It says a lot about the games industry when charitable gestures by developers are met with suspicion and skepticism. Many gamers have grown wary of predatory business practices. It’s got so bad that when a game like Holocure releases completely free, it raises a few eyebrows. Kay, the solo developer of the title, has taken to Steam to set the record straight.
Holocure Developer explains why the game is free to play
In a discussion thread on Steam titled “Where do these awesome devs receive their money from” Kay responded and shed some light on the pricing. Kay goes into a little more detail about their financial situation than I’ll share here. But basically, they have multiple sources of revenue and don’t need funding for game development. Moreover, they don’t even want it.
Typically, games are developed by a team, but Kay explains they do the vast majority of the work on Holocure completely solo. They had this to say about Holocure’s development:
“I’d say ~75% of the development work of this game, I do on my own. From gameplay design, most sprites+animation, programming (the entirety of Holo House I coded on my own), and project management.”
Kay explains that the only part of Holocure they didn’t do was the translations and some of the artwork. These tasks were outsourced, and everyone involved was paid.
The Holocure Subreddit is full of users praising Kay for the post and the transparency. Many users express sentiments like ” I feel bad for playing it for free.” As daft as that may sound, I’ve already got my fair share of enjoyment out of Holocure and would gladly hand over money for the title. Kay closed their post by saying, “people are enjoying the game, that’s all that matters to me.” If that isn’t the sign of a labor of love, I don’t know what is.
If you’re a fan of games like Vampire Survivors, I can’t recommend Holocure enough. If you want to learn how the Collab system works, check out our guide.
