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Author Topic: Vote on Greenlight for our free game playing Death deciding fate of a Nation!  (Read 27350 times)

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Koobazaur

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Free Narrative-adventure playing an Agent of Death who must take ONE life that could change the fate of a conflict-torn Nation!

Play it NOW: Clicky!

Freeform exploration with Rich dialogue
What might you learn exploring the fundraising Gala and talking to the patrons? Perhaps the less you know the better?

Meaningful choices and Unintended Consequences
Can your choice change the fate of a Nation? What other result could your meddling have?

Cast of ambitious and influential characters
What if they die? More importantly... what if they live?

Complex setting of violent domestic conflict and industrial revolution
A devastated country - but is it your place to fix it? What if your educated guess is wrong?

Dynamic and surprising Ending
The choice is *entirely* up to you - but what other factors may be affecting the outcome?

Online Stats to compare Your Choices with
Anonymous aggregate stats of everyone's playthroughs will let you see how your own choices compare! Are you one of the good guys?

Think The Walking Dead meets Home and The Last Express, with a dash of To The Moon!

Official Trailer Available on:






Check the Postmortem Homepage, Like on Facebook, Follow on Twitter, Track on IndieDB


So who is the author?

I am a travelling Cinematographer, Game Programmer and Web Developer currently living in Los Angeles. Aside from hobby game programming since me tweens, I have worked for two years at a small indie studio that published two titles for PCs and consoles. I also have a Masters in Comparative Ethnic Conflict which, as you can see, inspired much of the setting for the game. This isn't intended to brag so I'm skipping details - if you're still curious you can find more details about me here.
« Last Edit: August 20, 2013, 04:33:26 am by Koobazaur »

eXpl0it3r

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I've voted yes, but I wonder if you've gone through the whole legal readings of Valve, because from what I know and have checked with others, you can't release a completely free game on Steam. Every game that's Free 2 Play on Steam offers some starter packs or in-game purchases or both. The logic behind is, that Valve can't just release all kinds of free game (otherwise the shop would've already been overflown), because with every new game, they add additional load to their servers and similar, thus they'll something in return. If the game got a price tag, Steam will cut-off some of the costs for themselves. If you have starter-packs, you again won't see every dollar landing in your pockets and similar goes for in-game purchases.
Thus I'm wondering, how are you gonna get a free games on Steam?

Dang I should finally get into doing the beta testing, but I don't enjoy reading that much, I'd rather just put out a bug list... :D
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Vot1_Bear

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Voted :)
The concept is just amazing, really. Can't wait to try it once it's released!

On another note, I'm intrigued on how the game's going to implement that concept. The game will definitely have a great replay value, but if you can make your choice anytime you want (which seems likely, based on everything shown and written) then it will probably end up greatly cutting the amount of time spent playing.
On the other hand, it might also end up causing the players to go through redundant dialogues and choices they've done before when doing a new playthrough (I had bad experiences with 999's redundant replay system), so as said before, really curious on how the game's going to end up like.

Probably won't join the beta as I doubt I'll be useful, but good luck on further development! I'll try spreading the word as well! :D

Atani

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Voted for this, it looks quite interesting.  I will also post this along to a few more indie gamers on Steam to get them to vote as well...

FRex

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I've voted yes, but I wonder if you've gone through the whole legal readings of Valve, because from what I know and have checked with others, you can't release a completely free game on Steam.
I voted yes too but I hope you're careful about this so nothing bad will happen to you and the game, I'd not be surprised if there was some tiny text somewhere saying that valve has every right to take all the copyrights of your game, sell it as their own, ban you off of steam and put you on black list with your bank, I really would not be surprised, they are completely rotten and evil.
« Last Edit: July 20, 2013, 06:12:30 pm by FRex »
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eXpl0it3r

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I voted yes too but I hope you're careful about this so nothing bad will happen to you and the game, I'd not be surprised if there was some tiny text somewhere saying that valve has every right to take all the copyrights of your game, sell it as their own, ban you off of steam and put you on black list with your bank, I really would not be surprised, they are completely rotten and evil.
Not sure in which parallel universe you live, but in mine Valve is one of the more respectable companies, that listens to their community and heavily supports indies. So I'm really asking myself how you got such a negative opinion on Valve. Calling a company "completely rotten and evil" without giving any reason, makes your statement quite questionable. ;)

As for the topic, yes I hope he read the ToS very carefully. There's often a lot of bad sounding stuff in there, but it's always up to the company's use and execution on that. Bad companies use the legal part against their users, while normal and good companies use it to protect themselves and the users.
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FRex

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I have sent you lengthy PM explaining my dislike, I hope it makes it through..(cross-universe PMs are no joke!).
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Koobazaur

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I've voted yes, but I wonder if you've gone through the whole legal readings of Valve, because from what I know and have checked with others, you can't release a completely free game on Steam. Every game that's Free 2 Play on Steam offers some starter packs or in-game purchases or both. The logic behind is, that Valve can't just release all kinds of free game (otherwise the shop would've already been overflown), because with every new game, they add additional load to their servers and similar, thus they'll something in return. If the game got a price tag, Steam will cut-off some of the costs for themselves. If you have starter-packs, you again won't see every dollar landing in your pockets and similar goes for in-game purchases.
Thus I'm wondering, how are you gonna get a free games on Steam?

