ColePowered Games Ltd.
  • Navigation
    • Shadows of Doubt
    • Concrete Jungle
    • Older Projects
    • Jobs
    • Bug Report/Support
    • Contact
  • Search Icon
Search Icon

ColePowered Games Ltd.

The Game development adventures of Cole Jefferies.

Shadows of Doubt DevBlog #32: Release Date Announce and Early Access Thinking

Shadows of Doubt DevBlog #32: Release Date Announce and Early Access Thinking

March 27, 2023 colej Comments 0 Comment

Shadows of Doubt is a detective stealth game set in a fully-simulated sci-fi metropolis! There’s been a murder and it’s up to you to solve it by any means necessary, with the condition that you keep a low profile. A unique mix of procedural generation and hand-crafted design enables every room of every building to be explored. Be sure to wishlist on Steam, join our Discord or read previous dev blog entries here!

Hello everyone! Thank you to all of you who played the demo over the course of Steam NextFest. It was a massive success, with more people playing, wishlisting, and joining the community than we could have ever hoped for. As you may have expected we received a tonne of feedback, and we’ve been processing it all over the last few weeks to help us finalize the game’s launch plans – and beyond!

Yes, as some of you have suspected by now (pun intended), we’re going to be releasing the game via Steam Early Access on… April 24th! I can’t believe I finally get to say it! Shadows of Doubt will be in your hands in just a few short weeks, and I couldn’t be more excited for everyone to step into the role of detective and explore the city streets very soon.

But of course, elephant in the room, why Early Access? As many of you know, Shadows of Doubt has been in development for many years, and so we didn’t take the decision to launch into Early Access lightly. Being open and transparent, we’ve had a lot of serious discussions about how and when to launch the game. The game is in a very advanced state of development – while there are plans for new content and further optimizations, the game is functionally complete with a full suite of features, cases, content, and a complete Sandbox Mode, beyond what you may usually expect from an Early Access title. Both I and the publisher are confident in the overall quality, breadth of content, and playability of Shadows of Doubt’s Early Access release.

However, there are some key things that launching in Early Access allows for, not least of which is more content. It was always a goal of mine to develop post-release content for the game, but launching into Early Access means I can bring that new content directly into the pre-1.0 roadmap, meaning there’ll now be even more for players to discover in the initial base game when the full version launches (and Early Access players will, of course, get this content for free as it’s added to the game). As a bonus, it also means that we get more critical and constructive feedback from players who are passionate about the game during active development, which is really useful for further improving the overall experience.

Secondly, it helps me respond to bugs and unusual edge case issues that, given the massive scope of the game and the nature of its systems, I fully expect to be unearthed for the first time at launch. Speak to any developer and they will always tell you that a game is never finished, but with the breadth and (often unpredictable!) nature of Shadows of Doubt’s layers of AI, it’s particularly true. To speak openly and honestly with you, it makes me so much more comfortable knowing that I’ll be able to identify any of these unusual issues and react to them during Early Access, rather than have players discover them in what is considered to be a ‘final’ release. I hope that makes sense.

Also for the purpose of expectations, I wanted to let you know that the game doesn’t currently feature a story thread of missions beyond those featured in the demo. The purpose of ‘The Dead of Night’ case you may have played in the demo is to teach the player the mechanics within a scripted mission, before letting them off the leash for the game’s core immersive, non-scripted, sandbox experience. Early on into development, we found that asking AI citizens to behave nicely with heavily-scripted sequences did not benefit the overall game, especially when all they really want to do is live out their lives dynamically (no matter how long they ultimately lived for), and leaning more heavily into a sandbox experience driven by the AI itself is where the game shines. That said, there may be an opportunity to expand on more bespoke narrative-based missions during the course of the Early Access roadmap, depending on your feedback. There is still progression, of course – over the course of the game you’ll take on new cases to earn cash, find new gadgets and equipment, customize your apartment, and unlock new upgrades for your character to become a better detective. And I’d definitely encourage you to experiment with different cities – the Early Access release lets you generate bigger cities than the demo allowed, and they really can make a difference to how you approach situations, depending on what you get!

Shadows of Doubt really has been a dream project of mine to make, and it’s my goal to make it the best possible game it can be for everyone who plays it. Stay tuned for more info about our Early Access updates that we’re currently working towards and, when the game launches next month, we’d love to invite you to share ideas of what you’d like to see too.

So, April 24th! I can’t wait, and if you haven’t already, please do consider wishlisting the game to be notified the moment it’s available! It really does help small developers like us. I’ve also set up a poll to find out the kind of things folks are most excited about during Early Access (see below). You can select up to 3 answers, and your choices could help us prioritize if there’s something that particularly resonates.

Thank you again, detectives! See you again soon.

Twitter
Follow Me
Tweet
Facebook
fb-share-icon
RSS

Development Blog, General Announcements, Police Department Game, Shadows of Doubt

Post navigation

NEXT
Shadows of Doubt DevBlog #33: Launch Hype and What to Expect
PREVIOUS
Shadows of Doubt DevBlog #31: An October Update

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

I accept the Privacy Policy

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

About

Indie Games developer, currently working on detective simulator game ‘Shadows of Doubt’. I also made Concrete Jungle.

Twitter
Facebook
Instagram
YouTube
IndieDB

Development Blog

  • Shadows of Doubt
  • Concrete Jungle

Previously on ColePowered…

  • May 2023 (1)
  • April 2023 (3)
  • March 2023 (1)
  • October 2022 (1)
  • March 2022 (1)
  • December 2021 (1)
  • October 2021 (1)
  • August 2021 (1)
  • July 2021 (1)
  • June 2021 (1)
  • May 2021 (1)
  • January 2021 (1)
  • October 2020 (1)
  • July 2020 (2)
  • March 2020 (2)
  • January 2020 (1)
  • December 2019 (1)
  • November 2019 (1)
  • September 2019 (1)
  • August 2019 (1)
  • April 2019 (1)
  • March 2019 (2)
  • February 2019 (3)
  • January 2019 (1)
  • November 2018 (1)
  • October 2018 (2)
  • September 2018 (1)
  • August 2018 (1)
  • July 2018 (3)
  • June 2018 (2)
  • April 2018 (1)
  • August 2017 (1)
  • May 2017 (1)
  • March 2017 (1)
  • January 2017 (1)
  • December 2016 (1)
  • September 2016 (2)
  • August 2016 (1)
  • September 2015 (3)
  • August 2015 (1)
  • July 2015 (1)
  • June 2015 (3)
  • May 2015 (4)
  • April 2015 (4)
  • March 2015 (4)
  • February 2015 (4)
  • January 2015 (4)
  • December 2014 (5)
  • November 2014 (3)
  • October 2014 (3)
  • August 2014 (1)
  • July 2014 (1)
  • June 2014 (1)
  • May 2014 (2)
  • March 2014 (3)
  • September 2013 (2)
  • July 2013 (3)
  • June 2013 (3)
  • May 2013 (2)
  • April 2013 (4)
  • March 2013 (4)
  • January 2013 (1)
  • December 2012 (1)
  • November 2012 (2)
  • October 2012 (1)
  • August 2012 (1)
  • July 2012 (2)
  • June 2012 (2)
  • April 2012 (4)
  • March 2012 (2)
  • February 2012 (3)
  • January 2012 (3)
  • December 2011 (2)
  • November 2011 (4)
  • October 2011 (2)
© 2023   Copyright. All Rights Reserved. Designed by Freepik