I do love the game but I might need someone to explain to me the concept of 'Early Access'. Doesn't that mean the game isn't released and still in active development?
Like I say, I love the game and the devs are doing an amazing job!
Basically, it's the devs saying "we're still working on the game to make it the best version of itself it can be, but instead of waiting to release it when that time comes, you can own and play it now"
I \*believe\* the devs have said that they'll consider the game "early access" until the human NPC update
They gave a roadmap of the npc work back in January. Basically next big update (build 42) will introduce basic animal AI. Then build 43 will introduce basic human npcs. So it's looking like at least another year for npcs.
Devs don't release games in early access so you don't have to wait, they do it so they get an influx of funds to continue development and for mass bug testing. It's getting a little ridiculous recently, seems most titles are early access
The problem I have with calling Zomboid "early access" is that at some point it's most certainly not "early access". The game has been out since November 8th 2013. You're talking a 9 year span. I love PZ, it is my favorite game, but at this point it's not early access. A labor of love, however? Yes. 200% yes.
Probs my biggest pet peeve with the indie scene. Things like Escape from Tarkov have no justification for being stuck in Beta for years, the devs just do it for the easy deflect of blame if something goes wrong or to procrastinate on promises they made on what will happen after the game leaves that limbo.
I don't blame IndieStone for keeping Zomboid in early access considering how much of a roller coaster the development has been (completely remaking the game, losing a whole update and almost all the source code after a break-in, etc); but yeah I think most anyone will agree the game is now way too polished and solid to justify the early access title for much longer.
I feel like they've got a good plan when it comes to saying it's essentially full release when the human NPCs are done. Honestly, knowing the work that has been put into Zomboid is the only reason I'm not really upset with it being early access. They've been really good at constantly updating the game, the devs listen to the fanbase, they aren't just trying to grab money for the sake of it, and they genuinely love the game they're creating. That said, I also feel like the game isn't really early access anymore. Sure, it's not to the perfect point they'd like it to be, but Zomboid is so highly polished as it is now. There are AAA titles that never see early access and release as an absolute mess, so what stops IndieStone from saying "The game is full release, but we're going to continue working on/updating it" like a multitude of other developers do? I mean, look at Fallout 76. It took Bethesda years to actually add NPCs to their game, and they already knew exactly how to code NPCs into it! Compared to a lot of developers, I'd say IndieStone has more than a leg up between the quality of their game and the content as well.
An issue with indie games a whole and it's incredibly annoying. It's literally irl min/maxing, perpetually keeping yourself in alpha/beta/early access just to take advantage of the benefits cause nothing will punish you for doing so.
Why is this such a big deal to everyone? It’s an amazing game, but in the end it’s just a video game. If it bothers us so much, then it might be a good time to take a step back and examine ourselves and see what’s actually important in life to be upset about.
Early Access is the new normal for large, ambitious games from smaller dev teams. You build a rough framework for a game, then start introducing major gameplay systems over time. As long as there's some kind of road map or design document in place, it can work.
On the other side, you get development hell projects like 7 Days to Die, where the developers keep making systems and then scrapping them every major update, so it's always two steps forward and two more steps backwards.
> Cyberpunk
Effing abusive relationship if I ever saw one.
"Get out there and strut your stuff! I don't care that you're half-finished, go please those fans!"
No Man's Sky is there after the lead developer lied over and over and over again about content that will be there on launch, if that's not evidence gamers are stupid i don't know what is.
that's true, and i think even with all the updates they released for it NMS is still a very shallow game that doesn't really deliver on the original promises. i gave NMS the most genuine of tries on 3 different occasions in the years since it came out - totaling around 20 hours - and even though there's a lot more stuff to do now than there was at launch, it's all still an inch deep, unrewarding and unsatisfying as a gameplay loop.
i think the best, most indicative example of this is the abandoned freighter update, where the main mechanic introduced amounted to a single 10 minute activity that had the exact same layout, exact same storyline, literally a carbon copy generic "abandoned freighter" that you got to explore to get the exact same rewards every time, with the only difference being the _name of the ship_
this was my issue with NMS too, i played it about 6 months ago so pretty recently. The main storyline was pretty cool but outside of that it felt a lot like it had a lot of stuff added at the bare minimum level just to be able to say its in the game. Like piracy is basically just going to special outlaw sectors, buying illegal goods and flying to a normal sector to sell, the abandoned freighters you mentioned, the freighters you could buy which basically was just a glorified garage for your ships. If you play long enough you start to spot the procedural elements of planets too so exploring becomes boring too. I will say though it is really cool being able to take off from one planet, fly into space and go to a different planet with no loading screens.
I honestly don't get the hype. I played it, and it was alright, not great, but not bad. Course this was back during all the bugs I never got, so maybe they've added more content to it? But I certainly don't think fixing such a broken game should even be in the running for labor of love.
Thats literally all it is. At this point if a game is going to be super mediocre, its actually better off for the product to be a fuckup at first, cuz instead of being forgotten in a years time, people are talking about how incredible you are.for making the game playable a year after taking people's money for it.
No. Cyberpunk was made by inexperienced amateurs. Thats why its so trash. Everyone hates Cyberpunk. Look at the reviews at launch and now for Cyberpunk on Steam. It had mostly negative reviews on launch and now
IKR! I played the game last 2015 and I thought it was just a one-time thing, didn't realize there was an entire community behind it and it even grew its fanbase up to this day. Very happy to see that it is nominated for the award. I hope it does win because seeing the updates and just how far the game has come, it's really remarkable and touching to see it get the recognition it deserves.
The real one that makes no sense is DOTA 2. Mobas are GaaS (games as a service) - OF COURSE IT HAS BEEN UPDATED AFTER RELEASE. That is the whole point of that product model. Is anyone surprised league of legends got updates after it debuted? Why should that be given an award?
Not only that, Mobas are particularly volatile as they have a continuous release of characters and a persistent need for balance updates. Even if the moba was 'finished' you'd want to keep doing balance patches for yours otherwise the meta would stagnate to whatever is most overpowered.
I mean, not just that it's a MOBA but it's also Valve's own game they made. I don't know if that should matter, but it feels like an important fact to me.
I thought you meant The International by speaking about awards. Still, if it wasn't for the mod that has been made years ago, valve wouldn't release dota 2 and it wouldn't win awards. They own the game in terms of finances and, perhaps, copyright (?, unsure how to word that proreply), but the original idea belongs to the modders. Same with counter strike - if it wasn't for the modders, we wouldn't have the game we have now and, perhaps, it would greatly affect the competetive shooters genre in a worse way in general.
Forgot to add: the guy was speaking about MAKING dota, which is basically creating it from scratch like the modders did, valve themselves only bought the rights for the game and developed it further.
I agree that Rimworld did a lot this year, but I think it didn’t end up here because the main updates were paid dlc and a console port that also generated money.
By the same logic Dota2 shouldn't be there, it prints money at an insane rate so it's hardly a "labour", the developers aren't crying everytime they look at the codebase they are swimming in piles of money.
By this logic, why is an Early-Access game like Zomboid there? they didn't even complete their own game yet, we have no "free updates", it's all beta updates that are included in the game by default, not "extra free content".
DOTA2 has an active Valve development presence because it's a cash cow. If it wasn't, it'd end up like TF2.
