Why Early Access?

“We need to figure out what direction to take the game, and which mechanics to implement.

Do people like running the shop itself, or is it too slow-paced? Do they prefer running dungeons, or are they too hard / not rewarding enough? Does everyone ignore the crafting system, because the profit margins are too low? Which parts of the game are resonating with people, so we can spend more of our energy on that?

There are plenty of unfinished or underbaked features. We plan to incorporate player feedback and ask the community for direction.

Things like the user interface, combat balance, and enemy behaviour are rough around the edges. It's the kind of thing we need to put in front of people and hear what's wrong specifically before we can improve it.”

Approximately how long will this game be in Early Access?

“We anticipate taking 6 to 18 months for a fully polished 1.0 release. We want to focus on the missing mechanics first, then flesh out more cosmetic stuff like monster visual variety.”

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

“Compared to our ideal 1.0 release:

=Missing Mechanics=
- NPC Employees
- Farming
- Fishing
- Pet training (you can tame them now to simply follow you around; eventually we would like to allow you to give them commands and use them in combat)
- Ideas to be suggested by the early access playerbase!

=Missing Content=

The dungeons are missing a lot of content, as we were focused on getting the game mechanics in place for the alpha.

- Each of the 15 dungeons has at least one unique monster.

- Each dungeon currently has a unique dungeon -- e.g. the Vampire Lair has spooky red mist and wooden walls, while the Goblin Cave has damp rock walls. All the dungeons do have unique loot lists: you find blood in the Vampire Lair, potions in the witch hut, etc.

- We have 4 of a planned 12 non-monster animals implemented.

- Various items. There are over 100 items but only few pieces of armour - all of them hats.

=Needs Balancing=

- The base prices of items. We need to hear testers' input about this. What feels fun? What feels like a slog? What's so good you can't avoid it, and so bad you never use it?

- Progression in general is kind of all over the place. We need to figure out how long players stay in the "every copper coin matters" stage, when they should feel like "I want an npc employee RIGHT NOW and I should be able to afford it", and so on. This is not something we can figure out on our own - every person is different, we can't balance it based on our own opinions.

- Combat. This is the roughest part of the game right now, for sure. Personally, I find it fun, but I need to know if other people do, and what needs changing.

- UI/UX/Control scheme - Some inputs feel very awkward, and we'd like feedback.

- Balanced things like enemy health, weapon damage, item base pricing, etc. based on player feedback.

- Attempt to make better visuals - particles, shaders, meshes, textures, lighting.

- Attempt to improve multiplayer netcode. It works great with low latency, but there's currently no rollback or clientside prediction, so high-latency games are untenable.

=Other=
- More clarity and insight into how NPCs work. There's actually a very cool, simulated mini-economy powering the game, but I've left that information too obfuscated to be useful or interesting to the player right now.”

What is the current state of the Early Access version?

“Playtesters say the fun is there! The core game loop works, but not every game mechanic is implemented. What's mostly missing is content and balancing. Currently the 2d sprites for item icons and the user interface are quick programmer-made sketches or outright placeholders.

Currently implemented:
- Stacking shelves, setting prices, selling items.
- Over 100 items to craft, gather, buy and sell.
- A tutorial for the basic controls and concepts.
- Buying wholesale from NPC vendors.
- Tracking shop statistics, customer desires, etc.
- Customers who intelligently buy items based on their job needs.
- 15 Dungeons (2 secret, 1 endgame). We plan to have at least a few unique enemies and a boss per dungeon; currently there is only 1 per dungeon, and bosses are just scaled up normal enemies.
- Creatures. We have 4 (emu, camel, dingo, pig), but would like to add more.
- Basic combat and simple monster AI (both need improvement)
- Basic crafting - a cooking table and an alchemy table.”

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

“We plan to raise the price after the end of early access, with the release of 1.0.”

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

“- Ingame bug reporting / feedback sending to open bug tracker issues directly
- Opt-in analytics so we can see what people like and dislike
- Community polls to vote on development priorities. "For the next patch, should we focus on A. More monsters, B. Bugfixes, C. Multiplayer netcode improvements?", stuff like that.
- Join us on the Steam community forums or our discord to be a part of the development process
- Upon 1.0 release, all EA players will be credited in-game as "Beta Testers"”