Alpha Release Schedule and Dates

[Raphael van Lierop]

Hello Hinterlanders,

Wow, what a day! Not only did we launch a new website and trailer -- which are both getting rave reviews -- but we did a 1-hour Twitch stream with Joystiq Magazine, and got a great preview article on Gamespot! All in all, a banner day for the team at Hinterland.

But, a lot of that was overshadowed by us making many of you unhappy with our stated plans for Alpha Sandbox rollout. We're sorry about that. Many of you felt slighted that you'd have to wait to play the Alpha, despite the fact that you know playtesting is going on with a small group of "scout" testers. Many of you who backed at the $20 CAD rate for the game, felt understandably slighted that Early Access was coming in at $19.99 USD, and that those players would get to experience the game before you.

Between Kickstarter and PayPal, you all have collectively contributed over 20% of our development budget for The Long Dark, and we certainly don't want you to feel that we take you for granted. Because we don't.

We'd like to explain to you our original thinking behind the Early Access pricing (we have to price for the lifetime of the game and within the marketplace, not tie it to backing values that would make us unsuccessful in the long run), how we didn't plan to launch on Early Access when we started out campaign (it was pretty new back then and we didn't know much about it), and how all our Alpha testing so far has been purely about wanting to ensure that you all have a great experience of the game as soon as the *real* Alpha Testing commences.

But we get that you feel slighted, and that was never our intention. You don't want excuses or reasons -- you want an apology and you want a solution. We're sorry. And our solution is to change the dates.

So, as of, well, right now, we're revising our Sandbox Rollout plans. They're going to look more like this:

All Alpha Backers will get access to the Sandbox Alpha on July 22nd.

All Beta Backers will get access to the Sandbox Alpha on August 22nd.

All remaining Backers will get access to the Sandbox Alpha as soon as we launch Early Access in September.

We hope this change makes you feel better about supporting us from the early days of the project, and we hope you'll still be with us at the end of times, and beyond.