Vita modo retrograda intelligi potest, sed ante vivendum est. No images? Click here Steve here, sending a missive your way after a long break. To those of you reading this who signed up for the Fullbright Newsletter within the last couple years, welcome to your first edition— and to the Newsletter's longtime subscribers, welcome back. Last time I sent one of these we were just wrapping up the first round of press for Open Roads. Then there was some serious turmoil at the studio. I stepped away from the project. Not much was shared about what we were working on. I did my best to reflect and reconsider how I worked with people and what the best role was for me. And now two years have passed. So what is this newsletter all about?As mentioned, a lot has changed at Fullbright and on the Open Roads project since I was last in touch with you. But after a great deal of consideration, it's just no longer Fullbright's place to represent Open Roads publicly going forward; it will be credited to "The Open Roads Team" at launch and won't be covered further here. As much as I wish the game the best when it does come out, if you joined this newsletter hoping for fresh info on Open Roads, you should do yourself a favor and sign up for the Annapurna newsletter on that front. They've got you covered. Then what is this newsletter about?Well, the last few years have shown me that my own strengths do not lie with attempting to manage a large project or direct the work of others. I was increasingly unhappy in that higher-level role, and I let that affect how I acted towards people at the studio. It's something I really regret and should have managed to address sooner. But that didn't happen, and that's on me. I'm a strong believer that when you face a failure, it's insufficient to just try to do the exact same thing over again but "do it better" this time; you have to think deeply about how to work differently, change the shape of your work and your own role and your relationship to what you do. To that end, for the last year or so I've been working on a new Fullbright game as a solo developer. I hope that along with continuing the self-reflective work of the last couple years and moving forward with a sense of humility, that by taking Fullbright down this new path I'm able to make my next steps positive, productive ones. I won't be sharing more about the new game I have in development right away, but if you know someone who loves Gone Home or Tacoma, feel free to point them at the Fullbright homepage (or forward this message along to them) to sign up for future editions of the Newsletter and be the first to know when details on the new thing start coming around. Upcoming issues of the Newsletter will be making their way to you more regularly, and will contain updates and insight into the process of making the new game, any promotions or new stuff happening with Gone Home and Tacoma (even five and ten years on from release, they're still showing up in surprising new places), and recommendations of media— movies, books, podcasts, games and more— that folks might find exciting to check out. There'll also probably be the return of the occasional Portland Fact here and there. I'll look forward to sharing more. Thanks again, and welcome (back, or for the first time) to the Fullbright newsletter. All the best til next time, |