Where the Water Tastes Like Wine is an ambitious journey through the heartland of American history that unfortunately failed to live up to those ambitions, and is best remembered these days for being a "commercial disaster." Despite that, a new update for the game called Gold Mountain was released today that adds full Chinese localization to the free Fireside Chats, and new stories based on the experiences of Chinese immigrants.

The Chinese localization was done by fans, according to the Steam update, who have been working on it for four months so far. "We are humbled and gratified by this, and we hope that Chinese players can play and enjoy our game, and understand our criticism of and reflection on America history and American culture," creator Johnnemann Nordhagen wrote.

"We know that China has its own wonderful and varied folklore in its thousands of years of history, and we hope that players there find our relatively small and brief American history and folklore to be interesting to them."

To pay tribute to the "generally overlooked" role played by Chinese immigrants in US history, new stories that focus on the role they played in shaping the country, written by Serenity Forge head Zhenghua Yang, have also been added to the game. 

"From miners in California to the railroad workers who bridged the continent to a whole host of other folks, Chinese immigrants have played a huge role in building this country. We're happy to be able to write more exploring their stories," Nordhagen wrote.

Bolstered by those new stories, the addition of Chinese language support, which includes the full game and the soundtrack lyrics, could help Where the Water Tastes Like Wine find the audience that's eluded it thus far. The localization is currently limited to Fireside Chats, the free "standalone experience" released late last year, but will come to the full game once everything is finished. Owners of the game will get the new content as part of a free update; for those who don't, it's also 60 percent off on Steam until July 17, dropping it to $8/£6/€8.

The story of Where the Water Tastes Like Wine is an interesting one. Some game sites rated it very highly, while others—including ours—were much cooler on it. Some of the tales it tells "are beautiful, and they're all important," we wrote in our review, but they're told "at an agonizingly slow pace" that brings the entire experience down. And in any event, it was a sales disaster.

Despite all that, publisher Good Shepherd Entertainment isn't letting it go quietly. Today it released a free, standalone "companion" to the game called Where the Water Tastes Like Wine: Fireside Chats, which adds new story content to all of the tales told in the 16 chapters of the core game.   

"Like the full game, the Where The Water Tastes Like Wine: Fireside Chats experience allows players wander through the United States—and through a century of history—to meet a variety of people, each with their own stories to tell," Good Shepherd said.

Fireside Chats also serves as a demo for the original release, as it includes all of the Dire Wolf's first chapter from the full game.   

Where the Water Tastes Like Wine: Fireside Chats is currently available exclusively on Steam. Good Shepherd said there's a chance it will make it to GOG as well (the core game is available there), but "it won't be anytime soon." 

We were pretty excited about American folk-tale travelogue Where the Water Tastes Like Wine when we first heard about it, but upon release our reviewer Tyler Wilde was moderate in his praise: "It tells over 200 tiny tales, and several bigger ones, at an agonizingly slow pace. There's truth to find within its choppy transcontinental trek, but it comes at the expense of sore eyes."

Since then it's been updated, and a patch from March added the ability to return to locations by using the mementos found there, and also increased the distance covered by fast-travel between cities in the second half of the game. The June 3 patch, called the 'Tall Tales Update', further tweaks the pacing, with an autowalk option activated by pressing F so you don't have to wear down the W key on your long trek across the United States (it's right bumper on controller). As well as modifying the way travel works, and catching a few bugs, this patch adds to the trove of tales you'll find while criss-crossing America.

As the patch notes put it, "We've released some new stories by some new writers! In the latest update you'll find 15 new vignettes scattered around the country, ranging from the terrifying to the disgusting to the hilarious." If you've been put off Where the Water Tastes Like Wine due to its stately tempo, seems like now is the time to give it another chance.

Story adventure game Where The Water Tastes Like Wine struggled critically and flopped commercially, lead developer Johnnemann Nordhagen said today in a post-mortem of the game, in which he argues that its difficulties don't bode well for experimental indie games. 

"Commercially, it’s a disaster," Nordhagen said. "I can’t discuss exact numbers, but in the first few weeks fewer people bought the game than I have Twitter followers, and I don’t have a lot of Twitter followers." (At the time of writing, Nordhagen has 4,272 followers.) 

Although Nordhagen received support from publisher Good Shepherd to complete and market the game, Where The Water Tastes Like Wine has yet to break even. "So far, I have made $0 from the game," he said. "That may look like a high number, but consider that it took four years to make — that works out to approximately $0/year … And then once you factor in the ~$140,000 I spent paying my contractors and collaborators for the game, you begin to see that maybe it wasn’t, financially speaking, worth it."

"Joking aside — that’s dismal. And terrifying," Nordhagen said. "At the end of the day it’s astounding that a game that got this much attention from the press, that won awards, that had an all-star cast of writers and performers, that had a bizarre celebrity guest appearance(!) failed this hard. It scares me." 

