Update 16
Those other games are green with envy[edit]
Feb 20 2015
As some of you already know, Underworld Ascendant has been Greenlit on Steam! Only took a week. Not sure if that’s a record, but mighty fast. Huge thanks to all the fans who gave the game a big YES and helped bring us to the attention of the tens of millions of players on Steam. We are still in early prototype development, so many months to go before we’d have a build for Steam. But sweet that we’ve got a slot warmed up and waiting, for when we do.
Wanted to introduce you two more on the OtherSide team. Chris Siegel is the Senior Producer on the project. His job is to keep the rest of us in line, and wrestle any stray raccoons that wander in from the street. Chris worked with me at LookingGlass on Thief and several other projects, and then did an extended stay at Turbine working as producer on several of their leading MMOs. Steve Pearsall is our jack-of-all-trades, wearing a half-dozen hats at any time. Steve also worked with me at LookingGlass, including as Producer on Thief Gold. Between these two they have shipped over a dozen award-winning games, so they know how to deliver.
Also wanted to share what we’ve learned so far from the forum polls:
- 74% have played the Underworlds before - glad so many enjoyed the originals!
- 28% have some or a lot of interest in VR - lower than we anticipated
- 8% play their games on Mac or Linux - actually more than we anticipated
- 42% have some or a lot of interest in Co-Op - about what we anticipated
- 97% have been playing PC games for a decade or longer - where are the young’uns?
I suspect that the lack of VR interest is partially reflective of VR not yet being a mature technology. Sooner or later there is going to be a killer VR game, and then interest will grow. Clearly we need to find way to reach some of the younger gamers, who otherwise are missing out on a wonderful game.
We reached 9,000 Backers this morning!!! Welcome all the new fans to the wonderful ride we’re on to rekindle the Underworld franchise! Now let’s see if we can get over 9,100 Backers by this Sunday noon, so that the Dark Elf Sling will come with bonus purple Splatter Seeds…
Sharing this fan submission from Sark, where he becomes caretaker of his very own faction, when he was a kid no less: “In the first levels of the Stygian Abyss there was a faction of green goblins living inside a big hall that was locked by an iron gate. I loved to charm them, fill the room up with summoned Creatures, bring my treasures there, and lock them in by lock picking the iron gate. I called it my Stronghold and thought I was their King.”
Finally, the team is going to catch their breath this weekend. The campaign has been 7 long days a week so far. We need a day over the weekend to recharge our batteries for the final week-and-a-half push. As such, no Update this weekend. We will have an extra big Update first thing Monday morning.
Paul Neurath