Why Early Access?

“We have been developing our game for about 2 years now and have a small community from our closed alpha that really enjoys playing the existing core gameplay loop. While the core gameplay is already fully developed, many advanced feature still need implementation. The feedback from our community has often surprised us and made us re-evaluate our priorities, and as a result, we are eager to open the conversation up to a broader audience. There are many directions the game could take from here and we hope to see what players will enjoy and what additional features they would want us to prioritise.”

Approximately how long will this game be in Early Access?

“This is difficult to say. At the moment, we are expecting further development to roughly take one year, but this timeline could change depending on how the game is received by the community and what features we ultimately include.”

How is the full version planned to differ from the Early Access version?

“Some of the bigger points we have on our roadmap are:

- a singleplayer campaign across multiple maps
- AI opponents
- a scouting system that allows you to get intelligence on your island and competitors (including a map)
- a system to research new technologies and items (e.g. more accurate guns)
- improving the jungle to create a mysterious and threatening environment that needs to be tamed (e.g. denser foliage, unique areas, animals)
- improving city building to become a more involved and rich experience (e.g. beautification buildings, work animations, ambient characters)
- improving combat to be more tactical and varied (e.g. industries to create weapons, more units)
- visual improvements (UI, models, animations, etc)

Depending on community feedback, we may prioritise some over others, and may decide to drop some of these points in favour of some that are yet to crystalise. We are a team of two, developing this game part-time after work, so at the moment, we are expecting that we will have to narrow our focus to create a polished but smaller game, focusing on 2 or 3 of the above points. Should we get sufficient support to allow us to work on this full-time, we will likely be able to include more of the features, and create a broader experience for a wider audience.

Regardless, the final product will be a game that provides a rewarding experience for the player and will be centered around the idea of smart re-investment of your money. The end goal and context will be adjusted based on player feedback, but could potentially be more focused on base building, exploration, PvP multiplayer, or a co-op campaign.”

What is the current state of the Early Access version?

“At the moment, we have a solid core gameplay loop based on placing buildings, re-investing coin to improve production, and basic military units. We have a robust logistics system, and have worked hard on making the balance of first person view and RTS style gameplay as seamless as possible. The game can turn very competitive when played against others, and can be a very calm citybuilding experience when played in singleplayer. There are some bugs that can require some player intervention to recover (e.g. bringing the last 5 wood to a building for it to get finished), but we have not had gamebreaking bugs for some versions and are ironing out issues with every release. Many aspects of gameplay are random, such as loot and ore vein spawns, the seed market, or player position, so some of our players have already put dozens of hours into the game at this point.”

Will the game be priced differently during and after Early Access?

“We want to charge players for what is already in the game, so we intend to raise the price with major updates as seems appropriate.”

How are you planning on involving the Community in your development process?

“We have a discord server that we primarily use for active discussion on the game's development, and are also engaging with feedback on a range of other social media such as reddit or youtube. Especially on discord, we have a dedicated channel for player feedback, and we regularly ask our players for their opinion on upcoming features or more recent inclusions. We have also repeatedly joined our players in multiplayer games to understand their experiences in real time. Based on the community's feedback, we will adjust our priorities and potentially add or remove features from the roadmap.”