Atomic Society

[Asid]

Version 1.0 Leaving Early Access
Mon, 9 August 2021



•   Gameplay Modifiers
•   85 Achievements Added
•   New Building - Miner’s Shack
•   New Building – Refinery
•   New Reputation System
•   Brand New In-Game Goals System
•   Extended Goals
•   Map Completion Progress
•   The Leader’s Mansion can now be upgraded with electricity, letting your spouse(s) and children survive for longer
•   Citizens no longer die when their morale is zero. They now pack up and leave town instead
•   A new type of ruin (a burnt church) has been added on certain maps
•   The “raiders are considering an attack” warning messages can now be disabled in the options
•   Added a new message when a child becomes an adult worker
•   Citizens now age up physically as they should, changing from children to elderly models
•   Various menu/UI tweaks
•   Various balance tweaks
•   The AI navigation system has been upgraded, removing various oddities and bugs like citizens walking around the map
•   Frame-rates have been improved greatly
•   Fixed: A rare bug that could cause saving to freeze
•   Fixed: Prison and Punishment Center was draining nearby morale far too quickly
•   Fixed: A bug where the pause button didn’t behave correctly after pressing Escape to open and close the menu
•   Fixed: The “would you like to save” message getting stuck on the screen if you were building at the time it popped up
•   Fixed: Certain the hidden skeletons having incorrect text
•   Fixed: A rare pathfinding issue that could cause citizens to stop moving for a while
•   Fixed: A typo with the extended goals. The text now correctly shows 60% for the needs goal
•   Fixed: Stats screen was not adding citizens who had come to the town because you encouraged a certain law
•   Fixed: Certain status effects on citizens were not lasting as long as they should
•   Fixed: An issue with the news feed where it played the "migrants with encouraged issues" more than it should if you encouraged multiple issues
•   Tweaked: Certain social issues are now make less impact on the birth rate. This will however increase the odds of people having abortions (more pregnant people = higher possible abortion rate)
•   Tweaked: The camera can be zoomed out further on the Summit map
•   Tweaked: Reduced the chance for migrants with encouraged issues to occur, as it was happening a lot at maximum migration speed
•   Tweaked: Increased the chance people will give birth in big, established towns

[Asid]

Farewell to Atomic Society
Wed, 21 February 2024



Atomic Society will be removed from sale at the end of this week.

It's been a long, wild ride but the time has come to shut down our little studio and move on to new pastures. Don't worry, everybody who owns the game will still be able to play it. It will remain in your Steam library forever. However, the game barely sells anything these days, and there are still several costs involved in running a business (accountants, etc) so we have to start winding things up, starting by removing the game from sale.

I guess it's an appropriate time to say goodbuye. 2024 marks 10 years since a friend and I (with the optimism of complete beginners) asked “why don't we make a game for fun?”

2014 was a boom period for wannabe developers with crazy dreams. Steam Greenlight (remember that?) had been running for 2 years, the indie market was opening up, and Unity had made it possible for beginners to test their luck, for better or worse. Our idea of a post-apocalyptic town building game was a brand new concept back then. When we revealed it in 2016 (via Kickstarter), no one had heard of Frostpunk, Endzone, or Surviving the Aftermath. That Kickstarter still failed, but luckily a random YouTuber made a video of our fledgling pre-alpha and suddenly thousands of players fell in love with the game's potential and were clamoring to play AS. After yet another 2 years of grueling work, we released the first ever Steam version in Early Access (one of the most stressful things I've ever done!) and it sold quite well, considering we were making things up as we went. For a year or two afterwards we even earned basic salaries from this passion project - not much but we did get the privilege of doing something we loved.

However, it was really hard living up to everybody's expectations. A fully 3D town building/social sim game was a huge
concept for a tiny group of hobbyists working around their day jobs! We could just about handle it, but we were slow, and the games industry moves fast. Richer competitors came along. Also, after 7 years of work on top of regular jobs, “burnout” was becoming a thing too. But we pressed on for 3 years in Early Access, getting the game to the best state, and finally let it go for good back in 2021 (during a real life post-apocalyptic event of Covid).

Unfortunately a game only really gets one big launch, and Early Access had been it for us, so that final release didn't do much, but at least finished and I was done
. I couldn't even look at Steam without having a weird panic attack after we released. Making and marketing a game had worn me down (several real life disasters didn't help either). You need a lot of business stamina to stick it out in indie dev, and a peaceful real life. After we launched, our American coder friend had to get a real job, our artist had to give up dev to look after their elderly parent, and main coder Nick started a new family. It was okay though as we had nothing more to add to the game, but life had called us all in new directions.

I'm still extremely proud that we managed to create a pretty big 3D game out of a dream, that we stuck with it even when the problems seemed insurmountable, and that Atomic Society is still something different and quirky in an industry that likes to play it safe. For someone's first ever shot at game dev, it's not bad!

Thanks to everyone who bought and enjoyed the game and supported tiny, no-budget indie devs like us. I hope you all enjoyed being crazy post apocalyptic dictators, setting wild laws that might not show up in other games, and that these old blogs have been inspirational for anyone who wants to make their own gaming dream. If you believe in your game, you've got to make it!

However, now it's time for us to head out into the post-apocalyptic “wasteland” and see what other adventures are out there.

Best wishes from the Far Road Games team:

Scott, Nick, Mariana and Adam