One Year on the Island

One Year on the Island

A year ago today, Wicked Island launched into Early Access. I genuinely didn't know what to expect back then, and a year later, well over 100,000 of you have washed up on that shore. This started almost 5 years ago as a personal hobby and learning project, and over time it grew into something much bigger. I still have trouble grasping the reality of it. From the bottom of my heart, thank you!

What a year it's been

Looking back at everything that shipped since launch, it's honestly a longer list than I remembered writing, but to mention just a few:

• A complete rewrite of the Servant System, plus the Bonding Ritual that turned taming into a survival test

• Reworked armor tiers and several new armor models

• A complete rework of all building pieces, a huge amount of new ones, and shareable building presets

• A full rework of food, ingredients, and crafting

• New encounters, animations, and enemy balancing

• Localization into 10 languages

• Full Steam Achievements

• Multiple new dungeons, locations, and bosses

• New and rewritten questlines, dialogue, and story

• A complete rework of the dragon into proper endgame content

• Major improvements to visual quality

• Tons of optimization work, including better Steam Deck performance

• A huge slew of fixes and minor changes across the board

None of that direction happened in a vacuum. So much of what shipped this year came directly from your reports, your feedback, and your (occasionally unhinged) suggestions. This island is shaped by the people surviving on it.

What's next

Work continues; our small team is already deep in the next update, centered on something we've hinted at before: the Goddess questline, and the endgame armor that comes with it, alongside a wave of new building content and a batch of fixes and improvements.

Beyond that, there's one milestone left on the horizon: Wicked Island leaves Early Access with its 1.0 release later this year.

Year two starts with 1.0. See you on the island.

— RawDarkness