This is how the office of Snowbird Games looks today. Just the same as yesterday, and it has been looking pretty abandoned for the last week.

There is an irony that we have created our first games, for example, Combat Mission: Afghanistan or Mount & Blade: With Fire and Sword - as a distributed team, so this current quarantine mode is not as stressful for us as for many other teams. There is only one member of the team who suffers from frustration - our cat Girya (is diminutive of Snegirya, literally ‘a little snowbird’ in Russian).

This kitty had a bit of a rough start, we found her and adopted her in 2014. Once she’s spent 2 weeks in a locked basement, and that is why she doesn't like it at all if there are less than three or four people around. Of course, we don’t abandon our kitty, and our level designer Stanislav became her personal curator, but Girya still doesn’t understand where everyone has gone and is it already possible to bring everyone back. Oh my dear cat, we’d be happy to know the answer.

This is not to say that when everyone works from home, they have plenty of time. There is no time at all now - instead of one finger you could point to the monitor and three words (what the hell? ), you have to assemble a Skype congregation. Some of us have children, and this is a special hell of having a remote school in your living room. All your family members also have constant calls, there is little space, there is a lot of noise, you can’t go for a walk, so you’re going bananas. Still, you can’t say that this is SO BAD. The blockade of Leningrad anyone? That was terrible, and the current quarantine routine is only annoying.

Why do we write all this stuff, anyways? Plague comes and goes, but production can’t be stopped. There are loads of tasks for our level designer Stanislav, besides feeding the cat. This week we are writing perks for enemy and friendly captains and completing a stash system (after all, every pirate game should have an opportunity to bury the treasure). We are also busy with the interface of diplomacy. It’s hard to say when the next update will be shipped, but we are doing our best to release it in May.

Take care of yourself and try not to overfeed your cats. Do not believe them at all. This sad face is only a vile deception.