While I love the idea of sampling something early, I’ve never understood exactly how it works. To me, it’s a bit like throwing a party and purposely inviting a few exclusive guests over early. The sun is still out, the floors haven’t been cleaned yet, and I’m still walking around in an unfortunately revealing bathrobe with appetizers in the freezer. Most of those exclusive guests would apologize for showing up early and walk out. And if they were also gamers they’d then complain about my unfinished party on Reddit.
What can be definitively concluded is that both pre-release content and access is an effective way to drive attention to a video game. We, as gamers, count down the days as soon as a release date is announced for our most sought after titles. The prospect of knocking a few days off that countdown is one over which we salivate. I have a very odd understanding of this phenomenon, but my experience and interpretation of it are best illustrated by the now infamous latest entry to the Fallout series.
After mulling over the big fall releases of 2018, Fallout 76 finally caught my attention sometime in the early part of October. Normally a peak of my interest like this would dissipate after a few days. I’d watch game play videos and trailers on YouTube, read all the articles and Reddit forums until I got bored waiting for launch. What was different about Bethesda’s entirely online post apocalyptic scrounge fest was the prospect of diving into the game early. As announced during the publisher’s 2018 E3 press conference, all players who pre-ordered the game would receive access to the B.E.T.A., an acronym for Break it Early Test Application. This whet my appetite just enough to coax me into doing something that I rarely do – pre-order a video game. Say what you will about pre-ordering but I had almost nothing to lose. All it cost me was $5 down on the game with the ability to cancel whenever I wanted. So, I did it.
What happened next with the B.E.T.A. and the full release of Fallout 76 was well documented, and not ground that needs to be re-tread here. What I became more interested in is how this early access helped, or hurt the game. I may not be in the majority here, but I really appreciated Bethesda’s approach with why they opted for a B.E.T.A. Todd Howard was humble and forthright in admitting that the company had made mistakes in the past by releasing unfinished buggy messes. The studio did so by sending an open letter to fans and the media. This was done in an effort to set expectations and demonstrate why they wanted to take the risk of early access content.
Looking at the past decade where the number of games relying on servers to power their online environments, it seems that’s exactly what pre-release or early access content is – a risk. However it’s obviously a great way to coerce potential customers into a pre-order, or even just handing over your personal information (many betas don’t even require a pre-order, rather just completing a sign up page).
Publishers know their customers well. They know that the prestige of being able to play a game prior to release is something that many of us cannot resist. We can’t pass up the opportunity to brag to our friends and fellow gamers that we are sampling this new world days, or even weeks, before them. Furthermore, given the drive of viewers on Twitch and other live streaming mediums, it’s a no brainer for any self respecting streamer to get in and broadcast as early as possible.
But the risky part comes when it gives your potential players the opportunity to dip their toes in before committing to the full price tag. The way the story ended up for me and Fallout 76 was a cancelled pre-order. Bethesda lost my business as a result of letting me sample their game before it was ready to come out of the oven. While I fully understood that what I was testing was not a finished product, I am well-versed enough to know that it can take weeks or even months to fix some of the issues present in the B.E.T.A. No quality of life upgrade or routine patch can mend a game that was so glaringly and fundamentally flawed.
Electronic Arts and DICE arguably took an even bigger plunge by offering an open beta for Battlefield V in early September. This of course followed a closed beta that was only open to those who did pre-order or had EA Access. By giving prospective players the chance to try out the unfinished game with two maps almost two months before the eventual release date without any commitment to a pre-order has the potential to backfire in serious ways. I trust Electronic Arts knows what they’re doing with this kind of exercise – this isn’t the first time they’ve offered this sort of trial. But the post-open beta impressions ranged from mixed to negative. Players who were both seasoned Battlefield vets and new to the series questioned the new attrition system, lambasted the time to kill, and were down right confused by the inability to see enemy players as they blended into map assets. And these were complaints coming from people who hadn’t even pre-ordered. I can’t imagine the number of players who were on the fence for Battlefield V and ended up deciding against the purchase after the open beta.
It’s quite difficult to tell how these different approaches to early access effect a game in the long run. With AAA developers supporting games years after release despite mediocre early opinions (a la Rainbow Six Siege, or The Division), you could argue that initial reception is irrelevant as long as you have the resources to support the game.
Another EA title set to hit in early 2019 is Anthem. The development team at Bioware has a lot to make up for after Mass Effect; Andromeda failed to recover from early lashings received critics and fans alike. They seem to be adamant in articulating that what they will release is a “VIP Demo” for Anthem a full month before the full launch. Similar to Battlefield V‘s closed beta, the VIP Demo will only be available to those with Access or a pre-order. But by using the word demo, does that insinuate they’re so confident (or cocky) in the product a month away from launch? What if early reaction after this early access is largely negative? Will EA then quietly change the name to “VIP Beta?”
I liked what Bethesda did, or tried to do, with the Fallout 76 B.E.T.A. It showed that they are human and they recognized their mistakes. Seemingly, it wasn’t enough to save a game that was evidently doomed from the start. But the risk associated with giving players a chance at an unfinished product must be outweighed by the reward. As long as it remains a useful sales tactic, whether that be building pre-release sales, hype, or a combination of the two, they’ll continue to pray on our need for exclusivity and prestiage to lure us in.
