy it at all right now". When those criticisms entirely miss the point of what a bad precedent Larian has set for the industry to further exploit.

Mindless consumer culture has pretty much assured we will eventually reach the point where it's actually considered absurd to offer your customers early access to a work in progress, at a reduced priced, or other such game content perks, because treating consumers like unpaid stockholm-beta-testers is just considered normal.

It's been ages since I bought a game at full price. I usually wait for a big discount and by that time most of the release bugs have been fixed as an added bonus. So I pay less for a better game than the people who preorder. (Although they have probably already finished the game by the time i start playing)

I also do the same, in fact I normally wait 2-3 years before buying games.

The game will have been patched as much as it ever will, you will have mature graphics card drivers, normally you will get a GOTY version of the game for £10-15 in a sale and perhaps my biggest reason of all, the hardware you need to run a game at high detail 60 fps+ will be cheaper than when the game launched. I refuse to spend more than £250 on a graphics card and if that means waiting to play games then so be it.

I understand why people like to buy at release when every one else is playing and it's hyped up but I have been let down too many times by buying at release only to find bugs and glitches to continue buying new games at launch.

How does it effect me?

Well, that it becomes a custom.

So the next time it'll happen again. And again.

And I guarantee you, that then again games will stop being finished, because enough people buys this beta-phase for full price. So why bother?
We already saw this tendency with like, Diablo 2, a never-finished, always-promised-to-be-patched game. And a bunch of others.

Well - we have Star Citizen which is a perfect example of the early access business model taken to its logical extreme. Don't ever finish the game - keep on enticing players with small demos, videos, roadmaps, bigger features etc - seems like you can do this for decades and everyone is happy.