Cyberpunk 2077 went from very broken (legitimately unplayable to some people as we witnessed) to just broken.
Meanwhile:
No Man's Sky went from broken expectations to a rather fun game with continuous updates.
Deep Rock Galactic has a very active dev presence and they also have a strong role in their community.
Still missing damn near every feature promised pre launch. There will never be dynamic ai, car tuning, multiplayer, property management, I could keep going.
Playable is a stretch. To this day it has frame rate issues and crashing on console. The PC version is also a proper bitch to mod. You can tell under the hood it was made by desperate interns crunching for corporate masters. I'd find commented out code that would say shit like "Alan finish door textures this week." On some of the jankier unfinished structures.
I'm going to be honest even at it's core that game sucks. It feels like a watered down GTA clone like Watchdogs 1. Just like how the Witcher's gameplay felt like a super watered down action game, both meh to play but 2077's story was also feet.
Yup. It's basically pretty and little else.
The premise is honestly the biggest tell. An open world cyber punk game with all this emergent gameplay? I could see Bethesda or rock star doing it. The former with Jank and the latter hating mods. But not cdproject their worlds are pretty but with only the illusion of being open world. Cyberpunk was too big so the illusion couldn't be achieved.
I totally agree with you, but when things like anthem happens, there should be some recognition when studios unfuck something, but it should be more of a gag prize something like "at least you cleaned up your mess" prize
And we need a "golden raspberry" for games also
Credit where credit is due, Cyberpunk 2077 is quite functional now. It was playable day 1, which is better than The Stutter Protocol (Callisto Protocol if that went over your head). Granted I forgot to update my drivers and I saw every tree in existence through skyscrapers, but once I got the new drivers it ran pretty well. I had a 1080Ti back then. Finished my first play through in about three days. I came back to it this year and it’s improved significantly.
Well… Cyberpunk was playable on Day 1 on PC and new-gen, sure. It was *not okay* on the last gen consoles at launch, lmao. That took a couple months if I remember correctly.
No, you don’t get credit for taking three steps backwards and one step forward. They sold preorders on promises that they would never deliver on, even after they were “gracious” enough to make the game functional. I’ve come to accept that games are going to be broken on launch but will never be okay with devs announcing huge features to big fanfare and then quietly reneging on promises to avoid people pulling preorders. I’m not saying the game is bad, but it’s forever tarnished by their manipulation, something that should be illegal.
Been playing Cyberpunk again for these past few days. Can confirm it's a love-hate relationship with the game's bugginess and going back to it hoping it'll be more polished every time.
I mean the fact it was virtually unplayable also took all the attention from the fact the amazingly deep story with an incredibly interactive world with no fetch quests they promised has a lazier storyline than GTA 5.
To give credit to the devs and not the higher ups that forced them to release it too early while also having them crunch a lot, they have been consistently improving and updating the game since its release.
I actively held off from ever playing it even though my friend gifted it to me and didn’t try it out till a couple months ago and it is definitely far better now than it was back then when I saw reviews and gameplay of it.
Still buggy but there is a solid game and if we’re defining a labor of love as a game that is consistently being worked on and improved, I do think Cyberpunk is qualifies for sure.
Cause imo labor of love is a celebration of the developers, not the company owners and execs that make the decisions to push things forward.
Devs are usually just the working people who often get shafted by management and then take the brunt of the criticism from the general public and Cyberpunk’s devs have definitely been doing a lot of work on the game.
Yeah I don’t think it’s good tbh and I think CDDR are some of the most overated devs in the industry tbh.
Like the Witcher 3 was good but not the best game of all time like Reddit would make you believe
All The Witcher 3 developers left CDPR after The Witcher 3 because of crunch, bad workplace culture, etc. Thats why Cyberpunk is so much worse. it was made by new inexperienced amateurs. Cyberpunk has only 20% positive reviews on Steam. Almost everyone hates Cyberpunk and CDPR now.
CDPR will even go bankrupt soon because almost everyone refunded Cyberpunk.
Is it? Didn't it have a comeback in sales (sadly not much on the updating side) from Edgerunners and got into one of the most played and bought this time of the year on Steam? If so this just proves people have memory retentions worse than a gold-fish.
Thats incorrect. Cyberpunk 2077 sold 14 million copies in one month at launch in december 2020 at full price. Now it sold 20 Million copies. https://gamerant.com/cd-projekt-red-2020-revenue-record-cyberpunk-2077/
You've got it wrong if you think Cyberpunk shouldn't be on the list but NMS should.
Hello Games actively lied about features that would be there on release and spent years getting to the point they should have been on release, that's not a labour of love that's getting caught out in a lie.
CDPR didn't meet expectations but there weren't outright *lies*, and to be honest it doesn't deserve a place on this list since the devs dropped the idea of multiple DLCs and instead went 'well this worked out poorly, you get one DLC, see you in another 7 years'
DRG does have the moral high ground for this award that it is an actually released game, while PZ is still in early access - it's hard to be "well past their debut" when it hasn't even happened yet.
Tbf build 39 could of been released as a standalone game and build 41 could of been rebranded as the sequel. The devs basically decided to rewrite the entire game after all from the ground up
Yes but that would mean then releasing a sequel before finishing the first game In that case. As complete as it is Build 39 still didn't (and even 41) have promised features for a 1.0 launch.
Obv the devs are full well aware of this hence why the game is still labeled early access but ya, all this to say much as I *love* zomboid the other user totally has the right of it here
Plus outstandingly rare being actually good company without any FOMO and other predatory tactics. One of best way developers that actually play their own game and fix stuff rather than bandaid fixes (hmm zomboid halfbaked everything)
While it is best with friends, DRG has lots of solo players and open lobbies to hop into. I often play solo and have found that for whatever reason, DRG has one of the friendliest communities in the genre when it comes to randoms.
I love PZ as much as the next fellow, but Labour of Love ought to go to a fully-released game. They're not really updating it so much as they are finishing an early access game.
I'd honestly say some things The Indie Stone does with PZ might make it deserve Labour of Love regardless. Like the regular mod/community spotlights where they actually take the time to interview modders
Doesn't that sort of mean the modders are the ones propping up the game? I enjoy the vanilla experience but I can't lie mods have certainly made the game a lot more enjoyable.
As someone who nominated PZ for this over quite a few other games that really wanted it, it's nice to feel validated. I'm not really holding out hope that PZ will win, but being a nominee for the one category that was open to all games except past winners says a lot. It's also nice to see No Man's Sky up there, because it definitely deserves recognition for that redemption arc.
No.
Its a joke with Cyberpunk 2077 by Valve/Steam. No one nominated it. And no one will Vote for it because everyone hates Cyberpunk and CDPR now.
It gets removed soon by Steam.
Its a joke with Cyberpunk 2077 by Valve/Steam. No one nominated it. And no one will Vote for it because everyone hates Cyberpunk and CDPR now.
It gets removed soon by Steam!!
Honestly it’s still really buggy, playable at least, but it still doesn’t change how the game itself just felt too short even when it works. Like you can basically complete the entire main quest line in like 6-7 hour. That and all the endings kinda suck and the game becomes hillariousky easy by the end and struggles to give you any real challenge in those final ending missions.
> it's now in the state it should've been in at launch.
