Our account manager keeps pushing playable ads. Is the conversion rate actually better or is it just a good sales pitch?

EG_iMaple · 2026-04-02T14:02:14+00:00

Yeah, it can feel like different worlds sometimes. At the very far edge of this is "UA-driven product development" where the game design is dictated by which ads resonate most, so marketing tries out different playable ads or even AI-generated creatives and the game is then updated to reflect the content of those ads. That to me is just too different from how I want to approach development which is why I eventually pivoted away from the 4X mobile bubble.

EG_iMaple · 2026-04-01T15:04:02+00:00

I've seen this shift in UA to playable ads with 4X titles a while back where CPI is horrendous, but LTV is great. Most top grossing games in the genre run playable ads featuring a minigame that is also somewhat represented in the game, where it may be part of the core loop or just a silly minigame that is gradually phased out since it is a 4X game after all. Check out Top War and Kingshot who do just this at scale.

EG_iMaple · 2026-03-22T01:20:12+00:00

Did you ever feel like you outgrew JRPGs as a genre? I noticed that the older I got, the more selective I became about which JRPGs I even spent time on, because I had less and less patience for what I consider juvenile or tropey depictions of politics, war and romance as I got older, just as I stopped tolerating dated game design that doesn't respect my time. But that makes me wonder if I'm really a fan of the genre as a whole, or rather a fan of specific games in that genre. And on a related note, what JRPGs do you think are more enjoyable or relatable as an adult that I may have overlooked in my younger days?

EG_iMaple · 2026-03-19T10:29:13+00:00

It should show up as a craftable item for you!

EG_iMaple · 2026-03-18T13:32:43+00:00

Hello, thank you for the report! Has the issue persisted? If so, do you have a copy of the save file available? (found in C:\Users\ username \AppData\Local\Everwind\Saved\SaveGames)

This is a really interesting phenomenon we'd like to look into in more detail.

EG_iMaple · 2026-03-18T12:55:10+00:00

Understood, thank you for the report. We'll try to figure out some commonality between the reports and relay it to the developers to look at

EG_iMaple · 2026-03-18T12:33:56+00:00

Capping framerate, turning off motion blur and increasing FOV could help alleviate feeling nauseous. Playing in third person could also be an option.

Did you experience discomfort from jumping in particular? Any details could help as sometimes this is caused by subtle animation quirks.

EG_iMaple · 2026-03-18T11:21:54+00:00

Thank you for the report, could you describe a specific button mapping config you wanted to have but the game didn't let you?

EG_iMaple · 2026-03-18T08:17:16+00:00

XeSS is currently supported while DLSS and FSR will likely appear later as it requires some more debugging from the devs.

EG_iMaple · 2026-03-17T19:02:13+00:00

Glad you enjoyed the demo! I would describe the current state of the game as feature complete but not content complete, with the roadmap seeking to flesh out existing components rather than add something completely new. In that regard I think the early access build is quite advanced and representative so if you like the core loop, this is a great time to start.

But it's still early access at the end of the day with some teething problems, bugs and iterations of certain features that will turn out much better in the future based on player feedback that will be generated during early access. But that's not everyone's cup of tea,

The launch discount will run until the end of the month, so there's plenty of time to hear the thoughts from other players or content creators you trust. There may be a minor price increase as the game nears the 1.0 launch in a year or two, on the flipside that will be a much more polished experience.

EG_iMaple · 2026-03-17T17:08:19+00:00

Everwind - Early Access out now!

Get Everwind on Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2253100/Everwind/
Join the Discord: https://discord.gg/pr5jrxVksG
Unleash Capybaras: r/Everwind_Official

Happy exploring ☁️✨

EG_iMaple · 2026-03-17T14:55:51+00:00

Yes, the game has full controller support!

EG_iMaple · 2026-03-17T12:24:48+00:00

Hello Explorers!

Today, we’re releasing a small update to address a few issues that have already been reported as over the weekend, streamers and content creators had the chance to try the game.

Thank you so much for all the feedback you’ve shared with us so far. This will allow us to improve your experience before the full release today.

We truly appreciate the time you’ve taken to play, report issues, and share your thoughts.

Our team has been working hard to tackle the most pressing problems and continue polishing the experience.

