Silk: Wilderness Adventures

Countdown to Release!

A little surprised and shocked to report that our release date has completely crept up on us: Silk will officially launch on Switch and Steam Friday 11th October at 2 pm UK time. That's just two days from this post! I've been so busy testing the v1.5 release candidates for Steam that I haven't had time to stop and compose a devblog update mentioning the launch...

If you are a backer at the Digital Game Bundle tier or above, you should have received a survey from Kickstarter asking you to confirm which Digital Key you want to claim... those of you who have already responded and asked for a Switch key should get your code on the launch day (probably just a little after the launch time), provided Nintendo release the codes to us in time. Anyone who hasn't responded yet still has a chance to get in this first batch of Switch keys if you complete the survey at least twenty four hours before launch (and if not, you'll still get your key, you just might have to wait a little longer).

T-minus 48 hours to Silk launch!

 

 

Pre-Order Silk on Switch

Thrilled to report that the store page for Silk just appeared on the Nintendo Shop for the Switch - along with a pre-order discount of 20%. Our official release date is a week from today, Friday 11th October 2019, and the game will be available on both Steam and Switch then. You have seven days to pre-order the game on Switch at the lower price, and then another week before the launch discount ends. (Sorry, Valve won't let us discount pre-orders, but it will get a discount at launch!)

If you're a Kickstarter backer at the Digital Game Bundle tier or above, look out for the survey message you're about to receive - you'll need to let us know if you are claiming your Digital Key (or Keys) for the Switch version within a few days or we won't be able to get you the keys for launch. We strongly encourage you to claim your keys for the Switch if you have a Switch, not only because it's ready now but also because it will help us a great deal if as many backers as possible support the earliest console release.

We are one week from launch everyone! Thank you all, as ever, for your support!

Guess Who's Coming to Switch...?

It's been a hell of a month for the ihobo games team getting Silk where we wanted it to be, but I'm proud to announce that on Monday this week we submitted our Master Candidate to Nintendo. Yes, Silk is coming to Switch later this year. It's a perfect for the Switch's handheld mode, and it's great to play on a big screen too.

This officially marks the end of the Beta period, and although we still have some tweaks and fixes to implement before we're done, the game is now substantially complete.

Thanks to everyone who has supported us getting to this momentous moment!

Introducing... the Silk Manual and Almanac

It gives me great pleasure to announce that, following the victory of 'verbose and detailed' over 'clear and compact' in a recent Twitter poll, I have completed work on the Silk Manual and Almanac. 

You can find it in the usual place for the Silk manual (it's always available via a link from our Steam page).

If you wanted a clear and compact manual, the old concise reference manual is still at the beginning in just two pages (plus two pages of hints). But if you wanted detail, you'll find the Almanac just what you wanted. Written in the style of the first century BC text Parthian Stations by Isidore of Charax, The Stations of the Silk Road is a traveller's guide to the "Overland Trade Route between the Levant and the Orient."

Check it out!

Silk v1.4 Out Now and Other News

It gives me great pleasure to announce that v1.4 of Silk has just shipped on Steam! This is the first non-Beta build... we're not quite releasing the game (controller support for PC is still missing for instance), but this version is the foundation of the Switch release and is very close to Master.

Our grateful thanks to everyone who has contribute to the Beta testing of the game! Truly appreciated.

And in other news:

• I've been running a series of Designer's Notes for the game on my original blog, Only a Game.
  • Part One of the Designer's Notes is called Silk is about... 200AD
  • Part Two is called Silk is about... 1984, and is about the debt I feel as a game designer to Mike Singleton.
• There is a slightly updated manual for the game in the usual place...
• ...and there is also now the The Unofficial 1986 Retro Manual, by DarkBlueMonkey, one of our stalwart Beta Testers. This is a huge document that reimagines the game manual in the style of the 1980s - you have to see it to believe it!

We are on the home straight for the game now - thank you all for your support!

Prepare for Version 1.3

We're very close to shipping v1.3, which includes a Control Summary on the pause menu and a How To Play tutorial (like the image above) on the start menu, plus a huge number of minor map and script bug fixes. We have also fixed the last of our major bugs, which included one related to the Unity compiler that we're especially proud about tracking down (if you've ever been in a settlement that didn't behave like one, you've fallen prey of this bug!). 

Thanks to everyone sending their thoughts and bug reports to the QA Report link we sent you all with your Steam keys - these all get read, but we can't act on everything reported because we're so late in the project. However, everything we can fix without delaying our Switch launch we have fixed, and every viewpoint raised does get discussed by the team and considered for feasibility.

I'm away next week on a much needed (but badly timed!) vacation, but I'll be back in time for our Switch Master Candidate submission which is getting very close now. Until then, expect v1.3 to appear on Steam sometime in the next day or so - and keep travelling the Silk Road!

New Manual

The Silk manual has been updated, including the map of the seventeen key cities, and an explanation of the goods bar. The latest version of the manual is always available from the Steam page.

Check it out!

Another Update Today

We're continuing to make good use of our final month of core development on Silk, balancing our bugfixing against requests from Backers for changes to the game.

Version 1.2 ships later today, which will see a new Notification system that should be easier to follow, a message on start up informing players that the game is keyboard controlled, the removal of the cursor in the game to help prevent confusion, a maximum frame rate of 60 FPS, a fix for the bug that causes some players to not discover the map, some new sprites, and a massive overhaul of the Bazaar scripts that fixes more than 200 subtle bugs.

We are looking at adding a control reference card to the pause menu... it should be possible in v1.3, which ships at the end of next week. There is probably only one more update after that, and then we're Master with only the porting to go.

If you have any requests or issues, let us know through any of the usual channels! We'll do what we can in the remaining time.

Class of 200AD

It gives me great pleasure to announce that the class of 200AD has been assembled and is now in the game, ready to be hired and taken off into the vast three million square miles of wilderness that is Silk! My infinite thanks to everyone who backed the game as a Personal Advisor Super Backer - you've added so much character to the final experience, and I couldn't be more delighted with how it has turned out.

Go forth and tame the wilderness together!

Your First Game of Silk

It's the Silk Beta Weekend, so we're asking all Backers to try and find some time to play the game at the weekend. If you come across any bugs, please use the link in the Keymailer email to report them.

And if you need some help getting into the game, do check out the Silk Beginner Guide over on Steam. It's intended to help players who are less experienced with videogames, but it will also help anyone who feels they might have missed something in the tutorial.