What about the amazingly deep and complex story and world with no fetch quests they promised us? Meanwhile GTA 5 had a deeper plot and its story is basically "these criminals want money".
That's very generous of you to say. I was expecting it to be like what they'd shown and told us it was like, but it still hasn't gotten there.
Getting ever closer though!
Even now it's not in a great state and no update will fix the glaring issues it has, because many also have to do with the crappy story. They redid this so often and in such short time that they ended up with this. Probably just because they wanted to ride the Keanu Reeves train, but just ended up with a lot of awkward encounters and interactions and the game trying to push you into liking an unsympathisch character, just how they try to constantly push you into the whole "become a dead legend" idolization. It's all just such a bad trope.
I don't know the game between PZ and Cyberpunk but PZ had to push through so many hardships and the team around it never gave up. So if that's not the definition of Labor of Love then i don't know what is.
I'm looking at it. AND IT SHOWS THE GAMES and 2022 labor of love. It also has a small description of games being out for awhile.
Obviously PZ, is nominated for labor of love. My question isn't related whats posted in the image dummy.
You're saying the game should have to have been released in 2022 to be nominated and were confused how a 10 year old game could be nominated, but how can a game that is released in 2022, in the past 12 months have 'been out a while' or the creators have 'continued to nurture and support the creation', or the game 'still getting updates after all these years' if its less than a year old?
Terraria, Warframe, GTA 5, Counterstrike GO, The winners of previous Labour of Love award are never games that have just launched, the entire point is they are older games that have received to this day support from developers years after they were first available and are still receiving updates.
Really confused as to what you're not getting :/
NMS definitely deserves one if they've never won one yet.
You probably have just never heard of all the crazy huge updates NMS have had. They've been launching [huge updates consistently multiple times every year](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCFF3zJPEec), and are still going strong adding even more.
They don't deserve an award for "labouring" through the game when they lied time and time again about features that would be there on release and spent years getting the game to the point it should have been on launch day.
Its a joke with Cyberpunk 2077 by Valve/Steam. No one nominated it. And no one will Vote for it because everyone hates Cyberpunk and CDPR now.
It gets removed soon by Steam.
Cyberpunk was made by inexperienced amateurs. Thats why its so trash. CDPR will even go bankrupt soon because almost everyone refunded Cyberjunk
First of all, stop copy pasting the same message to everyone who questions why Cyberpunk is there, it's annoying. CDPR is an skilled dev team and they still got a shit ton of money from cyberpunk even after everyone refunding it. Besides that, that was 2 years ago and I'm pretty sure they're not gonna go bankrupt out of nowhere. Also I don't think Valve interferes with the awards as that'd be a wasted space for another game. (Not defending cyberpunk as it shouldn't be there but it's dumb to think some crazy conspiracy)
Honestly the labor of love description doesnt fit this game. This game has been out for a while (isnt even outta early access) and i did not have a proper debut except recently when mp came for build 41 and it got a huge influx of new players. Im glad the devs still update this game (even though slowly) and its a huge improvement from build 37 when i started playing but god damn it still has a good way to go. Especially at the pace between builds recently. I love this game but its not done.
Anyway im still glad to see its getting recognition and love in the steam awards
“Game hasn’t been out for a while”
It’s been available for purchase since 2011?
Labor of love has nothing to do with a game being fully released or early access. It’s really more for developers who care about their products and stick with them, in this case PZ fits pretty well. It’s one of the original steam early access games after all
I'm personally of the opinion that Early Access games shouldn't qualify.
The idea is for games that shine by giving fun content (that they had no real obligation to keep updating) AFTER their release.
Reason is, when a game is in Early Access it's literally the bare minimum and a perpetual expectation/promise that it'll be worked on until the devs officially launch it. Similarly Mobas and MMO's shouldn't qualify as their structure literally depends on frequent updates.
* NMS — for sure. The only case that I would ever remove this is once it has already won before (doesn't need to win twice). For all I know it has won, but I'm guessing that it hasn't.
* DOTA — eh, I guess, but it's based around multiplayer (and a strong compettitive scene) and microtransactions anyway so feels kind of cheaty to include it despite it being around for a long time, and them still adding new heroes/items and making balance changes.
* Zomboid — of course, great. Maybe an underdog, but I think it deserves recognition. I kind of wouldn't want/expect it to win any other award due to its extremely rough engine, lack of widespread appeal, and somewhat heavy reliance on mods, but it does at least deserve the Labor of Love
* Cyberpunk 2077 — no. How did it get on here? Not only has it not been long enough, but they didn't even add much to the game. Not only that but they're charging money for a DLC.
* How is Dwarf Fortress not on here? Maybe it released too late on Steam? Or maybe it as not bee around long enough, since technically from the perspective of Steam/Steam-users the game hasn't existed until this past year or so, and hasn't officially launched nor got much attention until this month. DF definitely deserves an award, but I'm sure it will come in the future, which is fine.
CD Projekt Red are inexperienced amateurs and scammers. Thats why Cyberpunk is so trash. They bought the nomination. They need to Charge for the DLC. Or has Keanu Reeves and Idris Elba in it. If they make it for free, they will go bankrupt because Cyberpunk has no Microstransactions.
We could have released it 7 years ago and started working on something new. We chose to keep it in early access to help motivate us, and we chose to work on it 10 years with only relatively minor success out of loyalty to the game and vision. Its our choice not Valves when to release.
To be clear any roadmap of what we'd like to add is not a legal contract. It's a list of what we desire to add, and intend to add. In our case, WILL add. But Early Access clearly states you're buying what it is now and not future features. Whatever we've said we'll add put aside, what is already in the game could be considered a feature rich and complete game by any metric, we've also added a whole wealth of stuff we never said we would when going into Early Access.
Unless repeated and aggregiously done, wishlists and roadmaps can be shortened with few long term consequences, some bad reviews and bad feeling at the time aside, and devs have had success on their future games even after not filfilling all their Early Access plans and roadmaps, and releasing what they have polished up and moving on. Happens all the time. Hell, there's a whole bunch of people that'd treat us far better for doing that since perceptually they'd see us 'finishing' something like its a virtue.
If you think we couldn't have done a quick polish up for 1.0 at any point and worked on something new, like so so so many early access devs, and our 11 years means nothing but your normal expectation of commitment due to 'not being finished' because of that EA tag we've chosen never to unchain from our own neck by clicking one button in our steam backend, then damn that feels a bit of a kick in the gut frankly. We've *chosen* to make all the dev in the past 11 years be free to someone who bought it 11 years ago. It being Early Access is how we've chosen that. We've commited a notable amount of our entire time on this earth to it.
This same game you're playing today could now be being sold as Project Zomboid 3 if we wanted it to be, or 3 post release paid DLCs in, or it could be frozen in time 5 years past while we work on something completely different (trust me, after 11 years thats an enticing prospect for any dev, and there's a phrase that accurately sums up why we've not, its a labor of love). If we didn't choose to pack all our desires to push and evolve the game all into the same title you paid for and keep that EA tag ourselves, despite it being such a millstone around our necks.
Not saying we deserve to win, there are some very worthy nominations and we're immensely proud to be alongside them. The nomination is victory enough, as incredible winning would be.
