Folks,
Obviously some people are disappointed that we don't ship No Rest for the Wicked in October day and date on Xbox and Switch 2 as well.
Since the rumor mill is already going wild on us having accepted some exclusivity deal or something... Folks, chill, none of that is the case.
We've spent months assessing what it takes to ship Wicked at the quality level we expect on each platform. PC, Steam Deck and PS5 are where we're confident we can deliver the experience we want for our October launch.
On Xbox Series S and Switch 2, more hardcore optimizations are required mainly due to the smaller memory budget there. Wicked is constantly simulating and streaming a living, breathing world in the background, loading and unloading huge amounts of data as you play. Every megabyte matters.
We're not in the business of shipping shoddy ports. We were always insanely proud of being able to ship BOTH Ori games on Switch at 60fps, no compromises. But that took time - and the same thing is true here.
Our goal is simple: Wherever you play Wicked, it should feel amazing. We know what's required to get there, and we're continuing that work.
No Rest for the Wicked is coming to all current platforms. We just want to make sure that when it arrives, it's the best version it can possibly be 👍
I've seen a lot of indie developers worried about Steam's recent algorithm changes and the fact that reaching the Popular Upcoming list seems almost impossible for smaller games.
But as a indie developer releasing Maseylia game in two weeks, my experience has actually been extremely positive so far. +1000 wishlists this morning alone.
Since the update yersterday night, my wishlist growth has noticeably accelerated, and it's from the Steam's new personalized calendar category is playing a big role in that. Instead of only rewarding the biggest upcoming releases, it seems to be surfacing games that are relevant to individual players' interests.
For niche indie games like mine, that's potentially a huge improvement.
It's still early, but from what I'm seeing right now, this change may end up helping smaller titles get discovered by the right audience rather than forcing everyone to compete for the same front-page spots.
Curious to hear what other indie devs are seeing. Has anyone else noticed an increase in visibility or wishlist activity since the update?
Early evidence is that Steam's new Personal Calendar is WAAAAY better than Popular Upcoming!!
Moon River is 2 weeks from launch with ~7000 wishlists. In less than a day after this change, we added >700 wishlists!!
A lot of gamedevs are worried that this will be bad for Indies but after reading the announcement, it looks like this is actually a win for indies because of the Personal Calendar.
The Personal Calendar has more visibility than the popular upcoming list and it's algorithmic so if Steam does this right, your game will be showed to people that might like it even if you don't have tons of wishlists!