Today we hit an important milestone: “Ride Like the Wind” for macOS and Windows is far enough along to be declared “Alpha.” Different studios use that term differently, but for us it means it’s essentially feature complete. The various tutorial elements are not implemented yet, and there are a number of known bugs and things to polish. But the UI is all there, and you can play the game. Rusto Games has done a great job adapting to a very different game engine.
Our QA team has started taking a more thorough look at the port. Their available Windows machine had a smaller screen than I thought we could support, but it seemed to run well enough. That’s a good sign. It can also run on a 5120 x 2880 Retina display connected to a Mac.
Once it’s had more testing, and the Guide and Tutorial are in, we plan on doing some beta testing with a small number of players. We’re still planning the particulars with our publisher, Kitfox Games.
Once we have beta feedback, we’ll be in a better position to know a release date. One reason this is hard to know in advance is that it can depend on other games. With a couple hundred games coming out each week, you obviously can’t avoid all conflicts, but there can be games you don’t want to release simultaneously with.
If you haven’t already wish listed the game on Steam, please do. We also expect the game will be on GOG (though they don’t have store pages for alpha software).
We’re also fixing bugs and added another interactive scene to the game for an App Store update. Thanks to all our players who have reportedbugs!
CHAPTER TWO
Meanwhile, we’ve been working on the next game in the saga, “Lights Going Out.” The art style is defined and a reasonable amount is complete. It’s hard to know how much writing we’ll need until you can play the game from start to finish, but I think we’re close to having half the necessary scenes written and coded.
“Lights Going Out” lets you continue a game of “Ride Like the Wind,” so you can determine the next chapter in your clan’s saga. As a practical matter, you might want to save any games you’ve completed.
Some Notes on Porting
Many games can be brought to new platforms with some careful attention to the user interface on the new device. In fact, I’ve done this twice (adding iPad support to King of Dragon Pass, and adding iPhone support to Battle of the Bulge). You may need new art assets, and certainly a bit of new coding. But most of the game code is identical.
Back when I started working on Six Ages, this was my plan. Basic development was on iOS, in part because the tools were more reliable. I had experimented with two different solutions to bring that code to other platforms, and was optimistic that I’d be able to just rebuild the game. Then I’d be able to polish it, add support for platform-specific achievements, and start a new testing cycle.
Things didn’t work out as I’d planned. Both of the porting libraries I had expected to use were discontinued (one formally, one not formally abandoned but clearly not viable).
So instead of just recompiling, we were faced with rewriting. That’s a way bigger hurdle. And that’s why it’s taken longer than our original plan.
I’ll discuss this in more detail in the future, but we’re pretty much at the point of adding support for platform-specific achievements. QA has been testing the port, and we hope to bring in outside beta testers soon. Our publisherhas suggested that people interested in testing the game sign up on Discord. If you’d rather wait until the last bugs are out, wishlist the game on Steam or GOG.
i just hope that developers didn't forgot about that one, and now that im thinking they probably did. like 95%
Six Ages: Ride Like the Wind PAX West 2019 Impression
Every action has consequences, intended or not.
Developers are always looking at new ways to bend the RPG genre, and mixing a tactical game with a narrative title isn’t a unique idea — both Banner Saga and the Utawarerumono series create their own mixes of the two. Now a third game is tackling the narrative-tactical mix, in Six Ages: Ride Like the Wind. Unlike the former titles, there are really no wrong answers, though there may not be a right one either.
Starting the game, players get to choose their background through a series of questions. For example, when presented with two events my tribe lived through, I selected the flood; this gave my tribe a boon, ensuring they would never be afraid of water or water spirits in the future. After completing a tribal history, the game quickly moves into present day, where the tribe has recently resettled, fleeing some disaster; in my case, this was also water-based, a glaciation.
The tribe the player helps guide is made up of seven families, and thus the council of seven advisers that the tribe uses to make decisions has one from each branch. The player doesn’t have to balance the council (and doing otherwise has its own pros and cons), but for the purposes of the demo they were balanced. First on the docket was deciding what would be the primary task of the tribe for the upcoming seasons. Making new fields seemed to make almost everyone happy, since feeding the 650 members and growing population was going to be a serious concern.
From there, each month passed with small events, which players will need to decide how to handle. These include both non-combat encounters, such as deciding how to handle an overpopulation of deer, to combat-specific tasks, like deciding how many warriors to send against a tribe who’s decided your goat herds look like their goat herds and have come to make their point with pointy things. How many troops your tribe is willing to commit will dictate the outcome, but it won’t necessarily mean a clean win. Every action has consequences, intended or not.
There’s a lot that can potentially go on during each turn, like organizing the clan, casting magics, human sacrifices, shamanistic rituals, building, diplomacy, and more. These were only hinted at during the demo, but will provide a more rounded experience during a full game playthrough.
Though Six Ages: Ride Like the Wind is clearly still in development, the structure for an interesting title peeks through. A release date announcement should be following shortly, as the game is expected to launch in 2019. It will be available on PC via Steam and can be wishlisted now.
