Future of KINGDOMS

[Cyfieithydd]

Well, this post won't be optimistic one and before describing the problem, i want to thank all of you for the support i got since game was release till the point we're standing at the moment. I've been thinking quite long time (about whole last week) to post it or not, but we all decided that i'll share with you all the info about development and my plans, so i'll be honest with you till the end. For me it's very hard to write all this, i really love KINGDOMS and all this situation is just driving me mad. I'll try to describe the problem step by step so you can see full picture.

I've spend almost a year (since Autumn 2017 to Summer 2018) to totally converse the game (more info here if you've missed it:
https://steamcommunity.com/games/409590/announcements/detail/3427693908974437526
It was probably the most hard year in my life, full of stress and crunches - but i hoped that the result will worth it. It was released in October 2018 and by that time i was full of optimism to move forward. The plan was to release stable updates every month after conversing the game and it's perfectly working - there were 3 major updates since that time.
https://steamcommunity.com/games/409590/announcements/detail/3422065577037969627
https://steamcommunity.com/games/409590/announcements/detail/1690435234147370730
https://steamcommunity.com/games/409590/announcements/detail/1690437771506658087

I really hope that they were full of content and most of you enjoyed new stuff.

As you know KINGDOMS is my full time work, not a hobby - i'm single indie developer in full meaning of this word, i'm working at home, i've left my job (I was working as a German teacher in school) to give all my time to my dream project. It made me, my wife and my 5-yo son fully dependend on KINGDOMS success. Since summer Steam changed something in search and recomendation logic - Steam started to show AAA titles as recommended on various pages, some game couldn't set sales properly, search didn't show games correctly etc.etc. As result the income of almost indie developers on Steam was about X10 worse than usual. (You can find some posts on Reddit written by indie developers, not trash ones but rather professional).

I was thinking that my personal low income was connected with my own stupidity (closing Communty and banning in summer) , but i was surprised that not only me experienced same problems. My average income in last 4 month was about ~500$ per month, and during this time i was told to myself "Everything is fine, just work hard, deliver good updates and things are gonna be better". The problem is - things are worse. (Worse than 500$ pro month) My plan now is to wait next 2-3 month (updating the game monthly of course) and watch the dynamic - if things will change, then game will be finished in full scale as initially planned. If not - in last update i'll fix the most annoying bugs and will release the game out of EA. (For me it will be the death of my beloved child).

Another problem are reviews. That's one more thing that was probably changed by Valve in summer - now even after one single negative review your sold copies will be zero. For example, one day last review rating was 78% and game got 15 sold copies (the best result actually for last month, i started to believe that things are gonna change), but the next day after one single negative review game got zero sold copies (by 75% positive rating, positive rating = 0 copies). Sometimes reading reviews i'm just thinking that the game is the buggy crap and no matter what i'm adding or fixing it will be crap and trash. Many reviews are the only ones from the account so the game is really bad if the person decides to write first review for unfinished EA title. After reading positives ones i'm usually get back to normal, but then at some moment i'm getting bunch of negative stuff and circle repeats. That's really hard not to mention it, but i'm trying to keep positive. Maybe single-player is truly dying and only AAA titles can survive massive PVP madness, don’t know.

Hope we're all adult people here and all of you understand that my family can't just eat air, we fully depend on Kingdoms income. Again, i want to repeat that the game will be finished anyway, so i won't just say "F*** it" and leave without any explanation. So 2-3 month i'll be with you for sure. I don't think that this post will change anything but at least i shared all my thoughts and concerns with you.

Peace.

[Rezulm]

Thanks for the honesty. I can't imagine the stress and pressure it would cause. Thank you for the work you've put in as I have enjoyed many hours in the game and enjoyed watching the game change and grow.

One thing I think could be hurting the game is that there are many games and other things like movies, shows etc that have the word "Kingdoms" in the name. It might make it hard for the niche kind of gamer that would be into a game like this to find it or look it up.

Other than that, keep your head up and do what you have to for your family. Regular updates could be smaller and sometimes with just bugfixes if needed. People just want to see you're still here and active. Things will work out eventually, how they're meant to. The game was already worth the price ages ago and keeps improving.

[Aeh]

Well i didn't expect your situation to be like this, i hope it will get better because this game is the only one i look forward to and i understand your love for it, i really hope you will be able to finish it. Maybe if you have to abandon the project the community (if someone has the skills) could try and finish it instead of putting it out of early access ?

[UTJohnnyDollar]

Sorry to hear about your struggles. I can't imagine how stressful that would. One thing I am going to do (and I would like to request everyone do that enjoys Kingdoms) is write a review. I have not done it yet so I should do it now! I will give you a good review because I really love this game (and the idea of the game). It is one of those games I keep coming back to long after I have lost interest in other games.

