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[nenjin]

Hadn’t seen any updates on the game in a while so I checked the blog.

They were feature complete at the start of the year, and declared “beta” a month ago or so. Play testers have had the game for a couple months. They just put a trailer up as well. Still no release date announced but I imagine we’re getting very close to it.

edit

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvLNHwBXk24

Not really a trailer as much as a dry advertisement. They didn't want a big, flashy, dramatic trailer but I think they went a little too plain. KoDP players will know where the goodness is at, but people unfamiliar with the series?

[LoSboccacc]

yeah especially since is one of those games that looks booooring as heck and then when you enter to play a couple seasons a whole day of your life disappears

[birdy51]

Yeah, the trailer definitely looks like it was made in Windows' Movie Maker or something, but anyone who knows the company will immediately know the game itself will be quality. Can't wait for it to release!

[alakoring]

Still testing and tuning.

[Tiruin]

Oh wow. I only knew of this now. Posting for info!

Also love KoDP. It is extremely tempting to prolong the life of good clan heroes, and I still haven't found out through all my games if finishing a trial benefits future council member potential or just this one person who did said trial (with the big question being how to get those councilmembers stats up other than tons of artifacts, shrines/temples, being in a tribe for goodies and benefits...)

[nenjin]

So the game has a release date: June 28th.

But this announcement comes with a lot more bits that honestly.....have torpedoed my enthusiasm for it.

-It’s an iOS game. It gets a PC and android port sometime in 2019.

-It’s going to be “the first of six games where you can play the same clan through each.” No where do I remember reading they were making an episodic title.

-Gameplay will be both “simpler and richer.” “More combat choices, easier resource management.”

I’m on the fence about #3, but #1 and #2 sound like ass. This was not what I was expecting or looking for. I’m sure it will be a fine game, but it has gone from a Day 1 buy for me to “wait for reviews and when I decide I want to play games on my phone instead of my pc.” Also I hate episodic content. It will have to be an amazing game for me to swallow that. Rarely do episodic games feel driven by the gameplay; rather it’s a decision often motivated by financial realities.

It’s hard not to feel disappointed by all this after just checking on the blog on a whim. They’re thoughtful game designers, but Six Ages now seems like it’s put the platform and revenue first. They say it’s a bigger and richer yet simpler game....that they now want to split up in to multiple games. We’re it not for KoDP’s amazing pedigree, I would already be writing Six Ages off based on their decisions.

He has my sympathies as essentially a one man studio. And I hope SA does well enough they can expand. But still.... very little of this is what I was hoping to hear. And it feels very last minute/unexpected. Maybe I’d have been better prepared if I’d stayed up with the blog.

[dennislp3]

iOS game?...sounds like they are specifically marketing to people who pay more for apps/games than the average user first. That to me is a huge red flag. Is that for microtransactions? General price of the game vs what you get? iOS users are more likely to drop money on the episodic format?

No matter how you spin it I don't see this just being a game....this stinks of a guy trying to take a game and make it some sort of "games as a service"/DLC/episodic gore bullshit that I don't even want to look at.

[nenjin]

I don’t get that impression. His dev blogs are legit. His spirit seems in  the right place.

More he seems to be trapped by dev realities and funding. They’ve been working on SA for a few years now. The App Store is probably the easiest and quickest way for him to get the game deployed and start getting paid.

It’s the episodic content that sits the worst with me though. SA part 1 is going to be a $10 app. So that makes it a $60 game after it’s all done, whenever that is.

Kind of makes his decision to not do Kickstarter seem a little....mistaken. He could have had the funding he needed to get the help he needed to not have to do it this way, despite the counter balance of having time tables and backers to please.

Part of me suspects that they are chopping the game up simply because he wouldn’t have the time or man power to get the whole game out by himself in good order. I doubt they were 6 months out from release before he just up and went “let’s make 6x more game than we originally planned on.”

[Persus13]

Well when they rereleased KoDP, they released it for iOS and then ported it to PC, so I guess that business model worked for them and they decided to stick with it. Also, how would you include microtransactions in a game like KoDP anyway?

