Why Early Access?

“Since this is an Indie game, it is important for me to gather feedback from the community and improve the game based on player's needs and preferences. It will help me prioritize effort in order to guide the next steps. ”

Approximately how long will this game be in Early Access?

“I expect to take 3 months to finish the game engine. Then I expect to take 3 months on the game art and text. Therefore, the Early Access is expected to take 6 months, period where players can suggest improvements, which I will do my best to add to the game if doable.”

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

“My plan is to finish game engine, including all the game concepts, such as the simulator, the multiplayer duels, etc. Some work will be required to fine tune the parameters.
There is also a lot of work on:
* Bug fixing,
* Improvement of details: more items, quests, missions, effects, animations, etc.

Then some work is needed on the game arts and text/story. ”

What is the current state of the Early Access version?

“The whole game described in "About This Game" is already in this build and playable from start to finish. Please refer to that section for details. In short, the Early Access version includes:

- The full campaign: 10 ages from a stone-age village to the modern era, with 78 technologies, 99 kinds of building and 75 production recipes.
- The economy simulation: every household has a class, a wage and a pantry. Markets set prices, and policies change how satisfied each class is and how legitimate your government is.
- All four endings (Solarpunk, Cyberpunk, Paradise and Wasteland) can be reached. Each one has its own buildings, streets and skyline.
- The street view: you can leave the map at any time and walk your city as one of its households. You can run errands and courier jobs, learn a trade, buy and drive a car, and go down into the cave dungeons. There you fight monsters, level up, craft gear and cast spells.
- Automation: you can hand your country to its own government and watch it play itself to any of the four endings.
Multiplayer: online over Steam and on a local network, with several nations sharing one world, plus co-op where several players run one nation together.
- Saves: saving and loading, Steam Cloud saves, and achievements.
- Languages: the interface is in 14 languages. There is no voice acting in the game.

What is still rough, and what Early Access is for:

- Balance: economy and progression numbers, such as prices, wages, growth rates and how long each age takes, still need tuning. Some games may feel too easy, too slow or too punishing.
- Interface: the interface is the part that changes most often. Some actions take more clicks than they should, and some information is hard to find.
Multiplayer is newer and less tested than single-player. Expect occasional sync problems or disconnects.
- Translations other than English were machine-assisted and have not yet been checked by native speakers.
- Bugs: expect bugs and some unexpected behaviour, especially in long games and large cities.
- Not supported yet: controllers and Steam Deck.
- Updates will fix bugs, recalibrate the balance, and make the interface and the street view more natural to use.”

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

“Yes, considerably different. There are improvements that must be done regarding (1) the game itself; (2) arts; (3) text; (4) suggestions and improvements from community. After those 4 layers of improvements are finished, the game will be release as version 1.0. The price is expected to increase 2x to 4x when the game gets reasonably mature. ”

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

“I would like to have open discussions with the community. I want to hear the community opinion about the game, and do my best to improve the game to fix all the issues found by the community.”