RIFTSTORM Surpasses Expectations in Pre-Alpha
The recently conducted pre-alpha playtest for the upcoming roguelite shooter game RIFTSTORM saw overwhelming success and engagement from players. Over 5000 playtesters spent an average of 40 hours with the game within the first week, even though initially there was only expected to be 3 hours of playable content.
This tremendous response took the RIFTSTORM development team by surprise. Players clearly resonated with the game’s core “Diablo with guns” gameplay loop, Lovecraftian style, and rich amount of character customization options. Many testers replayed the available content extensively, trying out different character builds, gear loadouts, and strategies for facing the various mythic creatures.
RIFTSTORM Sparks Creative Collaboration
Motivated by the passionate response, the RIFTSTORM team is now looking towards fostering greater creative collaboration with their player community. They aim to develop RIFTSTORM not just as a game, but as a collaborative entertainment experience driven by fan engagement.
As a first step, the team will soon release supplementary content including a short web comic and one-off narrative shorts based on ideas and feedback received during the pre-alpha test. These additional content drops will tide excited players over until the game’s full release on Steam and provide avenues for further collaborative storytelling.
The Future of RIFTSTORM
As an emergent roguelite shooter set in a rich, dark fantasy world, RIFTSTORM has seemingly struck a chord with players looking for challenging, varied, and highly replayable cooperative experiences. The RIFTSTORM team hopes to continue leveraging this momentum to unfold the game’s story and expand its lethal mythic threats in new ways, with direct input from the fans themselves.
If the pre-alpha test is any indication, RIFTSTORM’s grim setting and tense, tactical action seem primed to foster a passionate player community. By embracing collaborative entertainment, the game could pioneer a new model for roguelite development and live on for years to come. The next vengeful tide of mythic mayhem cannot emerge fast enough.
