We are excited to announce that we are planning to release Behind the Beyond in Early Access this year! We bet you have lots of questions about that, so here are some of the most important details.
What is Early Access?
Early Access is a Steam feature that lets developers release their games before development is fully finished. Once we enter Early Access, the game will be available for anyone to buy and play immediately, while we continue developing the game.
Will I have to buy the full game too when it leaves Early Access?
No.
If you buy the game in Early Access, you are buying the full game. But unlike with a pre-purchase, you don't have to wait until the game is fully released to actually play it.
Why should you get involved in Early Access?
We have two good reasons for you.
💬 First, because you will be able to provide feedback about the game, its features, the story or anything else you'd like, and we can make changes to the game based on that. We've found such feedback extremely helpful in the past!
💰 Second, while the game is in Early Access, you will be able to buy the game for a reduced price.
Isn't it going to spoil the story though?
No.
Even though the individual storylines are very much intertwined, we will attempt to split the whole story into bigger chunks and release an update when one of them is ready. In each chunk, the included storylines will be brought to some form of conclusion, or to a logical milestone (like in the demo). So you won't have to restart from the beginning each time we add new content.
With that being said, since this is a "choices matter" kind of game, we do recommend that you keep saves from different stages of your progress in case we need to make changes to parts that you have already played through. We will do our best to avoid these situations, but we can't guarantee that it won't ever happen.
What exactly will the game include when we go into Early Access?
The game will be reasonably feature complete. That means it will include every feature and game mechanic that we currently plan* to have in the final version of the game, except those that may be unique to certain puzzles which only appear towards the end of the story. The only difference between the Early Access version and the full release should be content: more story, more places to visit, more puzzles, more characters.
*Since player feedback may largely impact parts of the game we might add or change some features as development is progressing.
Will it include Ulti** from the beginning?
Yes, absolutely!
**Ulti is a card game that you will be able to play with most characters in the game.
What about localisation?
The list of supported languages will always be kept up to date on our Steam store page***. The list will always be reflecting the supported languages of the full game, even in Early Access.
***Currently, our demo is missing Hungarian voiceover from that list, but it will be added for Early Access and the demo will get an update at that time too!
When is Early Access starting?
Our plan is to get everything ready for that before this summer.
We will announce it when we have an exact date.
How to get involved?
The best way to do that is to join us on Discord here: http://discord.gg/fcmJt65Prm
We are a friendly bunch and it is also a good way get info about things happening to the game, whether you want to opt in to Early Access or not! So come along and say hi! :)
You can also follow us on social media!
Follow Behind the Beyond
https://twitter.com/BehindTheBeyond
https://www.facebook.com/BehindTheBeyond
Follow Sugarpunch Games
https://twitter.com/SugarpunchGames
https://www.facebook.com/SugarpunchGames
https://www.instagram.com/sugarpunchgames/