Some thoughts on Hytale Early Access Chapter 1 and why we've been so quiet about it!
The plan so far has been to keep all new content hidden until release day, so the first chapter lands as one big surprise. I still believe in that for impact, but there's a downside I've been thinking about: until we have a chapter or two actually out, all you see from us is weekly patches and foundation work, and from your point of view it's fair to wonder if the new content is actually happening. And our reality is that the hard part internally right now is keeping track of everything in production at once, not finding things to show!
But actions speak louder than words, and we haven't shipped new content yet. That's by design btw: we're not trying to push sales before the game can make a great first impression. Still, asking everyone to run on faith for months isn't great either. We know how that went in the past.
So I'm going to be more open about what's behind the scenes. I'm putting together a proper blog post explaining some of what we're working on for Chapter 1 and more, since quite a bit of what's in production isn't chapter content at all. A few of these things are honestly blog post material on their own, and a couple deserve a mini showcase down the line. But expect this one to be light on final visuals, mostly explanations and work-in-progress peeks: the polished reveals stay with the release itself, where the hype belongs.
Give me a week or so to put together the blog post!
Watching Tennocon can be done from two wise schools of thoughts:
1) I have no idea what's going on, I haven't played enough Warframe.
2) I have played enough Warframe, and I have no idea what's going on.
Be prepared!