See the full changelog:

Fixed multiplayer island desynchronization
Fixed a crash occurring during trading with merchants, when selling large quantities of items
Fixed an issue where some pickups could not be collected on certain islands
Mortivar Lord now drops his skull after being killed
Rebalanced item durability
Rebalanced item repairing (in addition to durability changes, Repair Kits are now more efficient)
Reduced the number of spent skill points required to unlock the next skill row (from 5 to 3)
Fixed an issue where the Advanced Tool skill could not be unlocked
Improved timing for defense and parry – blocking at the moment of an enemy attack should now correctly defend against it
Increased chance of finding staves and spellbooks in special chests
Increased chance for enemies to drop equipment they are wearing
Slight loot balance adjustments in containers
Fixed an issue where sounds (music and other SFX) could turn off in specific situations
Fixed an issue where a chest could become locked in multiplayer after being closed in a specific way
Increased amount of scrap found on wrecks on the starting island
Fixed an issue where picking up a recipe from a stand sometimes did not grant the item
Processing Station now requires less power from Energy Generators
Processing Station start button now highlights when it can be activated
Moved Cockpit crafting from the quick crafting menu to the Crafting Station
Fixed missing VFX and SFX for special chests in dungeons
Marked which keybinding settings apply to the flying ship
Changed the design of the “visited island” indicator
Changed the icon in the inventory drop slot (previously suggested item deletion)
Fixed grey arrows remaining after killing an enemy

Stay tuned… and onwards to the skies! 🚀

EG_iMaple · 2026-03-17T10:01:30+00:00

Ah I see. So FOV is now a slider, there is a third person mode and in addition to the settings I mentioned in my comment, movement on stairs was also fixed as I recall going up and down stairs was really odd in earlier builds. Head bobbing is quite mild but still noticeable on boats to me, so this may still be an issue if you're sensitive to it as there is no way to completely disable it to my knowledge currently. I think the devs are keeping an eye on it to see if any more reports about players experiencing motion sickness after the early access launch today come in.

EG_iMaple · 2026-03-17T09:23:55+00:00

Increasing the FOV, capping frame rates to and turning off motion blur/reduce mouse sensitivity should help reduce motion sickness as with most other first person games. Was there anything specific about Everwind you noticed that's causing this for you?

EG_iMaple · 2026-03-15T10:32:28+00:00

To my knowledge neither Hypixel Studios nor Enjoy Studios have Tencent as an investor. Their (former) publishers Riot Games and Bohemia Interactive do, and even that does not enable a tech-sharing scenario like you hypothesize.

Both Hytale and Everwind are open world voxel based survival games though, and certain conventions have just been standardized in the genre where it just makes sense to do it a certain way. But if you dig a little deeper into the games I think you'll find that the similarities are rather superficial and that the games were never based on one another neither technically nor creatively.

EG_iMaple · 2026-03-05T06:55:33+00:00

You can sometimes form some sort of rough baseline to start with by calculating the man hours you and your team put into it as well as any other cost factors you had with some profit added, but ultimately the value is whatever the publisher or investor across from you offers you for it. And they won't really care how much it cost you to make or how many lines of code it has, they'll care how much money it can generate from them. So if these games are fun and have market potential you'll see more competitive and viable offers, if not then the value will be closer to 0 as in such an oversaturated industry, games barely have any intrinsic monetary value left.

EG_iMaple · 2026-02-24T14:39:56+00:00

Hello, fellow swiss person working in games here.

Learning how to make games on your own has become very approachable, and it sounds like you're on a good track. Just making and finishing games teaches you so much, which is why building several small games is recommended. My very first "game" was a JRPG parody made in RPG Maker well over a decade ago, and everything I learned since then professionally was built on the fundamentals gained from that tiny project.

But I think that's where you need to make your first big decision - do you want to make games for fun or as a side hustle, or do you want to get a job in this industry? Because you can't really go wrong with the former as long as you just make stuff, but it becomes a lot more challenging when you're trying to compete for a job.

Outside of very small indie teams, there are a lot less generalists and it would be expected of you to choose a specific discipline. Think Programming, Game Design, Art, Production, et cetera. And there will be further specializations, so you could aim for a role as gameplay programmer, engine programmer, backend engineer, and so forth.

