I also hope they add helicopters in some capacity down the line, after they get the core game worked out and balanced. If they do hopefully they raise a bunch of money and throw that into licensing a realistic flight model, or hiring a team to design one.

If you consider me as someone defending them, I'm not. I'm just stating known facts about the game development process, and the huge investment of time it is. The sentiment of vitriol that some posters project is silly in my mind when they could ask for a refund and be done with it, and/or wait until the game releases. If you have want to have a legitimate discussion of your concerns, post what concerns you. To the fact we were lied to? It could be a lie, or a miscalculation, but let me take your perspective that it was a lie: One explanation I would think of is the company was strapped for cash and needed some hype to get more development bux. If that was true, I personally don't care about how they go about their PR/Marketing gimmicks. I've seen so many companies, that everyday are doing much worse amoral shit to our society that I don't care if pumping cash into their bank account via hype was the reason they missed the first date. Again back to the time sink, I understand that, and time literally costs money. I pre-purchased the game because I believe in the vision behind it, as well as Asylum's track record from Altis life that's it. No your not a bad person for being disappointed, hell I get disappointed in peoples actions everyday, but disappointment is different than being bitter, which how I felt your post came off, I could be wrong though, I have been many times before.

I've been known about this project for awhile as well. Game development(backend,UI/UX, mechanics, features, assets, balance, customization, documentation, industry partnerships, QA, anticheat, and anything else I missed takes time. Anyone who has worked 14 or more hours a day, doing anything, for multiple days on end knows burn out is real, so maybe you work shorter hours for a week, or take a weekend or vacation day off. That extends the timeline. Sometimes you have to completely clear your head to reapproach a problem. More time. Also, not all development teams are the same, or progress at the same pace. So they announced dates in the past that they didn't make, mistakes are a human quality. The only one we need to exercise in this process is patience, as the game will still be for sale when it's complete.

New Valona Since the map is said to be inspired by the Carolinas and Georgia, I took New from New Bern, NC, and Valona from Valona, GA.

A recently expanded team getting settled in and up to pace, good things coming in time. I can wait.

I think I read you won't be able to sell people's car, because of the grind/cost of them. Perhaps we will be able to fence the contents to a black market dealer, and if there are upgrades on the car (from the racing module) if you have the required mechanic skill maybe you could part those out to a chop shop. Then police would impound, and since insurance would pay, the owner collects the car back in the condition they got it stolen, minus the inventory contents.

Its gonna be a slog, but my guess is they push the modules off as far as possible apart to only when resources (funding) gets tight and they need another infusion of cash from hype. They are a real company, with real people working through real challenges with each task taking a some investment of time, in turn money. No one wants them to release some bugged out garbage where everything looks nice but nothing works. This in the age of streamers and youtube, the optics of a projects potential, developer competency, and gameplay are amplified so much with massive audiences watching streams and videos of all "early access" games and either supporting them or writing them off and to a huge audience with an echo chamber to follow. I'm sure the team understands this, and my guess as to why they play their cards very close to their chest. Releasing a module that doesn't showcase the game in the way they want it to be perceived will be a big financial hit to their development fundraising( In an interview i heard the total team Is around 30 people including freelancers). I don't see them, at this point, in any rush to release a module until internally it's been heavily tested and debugged. Keeping in mind backers were promised beta access, and alpha comes first. I'm optimistic, but in no real rush, we all know how fun the game is going to be anyway, and from the standard they set with their altis life servers, i have no reason to doubt. On time, maybe, fun as he'll, definitely.

