What's New in the PC Release of Wagon Adventure

The PC version of Super Amazing Wagon Adventure is basically finished. It should be released within a week or two on Desura. If you haven't heard of Desura, it's an excellent distribution platform similar to Steam but more focused on smaller indie games. Here's what to expect in the PC release.

• Standard PC options: full screen and windowed mode, support for multiple resolutions, keyboard and mouse controls, and key remapping.
• Completely DRM free: you'll be able to download the game through the Desura client, and there will also be a standalone installer for those of you that don't like clients. In either case there's no DRM.
• Free demo: there'll be a free demo which will be basically the same as the trial for the Xbox, except without a time limit. If you're worried the game won't run on your PC (it has pretty low system requirements, so it probably will), the demo is a great way to check.
• Soundtrack: the PC release will come with the complete 7 song soundtrack.
• A new unlockable wagon: the name of the wagon is "The glitch." That's all I'll say.
• A new survival mode: this one is titled "Fighting Fish." It's easy to guess what it involves.
• A handful of new random encounters: there's some new random scenes sprinkled through the game. My best estimate is that there are about 10% more scenes in the game, although it's pretty hard to measure the size of the game. This includes some new enemies and surprises. Some of these new random scenes are also added to the Shuffle mode (not all of the scenes in the game are in the Shuffle mode for various technical and gameplay reasons I won't get into here).

If you've already purchased the Xbox version of the game, don't worry. The new content will also make it's way into the Xbox version via a free update (with the exception of the soundtrack which I have no way to distribute over Xbox Live). I'm also figuring out a way to distribute the soundtrack separate from the PC release for Xbox gamers that want it. It will most likely be a download via Bandcamp for either cheap or free.

The PC version of the game will be slightly more expensive than the Xbox release at $3 (the Xbox version is $1). I realize the price difference might be a little off putting to some of you, so I'd like to explain the reasons behind it. There are a few different reasons for the price bump, so bear with me.

First, the PC version took a not insignificant amount of time and money. The stuff you see listed above took about a month and a half of work on top of the Xbox version. On top of the added development time, testing the game and getting the distribution ready took a lot of time. With the Xbox game, you basically only have to test on one machine–every Xbox is (mostly) the same. On PC, I had to coordinate a small beta test to make sure there weren't any major hardware incompatibilities. I also had to shell out about $180 for a code signing certificate so I can distribute the standalone installer without as many anti-virus software false positives. With the price increase I'm hoping to recoup this added investment of time and money.

Second, I think the game is worth $3, especially with the added content and the soundtrack you're getting in the PC release. To be honest, I think the original Xbox game is worth more than $1 and probably closer to $3. However, it's widely believed that selling a game on the Xbox Indie Game Marketplace for more than $1 is a very bad idea. On that marketplace, $1 is the normalized price, and in almost every case selling your game for more than $1 is a sure fire way to make sure no one buys it (for more about this see this excellent article by Soulcaster and Escape Goat develper Ian Stocker). On the PC, the situation is very different. PC gamers are used to a much wider range of prices, so I have more freedom to price the game at the price I think it's worth.

Third and finally, $1 would be an extremely unusual price for the PC market. Most of the popular Xbox Live Indie Games which have been released on PC (DLC Quest, Soulcaster I and II, Dead Pixels, Escape Goat) have been released for $2 or more, and $3 seems to be average. In fact, I'm not aware of any games which are $1 new on Desura (excluding games on sale). The cheapest I've seen is $1.30, and that's unusual. I trust that these developers know what they're doing. I think one of their reasons many developers have priced at $3 is this seems to be the minimum price for a new game on Steam. I have no insider information about pricing on Steam, but I've never seen a new game (again not on sale) priced at less than $3. If I have any hope for ever getting my game on Steam (and with Steam Greenlight around the corner this is a possibility), keeping the PC price at $3 is a good idea.

I apologize for being long winded here, but I want to be sure PC gamers don't feel like they're getting fleeced. Deciding how to price the PC version was actually a difficult decision I put a lot of thought into.

I'm really excited to get the PC version out there and into your hands!