Basic Question

As a guess, I'd say that balancing 8 different characters, each with their own unique skills, (not to mention the variations one can experience in differing builds of the same character) is already challenging enough for the developers. They're definitely attempting to go for quality over quantity in this regard.

This actually was brought up a while ago by a number of DotA players, who are used to having god-knows-how-many playable classes at their disposal. I think the eventual counter-argument was that only a select few of those DotA classes were ever used by experienced players anyway, and the rest were merely "throw away" classes. Or something. *Shrugs*

On a personal level, I can't say as I've ever been bothered by the idea of having duplicate demigods on the field at once. If I were playing a single-player story-mode, that'd be a different matter. But in multiplayer matches,  I suspect it's kinda important that each player has the option to play duplicate DGs, if they so wish. If only to avoid arguments about who gets to play the Rook.

I suspect it's a big issue:  Art, Animation, Effects, Balance.

It's much easier to create fewer demigods...

The reality is time = money.

To get the art, animaiton, effects and balance done = Time.

If it does well, I'm sure more Demigods will be added.

Like the poster above, I'm not that worried about multiple characters.  In diablo did it bother you that someone else was playing the sorceress as well as you?  It never bothered me... (Granted my friends and I would try to pick diffrent classes so we did not overlap).

IMO it does not matter, what matters are the ones that are in are A) FUN and Semi-balanced.

Street Fighter 2 had 8 fighters.  World of Warcraft had 8 classes on each side.  I think Demigod only has 8 because of a budget issue.  They don't have that much money and time to create 20 demigods.

So 8 is probably ok for a first commercial game.  It's not fair to compare it to a dota mod.   They plan to add 2 free more free demigods after release for a total of 10.   Then add more Demigods depending on how well the game sells.  They can't afford to create 20 demigods and if the game bombs, they will lose alot of money. 

I understand your point, although Blitz64 SF is a 1v1 beat 'em up and classes are something generic.
Demigod deals with individual characters which are part of a lore afaik, and each one has his background and unique concept.
So your team has for example the Rook, and oh! the other team has the Rook too >.> It's awkward. It's like having Ronaldo 2 times in your football team and 3 in the opposing one...

I strongly believe most players will be extremely happy to see more demigod choices in the game, so I hope the designers will put some more weight on this side of the game. The hero gameplay concepts for such a game are endless.

Thanks for your answers so far, bed time

I think a lot of people may be uninformed about the depth of each Demigod or the potential for the depth of each Demigod.  Demigods have far more depth than they do in a game like Defense of the Ancients (which it sounds like you might be comparing it to).  In DotA, each hero is very limited to play strategy in that each hero always gets the same skills, while not necessarily in the same order, ultimately the hero will have every skill maxed.

Another point, would you rather have 8 really balanced Demigods or a slew of unbalanced ones?  Again, to look at DotA on this, sure there might be close to 100 heroes, but they are not all balanced, not at all. 

I think the point I am trying to make is that while 8 may seem like a small number, take comfort in knowing that each will be finely tuned, which will result in more enjoyment for everyone.  I think it is safe to assume more Demigods are on the way as well.

The end reason for why this bothers people is because "unique" makes games "fresh", and for far longer.

Street Fighter 2 is an old game, it was fine back then with console limitations, but now the cast is far larger. It's a poor example, as is WoW. Wow also recieved flack for it's lack of classes as well,  but that was until people found out that the talent trees gave you a lot of customization and each class already recieved like 40+ abilities, compared to other games (like FFXI) where you received at max 10 and without customization.

DoTA does have a lot of heroes that aren't used and a small elite cluster that the skilled players stick with, but the reasoning is simple: Balance. That's still also a poor excuse for lack of heroes, even though DoTA can't balance their heroes well (and I don't blame them, balance is very hard to do in many games because you have to predict so many situations..) they do have a roster of very unique and different heroes. Not bad for a mod.

I'm not attacking Demigod or the Dev's, I'm sure there are a lot of reasons why we only have 8 Demigods at the moment. Still, I agree with the OP. It's very unfortunate that we don't have at least six more at release to mix things up a bit. I'm sure more will come eventually and I'll be there on launch day regardless, but it still would of been nice.

I would have to say that the only thing that I had to re-read when I read the previews for this game was that only 8 playable demigods would make it into the release.  It's that unique factor as Cerulean_Shaman stated best, players like spawning and knowing they are the only one in the room with the powers and abilities of their current demigod. However, I think the customizablilty (is that a word ) of the 8 we are given will be a pleasent suprise to those of us without the beta, and speculating on this aspect of the game.

Each Demigod has a lot lot more skill choices than an equivalent Hero.  They still need some balancing, but the Rook on your team might be playing a completely different build than the Rook on my team, and you might pick a different build depending on which Demigods are playing with or against you.  At this point you can see three or four discrete builds for each DG (though maybe only one or two of those are well-balanced right now) and you can mix and match your skill lines to taste.  How many ways can you play Pudge?