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Basingstoke released back in 2018 and in my opinion, it was a damn fun game that really got my blood flowing. Sadly, it went quite under the radar and it seems it pretty much ruined Puppygames.

Recently, they've posted up a two-part post-mortem on their Patreon to go over what actually happened. This is coming from a developer who has released several other games including Revenge of the Titans, Titan Attacks! and Droid Assault and they were even included in a Humble Bundle years ago.

What is Basingstoke? Apart from a place in England, it's a mix of stealth and action involving you trying to escape following a violent alien invasion. You carefully navigate different levels, collect loot, craft things to help, throw a sausage roll to distract some aliens and then make a run for it.

It's a pretty sad tale of just how badly things can go wrong for indie game developers, and hopefully some other developers will find it helpful and for us consumers it's certainly an interesting read.

To start with in Part 1 here they go over a bunch of what went right. To quickly sum that part up for the busy: things like switching to Unity made a lot of things easy, the design of the game as a whole went well including some accessibility options and the reception from users was largely positive.

When we get to Part 2 here, things get a lot more interesting. A lot went wrong. For instance, Unity does make a lot of things easy and it also makes other things very difficult as it turns out. However, plenty of it is down to inexperience too they said as they had never made a fully 3D game before. One huge problem is scope creep, where you keep adding in new ideas and at some point you have to make it playable and actually enjoyable, this is where "Basingstoke grew from a 6 month project to a 1 year project to a 2 year project"—ouch.

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Scheduling and a little mismanagement mixed in with this also didn't help they said. When you're doing something like game development, attempting to actually stick to your plans and schedules can be pretty essential and in this case that didn't happen. This led to arguments between them, that caused more delays.

What didn't help is later Puppygames had a publisher almost lined up who were "very interested in the game suddenly weren't" and they were relying on getting that support. They tried to find others but they had no bites so they were suddenly alone.

Onto the launch they had very little press (we covered it, livestreamed it and more) but they didn't get as much as they hoped elsewhere. Not just that, the $29.95 launch price was possibly higher than people expected since indie games have largely become a race to the bottom and a lot of them launch at prices far too low. However, they have now cut the full price on Steam down to $19.95 to see if it helps.

Talking numbers, they've sold almost ten thousand copies after being on sale since April 2018. We're talking less than 500 copies a month and as you expect after paying for advertising, taxes, store cuts and so on that's not a lot of money to live on.

There's a fair bit more to it, see both parts on their Patreon for the full nitty-gritty. Well worth a read.

If you wish you can find Basingstoke free for Linux on itch.io (donations accepted), GOG.com or on Steam. They're also working on the upcoming free to play strategy game Battledroid.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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Eike Mar 3, 2020
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Worth noting that it's only and especially free for linux!
dpanter Mar 3, 2020
Ouch, that's rough stuff.
I own 4 of their current 6 games on Steam and have been looking at that tower defense one, Revenge Of The Titans, as well. All their games have been super solid and very enjoyable in my opinion.

Actually... as I wrote this post I suddenly decided to pick up the rest of their games in a tiny gesture of support.

I really hope Puppygames has a great future! <3
Linas Mar 3, 2020
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Sad, but unfortunately not that uncommon. I've seen (and participated in) projects that have grown way out of proportion, and missed every deadline imaginable. Larger companies can recover from this by burning money that other more successful projects generate. But smaller ones can easily go under.
Cyril Mar 3, 2020
I did not read their full report yet but it's indeed a sad story, all their games are available on Linux and DRM-free!
I bought the game at nearly full price when it came out on GOG but it seems not many people did that.

Best wishes for their next game!
PublicNuisance Mar 3, 2020
It doesn't look like my cup of tea but i'll try to give them $5 on Itch.io when I get my tax refund.
Janne Mar 4, 2020
It's a fun game; I bought it when it was released.

I think one mistake in selling the game is that the interactive intro - and the Steam intro video - gives the impression of a fairly frantic shooter kind of game, when in reality you're spending most of your time quietly creeping about trying to avoid being noticed.

The intro very nearly stopped me from buying it; and I can imagine some buyers wondering where all the action is once they start playing.
Mezron Mar 4, 2020
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I love this company. All of their games have been played in my home since they first came out on Humble Bundle. Titan Attacks! is one that I am always playing here and there when I am solo or traveling. PuppyGames was the first dev company that I added to my pateron after they gave out 2 games for free on itch. I do hope they go back to 2D game making as I think their art style is unique and lovely.
anewson Mar 4, 2020
massive shame, many years ago they were the first indie developers I fell in love with as a linux gamer. I hope they bounce back strong with their new MMO
Nanobang Mar 4, 2020
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Scope creep sounds insidious. It's easy to imagine how it could happen to new, startup dev teams, but it happens to veteran teams too, and that surprises me. I'd imagine that it's a well known problem in the industry and that guarding against it would be rather ingrained into project planning and management. I'd imagine it, and clearly I'd be wrong because it happens to big AAA crews and little ones alike.

More than any other reason, I downloaded Basingstoke from Itch for free as a sign of gratitude for their generosity towards Linuxians. I'm really not much for stealth games, generally, but figured if I really dug it I'd go back and pay them an appropriate amount. As yet, though, I've not played it.

I hope only the best for them.
morphles Mar 4, 2020
Really sad, as they were a company to, I think, fully support Linux on all of their games. Haven't played much of their games, besides some demos (they seemed decently cool). With the exception of "Revenge of the Titans" which is a damn fine tower defense game.
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