If you were involved in the early stages of Minecraft‘s development, you might remember the paranoia that ensued each time Notch delayed an update. Before “early access” was commonplace, there was always the constant fear that the developer would duck out with the money, leaving the game unfinished.
The situation surrounding Cube World is, essentially, the realization of those same fears. As the game’s updates began to thin out, many fans (including myself) were quick to make excuses for the developer, citing Minecraft as an example of what to expect. By the end of July 2013, however, those updates had stopped entirely, replaced by the occasional developer tweet from Wolfram von Frunk (@wol_lay) encouraging fans to be patient.
Wollay’s last tweet, including the video update below, was posted on June 30, 2014.
Since then, there have been no updates concerning the progress of the game. To make matters worse, the game has since disappeared from Picorama’s online store, becoming unavailable to purchase for the last six months. This is probably for the best, as anyone still buying the game is unlikely to receive a finished product at any time in the near future. According to Wollay, however, it’s a matter of when, not if.
Yesterday, over a year since his last public statement, Wollay responded to an email from Kotaku correspondent Patrick Klepek. In the email, Klepek inquires about the development status of the game. Wollay responds predictably.
We’re still working on the quests. It’s quite difficult and a lot of work to make randomly generated quests that are fun and non-repetitive. Since the last published video, I redesigned the quest system several times but didn’t want to tease fans with new features before I’m 100% happy with them.
Video game fans are no strangers to delays, and generally speaking, delaying a game to ensure its quality is a good thing. Delaying a game’s development for a year to polish a single mechanic, however, seems a little extreme. “Maybe I’m a bit perfectionist here,” Wollay adds, “but I just don’t want to develop Cube World in the wrong direction.”
Fine, I’ll bite. It’s a reasonable enough explanation. But why is this the first time we’re hearing it? Klepek shares my sentiment, asking why Wollay hasn’t bothered to check back in with the community in so long.
When I’m working on something complicated I prefer to focus fully on development until I’m done and can show the results. Unfortunately it’s taking longer this time. I’m not posting ‘hey, we’re still here’ because that’s beyond all question – Cube World is my passion project and I will work on it until it’s finished.
That’s pretty bold talk, and many fans would be inclined to disagree. Even the game’s primary subreddit has become a sad joke, populated primarily by @ishl3outyet style updates reminding frustrated subscribers that the game still hasn’t recieved an update.
I suppose only time will tell. If you want to try Cube World for yourself, make sure to pick it up on PC the tuesday after the apocalypse. For more updates about the game’s development, don’t bother checking Twitter; stop by GameSkinny instead.