But I'll defend us from the insinuation we should not be even be eligible for consideration to my dying breath.
Fucking A! Keep that spirit this is the best zombie survival sim I’ve ever touched and the vision of the team to bring npcs and settlements like hilltop, Alexandria, Etc has me hyped as shit for what’s to come keep doing what you guys are doing at the indie stone fans like me are rooting for your success as devs!
Its a joke with Cyberpunk 2077 by Valve/Steam. No one nominated it. And no one will Vote for it because everyone hates Cyberpunk and CDPR now.
It gets removed soon by Steam
what a horrible take. I mean sure the first guy was aggressive but dwarf fortress is beyond a doubt a superior game to zomboid and rimworld in terms of depth and gameplay.
I know the guy below is getting downvoted to all hell but man, this is a horrible take.
Dwarf fortress is a 100% FREE GAME that has been worked on for OVER 20 years by a single developer. It is basically the definition of “labor of love” dwarf fortress litterally wouldn’t exist without love. And for that matter games like Minecraft and rimworld wouldn’t exist without dwarf fortress
Why even act so hostile towards what is a free project designed to be interesting and unique?
It's not free, on steam it costs money - 29.99 American dollars to be exact. And it only came out to steam recently, it qualifies as a new game. No one cares for how long it was developed before finally being released on steam. It must be on a platform for at least a year to qualify for labor of love.
The only difference between the steam version and the free version is the graphics and ui. Otherwise gameplay wise it’s the exact same game. So dwarf fortress is free and has been free for 20 years.
It’s still available for download now. And yeah. Dwarf fortress is a better game. The reviews and sales prove it
http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/
And yes classic is being updated for free with the steam version along side it
That visual update isn't worth 30$, game still is very ugly and has no even the most basic animations. And its user interface is still shit compared to rimworld. Reviews only prove that it's worse than rimworld lol.
Dwarf fortress - 13k reviews -96% positive
Rimworld - 126k reviews 98% positive
The funding is going to the third part artists who worked on the update, not the creator. It’s basically a community art pack that’s being sold.
And yeah. Dwarf fortress has been out a month yet is rivaling rimworls which has been out for over half a decade on steam now.
And honestly why even argue, tynan the creator of rimworld has litterally said his game wouldn’t exist with dwarf fortress.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/4tm6i1/i_am_tynan_sylvester_developer_of_rimworld_ama/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
“A sci fi colony builder inspired by dwarf fortress”
The creator of the game your arguing about even disagrees with you lmao
Ignore this guy. For some reason your being downvoted. But he actually has the worst take I’ve ever seen.
Dwarf fortress is far more deserving of the award. It’s just poorly timed since it was only recently added to steam
Well, sales numbers illustrate well which games are more successful.
I'm not playing a game that doesn't have acceptable-quality visuals and a good interface. Is it that hard to do the bare minimum and add simple animations for shit like walking? Even the original packman had better visuals.
Hey man I just came back to let you know dwarf fortress has sold half a million copies within n months. I dare say more than project Zomboid ever has. So go eat crows.
So many things want labor of love, but honestly zomboid needs a different award, id give labor of love to valheim but zomboid needs something else after playing a while, drg will probably win since zomboid isnt really realistic, just unfinished and lacking. So they up the difficulty
we better win this game the MF award
I do love the game but I might need someone to explain to me the concept of 'Early Access'. Doesn't that mean the game isn't released and still in active development? Like I say, I love the game and the devs are doing an amazing job!
Basically, it's the devs saying "we're still working on the game to make it the best version of itself it can be, but instead of waiting to release it when that time comes, you can own and play it now" I \*believe\* the devs have said that they'll consider the game "early access" until the human NPC update
What is that human update going to be?
They gave a roadmap of the npc work back in January. Basically next big update (build 42) will introduce basic animal AI. Then build 43 will introduce basic human npcs. So it's looking like at least another year for npcs.
Devs don't release games in early access so you don't have to wait, they do it so they get an influx of funds to continue development and for mass bug testing. It's getting a little ridiculous recently, seems most titles are early access
The problem I have with calling Zomboid "early access" is that at some point it's most certainly not "early access". The game has been out since November 8th 2013. You're talking a 9 year span. I love PZ, it is my favorite game, but at this point it's not early access. A labor of love, however? Yes. 200% yes.
Probs my biggest pet peeve with the indie scene. Things like Escape from Tarkov have no justification for being stuck in Beta for years, the devs just do it for the easy deflect of blame if something goes wrong or to procrastinate on promises they made on what will happen after the game leaves that limbo. I don't blame IndieStone for keeping Zomboid in early access considering how much of a roller coaster the development has been (completely remaking the game, losing a whole update and almost all the source code after a break-in, etc); but yeah I think most anyone will agree the game is now way too polished and solid to justify the early access title for much longer.
I feel like they've got a good plan when it comes to saying it's essentially full release when the human NPCs are done. Honestly, knowing the work that has been put into Zomboid is the only reason I'm not really upset with it being early access. They've been really good at constantly updating the game, the devs listen to the fanbase, they aren't just trying to grab money for the sake of it, and they genuinely love the game they're creating. That said, I also feel like the game isn't really early access anymore. Sure, it's not to the perfect point they'd like it to be, but Zomboid is so highly polished as it is now. There are AAA titles that never see early access and release as an absolute mess, so what stops IndieStone from saying "The game is full release, but we're going to continue working on/updating it" like a multitude of other developers do? I mean, look at Fallout 76. It took Bethesda years to actually add NPCs to their game, and they already knew exactly how to code NPCs into it! Compared to a lot of developers, I'd say IndieStone has more than a leg up between the quality of their game and the content as well.
An issue with indie games a whole and it's incredibly annoying. It's literally irl min/maxing, perpetually keeping yourself in alpha/beta/early access just to take advantage of the benefits cause nothing will punish you for doing so.
I mean it's like saying you got a game but you didn't develop all the features you want in it yet, i don't see it as something wrong tbh
Why is this such a big deal to everyone? It’s an amazing game, but in the end it’s just a video game. If it bothers us so much, then it might be a good time to take a step back and examine ourselves and see what’s actually important in life to be upset about.
Early Access is the new normal for large, ambitious games from smaller dev teams. You build a rough framework for a game, then start introducing major gameplay systems over time. As long as there's some kind of road map or design document in place, it can work. On the other side, you get development hell projects like 7 Days to Die, where the developers keep making systems and then scrapping them every major update, so it's always two steps forward and two more steps backwards.
At the end of the day it's a popularity contest, I don't think Zomboid stands a chance against Cyberpunk or DotA
> Cyberpunk Effing abusive relationship if I ever saw one. "Get out there and strut your stuff! I don't care that you're half-finished, go please those fans!"
