MMO players are uncomfortably comfortable with the idea that Kickstarter MMOs linger in unfinished states for years, but that will not be the fate of Rose-Tinted Games’ Genfanad, which officially announced a September 27th early access launch today.
The indie MMO first hit our radar over a year ago as a “nostalgic browser-based MMORPG” that aimed to “[throw] traditional RPG tropes on their head.” It offers multiple skills, biomes, PvE, and PvP, and though it slyly dubs itself a “generic fantasy adventure,” its quirky vibe suggests it’s anything but. It went to Kickstarter last June with a playable game and sought only $10,000 to finish up, but it brought in double that sum and launched almost immediately into player testing thereafter.
To date, “2,500 players have created in-game accounts and have logged 3,600 hours of total playtime during the Alpha test,” the studio says; it’s also vowed that this release is meant to be not the “be-all-end-all of the game’s development” but rather a “limited version” that will see the game “grow slowly” over time.