[RedVarg]

Thank you for sharing this info. It's sad but fully understandable. I was sure, that it wasn't your only job so it came as surprise.
As you know, you can count on this community with help in development. I hope, that it brings you some reassurance.
Good luck

[..]

thank you for the updates, i think this is the only game i have actually been checking for updates as this game is so much fun. also, because u are so honest to the people, i think that leaves a very good mark on people. what i just want to say (my english is not very good sorry) is thank you for not giving up on us!

[mcdonald447]

I have removed tthe game couple months ago from my computer to make room. I reinstalled it about a week ago and in total have 130 hours into it. This latest version seems too be progress I used the F11 button 4-5 times due to the build roads bug. But can't actully talk a lot with the NPC or get any quest to make fame. But overall think if the game stops tomorrow I got my moneys worth of game play. Hopefully you will be able to take care of family first I would love to see this finished but feed kids and payrent ect.Hopefully the crowd will understand. I would'nt bought early access game if my family could not afford it.Thanks for 130 hours of exploration and killing time I give it a win.

[Zillacus]

Thanks for sharing. As stated before we more than got our monies worth. I ,like others, would love to see this game in its full potential. In its current state is an awesome consept.

IMO if the combat/archery were fixed, add basic kill/fetch quests and minor bug fixes ( road recalc and walking through city walls) you could easily up the price another $5-$10.

[legeis90]

Have you *knocks on wood* ever consider *cringes * partnering with a larger game developer?

Like what stonehearth did when they ran into a funding issue.

Look in not going to pretend the developers of stonehearth didn't have to make comprimises when they sold to Riot but it at least allowed them to continue development untill the features they initiallty promised were compleate. Although once they didn finish the initally promised features they had to halt deveopment rather sudenly and towrds the end there it seemed kinnda rushed.

But if things don't get better it might at least be a way to help keep the game alive.

[legeis90]

Originally posted by UTJohnnyDollar:

Sorry to hear about your struggles. I can't imagine how stressful that would. One thing I am going to do (and I would like to request everyone do that enjoys Kingdoms) is write a review. I have not done it yet so I should do it now! I will give you a good review because I really love this game (and the idea of the game). It is one of those games I keep coming back to long after I have lost interest in other games.

On the note of writeing reviews on thing that can be done to help is even if you have already reviewed the game if it was a while ago you can delete you old review and post a new review....I dont know if this actually helps but I belive while it wount effect over all reviews it may give a boost to the recent review metric. which for an early acess game is the most important.

I always value recent reviews over overall reviews when deciding wheter to buy an early access game because it a better indicater of the games current state. Ya know if it was a buggy mess a while ago but has gotten 100x better that matters for a game in EA, or if a game showed a lot of prommis early on but recent updated turned it into a hot pile of garbage that also matters for a game in EA.

So I think we could help by rereviewing the game!

[MacK56]

Just bought this game to help support you. I love the idea of where you are going with it. I noticed that Kingdoms did not show up on the first page of steam even when I searched "kingdoms" specifically looking for your game. It was hard to find and I only found it a week ago despite playing many simlar games. I wish you all the best and look forward to seeing where it goes. I also noticed that there is virtually 0 videos covering the new update from the community on youtube or any wiki presence. Perhaps the community can help out by showing off the devs content??

[Peanut Arbuckle]

This is my favorite EA game but this is understandable, hopefully things work out

[UTJohnnyDollar]

Originally posted by MacK56:

Just bought this game to help support you. I love the idea of where you are going with it. I noticed that Kingdoms did not show up on the first page of steam even when I searched "kingdoms" specifically looking for your game. It was hard to find and I only found it a week ago despite playing many simlar games. I wish you all the best and look forward to seeing where it goes. I also noticed that there is virtually 0 videos covering the new update from the community on youtube or any wiki presence. Perhaps the community can help out by showing off the devs content??

The fact that Kingdoms is difficult to find in Steam frustrates me to no end. Steam needs to get their act together!

[Fyro]

I love this game and probably only one I'm waiting to be completed. Have you ever considered doing a gofundme type of raising the money? I know those that want this game to do well would be willing to.

Goodluck mate.

[UTJohnnyDollar]

Originally posted by Fyro:

I love this game and probably only one I'm waiting to be completed. Have you ever considered doing a gofundme type of raising the money? I know those that want this game to do well would be willing to.

Goodluck mate.

Great idea! I'd contribute.

[o.nozicka]

Originally posted by Fyro:

I love this game and probably only one I'm waiting to be completed. Have you ever considered doing a gofundme type of raising the money? I know those that want this game to do well would be willing to.

Goodluck mate.

Would send $ also...