I like your idea even better! So the only units available for auction DO contain some sort of inventory content(expired leases w/ 0 inventory just remove access from the renter). As far as the difficulty of previewing the unit, I REALLY don't know. I know I read, or heard in an interview with John that you would be able to rotate items, lets say in a car trunk, to make them fit/make room for other things(I assumed they meant 3d real time(like furniture placement), and not just 2D rotation of an item's inventory image on a grid) if the prior IS the case, I assume a storage unit would share a similar codebase and be quicker(relative) to implement. The preview idea would be really cool, but I'm thinking very frugally with what I think might impact server/network performance(but the whole Storage unit idea might be a bigger database than housing, IDK lol), it must be my Arma 3 PTSD. I guess we need to see how the town square module performs to get some sort of baseline to ground our ideas, expectations, and feature requests to reality. But it doesn't hurt to throw the ideas out now, hopefully some other people chime in with theirs and/or a developer gets a light bulb while we wait for the first module. aside: I was thinking much more free market ruthless with the auctions at the time I wrote about that. "awww, no items in unit, try again!" lol

Cool, my post there is just thinking in the mindset of creating a revenue stream for them. As far as payment via in game currency, maybe the units are purchased with real cash, and paid for at auction with in game currency? It's hard for me to quantify the value of a unit at auction with IG currency with the very little we know about the economy in the first place, so to keep it simple I just mentioned RL Cash in, RL Cash auction out. I could see myself paying for a storage unit when I need it, like if I had to log off across the map with some supplies or whatever, but I agree with you as far as playing the auction for the chance that someone filled a full unit with Tactical bacon and I just paid $80.00 battling someone else at an auction for. But some people just want to play storage wars and YUUUP! a win at auction.

Adding to the concept of storage units, I was thinking about this today on a drive. My thought was Storage Units could be a revenue stream for Asylum. Disclosure: I don't think they are going for a sleazy cash grab by any means, but it hurts none to think of ways to help them make a return on the teams enormous investment of time and money, in a ethical way that they can continue to generate revenue to fund the studio and continued development. Potential Requirements: -Player must have a residence(to avoid people only using storage units-would negatively impact social experiences near apartments/homes)-you need a address when you sign up for a storage unit in most reputable places IRL. -Perhaps limiting the # of units that can be rented at a time per character Idea: -Storage units could only be purchased with real cash. -Rental period of X amount of days -If the unit is not paid for by its due date, or returned the unit is put up for auction(again real money auction) -The auction includes any contents left by the previous owner, sight unseen. Instead of people bidding a lot of money for nothing(or let them), maybe they give the bidders a short description, ex: items in storage 0/50-empty, 10-20-small, 20-35-medium, 35-50-packed to the gills! All of the proceeds from the rental, and auction go to Asylum. For the convenience of having a space away from your personal apartment or home to store stuff, take a friend to get kitted, store extra stuff. This would all need to be a balanced in inventory size/capacity compared with whatever is available in apartments and houses, as to not push the need for a storage unit, but as a 'nice to have', Perhaps when you don't want to show the new join to your gang where you live, but want to have a place for them to store stuff, whatever. Theres also opportunity here for delivery missions for drivers to bring peoples goods from home to storage, as well as the market pricing of the units themselves, rent near the city $X.99/month rent out by the farms something else a month. These could be instanced units and after expiry if not sold at auction, the contents could be removed from the server database. Lootcrates, except a crate for YOUR loot.

I think it would be cool to have an app like meetup.com on the phones where players on any server; could organize events, post dates and times, server #, and get notifications in game that an event they subscribed to is starting. Maybe this is already planned but I haven't seen or recognized it(In the phone or laptop, might be blind), and would be pretty immersive and a way to socialize with new people in game.

C-low is a street game played with 3 die, each person throws them where highest roll wins the pot. Rolling a 4,5,6 is the highest followed by 6,6 6, etc.. a roll of 1,2,3 is an automatic loss. If more than 2 players get 4,5,6 they roll again against each other. I would like to see it as an illegal form of gambling that could be played on the street. It was pretty popular when I was in the military and we were bored out of our minds and wanted to feel gangster, raking in cold hard cash from each other...or losing. I'm sure if there's an economy issue you could cap the bets, or # of rolls etc... just thought I'd throw it up for consideration, thanks.

