Am I being fair to Ashes of Creation?

 If you browse my history of Ashes of Creation blog posts or read many of my comments on Reddit in the Ashes of Creation subreddit, especially around the recent Narc controversy, you will get a sense that I am critical of the game.  Skeptic, even, would be a good word to describe my view of Ashes.   But am I being fair in my criticism and skepticism?  Probably not but I need to get some things off my chest.

 In order for this to make sense you need to be up to speed on the drama created by Narc, a popular Ashes content creator on Youtube, who announced he was done with the game and can no longer recommend backing the game financially.  In the video Narc makes a range of points backed up by video.  Watch his video first:

 Steven Sharif, who started Intrepid Studios and is spending his own money to make Ashes a reality and serves as the creative director, did not take kindly to Narc's video.  First he responded publicly on Reddit and then he took to live streaming the current alpha test to disprove Narc's statements (with a specific focus around Narc's comments about the desert zone expansion).  It's along stream and can be watched here:

 Asmongold, a very popular and often considered toxic MMO streamer, then reacted to Narc's video. Surprisingly Asmongold stayed fairly neutral and wanted to hear more from both Narc and Steven on the topic.  First watch the original react video.

 Asmongold was able to then line up impromptu interviews with Narc, Steven Sharif, and Thor (Pirate Software) and get more of each side's view of the matter on the topic.  Another long video to watch but as the top comment on Youtube states "If you think I’m going to lay here watching this for 3 hours and 40 mins then you would be correct.".  So get watching.

 Once you've watched the above, which is an investment of time for sure, you should have the context for the rest of my thoughts shared below.

 First I want to point out that Ashes of Creation is a crowd funded game in a time period where there is not a great opinion of crowd funded games due to rampant fraud, scams, and failure to deliver related to crowd funded projects. Yes, Steven Sharif is making up the difference for development costs from his own pocket but the game is still at it's core a crowd funded project.

 Second it is worth noting that Ashes is charging for access to test the game.  Originally this was via more traditional crowd funding packages which were taken down for sale before the test was set to begin.  Right after the packages were taken down and assumed you could no longer buy access to the alpha test Steven announced new test-only access was available to purchase.  Charging for alpha access has been a bone of contention ever since.

 I mention the crowd funding and charging for alpha testing access because it sets the stage for a powder keg in the environment.  Add in a defensive, cult-like following for the game who practically worship Steven Sharif and it was inevitable something like Narc's video was going to set it off.

 The stage was set.  We have a crowd funded game with a feisty community and a "savior of all things MMORPGs" figure in Steven Sharif.  Toss in a spark of "I am quitting because the game isn't delivering what we paid for" from Narc's video and BOOM.

 My initial reaction to Narc's video was one of confirmation of my skepticism that Ashes of Creation could deliver the game that Steven has promised.  Or at the very least that the game that Steven promised was even farther away than we had hoped.  I wouldn't say I rushed to defend Narc's position but I did make many comments on Reddit that ended up defending his position.

 I still somewhat identify with Narc's points he made in his video but after seeing Steven's response, mediated by Asmongold, I can see where Narc cherry picked footage that exaggerated the point he was making.  In essence, Narc was not being fair to the progress the game has actually made.  The game came up short on his expectations but through words and selective video he overstated his opinion.

 I hesitate to say Narc flat out lied because at the end of the day he was ultimately sharing his opinion.  No amount of Steven flying around the world and showing things off will convince Narc that his opinion was wrong.  More importantly it is not hard to see that Narc had higher expectations due to the past developer updates and a lack of specificity about what was coming to the alpha test's .  When you are charging for access to a test and have a history of creating "fear of missing out" around crowd funding packages then the expectation of the buyer is always going to get a bit more weight from me.

