The demo is now live, and we appreciate all of the feedback that we've gotten so far. Looking at the statistics so far - how many people have wishlisted the game, how much people have played the demo - it's truly humbling to see people excited about and enjoying something we've created. Most of the feedback has been really positive, but one theme that has emerged is that players find the economy/income system to be lacking compared to the rest of the game.
Which leads to the next announcement - The Economy Update. This will ship with the full release. This update will add a significant amount of depth to the economy/income part of the game. The player's overall income will increase as it now has to be split between:
Procurement & Capital Funds - which functions like current use of money
Industrial Investment - turn-by-turn investment in increasing industrial capacity
Homefront - Investment in this category will improve stability and result in additional recruits
Diplomacy - Investment in diplomacy will determine how many envoys you have. You can no longer pay to increase relations faster with a country, but you can also stack more than one envoy on a country to improve relations faster.
Two other major changes:
The "Lobby" button is gone. The game is being rebalanced to run without it. Starting income has been adjusted to roughly match what aggressive lobbying would have done before, no more clicking.
Arms deals can now be paid for over time. Longer terms carry higher interest rates, but can allow you to place larger orders even if you can't pay for them now.
War Footing will be fully released on October 15! This is pushed back slightly compared to our original September target to give us extra time to balance the economy update.
But that's not the end. After release, we have two more items coming in Q4 2026:
V1.1 Update: This update will be free to all players. It will include at least one new feature (still to be announced) and at least one new scenario. It will also contain any needed polish, bug fixes, and balance changes.
DLC: The DLC will feature 3 new nations, and at least 3 new scenarios. We're not ready to announce details yet, but we plan to shortly after release.
After this, we'll take stock of where the game is. We'll be listening to player feedback, as always, and looking at where the game can go next.
We're hard at work getting the game ready for release. Feel free to leave comments here, or join our official subreddit at r/warfooting.