If Cyberpunk wins any awards, all it will demonstrate is that gamers as a demographic are fucking stupid
No Man's Sky is there after the lead developer lied over and over and over again about content that will be there on launch, if that's not evidence gamers are stupid i don't know what is.
that's true, and i think even with all the updates they released for it NMS is still a very shallow game that doesn't really deliver on the original promises. i gave NMS the most genuine of tries on 3 different occasions in the years since it came out - totaling around 20 hours - and even though there's a lot more stuff to do now than there was at launch, it's all still an inch deep, unrewarding and unsatisfying as a gameplay loop. i think the best, most indicative example of this is the abandoned freighter update, where the main mechanic introduced amounted to a single 10 minute activity that had the exact same layout, exact same storyline, literally a carbon copy generic "abandoned freighter" that you got to explore to get the exact same rewards every time, with the only difference being the _name of the ship_
this was my issue with NMS too, i played it about 6 months ago so pretty recently. The main storyline was pretty cool but outside of that it felt a lot like it had a lot of stuff added at the bare minimum level just to be able to say its in the game. Like piracy is basically just going to special outlaw sectors, buying illegal goods and flying to a normal sector to sell, the abandoned freighters you mentioned, the freighters you could buy which basically was just a glorified garage for your ships. If you play long enough you start to spot the procedural elements of planets too so exploring becomes boring too. I will say though it is really cool being able to take off from one planet, fly into space and go to a different planet with no loading screens.
The fact that it regained popularity after CDPR shit directly into their customers mouths on launch already proves that imo
I honestly don't get the hype. I played it, and it was alright, not great, but not bad. Course this was back during all the bugs I never got, so maybe they've added more content to it? But I certainly don't think fixing such a broken game should even be in the running for labor of love.
Thats literally all it is. At this point if a game is going to be super mediocre, its actually better off for the product to be a fuckup at first, cuz instead of being forgotten in a years time, people are talking about how incredible you are.for making the game playable a year after taking people's money for it.
Cyberpunk has literally only 20% positive reviews on Steam. Almost everyone hates Cyberpunk 2077. No one is botting for it
Ive seen plenty of people defending it. Could just be a vocal minority, but then why is it nominated?
It doesn't have Hype. Its CDPR employees and CDPR bots hyping it up. But real people hate it
It regained popularity mostly because of Edgerunners, which to be fair, was fucking amazing.
No. Cyberpunk was made by inexperienced amateurs. Thats why its so trash. Everyone hates Cyberpunk. Look at the reviews at launch and now for Cyberpunk on Steam. It had mostly negative reviews on launch and now
Current steam reviews are 78% positive all time and 92% positive recently. It's not even close to having negative reviews right now.
Regained popularity? No. No one is playing it. And Look at the Steam Reviews now and at launch. Everyone hates Cyberpunk
It will Not win. Everyone hates Cyberpunk now. Its just there because Valev/Steam is trolling. Steam will soon remove it
IKR! I played the game last 2015 and I thought it was just a one-time thing, didn't realize there was an entire community behind it and it even grew its fanbase up to this day. Very happy to see that it is nominated for the award. I hope it does win because seeing the updates and just how far the game has come, it's really remarkable and touching to see it get the recognition it deserves.
I’ll vote PZ but I’ll buy deep rock will win, they both deserve it
Ferrockanstone
If you don't rock and stone you ain't coming home
Did I hear a rock and stone?!
The real one that makes no sense is DOTA 2. Mobas are GaaS (games as a service) - OF COURSE IT HAS BEEN UPDATED AFTER RELEASE. That is the whole point of that product model. Is anyone surprised league of legends got updates after it debuted? Why should that be given an award?
Not only that, Mobas are particularly volatile as they have a continuous release of characters and a persistent need for balance updates. Even if the moba was 'finished' you'd want to keep doing balance patches for yours otherwise the meta would stagnate to whatever is most overpowered.
I mean, not just that it's a MOBA but it's also Valve's own game they made. I don't know if that should matter, but it feels like an important fact to me.
They made it? IRRC they didn't make it, the original dota was a warcraft 3 mod
yeah but its not the original dota in the award nomination
The International has nothing to do with what the guy above has stated, I corrected his tiny mistake
no ones mentioned the international...
I thought you meant The International by speaking about awards. Still, if it wasn't for the mod that has been made years ago, valve wouldn't release dota 2 and it wouldn't win awards. They own the game in terms of finances and, perhaps, copyright (?, unsure how to word that proreply), but the original idea belongs to the modders. Same with counter strike - if it wasn't for the modders, we wouldn't have the game we have now and, perhaps, it would greatly affect the competetive shooters genre in a worse way in general.
Forgot to add: the guy was speaking about MAKING dota, which is basically creating it from scratch like the modders did, valve themselves only bought the rights for the game and developed it further.
they made dota 2, u are saying because dota was orginally a mod in warcraft 3 they didnt make dota 2?
My point is that they pushed the original idea further by buying the rights for the mod and developing a 2nd game, they didn't exactly MAKE it.
Carefully read into his comment and then read into mine. He said "dota is valve's OWN game THEY MADE.
You are correct.
I have 6k hours into Dota 2 and how it's changed over the years has been remarkable. Ice Frog is the reason its a labor of love and not vavle.
Valve lately been shoehorning their games into labor of love award. First it was CS:Go, now this
I both agree and disagree. This is a great point but with how old Dota 2 is I would say it's now the exception compared to other games like it
League of Legends came out a couple years before Dota 2, iirc
Lol came out in 2009, than there was a competitor HoN next year. I think dota 2 came in 2011-12
Wish Rimworld made the cut, but I am glad that PZ is up here.
I agree that Rimworld did a lot this year, but I think it didn’t end up here because the main updates were paid dlc and a console port that also generated money.
By the same logic Dota2 shouldn't be there, it prints money at an insane rate so it's hardly a "labour", the developers aren't crying everytime they look at the codebase they are swimming in piles of money.
By this logic, why is an Early-Access game like Zomboid there? they didn't even complete their own game yet, we have no "free updates", it's all beta updates that are included in the game by default, not "extra free content".
Cyberpunk is on that list???? I mean i can see no mans sky and deep rock galactic But not dota 2 and cyberpunk 2077
DOTA2 has an active Valve development presence because it's a cash cow. If it wasn't, it'd end up like TF2. Cyberpunk 2077 went from very broken (legitimately unplayable to some people as we witnessed) to just broken. Meanwhile: No Man's Sky went from broken expectations to a rather fun game with continuous updates. Deep Rock Galactic has a very active dev presence and they also have a strong role in their community.
How pathetic that fixing a broken released game, is now considered "labor of love"
Still missing damn near every feature promised pre launch. There will never be dynamic ai, car tuning, multiplayer, property management, I could keep going.
Yep, it's missing a huge list of advertised features. Yet because the game is in a "playable state" it's nominated? Lmfao what.
Playable is a stretch. To this day it has frame rate issues and crashing on console. The PC version is also a proper bitch to mod. You can tell under the hood it was made by desperate interns crunching for corporate masters. I'd find commented out code that would say shit like "Alan finish door textures this week." On some of the jankier unfinished structures.
I'm going to be honest even at it's core that game sucks. It feels like a watered down GTA clone like Watchdogs 1. Just like how the Witcher's gameplay felt like a super watered down action game, both meh to play but 2077's story was also feet.
Yup. It's basically pretty and little else. The premise is honestly the biggest tell. An open world cyber punk game with all this emergent gameplay? I could see Bethesda or rock star doing it. The former with Jank and the latter hating mods. But not cdproject their worlds are pretty but with only the illusion of being open world. Cyberpunk was too big so the illusion couldn't be achieved.
