I am and always have been a supporter of multi player since FPSC EA and other forms of user game interaction to as wide a possible audience. e.g. different platforms.
However in the case of Reloaded I don't see it as a priority personally.
Whatever the issues from a commercial aspect TGC face that's not quantifiable to me as an indie game maker who uses a game maker engine to make games and make them to be as good as is possible whether its a single player game or any other kind - point being whatever I make I need the best tool to make the best game even possible if its a small one level game or whatever.....e.g. quality and not quantity. Small and top quality rather than massive and half a job rubbish result.
How TGC raises the finance needed is a mater for them to sort out. As an end user I am only interested in how good the tool is. Either its good or not no matter what it provides for.
Currently as the debate about the basic visual quality is going as reflective of this currently Reloaded features to date even the few we have are about less than half finished as to a level of provision of support in those specific areas they provide for (e.g. terrain editor, AI, water and so on) and though I understand the need to built what some see as a more complete engine by extending the current core feature set because they for one reason or another cant wait I can see no other outcome than we have seen so many times in the past and we seem to be in danger of repeating ourselves with a potentially similar outcome. Said it many times recently what is creeping towards us is a little bit of this and a little bit of that for whatever reason and nothing finished or providing the level of game making toll sets and advanced quality features that will ensure a quality finished deployable game. Seen it before and its happening again for whatever reason financial, lack of other resources or other...result is the same - a half baked job.
Sight of the quality of product and its tools and feature set is in danger of being lost if it is not already gone in favour of more features and less quality. You can't have it both ways without question - Yes unless you have a massive budget agreed (even then its not easy) so how that's accommodated as said is not my or other users problem... only the product and how good it is in whatever it provides....more features or less, poor or good is our domain. Whatever the issues as said many times moving on and skipping, leaving behind unfinished basic core features half completed to the level users want or need is a bad precedent. More can be done and included at any stage then it should be done until all potential possibility of a feature is maxed out before moving on. e.g. Water for example and Yes environmental effects like rain, wind, liquids and so on and anything else that the major features we have to date are lacking, e.g much, much better terrain editing, texture, shader, lighting, materials user management support, far improved AI and much more. To that extent I agree with science boy and others who wish to see the product provide for a flexible choice of game making choices with a full range of quality efficient core advanced fully fledged features to make their games top notch before contemplating anything else.
The Conkit and Character Creator are one thing - essential features for the vast majority of indie game makers but anything else and particularly Multi Player is not a basic Game Making essential much like Third Person Perspective which I would like to see its not an absolute necessity when many essential items are half finished or not yet even included or started. In some cases not even being considered. Some support for many other types of Game is essential. Not everyone wants to make a shooter or zombie game. Character interaction and lip scinc in support of game dynamics and so on. Many, many important game making features.
Multi Player - Steam, Multi Platform - Whatever - first off I have to make a game I would be proud of and worthy of distributing and playing that is a big difference from selling the Reloaded Product which we as indie developers have no relation to - as said that's the domain of TGC and as always as said many times often it is the case that a game engine developer and its game engine purchasers in this case backers objectives are totally incompatible. One selling a tool to make games and the other wishing to use the tool to make a game. Different animals with different priorities which is why there has never been a really successful Indie Game making product which has been available to us to date.
Personally I know little of Steam and not that much more about playing multi player games as I have not yet made a game as said worthy of their consideration. When I do I am sure they may be of more importance to me though that day seems to be an even longer way off at the moment when I cant even make a game proper to my own satisfaction at least for the foreseeable future - short or long. For that I need much better improved current features and more core essential ones to be added.
Adding to this :
Personally I think that many end user pledgers can see much more potential for Reloaded than the way TGC look at it perhaps in as much as they are putting together currently a first person shooter which is limited in the main to providing an out of the box solution to create a modern type army style shooter as a complete game and hand it over to users as V1 or whatever.
Users see it as potentially providing and using it for far more than that. Many have very creative aspirations for its use in their game or other application making being a very creative lot as we know from experience and they aspire to much more and need many more core features apart from improving substantially whats already partly developed.....
Where are the AI features of climbing stairs and so on mentioned in past blogs long time back? peeping around corners and shooting and so on, I need snow/ice in my snow levels, I need flying objects in my space level, I need moving vehicles, wheres that rat and flies? I need water flowing down the cliffs (bumps) to a stream from top of mountain to the sea, I need to go under water to the underwater world, I need asteroids and space craft floating in my space level, I need teleporters and lifts, I need to be able to talk to characters that talk back, I need allies and enemy teams? and much, much more before I have even a basic and complete game making engine with basic core features?
Multi Player - forget it.
