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You know a developer is confident in the game it’s making when it’s willing to list all of the reasons you might not want to buy it. That’s the thrust of the latest dev log for Wardogs, the tactical milsim FPS coming to early access in September.
Wardogs has built up a lot of buzz this year, joining Steam’s top-wishlisted games and rising ever since. Now it’s up for pre-order, and it’s immediately become Steam’s top-selling premium game. I played a handful of hours in a closed playtest this past weekend and it totally won me over—this thing might be special.
But developer Bulkhead also knows Wardogs won’t be for everyone—which is, coincidentally, one of the “10 reasons NOT to buy” Wardogs, according to the studio. The whole thing is worth a watch, but here’s a few of the more interesting bullet points with a relevant quote from the devs:
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- Early access content: “Wardogs has a content problem… After launch into early access, we’ll be focusing on bug fixes, feedback, and a new map… Players should not expect regular content drops [throughout early access]… We want to make sure your expectations are set here before your purchase.”
- The price: “Right now, you can preorder Wardogs for $39.99 on Steam and get access to the beta… If the price feels too high for an early access game, please don’t buy it yet. Wait until the game has more of what you want, and consider it then… If you don’t enjoy the beta, just refund it.”
- Player count will decline: “We expect our initial days after launch to have a lot more players than expected, but we can tell you for a fact that this is completely normal. Those players will fall away over the next coming months. Player numbers will drop off, and journalists and influencers on the fringe of the community will try to ragebait your enjoyment out of the game for social media clicks. This doesn’t mean the game is dying. We’re thinking longer term than a flash in the plan. Our goal is to settle into a sustainable, close-knit community. If we’re pulling in 3,000 to 5,000 daily concurrent players who genuinely love the game, it’ll allow new players to buy in anytime and join an active community.”
- Monetization: “We will not monetize the game at any point during early access. We will never monetize in-game gold bars, they must be earned through play. We will never allow you to purchase camos, with the sole exception of an optional supporter’s edition… However Bulkhead will have ongoing running costs [after 1.0], and those costs will need to be covered if base game sales no longer cover them.”
- We made Battalion 1944: “As much as we wanted [our WW2 FPS Battalion 1944] to succeed, with the low player numbers of only 50 to 200 daily players, our publisher relationships broke down, the console version was held in limbo by lawyers, and we burned through our profits supporting the game. We went dark on communication, way darker than we should’ve gone… If you still don’t trust our studio because of Battalion 1944, don’t rush to buy Wardogs. We hope our actions speak louder than words.”
The video is essentially a clever framing for a design manifesto, laying out what Wardogs is and isn’t so that curious Steam shoppers can decide if it’s their speed while also addressing common criticisms. The brevity is refreshing: I don’t know I’ve ever seen devs preemptively confront the hobby’s fixation on player counts, and the race to declare a “dead game,” in official marketing.
Wardogs isn’t out until September 10, but pre-ordering gets you into the beta on August 21.
