Age of Decadence - A tale of indie RPG development

Why are taking indie RPGs so long to be finished? Iron Tower Studio tells us why:

A tale of indie RPG development

"I've given up making estimates."
Styg, developer-extraordinaire of Underrail

Every now and then, someone asks, “What’s taking them so long? Why is the game still in development?” The questions are understandable. You hear that a game has been in development for more than a decade and you think that a decade is a very long time. Only the infamously mismanaged projects like Duke Nukem Forever take that long and nothing good ever comes out of it.

Since we’ve just released 2 new locations – 21 out of 22 locations are now available – and the light at the end of the tunnel is shining impossibly bright, now would be a good time to tell you a tale. (…)

An interesting read and view from the inside of game development.

More information.

"21 out of 22" - sounds good to me.

With games like Age of Decadence and Underrail, I'm certainly not going to give the devs a hard time for how long their titles have been in development. Grabbed both in early access and watched them grow over the years. They have very few people on their teams and you can really tell these things are labours of love for them. They've been quite open about what they're doing as well, so I would think most folks supporting or at least watching these games are reasonable enough to understand that they may take a while before development is complete.

Further proof of how time consuming and difficult game development is. I also bought both Underrail and Age of Decadence and am looking forward to their release. Had I realized AOD was the work of a two man team, I wouldn't have made some of the comments I had in the past. Compare either of these projects to Godus, and you can see that passion and an almost inhuman dedication make a good project. Good ideas alone won't cut it.

I'm happy that it worked out, but in over a 10 year span, any number of things could have brought the project down. So I'd say they should have been less ambitious.

But then, you even have seasoned, big developing studios (like Troika) who would have been better off taking this advice but didn't.

We gotta respect them at Iron Tower Studio. They're doing a great work! I didn't even know the game was so close to release! I once had it on my Steam wishlist and I ended up excluding it, because I believed it was never be finished/released. Now I added it to my wishlist again.

After all these years, they resisted and persisted into making this game become true.

I didn't know they started 10 years ago. Really impressive their perseverance, congratulations ! I didn't try the game yet but it looks very good.

I also had no idea that all of this began ten years ago. Seeing the love and dedication for this just makes me want to play it all the more, and I'll wait till it's done baking.

One of the few studios that actually takes ALL its time to make a game that will work properly instead of releasing something half-assed.

I just hope Vince doesn't have income problems since he's stated he's been working on the game full time a relatively long while ago by now.

Originally Posted by Sacred_Path
I'm happy that it worked out, but in over a 10 year span, any number of things could have brought the project down. So I'd say they should have been less ambitious.

But then, you even have seasoned, big developing studios (like Troika) who would have been better off taking this advice but didn't.

Go big or go home. Congrats, ITS.

Vince made a post on Steam as well:

June update - 21 out of 22 locations are now available!


New content:

• 2 new locations: Hellgate and Dead River
• a new enemy type: a spider-like constuct

• a loremaster who lost most of his marbles, an elder who can't show you his face because he's too pretty, and 2 new items (the Divine Spear and a homemade protection amulet)
  
  
• a second conversation with your 'friend from the other side'; keep in mind that the Aegis suit will protect you from the 'elements' but not from the 'friend' who will kill you unless you're working for Balzaar now.

Improvements:

• Darius' armor, Al-Sahir's armor, and Bringer of Storms (broadsword) have unique icons.
• Nets now appear on affected characters' models.
• Rebalanced stats of unique weapons and armor.
• Balanced the number of nets found on traders.
• Balanced and added dialogue checks to improve flow
• Added more civil SP rewards.
• Tweaked armor and helmet crafting schematics.
• You can now craft Lorica Hamata (chainmail).
• Buying price now goes from 125 to 100 percent (before: 150 to 100).
• Antidote is available earlier, more levels.

Fixes:

• Fixed camera issue after asking the blacksmith to repair items.
• Critical strike to arms reduced dexterity instead of strength.
• Nets' effect doesn't stack anymore.
• Fixed most (hopefully all) coordinates issue and crashes in old and new Teron
• Fixed dialogue illustrations' issues in certain screen resolutions.
• Added armor damage chance to all weapons
• Added a proper conversation with Cado in MG Teron. Now all issues with repeating quests and teleporting should be fixed.
• Fixed issue with Aemolas and some merchants teleporting in new Teron versions.
• You can't attack Faelan while under his control anymore (when he forces you to fight your comrades).

What's left?

• the final location (the temple) and the associated endgame content
• the monastery's lower level, accessible via portals
• to be able to use the console at the tower of Zamedi and access the databanks
• negative reputation effects
• extra quest options, like infiltrating a tower instead of charging into the breach or being able to talk your way past the Aurelian soldiers
• extra quests like Lord Miltiades long awaited arrival to Ganezzar (only if you vouched for him and said that he's the noblest of men.
• extra flavor like the body of a certain 'god' being displayed for a few coins, minor conversations here and there, extra training, etc.

We'll save the temple for last and focus on everything else for now, improving and polishing the experience leading up to the temple.

Once again, thank you for your support and patience. We wouldn't have made it this far without you giving the game a chance.

Purchased Styg's Underrail and Vince's AoD. Been great watching both games grow. I'm patient.

They are making steady progress and are sticking to their vision. This game is definitely worth of waiting.

Vince posts to Facebook?!

Originally Posted by Dez
They are making steady progress and are sticking to their vision. This game is definitely worth of waiting.

Well, it has been almost a decade now I think….I even did an interview with vince awhile back, thought it would be released by now.

Well someone please let me know when it's finally released.