Dev Blog #4: Funding Announcement!
Greetings Adventurers!
We have some exciting news about the future for Project Witchstone that we’ve been waiting to talk about until it was 100% locked in, and now that we have it all set in stone we can tell everyone about it. Originally when we came up with the idea for Witchstone we’d considered plans to run a Kickstarter as a way to generate the funding needed to develop the game. We’re a small studio, and while we’re lucky to have had success in the past with games like Stories and Omensight, funding the development of a game takes a lot more money than most would think, especially with a plan for a game that extends into multiple years of development.
Since Witchstone represented a step up from our previous work as far as scope and ambition, we knew we’d need to have a plan for any contingency, thus the original plan to Kickstart the game into Early Access while we worked on it further if that’s what it took to be funded. But as you know, Early Access development comes with its own challenges. As we worked further on the game we realized that it would likely be hard to deliver the quality we were aiming for while also having the ticking clock of making good on crowdfunding expectations as well as supporting public-facing Early Access updates. Over time we’d looked into some options of how we could not only continue development on the game without needing to crowdfund, but also in a way that would allow us to not have to scale back the planned game design, which would have been a major compromise from the original plan for the game.
We’re happy to be able to say that as of right now, Witchstone’s development is funded. We have the time and backing we need to fully finish the game, as we’d originally intended, without needing to make gameplay quality compromises to deliver by a date dictated by crowdfunding or early access concerns. This is such an exciting situation for us, and really a best case scenario for fans.
What exactly does this mean for Project Witchstone? Well first off it means that we’re able to go heads-down on development and really give our all to making Witchstone everything we know it can be. It also means that with the ability to pursue the full-scope version of the game that we’d always wanted to, we’re extending our development into the foreseeable future. As we get closer to major milestones, we hope to be able to talk about dates, but as of right now the timeline for development extends beyond 2021 at minimum.
It’s hard to exactly quantify the major changes this allows us to make, but it’s fair to say that the difference in what a player will receive as a finished game with this approach is going to be night and day. Without funding and extended deadlines, we were looking at a reduced experience if we were forced to release it on a shortened deadline. When you’re trying to tackle a new type of game as a studio, it can often be a bit of a learning curve internally with regards to how long you’re looking at for total development. In this case for us, as the game became more and more functional, we realized just how good it would be if we could take it all the way to it’s best version instead of looking for ways to speed up development.
We’re still planning to post updates online when we feel like we’ve got something cool to share, but with an extended timeline, we’re going to shift away from a regular post-plan so that we’re not borrowing time from development itself, as well as having to worry about showing off things that may later change, thus extending timelines even farther. For those of you interested in knowing what we’re up to, head over to our studio’s social media channels where we’re going to do our best to be a bit more active. Over the last year as we’ve been working from home and so focused on the project, we realized we wanted to still have a way to connect with fans, but it makes the most sense to centralize the efforts into one place for the time being so we can spend most of our time on the game development itself!
Spearhead Twitter: @SpearheadMtl
Spearhead Instagram: @SpearheadMtl
Spearhead Newsletter: Click here to subscribe
We appreciate all of your support over the years, and especially the fans who are excited for Project Witchstone. We know that waiting is always tough, but with this opportunity, we know we can deliver an experience that will have been worth the patience. We’d never be where we are without the fans, and so we’re working to say thank you the best way we can, by doing our absolute best work.
-Spearhead Games Team
We have some exciting news about the future for Project Witchstone that we’ve been waiting to talk about until it was 100% locked in, and now that we have it all set in stone we can tell everyone about it. Originally when we came up with the idea for Witchstone we’d considered plans to run a Kickstarter as a way to generate the funding needed to develop the game. We’re a small studio, and while we’re lucky to have had success in the past with games like Stories and Omensight, funding the development of a game takes a lot more money than most would think, especially with a plan for a game that extends into multiple years of development.
Since Witchstone represented a step up from our previous work as far as scope and ambition, we knew we’d need to have a plan for any contingency, thus the original plan to Kickstart the game into Early Access while we worked on it further if that’s what it took to be funded. But as you know, Early Access development comes with its own challenges. As we worked further on the game we realized that it would likely be hard to deliver the quality we were aiming for while also having the ticking clock of making good on crowdfunding expectations as well as supporting public-facing Early Access updates. Over time we’d looked into some options of how we could not only continue development on the game without needing to crowdfund, but also in a way that would allow us to not have to scale back the planned game design, which would have been a major compromise from the original plan for the game.
The Big News
We’re happy to be able to say that as of right now, Witchstone’s development is funded. We have the time and backing we need to fully finish the game, as we’d originally intended, without needing to make gameplay quality compromises to deliver by a date dictated by crowdfunding or early access concerns. This is such an exciting situation for us, and really a best case scenario for fans.
What exactly does this mean for Project Witchstone? Well first off it means that we’re able to go heads-down on development and really give our all to making Witchstone everything we know it can be. It also means that with the ability to pursue the full-scope version of the game that we’d always wanted to, we’re extending our development into the foreseeable future. As we get closer to major milestones, we hope to be able to talk about dates, but as of right now the timeline for development extends beyond 2021 at minimum.
It’s hard to exactly quantify the major changes this allows us to make, but it’s fair to say that the difference in what a player will receive as a finished game with this approach is going to be night and day. Without funding and extended deadlines, we were looking at a reduced experience if we were forced to release it on a shortened deadline. When you’re trying to tackle a new type of game as a studio, it can often be a bit of a learning curve internally with regards to how long you’re looking at for total development. In this case for us, as the game became more and more functional, we realized just how good it would be if we could take it all the way to it’s best version instead of looking for ways to speed up development.
Updates Going Forward
We’re still planning to post updates online when we feel like we’ve got something cool to share, but with an extended timeline, we’re going to shift away from a regular post-plan so that we’re not borrowing time from development itself, as well as having to worry about showing off things that may later change, thus extending timelines even farther. For those of you interested in knowing what we’re up to, head over to our studio’s social media channels where we’re going to do our best to be a bit more active. Over the last year as we’ve been working from home and so focused on the project, we realized we wanted to still have a way to connect with fans, but it makes the most sense to centralize the efforts into one place for the time being so we can spend most of our time on the game development itself!
Spearhead Twitter: @SpearheadMtl
Spearhead Instagram: @SpearheadMtl
Spearhead Newsletter: Click here to subscribe
We appreciate all of your support over the years, and especially the fans who are excited for Project Witchstone. We know that waiting is always tough, but with this opportunity, we know we can deliver an experience that will have been worth the patience. We’d never be where we are without the fans, and so we’re working to say thank you the best way we can, by doing our absolute best work.
-Spearhead Games Team