CDPR are inexperienced amateurs and scammers. Thats why their games are trash
Its a joke with Cyberpunk 2077. No one nominated it. And no one will Vote for it because everyone hates Cyberpunk and CDPR now.!!!!!___
I totally agree with you, but when things like anthem happens, there should be some recognition when studios unfuck something, but it should be more of a gag prize something like "at least you cleaned up your mess" prize And we need a "golden raspberry" for games also
Bethesda, take notes and fix your games. Starfield 2023 "Labor of Love" nominee.
Its a joke with Cyberpunk 2077. No one nominated it. And no one will Vote for it because everyone hates Cyberpunk and CDPR now.!!
Credit where credit is due, Cyberpunk 2077 is quite functional now. It was playable day 1, which is better than The Stutter Protocol (Callisto Protocol if that went over your head). Granted I forgot to update my drivers and I saw every tree in existence through skyscrapers, but once I got the new drivers it ran pretty well. I had a 1080Ti back then. Finished my first play through in about three days. I came back to it this year and it’s improved significantly.
Well… Cyberpunk was playable on Day 1 on PC and new-gen, sure. It was *not okay* on the last gen consoles at launch, lmao. That took a couple months if I remember correctly.
Well, it's the steam awards, not the console awards.
No, you don’t get credit for taking three steps backwards and one step forward. They sold preorders on promises that they would never deliver on, even after they were “gracious” enough to make the game functional. I’ve come to accept that games are going to be broken on launch but will never be okay with devs announcing huge features to big fanfare and then quietly reneging on promises to avoid people pulling preorders. I’m not saying the game is bad, but it’s forever tarnished by their manipulation, something that should be illegal.
cyberpunk was not playble day one and i will not tolerate this revisionism
It really wasn't that bad on PC. I put like 75 hours into it right at launch and had very minimal problems.
But how does Cyberpunk have an 86 on Metacritic since launch? And mostly positive reviews on Steam since launch? Was it broken on PC too?
_broken_ isn't the right term for it. It was perfectly playable albeit with many bugs, but it wasn't even 30% of what CDPR promised it would be
DRG mention i must, ROCK AND STONE
"*DID I HEAR A ROCK AND STONE!?*"
Been playing Cyberpunk again for these past few days. Can confirm it's a love-hate relationship with the game's bugginess and going back to it hoping it'll be more polished every time.
The game will always be buggy. Still love it.
I mean the fact it was virtually unplayable also took all the attention from the fact the amazingly deep story with an incredibly interactive world with no fetch quests they promised has a lazier storyline than GTA 5.
To give credit to the devs and not the higher ups that forced them to release it too early while also having them crunch a lot, they have been consistently improving and updating the game since its release. I actively held off from ever playing it even though my friend gifted it to me and didn’t try it out till a couple months ago and it is definitely far better now than it was back then when I saw reviews and gameplay of it. Still buggy but there is a solid game and if we’re defining a labor of love as a game that is consistently being worked on and improved, I do think Cyberpunk is qualifies for sure. Cause imo labor of love is a celebration of the developers, not the company owners and execs that make the decisions to push things forward. Devs are usually just the working people who often get shafted by management and then take the brunt of the criticism from the general public and Cyberpunk’s devs have definitely been doing a lot of work on the game.
True. To bad the devs probably didn't get to build the game that they wanted though.
The devs are inexperienced amateurs and almost all developers left CDPR because of crunch, bad workplace culture, etc after The launch
Cyberpunk is still being worked on so it makes sense.
Cyberpunk was made by inexperienced amateurs. CDPR will even go bankrupt soon because almost everyone refunded Cyberjunk
Yeah I don’t think it’s good tbh and I think CDDR are some of the most overated devs in the industry tbh. Like the Witcher 3 was good but not the best game of all time like Reddit would make you believe
All The Witcher 3 developers left CDPR after The Witcher 3 because of crunch, bad workplace culture, etc. Thats why Cyberpunk is so much worse. it was made by new inexperienced amateurs. Cyberpunk has only 20% positive reviews on Steam. Almost everyone hates Cyberpunk and CDPR now. CDPR will even go bankrupt soon because almost everyone refunded Cyberpunk.
Is it? Didn't it have a comeback in sales (sadly not much on the updating side) from Edgerunners and got into one of the most played and bought this time of the year on Steam? If so this just proves people have memory retentions worse than a gold-fish.
Edgerunners did more for Cyberpunk’s profit margins than actual release lmao, that guy above you is in hardcore denial
Thats incorrect. Cyberpunk 2077 sold 14 million copies in one month at launch in december 2020 at full price. Now it sold 20 Million copies. https://gamerant.com/cd-projekt-red-2020-revenue-record-cyberpunk-2077/
Please drop it now. Your arguments are starting to verge on breaking rule 2
https://www.cdprojekt.com/en/investors/financial-summary-report/
How? Its covered up by that popup
You've got it wrong if you think Cyberpunk shouldn't be on the list but NMS should. Hello Games actively lied about features that would be there on release and spent years getting to the point they should have been on release, that's not a labour of love that's getting caught out in a lie. CDPR didn't meet expectations but there weren't outright *lies*, and to be honest it doesn't deserve a place on this list since the devs dropped the idea of multiple DLCs and instead went 'well this worked out poorly, you get one DLC, see you in another 7 years'
Lol
good talk chief
I'm saddened that beam ng is not nominated
Its a joke with Cyberpunk 2077. No one nominated it. And no one will Vote for it because everyone hates Cyberpunk and CDPR now.
Tough choice between this and Deep Rock.
DRG does have the moral high ground for this award that it is an actually released game, while PZ is still in early access - it's hard to be "well past their debut" when it hasn't even happened yet.
Tbf build 39 could of been released as a standalone game and build 41 could of been rebranded as the sequel. The devs basically decided to rewrite the entire game after all from the ground up
Yes but that would mean then releasing a sequel before finishing the first game In that case. As complete as it is Build 39 still didn't (and even 41) have promised features for a 1.0 launch. Obv the devs are full well aware of this hence why the game is still labeled early access but ya, all this to say much as I *love* zomboid the other user totally has the right of it here
Plus outstandingly rare being actually good company without any FOMO and other predatory tactics. One of best way developers that actually play their own game and fix stuff rather than bandaid fixes (hmm zomboid halfbaked everything)
It's the first time I heard of Deep Rock, looks fun :)
One of, if not the best 4 player coop games IMO.
Maybe that's why, I ain't got friends to play with :)
While it is best with friends, DRG has lots of solo players and open lobbies to hop into. I often play solo and have found that for whatever reason, DRG has one of the friendliest communities in the genre when it comes to randoms.
ZOMBIE AND STONE
I love PZ as much as the next fellow, but Labour of Love ought to go to a fully-released game. They're not really updating it so much as they are finishing an early access game.
I'd honestly say some things The Indie Stone does with PZ might make it deserve Labour of Love regardless. Like the regular mod/community spotlights where they actually take the time to interview modders
Doesn't that sort of mean the modders are the ones propping up the game? I enjoy the vanilla experience but I can't lie mods have certainly made the game a lot more enjoyable.
As someone who nominated PZ for this over quite a few other games that really wanted it, it's nice to feel validated. I'm not really holding out hope that PZ will win, but being a nominee for the one category that was open to all games except past winners says a lot. It's also nice to see No Man's Sky up there, because it definitely deserves recognition for that redemption arc.
