Launching in a Recession

April 1, 2025 | Author: HDIAndrew

We have gotten a lot of great response since we announced last week that Emperor of the Fading Suns is finally coming to Steam on April 4 (Wishlist it now at https://store.steampowered.com/app/2799350/Emperor_of_the_Fading_Suns_Enhanced/). In fact, really the only negative response I have heard has been from fans worried about us launching our game during an economic downturn, or a “correction” as it is currently officially named.

However, this is not the first time I have faced this. When we launched “Vampire: the Masquerade,” it was during the 1991 recession brought on by the Gulf War. We worried about how this would impact our fans, but it proved to be an advantage. The base rules were $20, and they offered a huge amount of entertainment value for the dollar. 

As opposed to a movie, that you would go to a theater and watch once, this game offered hour after hour of fun. Many of our players who bought the book figured it ended up costing them less than 10 cents per hour of fun, and of course many people played the game without ever buying the book. I love that social component.

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End of 2024 Updates

November 15, 2024 | Author: HDIAndrew

Glad to say there are a lot of good things going on. Our HDI games continue to sell well on GOG. We are working on bringing Emperor of the Fading Suns to Steam, and while our old code does not care for Steam’s modern API’s, our efforts to crowbar them in are paying off. You can wishlist the game on Steam right now, as well as get the demo, and the full version will be up there next year.

Our old Warhammer Epic 40K: Final Liberation game is seeing a bit of a resurgence, perhaps as a result of fun recent streams. Check out this interview with Filmdeg Miniatures to enjoy gameplay and a fun converation.

The Georgia Game Developers Association had a very active year, including a month of SIEGE activities. We started with a really fun indie game festival in Doraville, followed up with our panels and Indie Playground at DreamHack, and wrapped up with a really successful college fair at ShaoCon. Working with our partners allowed us to support their worthwhile efforts while ensuring our attendees got access to even more activities.

The DeKalb Entertainment Commission continues to bring a lot of productions to the county. While production in Georgia has fallen to *only* $2.6 billion (who ever thought Georgia would be complaining about $2.6 billion worth of film production?), DeKalb residents are continuing to make millions renting out their properties and businesses to production companies.

Conventions and other events continue to grow here. If you are at Conjuration this weekend, please say hi. Other upcoming events include:

The GGDA Holiday Party Dec. 10 at Underground Atlanta

Conpossible Feb. 7-9 at the same hotel as Conjuration

The Atlanta Science Fiction and Fantasy Expo March 15-16 at Northlake Mall

Our next SIEGE Indie Game Festival April 17 in Doraville

Momocon May 22 in Atlanta

Hope to see you soon!

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Educational Games for Older Kids

August 14, 2024 | Author: HDIAndrew

I got a DM on LinkedIn from a friend asking for recommendations for educational games for older kids, since my friend was having trouble finding any worth spending time or money on. We are having a similar situation. Our nine-year-old no longer has any use for the learning games she used to play or her school offers, like Teach Your Monster to Read, Prodigy or ABC Mouse.

Minecraft has stepped into this space, creating more educational modules. The GGDA has even advised the Georgia DoE on, but teens now often find Minecraft to be a kids’ toy (https://education.minecraft.net/en-us/resources).

My main recommendation are entertainment titles that do a great job of Stealth Education. “Civilization” is the best example of this. I also recommended HDI’s own Machiavelli the Prince for politics, economics and Renaissance history (now on sale at https://www.gog.com/en/game/machiavelli_the_prince for less than $4). We want people to learn before they realize that is what they are doing 🙂

There used to be some excellent Flash games like Darfur is Dying, which taught about the Rwandan genocide, but the end of Flash means these games are hard to find and play, and who wants Flash on a computer they care about?

Steam does have the Education tag, but I find that a lot of games have that tag that should not. However, I have been told good things about https://store.steampowered.com/app/1270620/Project_Chemistry/ but since I have not played it, I do not feel I can specifically recommend it. Still, it might be worth taking the time to explore that tag on Steam. If you have explored that tag, or have your own recommendations, I would love to hear them.

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Emperor of the Fading Suns Timeline

April 22, 2024 | Author: HDIAndrew

We released a free demo of Emperor of the Fading Suns Enhanced on Steam and GOG (please wishlist us on Steam and it generated a number of questions. I posted this timeline in hopes of clearing up some of the confusion.

1997: HDI released the original Emperor of the Fading Suns (EFS) 4x game, part of the Fading Suns universe. You can still get a patched version of that original strategy game on GOG.

2022: Working with a team of modders, HDI released Emperor of the Fading Suns Enhanced (EFSe), a revised version of the original game with hundreds of changes. This is actually available today as a Deal of the Day on GOG: https://www.gog.com/game/emperor_of_the_fading_suns

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