Dang I should finally get into doing the beta testing, but I don't enjoy reading that much, I'd rather just put out a bug list... :D

Thanks for your continuing support (and shoutouts on the blog :) )

Hmmm, interesting point, we hope it won't be an issue. We do have some ideas for additional content/expansions stuff already we were thinking of monetizing, so perhaps that would work if we offer that on top of the base free game?

Atani

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I am not sure that having the game being Free would be any different than any of the F2P games on there already that have an integrate market, also not using Steam...

Now, I am not sure you would want to go Free on this.  Perhaps charge a very low price for it?  IE $2.50 or $5...  That way you get some return on the investment of time/energy/etc on production of the base game in perpetuity.  This could help pave the road to expansions and/or DLC, which could be in Steam or external.

eXpl0it3r

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I am not sure that having the game being Free would be any different than any of the F2P games on there already that have an integrate market, also not using Steam...
You just need to take a closer look. All the F2P games on Steam have some sort of monetization that runs through Steam/Valve. And again it's just logic: Valve has a platform to present games, this brings costs for server and people working on that, the costs have to be covered and the company wants to make profit as well. If any game can make it F2P and Valve gets nothing to see, but their server and service gets used anyways, then the company would very quickly die. And the second logic reasoning, if any Free game could make it to Steam, why are there only a handful F2P games? Do you really think all the free games wouldn't have a chance on Greenlight? ;)

Thanks for your continuing support (and shoutouts on the blog :) )

Hmmm, interesting point, we hope it won't be an issue. We do have some ideas for additional content/expansions stuff already we were thinking of monetizing, so perhaps that would work if we offer that on top of the base free game?
You're welcome!
Well as said above from my understanding, you'll need a way to pay Valve from the beginning. But that's just my logical thinking, so you should definitely check Valve's agreement stuff out. ;)
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Atani

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You just need to take a closer look. All the F2P games on Steam have some sort of monetization that runs through Steam/Valve.

Not all...
http://store.steampowered.com/app/36620/

I was playing that for a while, there is no steam shop integration.  All sales are done through the PWE servers with zero revenue going to Steam.

Now, this was not put up there through Greenlight so the rules may be different.

Do you really think all the free games wouldn't have a chance on Greenlight? ;)

It is doubtful that all free games would make it, many of the free games are, well, just not that great!  Steam can be very selective in what they allow the store, and they should be very selective.

However, this game seems like a worthwhile purchase if it was to make it onto Steam (or elsewhere!) as long as the price is right ($10 and under?) and possibility of DLC or other extensions/customization made available.

eXpl0it3r

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Not all...
http://store.steampowered.com/app/36620/

I was playing that for a while, there is no steam shop integration.  All sales are done through the PWE servers with zero revenue going to Steam.
Doesn't exist in my country... :-\
Do you know the devs, or why are you sure that know revenue went to Valve?
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Atani

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Doesn't exist in my country... :-\
Do you know the devs, or why are you sure that know revenue went to Valve?

Ahh, well, this game is available globally from PWE outside of steam.  I am not entirely sure why there is a Steam version really since it doesn't give you any benefit other than access to your steam friends for chat in the very annoying overlay (would be nice if they could integrate the overlay features into the real game instead of as an overlay!).

As for why I sure no revenue goes to Valve... The "cash shop" only exists on the PWE servers, as a webpage.  There is no integration with steam from their servers.  There is no link from your account that you use on the PWE servers to your Steam account.  Even launching the game from within Steam you still have to login as normal with a PWE account, which normally for Steam games authentication is transparent to the user (or at least it should be!)  Maybe MMOs are different than other games.

However, we have hijacked this thread enough on this subject I think.

For this game, when it comes out I do plan on getting it.

Grimshaw

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I voted yes, Good job! :D

Koobazaur

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Thanks for the thoughts guys, especially about price. Very encouraging to see you guys would actually be interested in paying for it :) We were promising it free since the start so backing out of that now would just look bad, but as I mentioned, we've always considered the potential for paid extras on top so we might consider. Will need to look more into Steam rules too I guess!