Thank you!

Hi there supporters,

My name is Eric Ruts. Together with a good friend I have created a game called Evolvation. During this exciting, but also exhausting two year development period, we finally launched the game out of early access. This is when we started to realize that the gaming market is undergoing an “indiepocalypse”. There was sadly no way that the game would get anything near the attention and the amount of required players for a successful multiplayer game.

This was a major down set for us since our only goal was to let people enjoy themselves by playing a fun multiplayer to play with friends. Since my motivation is purely to create a game which is fun to play with friends I decided to not monetize the game by introducing game-destroying features like pay-to-win concepts. This however did not work since I am not able to reach a large audience.

The large part of our reviews are really positive and rewarding! Nearly all the negative reviews are about not having enough players online (and about how difficult the game is for noobs, haha). What a shame.

I really wanted the game to succeed so I asked my friend Jacob if he wanted to help me out with rebranding the game. So we worked hard to optimize the servers, reducing the game from 16gb to a quarter of that, testing new controls etc. We wanted to show this on the gamecon Firstlook to test out the Evolvation 2.0.

I once tried to boost the game by giving away 10.000 copies on SteamGifts. We chose to do this since we prioritize players having fun with our game instead of monetizing on it. We are just hobbyists. However, instead of playing most people used the keys for other purposes. I admit that I wanted to start our rebrand of the game with a clean slate so I made the stupid mistake to revoke the unredeemed keys and accidentally got the redeemed keys revoked to. I was spammed with hateful comments, negative reviews and accused of things like being “money hungry apes” and “scammer developers”. In minutes reddits and steamgifts forums exploded with these kind of things and I did not now what to do since it was never my intention to hurt anybody. I choked up and saw our work being destroyed in a matter of minutes… However, as soon I started to explain things and showed I wanted to do everything I possibly could I also got support of a lot of people which appreciated my honesty above all. Thank you very much for your support in this.

However, after multiple tries Steam did not provide me with new keys to resupply or help to release the pressure. So what to do? I already had chosen that I find it more important that people enjoy the game than to monetize it. So to solve the problem I made the decision to make the game completely free with the knowledge that I would not be able to monetize. So I contacted Steam to make this happen for me and they came through.

With all the negativity I encountered and have to deal with I really choked up and it made me feel very sad. However, I never expected that because of my honesty I also got a lot of positive feedback of you guys! That really made my day and am very grateful for that. And want to give you guys my deepest and heartfelt: “Thank you”. You guys make me believe again and encourage me to continue making games.

Feel free to try the game! But remember, the game is ridiculously difficult!

Spread the word and enjoy!

With the kindest regards,

Eric Ruts
Just a hobbyist

PS.  I got a lot of requests to make a Patreon or another method to support us. I do not want to come over as a “money hungry ape” but to be honest all support is welcome. So I’ve created a PayPal button, it is the fastest thing I could come up with. . So if you like the game, please consider supporting us. I am still paying server cost etc. With the money we would be able to improve the game, or even give us the possibility to continue in the gaming business. Thank you in advance!