 So I think Narc created a misleading video and based on his follow up comments assumed more viewers would have watched previous content to have a bigger picture of his view point.  In the end though Narc had expectations based on what he saw and what he heard that were not met.  This was the straw that broke the camel's back for his diehard interest in the game.  His video was his way to say so and that he could not longer in his own good version of faith recommend the game.

 Steven's response was one of measured response at first but veered into anger and I personally think Steven made a couple missteps when anger got the best of him but after seeing Narc's unhinged response targeting Steven (which I won't link) I will give Steven a pass.  More importantly is that Steven's response increased my interest in the actual state of Ashes of Creation because if anything positive has come out of this fiasco is a much better understanding of the state of the game.

 Also Steven can sell a compelling vision for the type of MMORPG I want to play.  Without prompting he clarified positions such as understanding his desire for PvP systems in the game that are not in line with most of the market but a game with PvP is the type of game he is making... period.  Good on him.  Stick with your guns.  I have skepticism on how it all comes together but now I know it's not an area of negotiation.  I can get behind developers that stick to a vision.

 Now how do I judge my own response?  First, I admit I took the bait and fell for Narc's video hook, line, and sinker.  I supported words like "lies" and used phrases like "legal action" when I should not have.  In the case of the legal action comments I made I will stand by them because crowd funded games are a hot topic in the legal space with many game projects being forced into refunding backers even when they are able to release games.

 My own view of Ashes is it is slow to deliver and I've been regularly unimpressed with their monthly updates so it was not hard to buy into Narc's point that the team is not delivering to previous updates that made the game seem further along than it is.  It is worth noting that Narc doubled down on the assertion when questioned by Asmongold and while Steven did show some more of the desert area I would still argue it is no where near what was shown in the preview showcase two years ago.  It is a valid question to ask why what is actually in the test two years later is lacking in comparison and how none of the stuff talked about two years ago is in yet (i.e. the desert dungeon).

 The topic around the desert area expansion is also the only real point that Steven was able to dispute via showing the current state of the game.  The other points Narc made were only refuted by "its coming later" and "game development is hard so things may change" response from Steven. Which brings us full circle to why my own view is still closer to the points made by Narc than maybe I want to admit.  

 There is a long ways to go for Ashes of Creation to become the game it set out to be and as a crowd funded game that is charging players to access test phases I am personally going to set a higher bar and be more skeptical in nature.  As Josh Strife Hayes, another well known MMORPG content creator on YouTube, once said "If a game costs 100$ I judge it for this price.".  

 Yes, this means I am admitting that much of the uproar around Narc's video is more due to Ashes charging for access than it is for the development misses towards some player's expectations.  A point that Asmongold hammered home when he spoke with Thor at the end of the "About Ashes of Creation" video.  So to a degree that means I have not been fair to Ashes of Creation's actual progress and thus puts me in the same light as Narc.

 So where do we go from here?  First, I need to get back into blogging more about Ashes and my thoughts about their development updates.  I told myself I wouldn't do it as I wanted to avoid my past mistakes made with being a WAR fanboy before it's ill-fated existence, but I'm too invested now and have said too many short sighted things to not broaden my body of work about Ashes.  Ashes is also one of the only games doing interesting things in the MMO space so I would be remiss not to pay closer attention and provide my feedback.

 Second, and probably craziest of all, this entire situation has made me consider buying into Alpha 2 access.  Why?  Because I did get misled in Narc's video and I would not have had I had more actual experience with the game.  There is a side of me that does not want to reward crowd funded games anymore but there is another side of me that says "you are just paying a subscription to play a game".  Because while it is a test, and to Steven's point "not a game to play yet", there still seems to be tons of folks like Nyce Gaming having a ton of fun testing it by playing it as a game!  New World is in a dry spell.  Throne and Liberty flamed out. I really don't have an MMO addiction at the moment so the itch is there.  I may actually do this and that will speak louder than any number of words I've put on page here.

Note: as I wanted this post to be as pure as possible no AI was used in editing this post so I own the grammar and spelling errors!