To Nordhagen, it's evidence of a growing trend for indie games: quality, acclaim, and attention aren't guarantees of success. "That last part should be worrying for anyone in the indie games industry," Nordhagen said. "[Where The Water Tastes Like Wine] could have been a non-commercial game, but it would have had to be very different. It would be far less polished, it wouldn’t have had the collaborators that it did, I could not have paid people who couldn’t afford to work for revenue share or for the love of the game (thus, I fear, cutting out some of the most valuable voices that this game was a platform for). I could have developed it as a side project, but it took me four years as is. Basically, I’m not sure that games like this one can continue to be made in the current market." 

Nordhagen also discussed the development factors he believes contributed to Where The Water Tastes Like Wine's uphill battle. For example, it received relatively little playtesting, especially close to launch, and it abruptly lost both of its main artists mid-development. "I didn’t originally have the knowledge I needed to tackle many of the issues I encountered during development," he said, adding that the game itself "was too much to take on as a solo dev, and especially too much to take on as a commercial product." 

Nordhagen previously worked as lead programmer on Gone Home, which was well-received when it released in 2014. Encouraged by Gone Home's success, Nordhagen was optimistic about Where The Water Tastes Like Wine. However, in 2018, he's unsure if creating games like these is even feasible.  

"In 2014, starting a similar project seemed like a good creative and financial risk," he said. "Four years later, making any commercial game at all seems like a bad idea, and taking on the risk of an experimental, ambitious game like Where the Water Tastes Like Wine sounds terrifying."  

Writer and designer Steve Gaynor, who also worked on Gone Home, made a similar point about experimental games when we spoke to him following the release of Fullbright's Tacoma, a delightful narrative-driven game whose sales paled in comparison to Gone Home's at launch.

"I think there were a lot of things about Gone Home’s launch that were kind of 'lightning in a bottle,'" Gaynor said. "2013 I think was a very different time for smaller indie games coming out that were kind of reaching into the triple-A fidelity space. Also I think that we were lucky to be responding to what I think was a real desire for more games that were less violent or more focused on story or whatever. And so yeah, Tacoma’s release I think has been a much more realistic version of what launching a game is usually like."

Nordhagen's post-mortem focuses on the game's development and reception, but he's not the only member of the team to look back on Where The Water Tastes Like Wine. Lead editor Laura Michet wrote a lengthy analysis of the herculean task of coordinating the game's many writers, and several writers, like Emily Short, have explored how they wrote their individual characters. You can find more analyses in Nordhagen's post. 

Where The Water Tastes Like Wine is a mouthful of a title. It's also a promising adventure game set in the US during the Great Depression. More specifically, it's a narrative-focused game about collecting experiences which is inspired by the likes of Kentucky Route Zero and Sunless Sea as well as iconic stories like Huckleberry Finn and On the Road. And it's coming out at the end of this month on Wednesday, February 28. 

Here's publisher Good Shepherd Entertainment's comments on the launch date announcement trailer:

"Where the Water Tastes Like Wine is a wistfully imaginative game about traveling the land, sharing stories and surviving manifest destiny. Wander through a century of American folklore and history, encountering an eclectic cast of characters and exploring their deeply personal tales along the way. This surreal journey into the heart of the country’s past features gorgeous illustration from Kellan Jett and Serenity Forge, blending dramatic 2D visuals with a 3D overworld map of the United States." 

Luke saw a bit of Where The Water Tastes Like Wine at last year's Indiecade, and found it immediately engrossing. "The game opens with you losing a hand of cards against an anthropomorphic wolf in a murky, lantern-lit room, who subsequently condemns you to wander the country to gather the apologues of the common people. Things only get stranger from there," he wrote. 

And things did indeed get stranger: in January, we learned that former Police frontman Sting is handling the voice for said wolf. 

Where The Water Tastes Like Wine will go for $20, with a $27 Wayfarer Edition available for those who want its digital soundtrack and art book. 

Where the Water Tastes Like Wine is a "road game" that follows an anonymous backpacker crossing the US during the Great Depression, encountering 16 different characters, each with a unique story arc, along the way. A trailer released today showcases several of those characters and the voice actors behind them, included among them the mononymous rock star and tantric sex pro Sting, who plays the role of the Wolf. 

The game is inspired by narrative-focused adventures like Kentucky Route Zero and Sunless Sea, plus works including Huckleberry Finn, On the Road, and Easy Rider: "That real Paul Bunyon shit," as we said in our October preview. Each of the main characters is written by a different author, which lead designer Johnnemann Nordhagen hopes will give the game a diverse range of perspectives and voices.

"Where the Water Tastes Like Wine is a unique storytelling experience," Sting said. "I'm happy to be a part of this visionary collaboration." 

Other cast members include veteran voice actors Dave Fennoy, whose first IMDB-listed credit is the 1992 Sierra adventure King's Quest 6; Cissy Jones, who voiced Delilah in Firewatch; and Kimberly Brooks, who gave life to Mass Effect space soldier Ashley Williams.   

Where the Water Tastes Like Wine is currently expected to be out early this year. For now, you can find out more about the game via its website, which includes the full list of collaborating actors and authors, and on Steam.