Asylum: The Brutal And Honest Truth

[Agustin]

Dear Treffers,

Hope you’re all doing swell. I thought it was a good moment (happy holidays!) to stop by and give you a full status update about Asylum and what’s going on with my life. No, it's not that dramatic, I'm fooling around with the topic title. This past year or so I kept a low profile for a number of reasons, which may have given the community the wrong impression. So, I feel like I owe you this personal, straight to the point post:

First, let’s get this out of the way: Asylum is terribly delayed. We’re all aware of that. I fully admit we messed up the planning and overdid the production. The project grew out of proportions, even though its original vision and intent remains true: I wanted to create not just the spiritual successor to Scratches, but an adventure that pushes the horror genre as much as possible. Thus, we invested an inordinate amount of time in detailed graphics, believable characters, polished interface; you know, stuff to make Asylum feel modern and outstanding while remaining true to the adventure genre. I think we have succeeded, but it took way longer than expected.

That’s one problem, I guess: Asylum is not a commercial project, in a sense that it was never about making money. Had it been commercial, or a publisher had pressured us as it occurred with Scratches, we would’ve probably finished it a long time ago albeit in a completely different form. Maybe that would’ve been desirable, I honestly don’t know. What I can tell you is that Asylum –as it stands today– it’s the game we always wanted to do. I feel something most games are missing these days is a personal touch, something that makes them stand apart from each other. In that regard, Asylum is as personal as it gets. It’s a chunk of my life; when it’s done (and it will be done!), you’re going to play something I spent almost ten years working on.

Some have expressed concern or feel disappointed that I’m not traveling as much as I used to – in fact, I missed Gamescom twice in a row. Make no mistake: I love to visit Gamescom and the Adventure-Treff party. It was always my highlight of the year. But, two things happened: my financial situation is not as cool as it used to be, especially with ongoing economic problems in Argentina, and we have a baby now. Traveling to Europe is particularly expensive for us and we always used to mix vacations with “business” trip, which we couldn’t do for the past two years. It’s not that I don’t care or I’m not working hard enough; I’m sorrier than you are for not being there.

I can understand how all of this looks like I’m not interacting with the community as much as I used to. A mea culpa I must do in that sense is that Kickstarter made me a bit lazy when it comes to updates. I may have disregarded the broader community thinking (wrongly) that posting Kickstarter updates was good enough but, even though many of you have backed us, it’s still a fraction of the larger community of adventure game fans. Which is why I’m making this post, anyway.

Truth is, we’re intentionally keeping it fairly low key until we’re ready to disclose a release date for Asylum, which I’m hoping will happen sometime soon. It’s not like we’re super quiet, either: every two months or so, we release solid and tangible new stuff from the game, like that trailer last Halloween. But it’s true we’re not actively doing promotion or sending out formal press releases like we used to, at least not until we’re ready to make a lot of noise (which we will when we’re ready).

It’s also true that we made loads of changes, even though the core idea in the game remains intact, and took questionable decisions such as switching engines during development. From your side, it may look like we’re drifting aimlessly. From our side, I’m doing everything I can to ensure Asylum sells well. If it doesn’t, it truly would be the end of Senscape. Too much depends on Asylum right now (including my family). I’ve tried in a few occasions to have a side project to avoid betting so much on a single game with mixed results. The situation out there is tough as Hell – not just for adventures but indie games in general. I talk about this often with other devs and there’s a widespread concern about the status of the industry. Good games that should sell well aren’t selling, and the best example of this is Steam; like it or not, it’s the major portal of PC games, and indie games sales have been dramatically dwindling since 2013. Consider what it took to be Greenlit then with what it takes to put a game today on Steam.

Price wars are one problem, and I’m still undecided how much I should ask for Asylum. Charge a premium price for the 15 hours of gameplay? Go real cheap and potentially make it a big bestseller? No idea yet. Fragmentation is another issue: selling through Steam, or your own website, is no longer enough. At least not for a game like Asylum that should sell, say, 20.000 copies at full price just to break even. You may think “oh hey, that’s not so bad”, but I’ve seen games in the Steam Top 10 that don’t sell near as much. So, many decisions we’re taking are to ensure Asylum is available in as many platforms as possible in order to reach as many people as possible. Luckily, we’re going to be on GOG as well besides Steam. We have just tested the game on iOS and Android, and are looking to support VR devices on launch day. It should be OK with everything we’re doing, but I feel like I must be constantly adapting to the ever-changing situation of the market, especially with such a long project.

So it’s like I’m juggling between doing the game I want to do while ensuring it sells and keeping everybody happy, and clearly that’s not possible. I know it’s a frustrating situation, believe me, but I wanted to shed some light on why we’re doing what we’re doing and show my face around here. Good news is, we should be back in action next year with impressive stuff. We remain as dedicated as always to the genre, even if we’re working more behind the scenes these days. And yes, I sure hope to return to Gamescom next year. I miss partying. And those drinks in Poller Strandbar… oh, those drinks…

[Sven]

Hey Agustin. Nice to hear about Asylum. As I said take as many time as you want to finish it.

[LittleRose]

15 hours? The length alone is worth the waiting. I just wish you the best of luck with Asylum.

