Stormgate, a sci-fi RTS from former Starcraft and Warcraft developers, has just launched out of Steam Early Access. The game’s reception is split, holding a 50% positive user review score, but the team at Frost Giant Studios says active development will continue for a long time.
After several years and millions of dollars invested, Stormgate officially debuted on Steam following just under a year in Early Access. During that period, the game gathered 7,768 user reviews, averaging exactly half positive, which is… well, kinda unusual for a new release from such experienced developers. Yikes.
Stormgate is free-to-play and still under active development despite leaving Early Access. Frost Giant Studios shared a roadmap showing upcoming additions like new units, game modes, and a game editor alpha. Further down the line, players can expect a co-op overhaul and expansion, a new campaign, a custom games editor, and more free missions.
At launch, Stormgate includes the full Ashes of Earth campaign, 1v1 PvP mode, Sigma Labs mode with a terrain editor alpha and 3-player co-op, plus an AI Skirmish mode featuring two challenging missions. The patch notes are extensive and available here. It’s clear the launch is just one milestone, not the finish line.
Funding for Stormgate came through a successful Kickstarter and tens of millions in investment. The decision to launch at version 0.6 instead of the traditional 1.0 raised some eyebrows and confusion. The developers switched to using codenames like Necrolyte (today’s launch) and Mammoth (previous build) for updates to reflect that these are more like milestones than final versions.
Frost Giant Studios wrote, “This approach will allow us to properly recognize each release for what it is: not an incremental addition to a progress bar with an arbitrary ‘1.0’ at the end.” A sensible take, but does it make the wait for a polished, finished game easier? Guess they’re hoping it works.
