Hi all, this is an update from us in PodPal Games.
Developing Age of Space is turning out to be a very long journey. We are a small little team now that consists of four members, but we are struggling to find time to work on the game as we are all super-busy with other projects. So even if we found funding right now - we would still struggle to break away from our other obligations.
We feel like we have been super transparent through this entire thing, and that is not going to stop. Right now we need to lay down the work for a longer period of time (you guessed it - 111 days) as some of us are dangerously close to burning up.
This means that we will be (extra) dead silent until 1th of April 2023 where we will meet as a team again and plan the road forwards.
I know a lot of you are frustrated that this is taking so long and I don’t blame you. I also understand those of you that might un-list the game at this point. I don’t blame any of you! But for those of you that want to keep share this dream with us: you are very welcome to do so 🙂
Best regards, Team PodPal
Happy new year
Happy new year!
2021 has been a hard year for all of us for many different reasons; the ongoing pandemic, the never-ending home-office, the restrictions and so on. It’s also been hard for us in PodPal. We have had to reconcile with the idea that we are not getting the funding that we wanted. This means that we will not be able deliver the product we are visioning from day 1.
It’s also been challenging on the individual level. All of us in the team have other jobs and projects that take up most of our time. The last 6 months have been really hard for many of us working on several projects, finishing up projects, starting on new projects and so on. We also aim to stay married, which also requires some effort :)
But there is progress! In December we finished the UEA Dreadnought and we did a huge refactoring (622 files changed, ~6000 new files, ~13000 deleted files). This will make it easier to wrap up the upcoming demo version we are targeting.
But it’s hard. I’m not gonna lie. We have been working on this game now for almost 5 years as a team, hardly with any funding at all. Personally I’m really starting to feel the fatigue, so I need to be extra careful not burning out. But I am, and we are, determined to make this game happen in some way, shape or form! We just need to find the very core and try to deliver as good as possible on that.
Thanks for following us on our journey, and happy new year! :) Team PodPal
A majorly overdue update on Age of Space
Hi everyone!
We know it’s been a while since we’ve posted any updates. Now is a great time to let you know what we've been up to - and what we have decided to do moving forwards.
PodPal Games is a very small indie studio running off the blood, sweat and tears of our developers. Everything you’ve seen so far is the product of our team working evenings, nights, and weekends for several years. To be able to reach our ambition levels with Age of Space we have always been dependent on significant external investment. We’ve spent a lot of time and energy the past year trying to secure this investment, but unfortunately, we have not managed to close a deal yet. We did get very very close!
Therefore, to finish Age of Space within reasonable time we’ve got to make some painful cuts. By far the most expensive and time-consuming part of making this game is the storyline missions. Unfortunately, this is also one of the parts many of you have looked forward to most. However, with the current funding situation it’s simply not possible. Our primary focus will now be on making the game as fun, challenging and rewarding as possible with the time and remaining resources we have. We will also focus on making it look great.
The upside to all of this is that you will be able to play Age of Space much sooner. Our primary focus moving forwards will be to make a playable build. We will post more information about that when we get there – and how you can get involved.
Age of Space really is a passion project for all of us working on it. We appreciate every like, comment and response we get from you. It really makes our day and motivates us to move forward.
Thanks for sharing our dream! :)
Best regards, Team PodPal
What about some gameplay?
Hi, all.
We’ve been waiting a long time to make this announcement, but now it’s finally time to reveal some more details about our game.
The core gameplay loop of Age of Space has always been about mining, building, execution, rewarding, improving and doing it all over again. The execution aspect has already been through several iterations throughout the years, but now we are finally super excited about it, and we hope you will be too.
To verify the concept we made a demo for both internal and external testing. This demo is quite limited but it’s enough to show where this is going. In the video, we played as a full squad, but you will be able to fleet up with any combination of AIs and friends. The demo mission is very short and only contains simple kill objectives, so consider it a placeholder.
[previewyoutube="Q2D7yW4VE28;full"]
So what have we changed, and why? We have previously pitched the game as a “Squad Scale RTS”. We decided to remove the classical RTS part of it because after a lot of testing we couldn’t quite make it work. It was difficult making it a varied experience, and co-op didn’t quite feel right either. Also there are other great existing and upcoming RTS space games that cover that section of the market.
So what happened? For the longest time we had been dying to try out an alternative design for the combat inspired by one of our all-time favourite games; Guild Wars. With this design players would explicitly control an individual ship and have the rest of the squad controlled by AI (similar to heroes in Guild Wars). So we gave ourselves a 48 hour deadline to make a prototype and, even though the prototype was buggy and kind of rough, we all got very excited about it. We could also see how this would solve a lot of the problems we were having with the more classical RTS design.
Some of you might be disappointed about this change while others will share our excitement. Every decision we make is with the intention of making a better game and we are confident that this was the better design for Age of Space.
Next up, we’ll address some of the most frequently asked questions about the game:
Can I try the demo? If you already have a key then yes you will soon get access to this demo. We’ll also hand out a few new keys on our Discord community. We’ll release more keys later this year once the vertical slice is complete.
Is it instance-based? Yes it is. You deploy from your base and warp to the mission spot which is a limited but large 3D space area where you execute your mission. In other words, it’s not a open world game.
Is everything playable in co-op? Almost; there might be a few solo missions out into the mix, but all contracts that allow multiple captains will be playable in co-op. When playing a story mission, all players that have this story mission will get progress if the mission was successful.
Why is the release date set to “When it’s done”? We’re sorry that we can’t be more accurate about this at the moment. There are too many external factors right now so we prefer not to set a date yet when there’s a strong possibility we would have to move it anyway. What we can say is that it will not be in full release in 2020, but there are likely to be possibilities to test a demo of it in 2020. If you are interested in testing, the best place to be is on our Discord community.
So what happens next? The next milestone is making a vertical slice of the game. With this demo we want to show more of the context of the game moving through the different phases; mining, building, planning, executing, rewarding, improving. The actual amount of playable content will still be limited, but from a technical perspective we will have solved most of the difficult problems which puts us in an excellent position moving forwards.
If you have other questions then feel free to ask them in the comments section below :)
Thanks for your patience and understanding,
PodPal Games
Mining outpost anchoring has commenced
Your mining outpost plays a central role in Age of space. This is where you'll mine for resources, research technology, design and build your fleet. We are happy to announce that the first two facilities have now been safely anchored in space ready for your management.
The factory is where all the equipment, weapons and modules are being produced.
The headquarters is where most of your crew live, eat, sleep and spend whatever quality time they have when not working for you.
We will continue working on the rest of the facilities the next month along with the user interfaces you need to manage your operation.
PodPal Games have a special announcement to make. Those of you that follow us closely know this, but the last three months we’ve been very secretive about what we are working on. Now is the time to let you all know what we’ve been up to..
We are adding RTS elements to the game allowing you to move the bigger ships around the battlefield. The smaller ship types will exist as squads for the bigger ships that will fly automatically based on your commands.
We are adding base building to the game. This means you’ll get your own corner of the universe. You mine, build spaceships, upgrade and do mercenary work for the three superpowers of the universe.
That was a quick summary. To read more about this check out our article on IndieDB for more information and some gameplay footage.
