We're launching a new Prealpha Playtest TOMORROW (Friday December 13, 2024) morning, at 10am EST. The plyatest will run until Tuesday morning, 10am EST.

There's so much new stuff in here, I won't ruin the surprise by listing it in bullet point format.
We've gone into uncharted territory on some of our design choices and have a few features that definitely require some more iteration on the tech side, so there may be some bugs, but we believe the experience should be smooth enough to gather some good feedback.

There is also some content that's still in early stages, so some things are not fully realized, but we felt that including these would help flesh out our vision more, and give you a better sense of the direction we're heading in.

The build DOES have a save feature, since the playtest is too long to fit into one session for some people. The save/load system should also help in case you encounter bugs, but save/load sometimes also introduces some additional minor bugs. We don't have a dedicated QA team, but we think we've covered most of the really bad ones. If you encounter bugs, please feel free to let us know about them in the 'submit-bug-report' section of the Playtesting Discord channel.

This playtest is CLOSED and EXCLUSIVE to the Discord Community[discord.gg]. If you like what you see, invite your friends to the Discord so they can take part in this journey, too!

We do hope to eventually re-open the playtest to more players (ones that sign up via Steam), but that depends on the early feedback we get from people in here.

We're super excited to see what you think of the build, and ask that everyone please hit the "feedback" button in the main menu and share their thoughts on this build.

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend and enjoy our latest creation.

- Theo

How to join this playtest:
- Click Here to join our Discord for The Signal[discord.gg]
- Navigate to the 'playtest-chat' discussion and Grab a Key!
- Redeem your key when the playtest is open (Friday 13 Dec 10AM EST until Tuesday 17 Dec 10AM EST)
NOTE: If you've acessed our playtest before, you won't need a key -- the app will be open to returning playtesters without a key during the times listed above.

We're honoured to be taking part in Midgard's Zero Carbon Quest Steam event, happening December 9 through 16 2024. We have been working with the fine folks at Midgard to have the development of THE SIGNAL asessed for it's carbon impact. We've been tracking the data and once the game is released will receive a rating[www.midgard.earth] based on our usage.

Normally this sort of ESG stuff is reserved for the ultra-corporate suits and AAAs, but we feel it's relevant to our work. In THE SIGNAL you interact with a planet that has a mind of it's own -- it's governed by a self-sustaining ecosystem that extends beyond ecology and into its own consciousness. We don't want to give away too much, so we'll just leave you with the idea that systems are important. Everything is connected -- so why not bring that theme back out into the real world?

We're lucky to be based in a province (Quebec) where the majority of our power consumption comes from hydroelectric energy, and we mostly work from home so nobody's burning fuel driving around all day for their job. But that doesn't eliminate other activities: there's travel for events and showcasing, there's travel for team meet-ups. There are always things to consider!

That's where Midgard comes in! They have the power to... track our power usage!

Is this sort of thing important to you? Please complete this survey[www.surveymonkey.com] and let the folks at Midgard know what you think. If you'd like to learn more about the methodology behind the rating process, we invite you to visit the Midgard website[www.midgard.earth] for more details.

P.S. If you made it this far into our post, you get the reward of secret knowledge: we'll be running another playtest very soon. Like if everything goes as planned, before the end of the year soon... Make sure you're signed up and are following us on the Community Hub to be notified when it opens!