I imagine there’s a large majority of people who bought into the early access for 7dtd and got precisely what they thought they were paying for. I also imagine there’s a not-insignificant minority of people who bought into the early access not expecting it to take 11 years before they had a completed product, and ended up with a worse experience with the game as a result than if they’d just waited for the full release. I imagine there’s also a not-insignificant group of people who simply overlooked the “early access” bit entirely and just saw a trailer for a game that looked neat and a price tag and clicked buy. The experiences of the latter two groups of people are no less valid than the experiences of that majority. And, just for clarity, replace 7dtd in this conversation with pretty much any other early access title that has finally been fully realised.

Early access has largely replaced the concept of an open beta, though with something like an open beta you’re not typically paying to participate. When it was called a beta, and treated like a beta, there was a much clearer delineation between “the product” and “the work in progress”. With early access (or, perhaps it’s not early access itsself but rather how devs have treated early access), it feels like that line is heavily blurred. Early access has the additional benefit of allowing developers to start generating a revenue stream before the product is finished, which is great, and falls into place with other methods like crowd funding.

I don’t necessarily agree that the game couldn’t have been made without early access. Crowdfunding has existed for ages, betas have existed for ages. Collecting player feedback from betas is pretty indisputably just as effective as, if not more than, early access. Raising money to fund development has also been achieved reliably through crowdfunding. I get that early access is sort of a way of blending both of these aspects, and I don’t necessarily dislike early access in theory, more so the way so many games seem to have no desire to leave early access while being all too happy to continue taking people’s money. 7dtd did leave early access, and that’s amicable, but as mentioned there are numerous examples of games that like to live in an unreleased state while even spending developer time on creating paid DLC before the core product is ready. Again, 7dtd didn’t do this. But an 11 year development cycle is very prolonged for what 7dtd is, and I have no doubt that there are players who have had a worse overall experience with the game because they bought in when it was unfinished and they can never get their “first time” back.