This year is a blowout year for indie games, and many little-known studios on the Steam platform can bring phenomenal hits. The medieval strategy simulation game "Manor Lords", released at the end of April, has received a lot of attention since the beginning of EA testing.
Before the release, it topped the Steam wishlist with "Black Myth: Wukong", and sold 2 million copies in just three weeks after its release, all highlighting the market's recognition of it. What's even more amazing is that the development team of Manor Lords is only one person, and the launch of the game is a miracle in itself.
However, only a little more than two months later, the popularity of "Lords of the Manor" has quickly dissipated. At its peak, there were 170,000 online players, and now there are only 4K left. The 86% positive rating is an expression of players' approval of the game, but you can still see many players in the comments section who are dissatisfied with the current state of the game.
The reason for this is that Lords of the Manor, as an EA version of the game, has not given players anything new for too long.
In the early days of the game's launch, because of the early trial experience of many anchors at station B, this game achieved quite good exposure in the absence of publicity. On the eve of the release, Tim Bender, CEO of publisher Hooded Horse, released a Chinese thank you video on station B, which also increased the goodwill of many players.
However, in the more than two months since its launch, "Lords of the Manor" has only undergone three minor updates, which do not include new gameplay content. Raphael van Lierop, CEO of Hinterland, who is also a veteran gamer, questioned the speed of development of Manor Lords and Tim Bender's approach to the update.
From the player's point of view, he thinks that the update speed of "Lords of the Manor" is too slow. It is not ruled out that the production team is holding back the big move, but if this time is extended to three or five months, then he may lose interest in it and get out of the pit. This is obviously not good news for an EA game.
Games in a similar situation are not alone, the Moon Working Group, which developed the "Ori" series, has also launched a new work called "Malicious Spirit". It's a dark-style top-down action game with a distinct art style. The EA version has also been on the Steam weekly sales chart since its launch, but it is also extremely slow to update.
Up to now, "Malicious Spirit" has only opened three large areas, two story bosses and one trial level, and people are urging the community to update it every day. The good news is that the official promise will be online on July 25, otherwise the popularity will not be maintained.
For EA games, the participation of players is itself a sign of trust. People who participate in EA testing are actually "paying for bugs" in many cases. But if the game is too slow to update and has too little content, then it won't be able to keep people. "The Lord of the Manor", which has sold more than 2 million copies, should be aware of this.
Therefore, in the future, I still hope that game developers in the EA stage can give back to players with higher update frequency and quality.