Hey Guild Leaders, I wanted to write an update on the status of Netherguild, including the early access launch as well as what I'm planning to work on next - this week and onward! So get ready for an expedition...

Table of Contents

• State of Netherguild (Sales? Bugfixes?)
• Fixes & additions planned this week
• What's next?

State of Netherguild

Before release, I estimated how much Netherguild would sell (based on wishlist numbers) - However, the first week Netherguild sold far below what I was aiming for - more or less the bare minimum result, even with lots of marketing preparation. It was honestly a bit hard on me the first few days, since this is a game I've solo developed for a really long while, but... That's fine! Because- A) There's some great people already playing Netherguild; I've gotten excellent feedback for improving it since release which only makes me even more confident about the future of this game. B) Speaking of which, it seems like a lot of you are really enjoying the game! From your feedback & reviews, the core gameplay loop is solid and enjoyable. Now it's time to polish everything else to work smoothly and add even more fun things to discover! C) Netherguild was also... very buggy on release week - so in some ways I'm glad not as many players suffered from these issues. Most common bugs are fixed now, but there's still some things I want to add & fix this week (expanded on below). Also, again - I'm finishing Netherguild regardless. There was a point in development when I was about to release with far less wishlists & much less of guarantee the game will do well financially, so I feel in some way I was prepared for this (: This is just the beginning! Netherguild is going to be in early access for the next few years - early access release is only the first on many steps along that road. I plan addressing a lot of player suggestions during development too - which will serve to improve it even further, and have it do even better on big update releases, let alone the full release!

Bugfixes

As you might have seen, I've spent the last week bugfixing -
And that's not even everything... So what's fixed? In summary - the most common crashes and loading errors that I know of have been fixed, as well as many other things. (There is a single crash caused by descending that isn't fixed yet - but it doesn't persist on reloading the game. I'm also on it!) If you have a save that couldn't be loaded before, feel free to try to re-load it again! Most if not all "broken saves" should work fine now. ... Oh yeah, bugfix updates in the future will likely not be as... incredibly numerous as they were this week (should often be part of bigger updates), it's just that a lot of the issues this week have been causing crashes & save issues, so for me as a dev it's important to have as few people suffer from them as possible.

How can you help?

The very first review of Netherguild from last week! Review it: If you enjoyed Netherguild, write a Steam review! This is the best way to tell the Steam algorithm as well as other players that Netherguild is fun. If you're waiting for a certain feature or fix to be added, feel free to wait until it's added and review the game afterwards! (: Play it: Other things that help are just playing the game - if you encounter any bugs and issues or if you have any feedback at all, sending it in-game, posting about it in the Steam forums or in the Discord help a ton too. Share it: Share it with friends who enjoy similar games & your favorite streamers / youtubers!

The Week of Listening to Feedback

This week, I plan on working on player requested fixes & improvements! Specifically...

• Adding Steam cloud saves
• Fixing room generation issue where players are blocked out of progressing or getting to certain enemies (Already have a fix in mind for this one)
• Fixing control re-binding with WASD & arrow keys and making it available in-dungeon and in the overworld too
• Fixing a variety of other smaller crashes, visual bugs etc.

Will update you on the progress with these in next week's update!

What's next?

Content is the lifeblood of Netherguild - I'm dying to add more; https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1464220/view/3722828071300970020?l=english As I mentioned last week, after I'm hopefully done with all the remaining fixes & improvements this week, I plan to start work on adding more enemies, oddities, character skills and equipment - including completely new stuff and deepening existing content.
And that's all for this update - see you next Monday / Tuesday. Thank you for reading! -David

[ 2023-04-04 14:18:53 CET ] [ Original post ]