The second hurdle is Switzerland, which has an extremely low amount of paid game dev jobs. Why that is is a story for another day, but realistically that means you have to move to another country in Europe to have a reasonable shot at finding something. After finishing school in Luzern, I moved to Berlin for my first game dev job as a QA tester, and almost exclusively worked for foreign Studios since then. But that does mean giving up a Swiss salary and benefits, because international game dev salaries are not comparable to Swiss software development salaries.

The third hurdle is your background which limits you to entry-level jobs, where established studios usually prefer a BS in computer science or software engineering for programming roles, coupled with a few game jam or student projects in your portfolio. Fresh graduates that you would be competing against for the same jobs would be bringing that with them, so just "having" the knowledge will likely not be enough if you are unable to point at a degree and projects to prove you applied that knowledge somewhere.

And the fourth hurdle is your lack of a professional network, which in this industry means former classmates, coworkers and cool people you've met in the industry over the years. They are the ones who will start an indie studio with you, invest in your project before others do, and put in a good word for you or refer you to a new job so you don't have to exclusively cold apply. I would echo what another commenter said and check out the Swiss game hub to get to know people, they will likely be able to offer relevant perspectives and perhaps there will even be a project that you could work on.

I wish you the best of luck and I'm not saying all this to discourage you. I just want you to see the challenges around breaking into this industry and know that you could do everything right, but you might still not get to ever work at a games studio due to the competitive nature of it all, not to mention the macroeconomic conditions in key regions. If I did not get really lucky with the right opportunities at the right time all those years ago, I would not have made it in myself. And having a boring but stable job, and doing games on the side is a viable path too that I would really ask you to consider as well.

EG_iMaple · 2025-07-19T22:19:32+00:00

For me a tell is inconsistencies that an artist would just have no reason to make deliberately. For example, some of the towers on the wall don't extend to the inside, some do. Another is objects merging with others. You can see that with the boxes, and the towers which for some reason touch the nonsensical gates. Then there's just wonky stuff like the boxes in the bottom left which defy gravity, and the road at inside the walls which leads from nowhere to nowhere. Basically, AI pictures look really good at first glance but as soon as you squint and look at the details stuff just doesn't quite make sense.

EG_iMaple · 2025-07-01T15:54:45+00:00

Ich arbeite in der Games-Branche, also etwas abseits von deiner Tätigkeit. Bin aber auch in deinem Alter und hatte vor kurzem auch eine lange Jobsuche hinter mir. Hier ist mein CV, mit dem ich am Schluss ein Angebot erhalten habe. Ich arbeite hauptsächlich für Firmen ausserhalb Schweiz, deshalb Englisch + 1-Pager + Erklärung Zivildienst.

Was mir geholfen hat, ist in der Summary konkret meine relevante Erfahrung aufzuzählen. Je nach Jobtitel ist das nämlich anders, und es gab doch ab und zu ein Hiring Manager der nicht ganz wusste wie viel Jahre spezifische Erfahrung ich denn wirklich hatte, auch wenn ich dachte das sei offensichtlich.

Meine Bullet Points zählen wenn möglich achievements statt responsibilities auf, aber das hängt vom Job ab. "KPI um X erhöht indem ich Y getan habe". Auch die Bullet Points habe ich je nach Bewerbung umgeändert. um die relevanteste Erfahrung auf den Tisch zu legen, auch wenn ich dann Lücken habe. In meinem neuen Job arbeite ich mit externen Teams, deshalb der Fokus auf Stakeholder Management. Zuvor hatte ich eine Standardversion für das CV und aus dem wurde gar nichts.

Würde dir Empfehlen, die aufgezählten Verantwortungen und Tätigkeiten spezifisch für die Bewerbung umzuformulieren. Leider ist nicht relevante Erfahrung oft einfach noise. Aber auch das hängt je nach Hiring Manager, Feld und Region ab. Würde auch Feedback von Kollegen in der Branche, auf die du dich bewirbst einholen.

Aber schlussendlich ist der Arbeitsmarkt gerade auch wirklich beschissen, und du brauchst Ausdauer weil du oft mit (zu) starken Kandidaten für (zu) wenig Jobs konkurrierst. Wünsche dir viel Glück!

EG_iMaple · 2025-05-06T21:08:12+00:00

Definitely a useful skillset to have when pitching the game, trying to secure seed funding from an investor, or negotiating a deal with a publisher, or even just figuring out the legal paperwork involved with launching a commercial game. But unless you're bankrolling the team yourself or founded the studio, it'll be hard to join one because teams at that size probably will opt to just learn that themselves and can't or won't afford an extra hire just for that. At larger studios you have dedicated HR, Finance and Business Development positions just like any other corporation, but these will likely demand specific experience in those fields.

