'You Guys Will Judge Us By the Game We Ship'

The ArtCraft team has posted a new blog article called 'The Soft Launch Strategy' that is particularly aimed at Founders, but is equally germane to fans looking forward to release. The letter begins with a look back at the last year of development and the "good, bad and ugly" parts. The latter is the centerpiece of the letter as it begins the discussion that sits at the forefront of many fans' imaginations: When will Crowfall launch?

There is really only one way to deal with uncertainty. We are going to take as long as it takes, but instead of shooting for a single launch date (and delaying that day until we complete ALL planned features and content), we are aiming for a soft launch to get you in, and playing, as quickly as possible.

Our priorities are to…

• To build you a playable game experience,
• To turn on character persistence with the expectation of never wiping again as soon as we feel like the systems are solid enough to do so,
• To prioritize the features that are central to the heart of our vision first, and
• To treat the game as a live service, adding features and content incrementally over time

…and, most importantly:

• Continue to polish the core systems until we get them right.

Finally, the letter states, "In the long run, you guys will judge us by the game we ship. If we need more time to make it great, we will find the money and extend the schedule."

You can read the full letter on the Crowfall site.