Storm Gate When we launched early access around this time last year, we made many promises, but we didn’t offer many of them. The group of former Blizzard developers teaming up for self-published Starcraft-style RTS was too good to be true. Unfortunately, that was the case. The first game was “Undercook” (words from Frost Giant Studios CEO Tim Morten himself), and received some terrible feedback. Things didn’t improve much with the full launch last month. Morten then took him to LinkedIn to explain what went wrong, what was different, and why Cyberpunk 2077 and Mann’s Sky are “unicorns” between the games.
Stormate made no secret of chasing the Starcraft crown as one of the greatest RTS games of all time. It focused on competitive PVPs, and was able to be a valuable pick in every potential meta with enough juice for each faction. However, things didn’t get off to a good start, so despite major updates they weren’t actually picked up afterwards.
Stormate is currently sitting with 49% positive reviews on Steam, landing a “mixed” rating. However, recent reviews have been in even worse condition, with just 39% positive feedback and a “almost negative” rating. This suggests that players are not jiv with the full release.
Morten has a reason for this. “Stormate was launched with an early access shortage. This is my fault,” he wrote on LinkedIn. “Product range, speed of implementation, and available time/capital all played a role exacerbated by a disappointing moment of communication.”
If he spends his time again, Morten says that he “limits campaigns and early access scopes to 1V1, and adds modes later once those modes are polished, but also stiffens due to deadlines.
He admits that the frost giant is “exaggerated and lacking,” but believes Stormgate still has “the real possibility.” However, it is not easy to realize that possibility after such a rocky start.
“Even when labeled as early access, launches produce binary results that rarely change,” he says. “Recovering from a bad launch is extremely difficult. Man’s sky and cyberpunk are not effectively unicorns.”
If Stormate was first launched today, in a different economic situation a year ago, Morten believes Frost Giant should implement a “more radical production approach” that includes outsourced labor and AI use from outside North America.
Using a chatbot to store your Stormate is a bold strategy if it’s a cheap strategy. Sadly, so many issues in game development have been attributed to funding. Even with Stormate’s Double-A budget, awful first impressions, poor communication with Kickstarter supporters and a disastrous full launch, an average of 89 players remain this month.
If you want to play competitive RTs that aren’t Stormate, check out our list of the best strategy games on your PC. The best free PC gaming picks are also great. All 100 of them.
Are you one of the remaining 89 players in Stormgate? Please let us know on our community Discord Server. Readers and staff will discuss what is necessary to fix a fundamentally flawed video game.