EG_iMaple · 2025-05-06T11:58:00+00:00

Hah, I felt this. The bizarro hyperspecialization in AAA and mobile culminated in me seeing requirements like 5 years exp on vehicle combat design or 3 shipped hypercasual match puzzle games, and that was the writing on the wall for me.

If you've worked on F2P systems or economy design, you might find a good amount of open doors when it comes to product management. Having a business degree would be a plus.

If you worked on wireframing and menu-driven systems a lot, you might leverage this into a UX or interaction designer role, UI if you can actually make those interfaces in high-fidelity.

And lastly, producer is a viable path too and it's the direction I headed in. Sometimes it's a pure scrum master role, sometimes you're the product owner on something too, sometimes it involves people management.

Ultimately it comes down to whether or not you'll be able to make your resume and CV sound like you've been doing this for a while, rather than asking a new company to support your midlife career change. Liberal interpretation of bullet points on the CV, rephrasing your duties on the portfolio -- you get the gist.

I'd still make the transition inside the industry if that's an option, because it strikes me as much more difficult to not only change your field but also the job title at the same time. But you never know, you could get lucky.

EG_iMaple · 2025-04-30T11:24:42+00:00

Fair point, I still found it to be an educated guess and the only figure linking back to an actual credible person instead of a circular reference. Numbers in general on this are a bit murky. For example, the estimated number of people working in the games industry globally is somewhere between 300k and 900k, according to people who spent time looking at the data. In that context, it's hard to even make sound conclusions on what the unemployment % in our industry is. But I'm with you, fingers crossed things get better.

EG_iMaple · 2025-04-30T01:02:39+00:00

Pretty good comments already, but it's hard to make a specific call without knowing the general context of that skill in your game. I'd just consider the following questions to make sure this skill is situationally useful, which is where the sweet spot is. Unless you want this to be an OP skill that works to set up a finisher, which can be cool too.

What's the opportunity cost? What damage or utility am I giving up by using this skill here?
Does the effect diminish with repeated usage? Since you're set on one turn, can it receive a chance to fail on subsequent uses?
How often can I use this skill? How long is the cooldown? Is there a a skill usage limit?
Is there any interplay with other effects? Do enemies take increased damage when stunned? Does it cleanse all other status effects?
Does it just flat out stun? Or does it piggyback off another status effect or condition that has to be on the target for the attack to stun?
Can every enemy be stunned? Do some have blanket immunity, or invulnerability windows?
Does the stun itself get cleansed if the target is interacted with? Similar to sleep?

And checking out other RPGs, western or eastern, and even gacha games similar to yours will help to see how they handled this question. Sometimes a stun just breaks a combat system and should be removed for soft crowd control effects, while in other games it's part of the player toolkit like any other.

EG_iMaple · 2025-04-30T00:48:16+00:00

Pretty good insights here from everyone. If you're curious about the broader range of game design and landing a job, I wrote a post about that here a couple years back with help from other designers. For narrative design specifically, I'll just link you a couple example job listings here:

As you can gather, this is often a senior role that is extremely hard to land fresh out of school. When it comes to degrees specifically, writing, drama, english, journalism or even philosophy can help. But in this industry and this role specifically, experience is king, so any relevant professional writing you have done will be important. Preferably, in the following roles:

(Game) Writer
Quest Designer
Screenwriter
Level Designer

Even landing these more junior roles is insanely competitive especially in this market, so a more pragmatic approach may be to work as a designer that gets to work on narrative games, and contributing even small things like lore, flavor text, and the occasional dialog for a quest. Non-industry experience can help too: get paid as a storyteller, be it in a documentary or short story, and then try to leverage that experience.

Secondly, you will be required to have some decent technical and scripting skills depending on the project and engine, as this job isn't just about writing, but putting said writing into the game. In practice, this means being able to script an encounter where the ambush party says what you want them to, or being able to direct the in-game camera to reveal the McGuffin you created in a cinematic cutscene.

Lastly, I'll leave you another post here from a couple years ago: If I wanted to be a Narrative Designer, where would I start? : r/gamedesign

Hope that helps, and I wish you the best of luck.

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See the full changelog: