This publisher was into so many simulation projects at one time, but they barely let their developers complete the games. Before buying it read some reviews of Farmer's Dynasty and their other games on Steam.

the radio voice affect is unconvincing, models and animation look approsimative. I'm not surprised by your words.

Yeah, see, this is why I never buy EA/InDev titles and would rather wait for them to finally come out, that is IF they're able to finish them that is... It does sound too much like text-to-speech for me to be properly excited about this title...

Mr Hawkins, is that you ?.

I've also been put-off (slightly ?) by the apparent Amiga text to speech synthesizer, and have temporarily removed it from my wish list, because I find it really off putting (along with the slightly iffy animation). Hopefully the current voice over is just a placeholder, and will be changed to something more authentically human sometime during it 'in-dev' period.

Now that looks pretty intriguing. I will follow its career with great interest.

The promo looks like a mix of Dune and Stargate...

Dune de dee dune de dee dune de dee dune.

On the other hand, starting to sell it in early access now that the Dune movie is out is a smart business decision. Let's just hope we customers will be happy, too.

They couldn't use Stargate nor Dune, so using Stardune was out of the question. The references are a little bit too on the nose.

They had to resort to use Starsand in order for people to get it and had a good laugh. For 10 bucks this actually looks alright but I wouldn't pay for more.

For the next game, the devs should actually reference Dune but on a entirely different setting. Instead of a sandplanet it could've been a ice planet. Instead of spice it could be whatthefucknium. Instead of the Shia La Burf/Shai Hulud sandworm thing it could've been a cross between many monsters. A huge centripede/dragon thing would pop into mind, kinda like Dark Souls gaping dragon. This game feels too much like a copycat/quick buck, which makes the entire production seem soulless.

Your mission in that game could be to build a spaceport so the whatthefucknium gets transported around the universe due to its unique properties. A game akin to Satisfactory on an ice planet would be a really cool idea, but obviously watered down instead of being a complex sim.

There you have the idea of a game that sells millions that doesn't wholly seem like cashing in on a famous or well known idea.

Isn't that pretty much the blueprint of every big publisher for AAA games?

Just so you know that I totally understand your point, just think of the famous artist Picaso. He was on the nose. "Good artist copy, great artist steal" and all that. Its all make-believe (selling a game that is bad because its based on something, its ideas directly taken from other famous things) and a great way for a quick buck. Picaso knew that being an artist creating art can be a fruitable business, depending on what people want (and all of which entails from such reasoning).

But I still disagree with you because saying that AAA are just cashcows? 95% of all AAA games are actually fairly unique and even have unique ideas in them (though multitude of DLCs or other predatory shit hampers the experience). Its just that you know the wrong ones. For instance, not every car racing game is a copycat of Gran Turismo and I'd say that for instance Forza Horizons proves this point. Most big simulators are AAA games as well. This still goes hand in hand with what Picaso was saying, its just that many people don't actually know what they want unless you present it to them. If they want more, people at least have some direction of what to do.

Even Ubisoft with their Assassins Creed game (one of the more famous examples of a bad AAA game, at least from public discourses and shit like that) at least try to reinvent the wheel once in a while. Its not always the same recycled stuff. Its just that most people see AAA and stay the fuck away (I was like that with Doom: Eternal which was a huge mistake because that game is incredible) or Cyberpunk 2077 (too ambigious for a small company like CDPR to handle, needed over 1500+ people working on it for at least 12 years, the game itself doesn't even feel that it is a third complete of what it is supposed to be).

And besides, even a game like No Man Sky is more AAA than Indie (it still is indie obviously, its more about how the company structures resources, including time in order to even release something).

Most AAA games nowadays are available console/mobile games though but anything I wrote still applies to the underlying resoning why I think differently that you. A lot of games have uniqueness attached to them that I've either seen being copied badly or completely botched. No Man Sky has some botched ideas, back in 2020 I've thought the UI was absolutely terrible and taking away from the experience. I'm going to jump into NMS once the devs consider it complete.

However, I also partially with some of your reasonings. For instance most games based on a comic, anime or movie could easily considered a cash in. Its super rare for these games to have a soul attached to them. A similar soul seems to be missing from this game but I'd always like and enjoy being proven wrong, at least that means thatg I learn something from it.

I think I understand what you are saying and can accept it. Of course I didn't play all existing games and I never had a console.
AAA games have to appeal to a wide audience because they are expensive and have to sell therefore a lot of copies. This is by the way the reason why this games are called AAA. Not because they are so great but because they cost so much in development and marketing. "AAA" is just another marketing buzzword in my opinion.
The uniqueness and soul that you mentioned comes actually from the people that work directly on this games and not from the suits at the top.

I've heard this is inspired by the story of Mauro Prosperi.

This felt like when some devs saw Subnautica and immediately think about making similar game but want to change it enough to make it different.

SAND

When's the next patch coming out to fix the SAVE option???