Hidden Path Entertainment has pulled its sandbox construction game Windborne from Steam Early Access, and cancelled ongoing development. Players who own a copy will still be able to play, but it will unfortunately remain in its current, unfinished state.
“We have attempted to secure the needed funding to finish the game in various avenues and unfortunately what was once a not-so-completive market has now been flooded with games of this style,” the team writes on the Steam Community page. “Windborne has been a labor of love for this studio since its inception. We have spent countless hours designing and creating a striking world to share with everyone. We have decided that after much business development around the title with no positive movement in funding that we will be delisting Windborne on Steam.”
Owners of the game won’t be able to secure a refund, because any money received by Hidden Path was pumped straight back into development, but they will receive five extra copies of Windborne that they can hand out to friends.
Those who splashed out $45 for the Deluxe Edition will also receive three copies of Defense Grid 2 Steam Special Edition, and three copies of the Defense Grid: Containment bundle.
Hidden Path isn’t releasing the game’s source code for free, in case they return to the project at some point in the future. If they ever receive enough funding to do so, anyone who owns the original version will receive a copy of the new version for free.
As you might imagine there’s a fair amount of dissatisfaction amongst the game’s community, but unfortunately this is one of the risks early buyers take; Valve makes that pretty clear in the revised FAQ for Early Access games.
“You should be aware that some teams will be unable to ‘finish’ their game. So you should only buy an Early Access game if you are excited about playing it in its current state,” the company writes.
