Dear players,
First and foremost, we would like to express our sincere gratitude for the support and following from all players. Your companionship has been an invaluable motivation for our development team.
It has been quite a while since our last project progress update, and we have received numerous feedback from backers through negative reviews on Steam. Today, we would like to share some updates to address your concerns and provide you with a more comprehensive overview of the current situation.
Development ProgressAs you may have noticed, we haven't had any updates since August, and our devlogs have been sporadic with limited new information. This is partly due to team members dealing with personal family and health issues that required immediate attention (as mentioned in our May 2024 announcement).
Financial SituationOur main challenge currently is financial difficulties. To maintain operations, we have had to diversify our revenue streams through developing and publishing Hot Springs alongside the Peach Party team, as well as updating and launching new DLCs for Chill Corner.
Regarding our Kickstarter campaign, we want to be transparent with our community while respecting our contractual obligations. While the final funding amount is publicly visible on Kickstarter, the actual amount we received was less than half of that figure after accounting for various campaign-related expenses and fees - which were beyond our control. We regret that we cannot disclose the exact details due to confidentiality agreements, but we hope this helps explain why we've had to operate with significantly less resources than what might appear on the surface. With this limited capital, we maintained a team of 8 people (including 4 artists, 1 animator, and 3 developers) until November 2023. After that, we used personal funds to maintain operations until March 2024.
Current Situation and Future PlansThe Early Access version of Chill Town has sold over 6,000 copies in the past 9 months (counting 15% refund rate). This revenue is only sufficient to maintain basic living expenses and repay previous development loans. Due to declining revenue in the past 4 months, the team currently consists of only 2 developers with no artists.
Official Release PlanWe plan to launch the Official Release in Q1 2025 with new features:
- Museum System
- New Quest Lines
- Seasonal and Festival System
- Bug Fixes and Gameplay Improvements
Due to the absence of artists, we will combine self-development within our capabilities and use appropriate assets to complete the game.
Project SupportIf you enjoy our project and would like to support us, please help spread the word about the game to more people. This will help us gain more resources to continue development.
French Translation UpdateWe have integrated French language support into the game and will update it in an upcoming patch. Special thanks to @kulturegaming and @poudredenuage for their voluntary translation contributions!
Once again, thank you for your patience and support.
Best regards,
Low-Hi Tech