Torment: Tides of Numenera - Beta in January

For those backers who backed the Kickstarter for Torment: Tides of Numenera at a high enough tier, will receive their Steam backer key in the week of the January the 17th. Early Access will start at January 26. Read all about it.

Here we are in 2016, 17 years after the original Planescape Torment hit the scene and became a cult classic. This is finally the year for the spiritual successor to become a reality. I’m proud to tell you that Torment: Tides of Numenera Beta will be coming to all eligible backers during the week of January 17th and to Steam Early Access on the 26th of January. The team is incredibly passionate about this game and it shows in every aspect of their work. Having the opportunity to create a wholly original experience and intricate world is exactly why we got in the games business to begin with.

The beta will start you right in the beginning of the game and is quite lengthy for an early beta. It covers the game's introductory sequence (some of which you may have already seen a portion of in the alpha) as well as most of the first major location of the game, Sagus Cliffs. Sagus is a very old city that was built on top of ancient structures that predate the return of humanity to the Ninth World. It's split into five main districts: Circus Minor, Cliff's Edge, Caravanserai, Government Square and the Underbelly. As you might expect from a city location, it is rich in lore to discover, characters to talk with and obviously quests to complete!

Of course, we'll be looking to gather your feedback and use it to improve the game. During the alpha, we had a direct feedback form in the game and we'll likely provide that again, as it turned out to be an excellent way for us to gather feedback in a way that was easy for us to parse and implement. Indeed, many points from alpha feedback informed our design decisions during beta production, iteration is after all key to making our games. I look forward to gathering more unique insights from this release.

In a future update we'll talk more about the details of the beta release, but during the lead-up to the beta we will be providing you with new information on what it contains such as profiles of individual locations and discussion of characters and game mechanics. Keep an eye out in coming weeks for updates, starting with today's setting and design details.

The Kickstarter update also contains information about unusal items in the Ninth World.

More information.

I so totally didn't follow that game despite backing it. Seems like it should release soonish…unless there is a huge backlash with the beta.

Na. Don't expect it too soon. Early Access of Wasteland 2 wasn't that short. I guess inXile won't miss the chance to re-iterate some more months based on that feedback.

I only hope that I can switch for release to GOG instead of Steam. Don't remember what IE wrote about that.

Still hoping for a professional translation.

Originally Posted by azarhal
I so totally didn't follow that game despite backing it. Seems like it should release soonish…unless there is a huge backlash with the beta.

Based on Wasteland 2 it will probably be in beta for at least five months or more. So I would guess and say probably a summer 2016 release if not later given more delays.

Originally Posted by Avantenor
Na. Don't expect it too soon. Early Access of Wasteland 2 wasn't that short.

I know that Wasteland was basically a year in testing (~10 months to be precise, started December 2013, released September 2014). T:ToN started alpha tests last August and I consider another 6 months soonish.

Hm, turns out I qualify for the beta - I'd forgotten. Will def give it a whirl, just because the setting/mechanics sound so interesting. I will limit my play time though.

Please do share your impression (if you are allowed). I haven't been following this in a while, but this is still on my wish list.

Well, since the backers only get the game 9 days before early access, backing to get beta access is a total waste of money. Poor chumps.

Originally Posted by crpgnut
Well, since the backers only get the game 9 days before early access, backing to get beta access is a total waste of money. Poor chumps.

Early Access has no KS rewards and it will cost more. Wasteland 2 Early Access price tag was $60USD, backing Numenera at the lowest level ($25, $20 for early birds) and picking the beta add-on ($20) is $45 ($40 for early birds).

So, if you backed the game do you get access to early access?

I seem to remember that PoE kicked around in 'beta' for a quite a while. These KS projects use terms like 'alpha' and 'beta' in a very misleading way, though. A beta should be essentially complete, with bugs expected. These are just early demos, which is fine, but they should call them want they are.