Neon District launch delayed for six months

Cyberpunk turn based role playing game Neon District has been delayed and will now release during the summer. Game studio Blockade Games cites ‘unseen circumstances’ and individual misfortune as the main reasons for the delay. The studio has a tight budget and hospitalization and family health issues had a big impact on the production, CEO Marguerite deCourcelle said in a statement.

Apparently the request for the delay of Neon District came from the development team itself. Showing a strong contrast with recent news about so-called ‘crunch time’ in the games industry, in which a development team sometimes works twelve hours a day for multiple months.

After much consideration, and at the request of our development team, we are going to allow ourselves ample more time to complete the remaining critical pieces to ensure a successful public launch.

Marguerite deCourcelle, press release (23/1/2020)

Neon District development progress

So far Blockade Games has build the entire blockchain infrastructure for the game, allowing for both the free-to-play and play-to-earn business models to exists. All characters and assets for Season One have been designed, and are nog being integrated into the game. The studio also still needs to add a final touch to the visual effects and animations. The mission system and inventory are nearing completion as well. At the same time the team is making changes to many aspects, like visual story telling elements and the battle system.

They do this based on player feedback on the closed Season Zero beta test. In the six months up to release, they will keep acquiring player feedback. A new internal build will be released weekly.

Blockade Games prominent company

Blockade Games is a big name in the world of blockchain gaming. CEO Marquerite deCourcelle has already released a couple of crypto art projects mixed gaming and puzzle elements. Neon District is the studio’s first major hundred percent game.

In April 2019 the company sold a non-fungible token for $22.800. The buyer is now the owner of a boss character called Baus. On top of that the company sold regular tokenized game assets, acquiring a total of 90 thousand dollars. By the end of last year the company launched a item pre-sale, adding more funds to the development. Blockade Games became 17th in the Top 50 blockchain games companies from Blockchaingamer.biz.

What is Neon District all about?

Neon District is a blockchain-powered cyberpunk role playing game. The game will be available as a free-to-play game through Steam and probably some other platforms as well. Battles are very tactical, and are one of the core elements of the game. Gamers need to fight through procedural and story-driven missions to collect characters, gear, juice and parts. Collected and earned items can be used in-game, or sold on a marketplace like OpenSea.

The game takes place in Unity City. It’s a futuristic world, completely handcrafted. Your aim as part of the “Degens” and “Edits” is to combat a governing entity that has begun to control its citizens with implant technology and mass surveillance.

Originally published at NEDEROB.