Why Early Access?

“I feel Early Access is great for a fighting game. Most fighting games start off with a vanilla version that eventually changes due to balance patches. I'd say MerFight is currently in its vanilla bean phase, and I want to use the Early Access period to polish various aspects of MerFight's visuals, audio, and mechanics.

Right now, MerFight's cast of 12 seems pretty much complete, but as a solo developer, there are a lot of little things I may have missed gameplay wise and probably a lot of bugs. I want to work with an Early Access community to help garner that feedback to make the initial cast and overall gameplay better stronger. This can and will most certainly include feedback concerning visuals and audio, but I'm also looking for finer detail comments such as hitsphere placement and sizing, frame data, movement speeds, etc.

Also, because my rollback netcode solution is custom, I want to increase my community and stress test said netcode to see where it fails and needs improvements. I also want to slowly begin implementing my single player content and see if said content is engaging enough for my Early Access community.

Overall, I want to put MerFight into Early Access to garner feedback on all aspects of the game as I continue to work on MerFight's content, polish, and more.”

Approximately how long will this game be in Early Access?

“I ran a small Kickstarter campaign in fall of 2021. My goal was to have the game in Early Access for a little over a year, so my hope is to leave Early Access by April of 2023.

In that time, my hope is to have improved the visuals, audio, gameplay, and the amount of single player content in MerFight.”

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

“I'd like to do the following throughout Early Access:

• Improve AI for both Arcade and Story mode
  
• Implement Story mode as a whole
  
• Add various unlockables (costumes, colors, banners, achievements, etc.)
  
• Improve the online play where possible
  
• Polish the visuals of the current and finish the remaining stages
  
• Implement voice-over for the cast
  
• Improve the game's VFX
  
• Improve character mechanics and gameplay
  
• Bug fixing

A lot of the Early Access period will be focused content and polish, but said polish will extend to gameplay and mechanics as well.

If development is going smoothly, it'd also be great to expand the cast during Early Access from 12 to 16, but I am NOT promising that; however, I do plan on growing the cast through DLC after MerFight leaves Early Access.”

What is the current state of the Early Access version?

“MerFight currently has...

• 12 playable characters
  
• A simple arcade mode
  
• Local versus
  
• Online, 8-player lobbies, ranked mode (that's currently best of 3), and casual quick matches
  
• Some combo challenges as well as block & punish challenges
  
• Replay saving and viewing

”

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

“NO
Originally, I had planned on releasing the game with a slightly higher price during Early Access since I thought players would be getting an advantage by being able to play the game sooner, but updates between versions can be so drastic that this advantage doesn't mean a lot, so in the end, I decided to just keep it the same throughout.”

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

“MerFight already has a community through the Mattrified Games's discord -- https://discord.com/invite/VeaU9bg -- where a lot of feedback on its alpha version has already influenced MerFight's direction to a degree. Feedback ranging from frame data suggestions, system changes -- the Guard Pop mechanic came from community feedback for example -- to bugs, and more have been discussed, and I imagine more of the same coming from MerFight's Early Access community. I'd also like to hold online tournaments for the game; there have been a few already, and I always learn a lot from watching them.

The previously mentioned discord is probably the preferred place to give and discuss feedback and interact with the community, but I will try to also consider feedback given here or through other methods.

NOTE: I am practically a solo developer!!! A fair amount of talented people have worked on illustration, audio, and voice acting, but I've been doing all of design and engineering myself. That being said, getting a lot of feedback can sometimes be overwhelming, but I will do my best to consider all feedback that is clear, actionable and respectful.”