Hello Moonrise fans,
As you know, Moonrise has been in beta on Steam in the Early Access channel for the past few months. At the same time, the iOS version of the game has been available in limited release, in countries including Australia and Canada. During this beta period we’ve been gathering data on how people play the game. The free-to-play model, and the mobile market, are new territory for Undead Labs, so we’ve been paying close attention to these numbers to make sure we’re making a game people are excited to play, and also a game that we can operate profitably and sustainably with the level of support you expect.
What we’ve found is that while some people really love Moonrise, there were unfortunately many more people who played the game and then moved on after a few days. For a standalone, offline game that might be fine; but for an online game with significant server hosting costs and an expectation for ongoing development and new content, it can mean a game that not only doesn’t pay for it’s development costs, but might even cost money to operate. As you can imagine, that’s not something that makes sense for an independent studio like Undead Labs, nor for that matter would it be a good business decision even for a large publisher.
