Sunless Sea was launched after a successful Kickstarter campaign, and its development took 10 months to complete. The developers made a Road Map[1] for new content during its development, as shown below.
With the EMERALD update released, a new category - STEEL[2] - was created. It addressed combat issues determined by user feedback. At that time, all future releases advanced one month in completion time.
Other changes to the roadmap: the content found in what was the upcoming AQUAMARINE release instead is now split between STEEL and CARNELIAN, and a new DIAMOND version concerned with optimisation and polish has been added, signifying what will be the final release.
On the 5th November, 2014, Failbetter announced that Sunless Sea would leave early access in February 2015[3].
Sunless Sea left early access on the 6th February, 2015.
The Road Map is as follows:
| Road Map | ||
|---|---|---|
| Name | Release date | Description |
| EXPLORERS’ BETA | 29th April, 2014 | Game enters beta state. |
|
RUBY |
21st May, 2014 | Stability, major survival system upgrades, and the islands of Shepherd’s Wash. |
|
AMETHYST |
5th June, 2014 | Combat and beastie spawning upgrades, the isles around the Sea of Voices, and Void’s Approach, where Mt Nomad waits... |
|
GOLD |
17th June, 2014 | Soft-launch Early Access release. A shiny new combat UI, a new save mode, more content and the Khanate at the heart of the Unterzee. |
|
CORSAIR’S GOLD |
1st July, 2014 | Steam Early Access release. Darkness management improvements, story interface upgrade, tyrant-moths and the Watching Eye… |
|
EMERALD |
Late July, 2014 | Map shuffling, the Iron Republic, the Sea of Autumns, the Mangrove College. [More sophisticated legacies, additional beasties deferred.] |
|
STEEL |
Early October, 2014 | A release focused primarily on the combat experience (including beastie AI and behaviour), but including a rather stunning array of islands. |
|
CARNELIAN |
Late October, 2014 - previously: Early September, 2014 | Combat with multiple enemies, interface improvements, and additional equipment. Saviour’s Rocks, the Promised Sea where the Fathomking holds court, and the South: Carnelian Coast and Dawn’s Edge. (The Aquamarine release has been divvied up between STEEL and this one.) |
|
SAPPHIRE |
End November, 2014 - previously: Mid-November, 2014 and Late September, 2014 | More complex and generous Legacies. The East: Irem and the Pillared Sea, the Empire of Hands, Frostfound and the sun-touched Calumnies. [At this point, the map is basically complete, although there's still content absent from some areas.] |
|
DIAMOND |
7th January, 2015 - previously: Early December, 2014 | Neutral vessels, wandering weather phenomena. The Sea of Statues and the Crying Heights. |
|
PEARL |
6th February, 2015 | Optimisations, polish, final tweaks and missing content pass. After that, we’ll take a break, then get cracking on the underwater expansion. SUNLESS SEA EXITS EARLY ACCESS. |
|
MAGELLAN |
16th February, 2015 | Week commencing 16 February. First update based on user feedback since launch: fixes for outlying issues with spawning and the tutorial, improvements to ramming behaviour of zee-beasts. |
|
BLEMMIGAN |
27th February, 2015 | A patch that addresses some saving and loading issues, as well as problems with zee-beast AI and bizarre behavior with civilian ships, plus a number of other small improvements throughout the game. |
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