FEB #2: DUESSA
I leave you with news that I’m trialling some themes in our monthly newsletter. This month’s theme, being cold and grey and miserable, is love. So if you fancy a quiz which’ll definitively, scientifically tell you whom you should romance next in Cultist Simulator… make sure you’re signed up.
“What are your influences?”
This is probably the question I’ve been asked most over the years, and every time as soon as I answer it I think of someone
State of the Factory: Year 2
Thanks for reading to the end! I hope it’s been useful. And if you’ve stayed with us through the rough times, we really appreciate it, both of us. A heartfelt thank you. It’s probably meant more this year than any time before or since.
Feb #1: CALIDORE & THE BLATANT BEAST
Next sprint – DUESSA – is the last two weeks on BOOK OF HOURS prototyping before we move onto to something rather exciting that we haven’t publicly announced. There’s a bunch of stuff going on behind the scenes in this early, fluid pre-production period that we can’t talk about yet, but… I’m actually excited about it, and this is my LIFE. So I think you will...
‘The Sweet Bones’, Brancrug, June 28th, 1929
From an anonymous F. to Christopher Illopoly, this letter is remarkable for a number of reasons.
Jan #2: BRITOMART
That’s it for this sprint, Beloveds. Happy Year of the Rat!
POST-LAUNCH STEAM DATA: CULTIST SIMULATOR IN NUMBERS
These numbers support a bunch of received knowledge: post-launch sales are vital for keeping your game selling; front-page featuring on Steam is priceless; localising your game into Chinese is a very sensible thing to do.
Game-Making’s Sense of Loss
At this chilly time of the year, when one calendar makes way for another, take solace in this.
Jan #1: ACRASIA
If you don’t know what Enigma is…………………. YOU WILL. 🌓
Dec #2: YELLOW
Happy advent, Believers. It’s been a helluva year.
“Got your book. Pretty good condition, too. Bit blurred round the edges, but the little fellow’s taken good care of it…” (January 15th-ish, 1906)
Address is in Vienna. Now you know how I feel about Vienna, never quite comfy there since all that with the Club, but I think, Serena’s a good sort, owe her a favour or two, not so far on the train. Off I pop.
Oct #2: VAN HELSING
In the meantime, if you haven’t already, check out the whole Secret Histories suite discounted in Steam’s and GOG’s Halloween sales. Have a good weekend, erryone.
Oct #1: UDOLPHO
First things first: an announcement! We released simplified Chinese last month, which was an extremely weird but also wonderful experience. Once we’ve a few months of data I’ll write a deep-dive into the numbers, but for now, we have another long-awaited localisation to announce: RUSSIAN.
Sept #3: THEODORE
In the meantime, our “State of the Factory: Year 2” should make for interesting reading, if you’re into the business ramifications of pretty much the worst PR a small indie studio could have. AK may turn his hand to some non-game-specific writing, but again, we’ll see what happens.
What Actually Happened
My name’s Alexis Kennedy. With my fiancée, Lottie Bevan, I run a very small game development studio out of our London flat. I used to own and run another studio, Failbetter Games, which was a little bigger (about half a dozen employees for most of my time there, ballooning to seventeen by the time I left in 2016) but was also generally indie and cash-strapped. We’ve...
Blood Sport: Cancel Culture from the Other Side
We are wasting our energy with cancel culture. It doesn’t solve our problem. It doesn’t make things better. It eats up our time and our empathy and hurts people, lots of people, and pretends it’s doing something good. We need structure and accountability and justice to make this industry a better place for women. Structure, accountability and justice are all things cancel culture’s left behind.