Causeway

Earlier this week I was writing a new design article.

While we don't do Design Articles often, I feel they provide the closest insight into the game we're making. Having them in a separate category helps keep key information from getting lost in all this blogging that we do.

Then I realised the article I was writing was unpublishable.

Not because it was poorly written, or because it gave too much away. Not because the website had broken (actually I did have to fight it a bit).

It was because writing this article about a game called 'Rise of Winterchill' (which has been the name of the project up to this point) felt wrong. Like, a complete undo to everything we just said. You couldn't pay me to publish it like that.

We reflected on what that meant, and so today we're announcing the actual name of the game we're making. Which is Causeway.

The word 'causeway' means "a raised road, usually on a mound of earth", as opposed to a bridge which crosses a specific obstacle. One of the many reasons we like it is that it's a synonym for a way, path, or lane.

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Descent of Winterchill

We've been settled on Causeway for a while, and the plan had always been to announce the name with the new website and memorable branding.

Of course, plans meet reality. Branding needs to fit the product, and we had plenty of other details to figure out: Story, Setting, and Art Direction being essentials.

All of those have made progress, and are still in progress. (Quite actively so! But that's for another post...). A new website would be unlikely this side of the new year, and committing time to it would disrupt the alpha.

Then, writing this week's article showed me that 'Rise of Winterchill' is limiting the conversation around our game and vision. That's such a bad thing to have happening, and is definitely not okay to let continue.

We've long known that 'Rise of Winterchill' had flaws. Among others: it's easily misspelled, people need to hear it twice, and it's similar to a location in Game of Thrones. I transitioned to using 'Causeway' when talking about the game in-person and internally years ago.

The old name's flaws were no longer affecting me, so I didn't give much thought to how its ongoing use might impact on public perception of the project. That was a blind spot for me — hopefully I can be more mindful going forward.

So, this announcement falls less on the fanfare and polished PR side, and towards "actual things people encounter when developing games".

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Changes 'Round Here

Now of course, this is being shared on the lustrous riseofwinterchill.com, and that will continue until the end of the year. It'll take time to shuffle things around, update the socials, and make sure everybody knows it's us when logos start changing.

You blog readers (wonderful people, all of you) get to enjoy a slight premonition of that future. Feel free to call the game Causeway from now on when chatting with us and others.

We will of course still refer to the old game as Rise of Winterchill. That's historically accurate — and it's still a name I have much fondness for. It has served us well over the years.

One happy change will be moving the RoW Design Articles over to Lane-Pushing Games, where they will continue as the ongoing series Crafting Causeway.

They will live their best lives on a site dedicated to game design, where design-minded people can find them. It's also a relief to have their presentation stay independent of any changes to this website.

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...Wait, What's the Fuss?

Right — all this about an article? It wouldn't read well with the old name?

Go read the article. It will teach you some new things about the game.

And perhaps you will see, as I finally did, that a domineering, fantasy-riddled name like Rise of Winterchill isn't the right fit for our vision. May it enjoy a good retirement!

Softmints