Hello everyone,
It has been quite a long time since I have made an announcement like this.
First and foremost, just gonna clear the air here, the game is still in active development.
Secondly, I wanted to apologize for the lengthy lack of communication on my part.
Keeping everyone informed and in the loop is kind of one of my weakpoints but communication still should've been made nonetheless.
Where have I gone and what has happened?
So to answer this, basically personal life stuff and overall priorities taking over.
When it comes to personal situations, it's one thing no one can control.
The past 3 years has been definitely crazy to say the least.
Burnout was also one of the big factors that slowed down progress.
I have also had to turn this project primarily into a hobby for those 3 years in order to keep stuff running.
Aside from that, you are all caught up on the last 3 years of where I have been.
What about the game?
This is the big one that everyone wants to know.
Luckily, even though it was downsized to a hobby for those 3 years. Progress never stopped.
Some of you tried out the public beta branch and that was a bit of what I was working on since then.
The last update to that was around January of 2023.
Now this doesn't mean that the game wasn't actively tested from that point.
It was just that the game internally had shifted around to the point where bugs started popping up left and right.
I ideally don't wanna push out a build that has more bugs than the previous one.
There has been some amazing friends that have helped me squash a majority of the bugs.
With that being said, effective with the next update, I will be phasing out the public beta branch and finally merging version 2 onto the main branch!
Also I do apologize for everyone on the public branch, when setting up some stuff, I had messed with some settings prior. Such as accidentally setting a build that broke the bot system... Sorry for that one.
So what happened to this game when it was meant to release in 2021?
To anyone out of the loop, around early 2021, when the game was nearing completion, I took a step back, and took a long, good look at what was developed. Personally I did not like what I had seen, some textures were made when the game was still in it's prototyping phase, models didn't match the current designs, etc.
So I made a decision to completely rewrite the game and redo all of the assets.
Ripped apart every single map, gamemode, character, animation, and even music to make a more cohesive version of everything. Could I of released that version and made this a sequel? Sure, I could've done that. But I wouldn't have liked the finished product at all.
So, where do we go from here?
As per usual, I will continue developing the game.
However, I want to give out proper plans and expectations for future content/updates.
The big first step right now is to get this update out to everyone as quick as possible without rushing.
I want everyone to play what has been made so far.
After that, make a proper roadmap explaining what is needed, what is left, and what is needed to achieve each milestone.
Then finally, make sure that 2025 is the year that this game gets the much needed love and care that it deserves for the community.
What to expect from this update
To anyone who has not played on the public beta branch, it will be kind of a shock to see how much the game has changed and evolved.
But that goes without saying that this update aims to try and refresh the game with some bits of polish scattered around.
Most of the biggest changes are more technical, but they will be fully explained with the changelog for that update.
That being said, this new update version will not follow the standard update naming scheme!
Instead of beta 1.12, the next update will be called "PRB 2025 0.1.0"
Also this year marks 10 years since the game initially started development. 10 whole years.
Back in the day this was meant to be a small side game that was primarily singleplayer in order to hold people over for a much bigger game. But this game ended up becoming way bigger than I could've ever imagined. It has been 7 years since I put this game on steam. And frankly, I thought I would have this game out by now. But I kept trying to improve the game over and over again. So now I am going to restrict myself from keeping this loop going. I am going to finish this game, and have this game tell the story it deserves to tell.
I wanna thank everyone who has supported this game so far.
From the people who bought the game, to everyone who has given me honest and critical feedback that I needed to help shape the game so far.
You all are amazing, and I am glad that you all have been part of this game's development.
And I wish I could've communicated better over the past few years, and since may of last year, I wanted to write this, but I couldn't think of a way to word it proper. I am glad I was finally able to word this all proper.
I should've done this much sooner, but I can't go back in time and fix that. I can only go forward and try to do what should've been done since this game first went into early access on steam.
So here's to hopefully making 2025 the year of Sector 452!
~Joseph L.
