Cube World - Editorial @ Kotaku

Kotaku has a new article about Cube World and why fans are worried about it.

So what's been going on? Has development stopped? Where is the project right now? Is Wollay, the developer, even alive? Fans have all sorts of questions like these.

The short answer is that the game is still being worked on—we'll get to that in a second. First, let's do a recap.

It all started back in 2011, when Wolfram von Funck, aka Wollay, posted the first screenshots of a charming-looking role-playing game that promised players a vast, procedurally generated world. Cube World, he called it. Lots of people took notice—the project looked promising, especially since it was taking inspiration from great games like Zelda and Minecraft. Still, despite the clamor from fans, it still felt like kind of a hushed affair—Wollay repeatedly said he didn't know when the game will release. It wasn't until 2012 that another person joined the team: his wife, Sarah von Funck, who is contributing as a coder, designer and concept artist on the project. Heck, we still don't know what the official name of this thing will be—"Cube World" is just a fill-in for now, according to the developer. Last year, Luke Plunkett said that Cube World was "quietly" becoming his most anticipated game of 2012, reflective of how low-key the game's marketing and PR has been.

Updates on the progress of the game weren't unheard of, of course—based on his old development blog, Wollay would periodically give updates that included new screenshots, videos, and hints of upcoming plans. Most would come once a month, if that, with updates ramping up in 2013—which is when a playable alpha of the game was planned. The catch: players would have to pay for the privilege of early access. This is where things got tricky.