“It had a fanbase, and it was pretty far along in development.” “Kenshi looks really good on a store-page, because it’s just a huge list of dreamlike features,” says Hunt. When Valve began searching for games to feature, Kenshi was ahead of the pack.
He had even started selling prototype copies, using services such as Desura and his own website. Hunt had put five years into Kenshi before Steam launched its Early Access section, much of that time as a full-time solo developer. Opportunities are many, but risks are also high, and a character’s story can come to a swift end courtesy of vicious wildlife or roaming groups of bandits. It’s a game about forging your own path in a world indifferent to your success or failure. Instead, they can be anything they like within Kenshi’s vast and strange world: a trader, a farmer, a bandit, a thief. Players don’t become some fantasy hero destined for glory, the familiar Dungeons and Dragons triptych of warrior, mage or rogue.
Kenshi is a role-playing-game, although it interprets that idea more literally than most. “I’d play a bunch, get inspired and start designing on paper. “I’ve been designing games since I was a kid,” he says. So long ago, in fact, that Hunt cannot remember exactly when he began working on it. Photograph: PR Company HandoutĪlthough Kenshi was one of the first Early Access games, its story begins much earlier.
But it raises questions about the relationship between developers and customers, and the responsibilities of Steam’s owner, Valve Corporation, to monitor what’s going on.Ī screenshot from Kenshi. Steam Early Access facilitates projects that would be otherwise impossible to produce. Alongside Kenshi, the released games are Kerbal Space Program, ARMA 3, Prison Architect, Drunken Robot Pornography, Gnomoria, Gear Up, Starforge and Kinetic Void. Of those, nine have been finished, two have ceased development, and one is stuck in limbo. Kenshi was one of 12 games selected to launch the initiative in March 2013. It can be likened to crowdfunding, although rather than investing on a promise, purchasers of the games can play along as development progresses. Through the platform, developers can release their games in an unfinished state, and use the revenue raised from purchases to fund the remainder of development. Kenshi belongs to a sub-group of “Early Access” games on the biggest online PC games storefront, Steam. This bizarre situation has emerged because, despite being a decade in the making, Kenshi has been playable for half that time, and already has thousands of fans.
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