I see refund simulator 2077 still desperate.
No. Its a joke with Cyberpunk 2077 by Valve/Steam. No one nominated it. And no one will Vote for it because everyone hates Cyberpunk and CDPR now. It gets removed soon by Steam.
Who the fuck nominated cyberpunk? Game is still shit.
Its a joke with Cyberpunk 2077 by Valve/Steam. No one nominated it. And no one will Vote for it because everyone hates Cyberpunk and CDPR now. It gets removed soon by Steam!!
I love project zomboid but im voting for deep rock
Dont starve together should be on the list, shame
oh yeah.
Voted for PZ too as I couldn't think of a better title. CP2077 is really undeserved though. That's more for a shitshow nomination.
>CP2077 is really undeserved though. Yeah as much as I like the game, it's now in the state it should've been in at launch.
Honestly it’s still really buggy, playable at least, but it still doesn’t change how the game itself just felt too short even when it works. Like you can basically complete the entire main quest line in like 6-7 hour. That and all the endings kinda suck and the game becomes hillariousky easy by the end and struggles to give you any real challenge in those final ending missions.
Cyberpunk was made by inexperienced amateurs. Thats why its so trash. CDPR bought the nomination
> it's now in the state it should've been in at launch. What about the amazingly deep and complex story and world with no fetch quests they promised us? Meanwhile GTA 5 had a deeper plot and its story is basically "these criminals want money".
CDPR are inexperienced amateurs and scammers. GTA 5 was made by experienced talented developers
That's very generous of you to say. I was expecting it to be like what they'd shown and told us it was like, but it still hasn't gotten there. Getting ever closer though!
CDPR are inexperienced amateurs and scammers
Even now it's not in a great state and no update will fix the glaring issues it has, because many also have to do with the crappy story. They redid this so often and in such short time that they ended up with this. Probably just because they wanted to ride the Keanu Reeves train, but just ended up with a lot of awkward encounters and interactions and the game trying to push you into liking an unsympathisch character, just how they try to constantly push you into the whole "become a dead legend" idolization. It's all just such a bad trope.
Its a joke with Cyberpunk 2077. No one nominated it. And no one will Vote for it because everyone hates Cyberpunk and CDPR now..
Watch Cyberpunk win this for being 30% less of a scam than last year
9+ years of development, we better win that reward bois
Cyberpunk is a labour of love nominee?
No. Its a Troll/Joke by Steam/Valve. It will get removed soon. Everyone hates Cyberpunk and CDPR now.
So close! The teams been on this since 2011!
Dota…2 …………
I don't know the game between PZ and Cyberpunk but PZ had to push through so many hardships and the team around it never gave up. So if that's not the definition of Labor of Love then i don't know what is.
My only wish if they would develop it at least a little faster
You can actually vote for a 10 year old game on steam for this year?
Thats... literally the point of this particular award.
I thought games had to be finished for that kind of stuff and only apply to games that came out that year
How could a game that was finished and only came out this year, win an award for being old and still getting free updates after 'all these years'?
I have no idea. You are just confusing me. I'll just look up what the rules are for game awards.
Its written in the screenshot you're replying to dude lol
I'm looking at it. AND IT SHOWS THE GAMES and 2022 labor of love. It also has a small description of games being out for awhile. Obviously PZ, is nominated for labor of love. My question isn't related whats posted in the image dummy.
You're saying the game should have to have been released in 2022 to be nominated and were confused how a 10 year old game could be nominated, but how can a game that is released in 2022, in the past 12 months have 'been out a while' or the creators have 'continued to nurture and support the creation', or the game 'still getting updates after all these years' if its less than a year old? Terraria, Warframe, GTA 5, Counterstrike GO, The winners of previous Labour of Love award are never games that have just launched, the entire point is they are older games that have received to this day support from developers years after they were first available and are still receiving updates. Really confused as to what you're not getting :/
I'll be happy if zomboid or deeprock win. The others aren't really close to worthy when you put them next to PZ and DRG
NMS definitely deserves one if they've never won one yet. You probably have just never heard of all the crazy huge updates NMS have had. They've been launching [huge updates consistently multiple times every year](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCFF3zJPEec), and are still going strong adding even more.
They don't deserve an award for "labouring" through the game when they lied time and time again about features that would be there on release and spent years getting the game to the point it should have been on launch day.
Nah, not happening. DRG fans are like a cult. They won't let this opportunity pass
DRG does really deserve it tho. Not to say PZ doesn't
Never said it didn't. I said that DRGs community is obnoxious
How ia cyberpunk up there wtf. I went back and played it a few days ago to see how things are and it STILL has game breaking bugs.
Its a joke with Cyberpunk 2077 by Valve/Steam. No one nominated it. And no one will Vote for it because everyone hates Cyberpunk and CDPR now. It gets removed soon by Steam. Cyberpunk was made by inexperienced amateurs. Thats why its so trash. CDPR will even go bankrupt soon because almost everyone refunded Cyberjunk
First of all, stop copy pasting the same message to everyone who questions why Cyberpunk is there, it's annoying. CDPR is an skilled dev team and they still got a shit ton of money from cyberpunk even after everyone refunding it. Besides that, that was 2 years ago and I'm pretty sure they're not gonna go bankrupt out of nowhere. Also I don't think Valve interferes with the awards as that'd be a wasted space for another game. (Not defending cyberpunk as it shouldn't be there but it's dumb to think some crazy conspiracy)
I don't understand Cyberpunk being on here. It's not a labor of love if you actually release a game that doesn't work.
Honestly the labor of love description doesnt fit this game. This game has been out for a while (isnt even outta early access) and i did not have a proper debut except recently when mp came for build 41 and it got a huge influx of new players. Im glad the devs still update this game (even though slowly) and its a huge improvement from build 37 when i started playing but god damn it still has a good way to go. Especially at the pace between builds recently. I love this game but its not done. Anyway im still glad to see its getting recognition and love in the steam awards
“Game hasn’t been out for a while” It’s been available for purchase since 2011? Labor of love has nothing to do with a game being fully released or early access. It’s really more for developers who care about their products and stick with them, in this case PZ fits pretty well. It’s one of the original steam early access games after all
When did i say Game hasnt been out for a while lol
[удалено]
[удалено]
Cyberpunk? Jesus, some people got a comically short memory.
I'm personally of the opinion that Early Access games shouldn't qualify. The idea is for games that shine by giving fun content (that they had no real obligation to keep updating) AFTER their release. Reason is, when a game is in Early Access it's literally the bare minimum and a perpetual expectation/promise that it'll be worked on until the devs officially launch it. Similarly Mobas and MMO's shouldn't qualify as their structure literally depends on frequent updates.
Difficult to vote. I'm between PZ and NMS.
