Hey all!
First of all, let me say a huge thank you to everyone who wishlisted and / or bought the Early Access release of Drowning Ashes, and to all the lovely folks on the forums who have shared their thoughts, feedback, and adventures in the ruins of the Capital so far!
It has been a humbling and extremely motivating experience to engage with such a thoughtful and enthusiastic community, and I definitely have big plans for the months ahead! The main purpose of this update to share some of that with you all, so you know what to expect going forward.
Regarding the Team Size
Before we get into all the fun stuff, it's time for a little bit of housekeeping! You've probably seen me refer to the team as "we" in some of my forum posts. That's a habit I fell into back when Elston Studios was bigger, and I kept it up because I was also considering the possibility of expanding the team going into Early Access for Drowning Ashes. For the time being though, I think taking on more staff wouldn't be the best move for the project, so for now I'm going to embrace that solo dev lifestyle.
Setting Expectations
Drowning Ashes is very much a passion project. I love working on the game, and it's awesome getting to share it with all of you! With that said, I am only one person, and currently I'm working with development tools that I'm less familiar with. RPG Maker MZ is great, but I'm still experiencing a bit of a learning curve as I figure out how to best use the base software, and all the handy plugins that I've been able to source from the community. Please bear with me! I do, however, want to try and keep up a relatively steady stream of new content, which brings us to...
The Roadmap
In the interest of full disclosure, I'm still figuring out exactly how quickly I can release new content to the same standard as the current Early Access version, so these dates may need to be adjusted in the future. It's also worth mentioning that I'm planning to roll out some smaller patches in between major updates, with things like bug fixes and smaller balance tweaks. The current plan for development looks something like this (mild spoilers ahead):
January 2026 - The Beast
This update will start your quest to retrieve the pieces of the Godsdoom in a large new explorable zone beyond the Hall of Trials, and also add a smaller area beneath the well in the Besieged Courtyard.
Expect new gear, new fiends to recruit, and the ability to upgrade boss equipment!
February 2026 - The Fiends
This update will focus on refining and expanding the recruitment system, updating existing fiends to have more diverse and interesting playstyles, and adding systems to re-fight (and maybe recruit) old bosses.
March 2026 - The Queen
This update will continue the quest to retrieve the Godsdoom with another large explorable zone, new recruitable fiends, and plenty of new equipment to find.
April 2026 - The Storm
This update will continue the process of refining and expanding the recruitment system and updating existing fiends to have more diverse and interesting playstyles, and it will also add the Thunder element to the game (along with some new fiends to make use of it).
This update will also include a significant overhaul of the Magician player class, which I feel is currently lagging behind the others a little.
May 2026 - The Order
This update will bring the quest for the Godsdoom to its conclusion with another large explorable zone, plenty of new fiends and items, and some other fun stuff.
Aaanddd... That's it for now. Will development be finished in May of 2026? Absolutely not! There's still plenty more to come with the final zones of the game, more new features and balance tweaks, and all the endings. A lot of that will depend on your feedback though, and I don't yet have a clear idea of what order I'll be doing things beyond about May. Expect updates to the roadmap in the future as I get a better sense of what the final months of Early Access will look like.
Until next time, thank you all again for playing, and may your adventures in the ruins of the Capital be glorious!
-Daniel