Sometimes it feels like just yesterday that we were making Strangeland (maybe because James and I were actually working on it last week!) and sometimes it feels like a lifetime ago. All of our games are intensely personal: we poured ourselves in Primordia and Fallen Gods no less than into Strangeland. But there was something especially personal about Strangeland, where we didn’t just weave an adventure out of the works and people that had inspired us, but also mourned the loss of those inspirations. I think that was true for each of us on the team; from talking through the many characters he would voice with Abe, I know that he, too, drew from such depths.
Players have talked about Strangeland as a part of their “journey through grief”; they have written to me about playing or thinking about it year after year. They have said it helped them in their darkest days. There aren’t words to say how much that means. For me, the project began with the loss of my grandparents, trying to give a form to the shapeless feelings and thoughts that grew in the hole they left behind. In the end, I felt lighter for having gone through that darkness—especially having gone through it with my friends as we built another game together.
“Together” as an indie developer doesn’t just mean your teammates; it means the players, too. My Aunt Virginia, whose poetry inspired me so much on Primordia, once wrote: “Then, as now, a poem might tell a story, create and transmit a mood, emotion, idea, a private or world view; it can do one, or some, or all of these things. But whatever it does, it must, first engage the reader as a participant in an event. And when this happens, a great poem, like a great love, leaves an ineradicable mark, forever changing the man or woman who experiences it.” Even more than a poem, a game must engage the player as a participant. And for your participation in Strangeland and Primordia, we are deeply grateful. We look forward to sharing more with you in the future.