Crunch Time

[beefster09]

Please don't cram. When it's out, it's out. Deadline = BUGS, BUGS, BUGS.
All I have to say is "stop adding new features by a deadline so you can zero in on the bugs, but still finish what you're working on."
I'm mostly willing to wait. Plus, Neofirst needs more time.

[ShadowTiger]

I still don't really see a reason to have this released by December. People can wait. They've got other things to do in the meantime. This is crunch time for schoolgoers as well, as this week is finals week for a lot of people, or midterms week. Conversely, it's also potentially a winter vacation (Christmas break?) for a lot of people, so they have time to test or build as well while others don't. Still, the point here is, there's no valuable purpose in rushing other than to say "Christmas = ZC's All Important Release!" If you released it in March or something, the only difference would be the date, a distinct lack of bugs, and people having more content in their quests to upgrade.

[Nimono]

2.5 Released by Dec. 31 = Disaster

That's about as good as I can put it. Seriously, you've only got about 2 weeks left before the end of the month. That may seem like plenty of time, but get this: EVERY SINGLE DAY GOES BY VERY QUICKLY THESE DAYS. It may SEEM like enough time, but when you factor in that 24 hours is up really quickly these days, you're left with one thing:

YOU'RE NOT GOING TO BE ABLE TO FINISH 2.5 THIS YEAR. Speed is NOT of the essence this time. Quit rushing yourselves. Give the people what they ask for, like the Dialogue Editor. By the way, if you DO put a limited enemy editor into 2.5, please allow us to select what tiles the enemies will use when the rule "Use New Enemy Tiles" is checked. You don't know how much it bugs me that I can't use that rule in my CGBZ quests because I'd have to do a TON of moving tiles and combos because most of my tiles are on pages 6 and up... That, and Pure requires some movement, too. What's going to happen when the enemies require pages 6-100? People would have to do a WHOLE LOT of scrolling in certain tilesets just to get to their dungeon and overworld tiles if they decide to use all the enemies ZC has to offer.

[Eliwood]

As a fellow developer, I'm going to take the middle around and say that both sides have merits. It's good to set deadlines, and I set deadlines for myself all the time to keep the project going. At the same time, I think that deadlines should be targets for completion, and not something your life depends upon. I too am planning to issue a major release of my project around Christmas, and while I am on schedule, I still treat it like a target deadline. I won't die if I don't meet it, and instead, I just push it back by a little, let the people know what's going on (just like you are doing right here), and that's that. As long as the people are informed, there's no harm done.

So in the end, I think that you should strike a balance between taking your time to ensure quality and meeting personal deadlines. Nobody's entirely right or wrong here.

[Tygore]

I still stand by my previous statement of setting the new goal to be the Chinese New Year.

[The_Amaster]

I say, like all the others, to take your time. There really isn't any rush(Although I'd like to see it before, say, April) Quality trumps speed. I would also say that you should implement the new featurs BEFORE debugging, only because you may spend time wiping out bugs, only to discover that the new features open up a whole load of new ones. Best to do it all in one shot.

[Lotus_Eater]

I just want it to work, that's it, while it would be nice to see it soon, if it doesn't work right, then what the hell is the point, besides, I am sure everyone who can is playing Twilight Princess anyways, and if they aren't well shame on them.

[Nicholas Steel]

if you look at how jman worded it you will see he worded it so as to make the situation look drasticaly worse then what it really is and as such most people posting here in this thread are purely making him laugh... nuff said.

[Imprisoned]

By Lotus_Eater
Besides, I am sure everyone who can is playing Twilight Princess.

I agree, after christmas many many people have a Wii (except me, they're all sold out ) and possibly, Twilight Princess. You could put "ZC 2.5 Released" in everywhere on the forums, but the thread would be empty. Just don't rush it... and not even Chinese new year is a good goal... just calm down, and take your time.

[beefster09]

I still stand by my previous statement of setting the new goal to be the Chinese New Year.

I say St. Patrick's day at the latest possible deadline, though. How about we use Chinese new year as a feature deadline. Then until St. Patrick's day, we (devs?) focus solely on bugs.