Why Early Access?

“This project is designed to grow with its community. Early Access allows players to experience the world as it takes shape and directly influence its evolution. The core systems—combat, progression, and exploration, are all refined from launch. What remains is scale: more bosses, more biomes, deeper story content, refined balance, and expanded endgame systems.

By launching in Early Access, we can gather real player feedback, fine-tune pacing, and shape future updates with the community at the center.”

Approximately how long will this game be in Early Access?

“The game will remain in Early Access for approximately three months. During this period, updates will focus on expanding content, refining combat and progression, improving performance, and integrating community feedback. The goal is a polished, feature-complete 1.0 launch shortly after that window.”

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

“We plan for the full version of Kōyō to expand on every core system introduced in Early Access. Our current intention is to grow the valley with additional areas to explore, new enemy types, more dungeons, and further chapters of the narrative. We also plan to introduce new weapon types, armor sets, talismans, and progression paths that deepen both combat and build variety.

On the homestead side, we plan to broaden farming, crafting, and village interactions so players have more long-term goals and systems that feed into combat upgrades. We are also exploring additional festivals, side quests, and optional characters that enrich the world and make the valley feel more alive.

Combat encounters, balance, and enemy behaviors will continue to evolve based on community feedback. We plan to add more bosses, expanded yokai variety, and additional mechanics that increase replayability.

Our intention is for the full release to feel like a larger, richer, and more complete version of the world introduced in Early Access, while keeping the same core focus on fast action, satisfying progression, and atmospheric exploration.”

What is the current state of the Early Access version?

“The Early Access version of Kōyō contains the full core gameplay loop and a solid slice of the valley to explore. Players can progress through the opening chapters of the story, fight yokai using the complete combat foundation, and explore several handcrafted biomes and dungeons. Core systems such as dodge-based melee combat, loot drops, equipment upgrades, light farming, gathering, forging, and early homestead progression are already playable.

Enemy AI, bosses, and dungeon encounters are fully functional, with additional variations planned during EA. The game includes early versions of crafting, farming, and resource gathering, along with the first set of weapons, armor pieces, talismans, and consumables.

The world is explorable, with environmental details, landmarks, shrines, and the central Warding Tree already implemented. Performance settings, controller support, and save functionality are also in place.

While the Early Access version represents a complete playable experience, it is still in active development. Content depth, polishing, and the variety of dungeons, enemies, items, and story events will continue to expand throughout Early Access.”

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

“We do not plan to change the price during or after Early Access.”

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

“We plan to involve the community directly throughout Early Access by gathering feedback on combat balance, progression pacing, enemy behavior, and new content as it’s introduced. Player suggestions will help shape future updates, including new dungeons, items, enemies, and quality-of-life improvements.

We’ll be using the Steam Community Hub, Discord, and in-game feedback tools to collect bug reports, feature requests, and ideas from players. Community polls and update previews will help guide what we prioritize next.

Our goal is to build Kōyō alongside the people playing it. Listening closely, iterating quickly, and making adjustments based on what feels best in the hands of the community.”