[Loma]

Happy holidays!
Greetings to your wife and baby as well. Hope you are all doing well.

In times of honest and brutal truth it's also time for honest and (hopefully not so) brutal opinions, I guess.

I have the impression that you put a pressure on Asylum that even the most perfect game in the world can't stand and that's why you are afraid of releasing it.

For Scratches you published a first game and late a special edition. Wouldn't this be an option for Asylum as well?

Otherwise I can't think of any "solutions",
The market for games has been ruined. Platforms like Steam make it easier to spread the word and the game, but the downside is that there is more competition and most people aren't willing to pay more than 10 Euros for a game or so...

I don't know what the successful exceptions have done right. Personally, I think it has more to do with marketing than with making an exceptional game (e.g. Firewatch).

And in times when first-person-horror-games are flooding the market the situation for Asylum is even more difficult, I suppose...

As far as I'm concerned I'm patient enough to wait for your game, because I know it's worth waiting for, but for more useful advice about you strategy you need less unqualified opinions than mine.

Even it's not a commercial game, I wouldn't mind buying the game after its release.

And we really have to do something about your absence at the AT parties! This is absolutely not acceptable!

I wish you all the best!

[Sven]

@Loma
Das Fehlen auf der Party hat immerhin ein weiterer Tag Entwicklung von Asylum gebracht.

@Agustin
By the way how is the progress of the book?

[Adven]

"I'm fooling around with the topic title."

Not. Funny.

Great to hear there's progress. Would like to know about any plans to get Asylum onto current consoles.

[Agustin]

Happy holidays!
Greetings to your wife and baby as well. Hope you are all doing well.

Thanks, hope you're having a lovely week too! December is always crazy (baby's --almost kid now-- 2nd. birthday this Friday), but I can't complain.

I have the impression that you put a pressure on Asylum that even the most perfect game in the world can't stand and that's why you are afraid of releasing it.

For Scratches you published a first game and late a special edition. Wouldn't this be an option for Asylum as well?

Valid and good points. Yes, there's a lot of pressure surrounding Asylum, both from myself and from fans. But I'm the one to blame, it's me who's hyped the game so much and upped the stakes. Scratches was an unexpected runaway success and I always posed Asylum as the next big thing. As I see it, at this point, not fulfilling those expectations is akin to lying to people. Our reputation depends on this game, so... yes, too much pressure. I'm certainly afraid of releasing it.

The idea to do a special edition for Scratches was the publisher's, and in retrospective I'm not overly happy with that decision. It was a good commercial decision, but the result was lackluster and rushed. Once we get Asylum out of our system, we probably won't revisit the game except for patches and maintenance (hopefully close to none).

Potential solutions I'm considering are Early Access, but I'm very, very wary of using it. Again, after so much waiting and expectations, EA is as anticlimactic as it gets. You get one shot at launch these days, and save few exceptions, EA is a weak launch.

You're very right that good marketing often weighs more than making an exceptional game. Some titles become "press darlings" too, which can boost their success a huge deal. On the other hand, Asylum remains a unique title that feels different and personal, even as a first-person horror game. Plus, we have a strong community waiting for it. I believe it will sell, but it's crucial that we don't disappoint people.

And we really have to do something about your absence at the AT parties! This is absolutely not acceptable!

Holograms?

[Agustin]

[this space intentionally left blank]

[Agustin]

"I'm fooling around with the topic title."

Not. Funny.

So sorry about the lame click bait.

Great to hear there's progress. Would like to know about any plans to get Asylum onto current consoles.

For now, consoles is where our ambitions stop. It's fairly straightforward to port the game to mobile or tablets because of its interface and execution (the node-based movement is very lightweight). But, consoles is a whole different world; you must deal with dev kits, contracts, a demanding QA process... Not ruling out the possibility and it will depend on how well the game performs on desktop/mobile, but PS4 would be my top choice (we're actually certified Sony devs). Then, Xbox, and way down the list Wii U or Switch. I hear Nintendo doesn't care about indie devs and it's become hard to deal with them.

[Agustin]

@Agustin
By the way how is the progress of the book?

Which book? You mean the Scratches novel?

I made a double post above, sorry. I can't delete my own posts!!

[Sven]

@Agustin
Yes the Scratches novel.

Good I hate early access.

@Loma
At least Agustin apologises.

[Agustin]

@Agustin
Yes the Scratches novel.

It's progressing very, veeeeery slowly, so it will be a while until it's done. I am, however, preparing an anthology of short horror stories with other authors.

@Loma
At least Agustin apologises.

Sorry, I do apologize too much. Sorry about that. I mean, sorry about being so... ACK!

[Sven]

You don´t have to apologise for that. It was meant in a positive way of course.

Oh new short horror stories...

[neon]

Thanks for updating us, Agustin. I totally understand the pricing issues, people don't want to pay much these days since the App Stores and Steam are flooding the market with low priced games and it's pretty hard to sell quality for a good price. Anyway, don't sell your game too cheap, I'm sure there are still a lot of people who are willed to pay 20 or 25 Euro for a high quality title. I think Asylum will sell well within that price range at release.