Not the mama!
In another Kickstarter heartbreaker, it seems as though The Stomping Land is stuck in the tar pits. After a very successful crowdfunding campaign in June 2013 totaling $114,060, it was released on Steam Early Access almost a year later in May 2014. Although there have been several updates for the game since then, no content or patches have been added since October.
In a forum post last month, The Stomping Land‘s lead artist Vlad Konstantinov announced he had temporarily frozen all work on the game due to losing contact with lead developer Alex Fundora. Konstantinov stated the last message he received from Fundora was in December, and he and the texture artist were owed money for completed work. Since then, it’s been discovered Konstantinov has gone on to start work on another project.
This isn’t the first time Fundora has gone silent. The developer disappeared from late May until August before returning to inform the fanbase The Stomping Land would be transitioning to Unreal Engine 4. After the announcement, the game was temporarily unavailable for sale on Steam, but at some point sales were reinstated and the game can still be purchased for $24.99.
As it is, the game is glitchy, it’s missing features, and it’s far from a completed product. Unfortunately, Kickstarter is offering little assistance other than apologies. One backer, who pledged $90, detailed its response to his inquiries about receiving a refund in the game’s forums.
As of the posting of this article Alex Fundora has not made any statement.
After Raising $114,000 on Kickstarter, Dev Goes Silent [Gamespot, PC Gamer]
[Thanks Hoffmann!]
