Yeah, the early access stuff is more miss than hit. But I've played one game, The Long Dark, that's been "early access" where I've got over 100 hours in it. That's a lot for me. Only the "sandbox" mode is available, but it's enough for me. More than enough. The game is therapeutic for me. It relieves my anxiety.
This is a case where the developers had a vision (and still do), but early access to a mode that was initially just for testing allowed them to discover their test mode (aka "sandbox") was actually a fine game in and of itself.
Early access, I think, allows developers with perfection obsession to go ahead and ship something. Instead of developing it forever, hoping to achieve their goal, and never shipping.
It's true that there is a lot of garbage in early access, but I don't think it's a worse ratio than most indie games.
This is a case where the developers had a vision (and still do), but early access to a mode that was initially just for testing allowed them to discover their test mode (aka "sandbox") was actually a fine game in and of itself.
Early access, I think, allows developers with perfection obsession to go ahead and ship something. Instead of developing it forever, hoping to achieve their goal, and never shipping.
It's true that there is a lot of garbage in early access, but I don't think it's a worse ratio than most indie games.