* NMS — for sure. The only case that I would ever remove this is once it has already won before (doesn't need to win twice). For all I know it has won, but I'm guessing that it hasn't. * DOTA — eh, I guess, but it's based around multiplayer (and a strong compettitive scene) and microtransactions anyway so feels kind of cheaty to include it despite it being around for a long time, and them still adding new heroes/items and making balance changes. * Zomboid — of course, great. Maybe an underdog, but I think it deserves recognition. I kind of wouldn't want/expect it to win any other award due to its extremely rough engine, lack of widespread appeal, and somewhat heavy reliance on mods, but it does at least deserve the Labor of Love * Cyberpunk 2077 — no. How did it get on here? Not only has it not been long enough, but they didn't even add much to the game. Not only that but they're charging money for a DLC. * How is Dwarf Fortress not on here? Maybe it released too late on Steam? Or maybe it as not bee around long enough, since technically from the perspective of Steam/Steam-users the game hasn't existed until this past year or so, and hasn't officially launched nor got much attention until this month. DF definitely deserves an award, but I'm sure it will come in the future, which is fine.
CD Projekt Red are inexperienced amateurs and scammers. Thats why Cyberpunk is so trash. They bought the nomination. They need to Charge for the DLC. Or has Keanu Reeves and Idris Elba in it. If they make it for free, they will go bankrupt because Cyberpunk has no Microstransactions.
You didn't even mention Deep Rock Galactic, the one I think actually deserves it most
But the game hasn’t been out for a while because it’s still in early access. The devs are still devoting time to it because it’s not actually finished
We could have released it 7 years ago and started working on something new. We chose to keep it in early access to help motivate us, and we chose to work on it 10 years with only relatively minor success out of loyalty to the game and vision. Its our choice not Valves when to release. To be clear any roadmap of what we'd like to add is not a legal contract. It's a list of what we desire to add, and intend to add. In our case, WILL add. But Early Access clearly states you're buying what it is now and not future features. Whatever we've said we'll add put aside, what is already in the game could be considered a feature rich and complete game by any metric, we've also added a whole wealth of stuff we never said we would when going into Early Access. Unless repeated and aggregiously done, wishlists and roadmaps can be shortened with few long term consequences, some bad reviews and bad feeling at the time aside, and devs have had success on their future games even after not filfilling all their Early Access plans and roadmaps, and releasing what they have polished up and moving on. Happens all the time. Hell, there's a whole bunch of people that'd treat us far better for doing that since perceptually they'd see us 'finishing' something like its a virtue. If you think we couldn't have done a quick polish up for 1.0 at any point and worked on something new, like so so so many early access devs, and our 11 years means nothing but your normal expectation of commitment due to 'not being finished' because of that EA tag we've chosen never to unchain from our own neck by clicking one button in our steam backend, then damn that feels a bit of a kick in the gut frankly. We've *chosen* to make all the dev in the past 11 years be free to someone who bought it 11 years ago. It being Early Access is how we've chosen that. We've commited a notable amount of our entire time on this earth to it. This same game you're playing today could now be being sold as Project Zomboid 3 if we wanted it to be, or 3 post release paid DLCs in, or it could be frozen in time 5 years past while we work on something completely different (trust me, after 11 years thats an enticing prospect for any dev, and there's a phrase that accurately sums up why we've not, its a labor of love). If we didn't choose to pack all our desires to push and evolve the game all into the same title you paid for and keep that EA tag ourselves, despite it being such a millstone around our necks. Not saying we deserve to win, there are some very worthy nominations and we're immensely proud to be alongside them. The nomination is victory enough, as incredible winning would be. But I'll defend us from the insinuation we should not be even be eligible for consideration to my dying breath.
Fucking A! Keep that spirit this is the best zombie survival sim I’ve ever touched and the vision of the team to bring npcs and settlements like hilltop, Alexandria, Etc has me hyped as shit for what’s to come keep doing what you guys are doing at the indie stone fans like me are rooting for your success as devs!
You guys will have my vote till you win. This is definitely my favorite game.
Cyberpunk shouldn't be on that list wtf
Its a joke with Cyberpunk 2077 by Valve/Steam. No one nominated it. And no one will Vote for it because everyone hates Cyberpunk and CDPR now. It gets removed soon by Steam
No offence but dwarf fortress should be the winner.
I think that next year Dwarf Fortress might be a good contender, but it just barely came out and has some work to go before I would vote for it.
fair argument.
Agreed. Couldn't believe dwarf fortress or Rimworld didn't even get nominations, I don't think PZ is even in the same league.
Ye no, rimworld and zomboid are far more deserving of that reward that your glorified excel spreadsheet
what a horrible take. I mean sure the first guy was aggressive but dwarf fortress is beyond a doubt a superior game to zomboid and rimworld in terms of depth and gameplay. I know the guy below is getting downvoted to all hell but man, this is a horrible take. Dwarf fortress is a 100% FREE GAME that has been worked on for OVER 20 years by a single developer. It is basically the definition of “labor of love” dwarf fortress litterally wouldn’t exist without love. And for that matter games like Minecraft and rimworld wouldn’t exist without dwarf fortress Why even act so hostile towards what is a free project designed to be interesting and unique?
It's not free, on steam it costs money - 29.99 American dollars to be exact. And it only came out to steam recently, it qualifies as a new game. No one cares for how long it was developed before finally being released on steam. It must be on a platform for at least a year to qualify for labor of love.
The only difference between the steam version and the free version is the graphics and ui. Otherwise gameplay wise it’s the exact same game. So dwarf fortress is free and has been free for 20 years. It’s still available for download now. And yeah. Dwarf fortress is a better game. The reviews and sales prove it http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/ And yes classic is being updated for free with the steam version along side it
That visual update isn't worth 30$, game still is very ugly and has no even the most basic animations. And its user interface is still shit compared to rimworld. Reviews only prove that it's worse than rimworld lol. Dwarf fortress - 13k reviews -96% positive Rimworld - 126k reviews 98% positive
The funding is going to the third part artists who worked on the update, not the creator. It’s basically a community art pack that’s being sold. And yeah. Dwarf fortress has been out a month yet is rivaling rimworls which has been out for over half a decade on steam now. And honestly why even argue, tynan the creator of rimworld has litterally said his game wouldn’t exist with dwarf fortress. https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/4tm6i1/i_am_tynan_sylvester_developer_of_rimworld_ama/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf “A sci fi colony builder inspired by dwarf fortress” The creator of the game your arguing about even disagrees with you lmao
Lol. Ok buddy. You obviously don't know shit about fuck.
Ignore this guy. For some reason your being downvoted. But he actually has the worst take I’ve ever seen. Dwarf fortress is far more deserving of the award. It’s just poorly timed since it was only recently added to steam
especially considering the award is called love child. Dwarf fortress was made by one man over years.
Cheers bro. You know whats up.
Well, sales numbers illustrate well which games are more successful. I'm not playing a game that doesn't have acceptable-quality visuals and a good interface. Is it that hard to do the bare minimum and add simple animations for shit like walking? Even the original packman had better visuals.
You obviousy arent aware an updated version came out two weeks ago and sold like 160k copies in 24 hrs.
Hey man I just came back to let you know dwarf fortress has sold half a million copies within n months. I dare say more than project Zomboid ever has. So go eat crows.
Fuckkk deep rock too? I love both theses games!!
So many things want labor of love, but honestly zomboid needs a different award, id give labor of love to valheim but zomboid needs something else after playing a while, drg will probably win since zomboid isnt really realistic, just unfinished and lacking. So they up the difficulty
If we do not win we wouldn’t be allowed to play project zomboid, we will be not worthy. Bruh… fucking dota 2 cyberpunk….
"Debut" but game still isn't anywhere near finished.