Aieeeeeeeeee War: Arcen Games In Pain
Tricky to know how best to approach this kind of thing, but quite frankly just getting on with it is only sensible. What's happened is that Arcen Games, who make awesomely clever strategy games such as AI War - the source of the 'Quinns doesn't have enough iron meta-gag' and a much-loved AAR that we hope to reboot in the not too distant - and the smart casual title Tidalis, are struggling to make ends meet.
Like, really properly actually horribly struggling. "To put it bluntly and briefly, at present we're only bringing in about one half of the minimum money we need to survive as a company," quoth bossguy Chris Park. Help them.
They've a whole bunch of ways they hope to resolve the problem, first and foremost of which is obviously "please buy our games, they're ace", and the very least of which is "giz cash." So they're also looking for smart suggestions, and even promotional help such as trailer-making and community-making. They're the kind of of guys who give away all proceeds of their expansion packs to charity, and are planning to giveaway the upcoming remake of AI War in the Unity engine for free to existing purchasers- so a What Goes Around ethos is entirely appropriate here.
Read Chris Park's full statement and explanation of the situation here, as well as further ways to help out and get in touch.
Why am I telling you this? Because you're RPS readers. You're the purest PC gamers there are. You know the value of ambitious indie games, and you know how to use the internet. Go forth, heroes. Buy and play and spread the word and viralise and use your hands and brains.
Good luck, Arcen. You totally deserve it.