I think you're reading to much into the six related games. It sounds to me more like "Now that we're releasing the game I have ideas for 5 other games in the same world" more than "I was going to make one game, but I then decided to chop up the game into 6 pieces and charge separately for them" to me. (FWIW, he specified in the comments of his dev blog that he's thinking something more similar to Mass Effect than Telltale)

The simpler gameplay thing is what has me slightly worried. Also, the fact that that I won't actually be able to play the game until 2019 is pretty disappointing.

[nenjin]

The game went from being called “Six Ages” to “Six Ages: Subtitle.” Make of that what you will.

Also KoDP was a PC release long, long, long before it graced the App Store. 12 years in fact.

[Persus13]

The game went from being called “Six Ages” to “Six Ages: Subtitle.” Make of that what you will.

And its been called that for months. He still refers to it in his dev blog as Six Ages. There's nothing in his dev blog to suggest he cut stuff or is planning on doing episodic content, so I think you're overreacting based on one sentence in a marketing release.

Also KoDP was a PC release long, long, long before it graced the App Store. 12 years in fact.

Well when they rereleased KoDP, they released it for iOS and then ported it to PC, so I guess that business model worked for them and they decided to stick with it.

re·re·lease (rēriˈlēs)
verb
release  again.

I know when KoDP came out. I don't really think a dev is going to use a 1999 release as his business model when Steam and the App Store exist now, and he's been more successful on the iOS store than anything else.

[Mephansteras]

Hmm. Well, I guess we'll have to see how it all shakes out once it hits PC. We'll certainly know more about the game by then if it'll have been on the App store for a while.

[nenjin]

“Gets indignant when I imply they didn’t know when KoDP released.”

“Proceeds to say I believe he should release this game just like he did in 1999.”

Well this discussion is off to a bang up start.

Also, since we’re harping on reading comprehension:

Our plan is that Ride Like the Wind is the first in a series of six related games. You’ll be able to play them in any order, but the idea is that you can continue the story of a clan through the age

That sure as hell reads like episodic content to me. Six Ages: Swim Like The Fish. Six Ages: Lo Like The Cow. Six Ages: Fight Like The Ducks. Playing as the same clan cinches it.

[Persus13]

“Gets indignant when I imply they didn’t know when KoDP released.”

“Proceeds to say I believe he should release this game just like he did in 1999.”

Well this discussion is off to a bang up start.

To be fair, my initial comment on the iOS release was more directed at dennislp3 than you. You then incorrectly assumed that I didn't know about when the game was first released, so I got snippy because I felt like I was being talked down to. I don't believe that you think he should release like he did in 1999, I was just explaining why I didn't consider that relevant to the discussion about releasing on iOS, and I apologize for not making that clearer.

Also, since we’re harping on reading comprehension:

Our plan is that Ride Like the Wind is the first in a series of six related games. You’ll be able to play them in any order, but the idea is that you can continue the story of a clan through the age

That sure as hell reads like episodic content to me. Six Ages: Swim Like The Fish. Six Ages: Lo Like The Cow. Six Ages: Fight Like The Ducks. Playing as the same clan cinches it.

I think the problem here is we're using different definitions of episodic. His mention that you can play the games in any order implies that there's a far bit of time between games (probably an age, considering the title and number), so it won't be episodic like a TellTale game, which was my main concern when I heard your initial use of the term episodic. His description in that post and in the comments makes it sound more of the Elder Scrolls series, only if they just kept going back to Skyrim or Morrowwind, instead of a new location each time.
I don't understand why you're worried about that unless they cut content from this game to include in the other ones, which I'm skeptical that that happened. His dev log is pretty devoid of discussion on the story front of things, so its pretty hard to tell if that's the case, though.

[nenjin]

To me KoDP is one game. I expected SA to be one game. So to me, it’s not 6 complete games as I read it. It’s the idea of SA spread over 6 games. True I’m using the term episodic loosely but I think it fits.

And yeah, sorry for my own snideness. I have no desire to squabble.