Yes! Maybe these could only be played at, on certain surfaces like some boxes in an alley or whatever bringing some risk to being caught. (Tier 1) With how I've heard stores can't be physically designed/upgraded too much/at all (at least in the beginning), it would be cool if it were done in some general purpose rental space, that in someway the police or detectives found out, they could raid it. (Tier 2 - illegal gambling)

With Semi trucks and delivery vans(commercial vehicles) being driven by players trying to get from point A to B with products and illegal items, I was thinking about ways Asylum could add more immersion for a vehicle heavy game and create some unique experiences for both drivers and law enforcement. Abridged Background: Commercial vehicles in the USA and Canada are governed under Federal law. The major points being: The # of hours they can drive in a shift(11hrs US/13 CAN) with a mandatory rest period of 10 hours before they can drive again. The next being the weight. In the USA, a max weight for a truck and trailer is 80,000lbs, where 45,000lbs of that is useful and the truck and empty trailer is something like 35000lbs combined. Last piece is that commercial drivers understand with that CMV license in their pocket, police can basically pull you over whenever, wherever(even bother you in a truck stop), check your bills of lading(whats in the trailer, drug test, and lastly pull you into a weigh station. These weigh stations also have a EZPass transponder system where you can be allowed to pass the station without pulling in, or the officer on duty can turn it off, and all transponders beep and flash a red LED indicating for the driver to pull in. The above is a high level overview of how it works for the sake of conversation. There are all kind of exceptions, and ways drivers work around and within the mentioned rules. To my point, What if Identity had a weigh station. Opposed to the Kavala(& others) checkpoint type system where someone had to be there to have any real meaning. I’m thinking since all of these goods made/purchased by players will be transported by delivery van or truck, with a weigh station, depending on where it was, could create a sense of vunerability for someone running drugs or the like with the risk of having their paperwork and trailer inspected. As far as the weighing goes, I would imagine hauling most goods in Identity will feel pretty weightless in game, so no overweight violation at the scale; but what if a FULLY loaded semi with certain goods(drugs, guns) would trigger a light or signal in view of the officer and they could direct the truck for inspection. So now maybe players sacrifice some profit on a haul because the fines aren’t worth tripping the weight sensor.(Realworld fines can start at $100 and hit over $4000 and more, depending on the officer of course:) And of course, if there is no officer at the weigh station, well then keep rolling. I think it would be something cool that would perhaps give low level police some experience and keep drivers on their toes, whether hauling legal or illegal goods. What does anyone else think?

Right, so I thought about this again on the logistics side, not so much weigh station (Though I still think it would be cool) What if a buyer places an order, and at the bottom there is a box for an authorized signature, where the buyer, using the artwork mechanic in game for painting, is able to scribble a signature on his order sheet, which is then sent to the shipper. The driver then has to pick up the order, deliver to the buyers location, and if the buyer is home they need to sign for it (with their signature). If the buyer is not home, perhaps some automated process stamps the drivers receipt with the correct signature. The driver, in order to get paid, has to deliver his signed copy back to the shipper, or even take a picture and email it back to the shipper. So a driver might not get paid immediately if the shipper is not there (business closed for the day) to confirm the buyer recieved the goods. In this I'm just trying to think of ways that would delve deep in to the real economy of getting products from a to b, while offering decent pay and a way for businesses to build relationships with each other.

I believe its in the ace mod For arma 3 they had it so you would actually drag a hose from a fuel truck to a helicopter, or any vehicle and insert it to begin filling, so if they are considering that for fuel islands, it would be a place to look. I think that would be cool as well. They could even make a delivery job driving a tanker to refuel the fuel stations themselves.

Good points. I still think as a gameplay mechanic restricting 3rd person to everything besides holding a weapon would be worth exploring, depending on how the camera works in 3rd person anyway, some are better than others. I guess we will need to see how the base level balance of risk/reward and how actual gameplay goes. My thinking was if the 3rd person view does create such an unfair advantage for the attacker, then they could counter balance that with a 1st person only with weapons, or even only when the weapon is at the ready(sighted in). I agree with the looks aspect too, it would be cool to take screenshots of you and your gang kitted out, just not aimed down sights. Anyway it ends up I'm cool with, just a thought. EDIT: Or scrap my idea entirely and maybe decrease accuracy by some amount.

