Leaving Early Access - Tower Unite Version 1.0
Alright everyone, its time! We’ve been preparing for this moment for years, and with this update we’re sealing the deal:
Tower Unite is out of Early Access!!!
The dream of Tower has been part of some of our team’s lives for almost 20 years now, starting as our lead developer Mac’s highschool daydream in 2006. Now, it’s been 9 years with Tower Unite!
Time really does fly, doesn’t it?
Inspired by our love of theme parks, arcades, resorts, and a metric ton of love for gaming, we’ve been creating a loving place that has endless entertainment and fun, and we’re so happy to give it a big welcome in its 1.0 state!
Our wish was to make a jam-packed game that offers you the world and delivers it as best as it can – a place where friends can hop on and chill, play all sorts of games, and express yourselves in your own digital home.
We have been so humbled by the support we’ve been given. Early access has been an absolute gift, and you all gave us the opportunity to make Tower with our small team and work on the game at our own pace, adding the features we all wanted. It’s been a dream come true. The support from our committed community has been overwhelming, and we are so proud of how much Tower has grown.
With all of the work we’ve done on the game over the years, we feel Tower is ready and doesn’t belong in Early Access any longer.
This does not mean we are done!
Tower development is NOT over. We have games to make, promises we are determined to keep, and we will never stop coming up with new games and ideas for Tower Unite! And, of course, we want to do our best to deliver polish and improvements. This game is our passion.
So, while we’re saying goodbye to Early Access, we want to give you all some info about how future updates will work and are happy to announce our first roadmap for post 1.0!
How Will Updates Work Post 1.0?
If you’ve been following Tower’s journey, you’ve been beta testing the game with us with every update and providing feedback. Since we are leaving early access, we’ll be releasing future major updates on a public beta branch before they get launched into the main game.
This way players can continue to provide feedback on new features and test them before the general public.
In terms of communication updates, we’ll still be continuing our developer blogs; We’ll still be active on the forums and our Discord, and we’ll still be using Trello for updates. We’re committed to being transparent with Tower’s development, even after Early Access!
Bug Fixes Post 1.0
No developer wants bugs or issues with their game, and we are no different. We want Tower to work as best as it can, and are always going to figure out ways to improve performance, solve issues, and make the game an enjoyable experience for all players.
If you encounter a bug or other issue with the game, we continue to encourage you to let us know on our forums. Tower Unite has a large scope and a small team, so we are always grateful to players for letting us know issues when they arise, or giving us more information on known issues.
We’ll continue to deliver hot fixes and plenty of bug fixes and optimizations in every update.
Post 1.0 Roadmap
Workshop Rental Store
A new expansion to the Condo Hub, the Workshop Rental Store displays both popular and recently released Workshop maps made by the community. This store will allow players to grab a map off the shelves and throw it into a special VHS portal device that will transport players to the map for easy browsing.
This feature is very close to being done, and it just needs some fine tuning. If you’ve followed development, you know this has been in our desired roadmap for quite some time, so we’re excited to get it out to you all.
Condo Pets & Cafe Miaou
We’re working hard on the new pet system, which will be one of the first post-1.0 updates. Pets will have the ability to walk around your Condo, follow you, eat, drink, sleep, and yes, you can pet them! Pets can be named, and you can form a bond with your pet by giving it care and attention.
With pets being added, you’ll need somewhere to adopt them. We’re very excited to finally share our progress on the new Cafe Miaou with all of you! Cafe Miaou will be a new store next to D.I.Y. and will be a place for players to adopt lovable cats to keep in their Condo.
Don’t worry dog lovers; there will also be a dog park in the Plaza, where you can adopt lovable dogs as well!
Community Condos
A much desired feature, Community Condos are dedicated user-hosted Condos. We plan to release Community Condos in stages. The first stage will be allowing players to host a dedicated Condo with their own Condo map and to show them on the new Community Condos server list. The second stage is to add editing support, so approved players can edit the layout of the dedicated Condo and spawn their own items. Community Condos will also have their own save system.
Cooking
Cooking is another project we are wrapping up development on! Plenty of food has been made, and the bulk of the work is now on the programming side.
Updates Beyond:
We are fully engaged with developing the updates mentioned above, and we are working our hardest to be able to continue with future updates beyond these. If things go well, we’ll be able to tackle another game world, future arcade updates, and other various projects that have been in the plans from the start.
VR Support
VR development is one of the ongoing projects planned to be a feature of Tower. Converting a game with the scope of Tower Unite to VR is complicated, so it doesn’t have a planned date for now. However, we’ve been steadily making progress and have made huge strides in its development. We plan to roll out changes to VR throughout the months post 1.0.
Future Game Worlds
Future Game Worlds include Planet Panic, Death Run, and a horror Game World. We’ve mentioned it before, but the horror Game World’s scope has grown, so we’re still in the midst of redesigning it to better fit Tower.
Future Game World Maps
Now that we are in a post-1.0 state, our content developers will have more time to work on maps for existing Game Worlds.
We have plenty of Game World maps still in progress, such as Accelerate: Moon City, Virus: Theme Park, and SDNL: Skyline.
Other Upcoming Features to Tower
Tower will continue to grow, and we plan to expand on existing features, such as releasing new Arcade games and Boardwalk Attractions. New Game World Mutators and Upgrades are also in the works.
Other Developments
Tower Unite has been our sole project for a long time. Throughout development we’ve had many ideas and discussions about future games. We’re happy to say we’ve settled on a project we’re most passionate about! With Tower now in its post-1.0 state, we’re excited to finally announce our next game!
Introducing…
The Elevator
The ultimate sequel to Elevator: Source! We have been eager to share this with all of you.
The Elevator will be our second standalone game!
The Elevator is a 6+ player multiplayer game with extended gameplay based on Elevator: Source. For those who aren’t familiar, Elevator: Source is a game about taking a mysterious elevator on a journey to places beyond your imagination. We don’t want to give away too much, but some floors you may have to get off the elevator…
We plan to have more elevating information soon in a future announcement!
Final Thoughts & Early Access Overview
Thanks for sticking around to read this, to play the game, and to see Tower Unite grow. We make games because we love them, and gaming has been an important part of each of our lives. Tower is all about spreading that love!
We can’t wait to keep making games with you all along for the ride.
Below is an overview of every year of Early Access development, up to our last update. I’ve highlighted some updates that were significant in scale or were technical accomplishments for us. All of them are included as interesting parts of Tower’s history.
When you look at this overview, keep in mind that it only scratches the surface of bug fixes, back-end work, and other important changes that have gone on throughout development.
Dev Hangout
In celebration of 1.0, you can join us for a Dev Hangout today at 1PM Pacific Time on Twitch! We’ll be playing Tower and talking to you all about the game.
THANK YOU
Thank you to our backers, early access players, supporters, patrons, and our inspiring community!
Thank you to those of you who submitted your custom maps & condos for our trailer, and thank you to those of you who joined us for trailer shots.
Thank you to everyone who filled out our Road to 1.0 feedback survey, and everyone who submitted bug reports, crash reports, and suggestions throughout the years.
Thank you to everyone who has been on or worked with our team in the past, to those who have given advice during development when we reached out for help, and to everyone who helped us keep pushing forward on this game.
Thank you for talking about the game, creating awesome things with it, and making memories in it, and forming new friendships!
Thank you for playing Tower Unite and being a part of this exciting journey!
We can’t wait for more!
We love you guys,
<3 PixelTail Games
Thank you so much for all the hard work you guys do on the game!!! I’m so excited for what’s to come!