Moon Studios CEO Thomas Mahler has taken the time to sing the praises of early access, going as far as to say that FromSoftware’s seminal action RPG, Dark Souls, might have benefited from the communication-driven model if it had been around upon its release.
The Ori and the Blind Forest developer spoke about how the studio has utilized early access for its upcoming action title, No Rest for the Wicked, in a post on X/Twitter. Mahler says that releasing the pre-release version of its game in this way is “one of the best decisions we could have made.” He even goes as far as to say that Moon wouldn’t be able to ship its eventual 1.0 build without feedback from fans.
“I think as games become more and more complex and sophisticated, we'll see some form of Early Access happening more and more often,” Mahler explains. “Speaking from our own experience, there is just no way we could have ever shipped Wicked 1.0 without being able to see all the data we're seeing now and getting all the feedback from users. And I mean actual users, not a Focus Testing Group.”
We're not even a week into Early Access and it's already pretty clear that going with EA is one of the best decisions we could've made 👍❤️
— thomasmahler (@thomasmahler) April 24, 2024
I see some people are still irked about why games like Wicked, Hades 2, Larian's new game, etc. launch into Early Access even if the studio…
The Moon CEO takes his appreciation for early access one step further by suggesting that some past video games might have benefited from early access if it would have been an option. The example he uses is 2011’s Dark Souls.
“Imagine Dark Souls 1 would've been in Early Access,” Mahler adds. “Instead of From rushing to ship a boxed product in a somewhat unfinished state, they probably would've been able to look at the second half of that game and still fully form and polish the less polished areas like Lost Izalith, etc.”
While Dark Souls is often thought of as a turning point for FromSoftware, some late-game areas have been known to be criticized by many in the past. Mahler points to Lost Izalith as one offender, though longtime Souls enjoyers have also taken issue with the layout of areas like the Demon Ruins and Blighttown, too. The latter location was notorious for causing frame stuttering issues upon Dark Souls’ original release.
Mahler elaborates, saying that more substantial issues can’t always be fixed by post-launch updates and DLC.
“Shipping games is always incredibly difficult and stressful and most of the time it means making quite drastic compromises, especially if your product is trying to accomplish something new. And if you don't know that it's okay to bring in certain features and scope after the fact, you'll just end up cutting before you hit the market.”
While Xbox and PC both offers avenues for developers to release early access versions of their games, Mahler hopes PlayStation and Nintendo eventually begin to implement similar offerings. He hopes those who criticize early access at least see the value in a method that allows “developers to truly perfect a product over time.”
No Rest for the Wicked launched in early access on April 18, 2024. We gave this early slice a 7/10 in our review, calling it a “compelling and unique action-RPG” that still has some kinks to work out. Moon launched its newest tweaks with a hotfix that released yesterday.
Michael Cripe is a freelance contributor with IGN. He started writing in the industry in 2017 and is best known for his work at outlets such as The Pitch, The Escapist, OnlySP, and Gameranx.
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