I think a cool way to do it would be restricted 3rd person. So if a player has a gun out it forces them to first person. I imagine it will take some short period of time to pull out a gun, at which point the camera could zoom down over that players head and into first person view. Third person allowed at all other times.

What if with insurance, If your car was stolen, you were able to pickup a loaner car from the insurers office, that could obviously not be chopped or sold, and was available to you until a time that police impounded or checked the registration on your vehicle. Where you got a message saying where your vehicle was found. Maybe even give police location of active insurance loaner cars (gps) so they can talk with the owner of the stolen vehicle and put out a call for that make/model/color?

From the level of realism they mentioned in their overview video, I don't think arresting someone for screaming in to a Mic would be fair(money seems like it's going to be tight already.) Though the cops will likely have the ability to detain and move people whenever they see fit... Another way they might consider is a the karaoke bar having a quiet section in the back bar opposite from the stage (behind a plexiglass wall) that either mutes the stage volume completely or severely limits what you can hear, with perhaps a way to vote to remove them via Red button or whatever. I've seen that kind of setup at a metal club when I saw Amon Amarth and they were setting people's brains on fire with volume. Maybe if enough voted against the singer a off duty cop, or low level bounty hunter working security would then be able to remove them.

Sort of the like the game Crazy Taxi! like you said, if the driver is messing around, I think the fair should be cheaper for the passenger whose time they're wasting/endangering them and affect driver pay. Maybe to a point where they get fired after so many incidents in a trip(s) and cannot hold that job for a period of time.

As a gamer with professional experience in product management, and having worked on a life server in the past, I find it interesting how every new game gets the "It's never going to happen" treatment. Regarding your worries about the development process, if you have never worked in software development or ever had a go at setting up your own altis life server, I encourage you to try it! What you will find is a never ending list of things to implement, bugfix and balance. I worked at it in a team of 3 and you very quickly realize the amount of time it requires to make a product people want to play. I spent many many days working 14 hrs or more on the project. Then I would hop on to an Asylum server and see they added 10 different things and balanced this or that, all on a network of servers to cater to 400 people at a time. Its impressive. Now completely change game engines, learn what its limitations are, change development languages, and all the new math you need to figure out AND get it to work together nicely together with everything else without so much as mistyping a single semicolon. It takes even more time. Honestly the little bit of video and media they have presented seems impressive to me. As far as people get concerned with a lack of constant updates, my best guess is they are too busy working on the backend(as they stated + videos of lines of code aren't as sexy as a pile of drugs and guns) and having to balance that with a need as a company to manage their public relations and put their best foot forward. It all takes time. On the business side, they just hired more people on, rented an office. As someone who has run a company making first to market products, these steps by Asylum certainly DO NOT scream to me, scam artists! What it does seem like, is they are pushing FULL forward to making the game they, and others could see that altis life could be. And as far as the release date for the alpha goes, yea it's hype by them, but they definitely need those that support it to tell their friends and raise more cash $$$. Someone might say, but they raised "800k-1million dollars!" I can't say for Canada, but in most of the US, every employee a company adds, their payroll costs the company like 15-18% more than what you see at face value. So if they now have 10 employees(idk) they might have this year covered but I'm sure they still need more. That's not forgetting, but not getting,into the interpersonal dynamics of running an efficient team while keeping them motivated and on task. Making ANY new product takes a lot of time and balls. Maybe some have done it faster and more that you never hear about quit, not every game is developed by a 1 man wonder, sometimes it's just regular people with passion for an idea. Asylum didn't let me down as a casual on their Arma servers and with the 10 Oct update I don't have any reason to believe why they would now.