Hellllo Crewmates (...and Impostors...)! 
 
Whew, it’s been awhile since our last dev log huh? Happy 2021! Here’s a giant dev log update, a wrap up, and mini roadmap for the time ahead. All strapped in? Then let’s goooo! 

--- Big updates ---

• New map coming early 2021 – watch the trailer here. As we revealed at the Game Awards on Dec 10th, the new Airship map will be dropping in early 2021! Inspired by our other game The Henry Stickmin Collection, this will be a huge map with all new tasks and rooms to explore. Choose which room you start in, run around in new costumes, and even climb up and down ladders?! Crewmate technology has advanced so much, wow. And yes – the update will be free! 

• Now available on the Nintendo Switch. Our first console launch! Avoid those Impostors as you play at home or on the go! We’re so thrilled to be launching on a completely new platform and seeing so many new people try out the game. We actually hit the eShop bestsellers list overnight, which is WILD. Thanks for that, crewmates. :) There's still some fixes that will be added to it including some hats and skins, but trust that it’s coming!

• Xbox consoles in 2021 and is out on Xbox Gamepass PC now. Yeeeep, we’ve had an EXTREMELY busy time. Trying to make sure you can play the game on your preferred platform, and we’re excited to have the Xbox community along as crewmates. More info here. 

• Epic Store. We’ve launched Among Us on the Epic Games Store! If you use your Epic Coupon, you can use it to claim the All-In-One Pack, which has all the skins and pets included.  

--- Small update ---

• Nintendo Switch bug fixes. We’ve did a few bug fixes for the Nintendo Switch, including some words being blocked in chat, scrolling with the controller, and more. Right now buying cosmetic items are missing from the game, which we intend to add in at some point too! 

--- Thank you! ---

• The Game Awards. We walked away with the Best Multiplayer and Best Mobile awards?! Thank you SO much for all of the support... never in a million years did we expect this, but you crewmates made it all happen! So surreal. We’re dedicated to making the game better and better for you! 

• 1 million! We hit 1 million followers on both Twitter and TikTok?? Dang, that’s a lot of beans! 

--- What’s next? ---

• 2021 roadmap. Now that we've wrapped up a lot of stuff for the holidays, we're looking to be more transparent about what we're launching and the expected order by making a public roadmap. It won't have dates until we know we can hit them, but it'll be a place to find out what to look forward to first! More on that soon.

• Hiring?  We’ve heard all the questions – why don’t you just hire more people so development can go faster? We wish it were that easy! Adding more people doesn’t automatically make development go faster – it slows it down and can cause a ton of issues if we don’t do it properly (and in the worst cases, when finances aren’t handled properly, it can actually end up closing a studio completely. Many indie studios have faced this problem, sadly.) Hiring, training, onboarding, possible interpersonal disputes, artistic differences, code legibility, legal/privacy concerns, and an infinite number of other problems can arise. We never expected all of this to happen (thank you!!!), so we’re taking it slow and steady to make sure we can keep sending good things your way. But we have things in the works!

• Accounts. We wanted to launch this earlier, and we're close, but we want to make sure it isn’t half-baked before implementing. (Trust me - you do not want a bad reporting system with no accountability behind it.) The first update for this is primarily focused on moderation - as stated in the previous dev log - and we’re hoping to get this out ASAP. This is a small step towards ensuring everyone playing the game has a safe and welcoming experience! Don’t worry, we’ve heard all your requests for things like a friend system, saved stats, and so on, but for now this will be the first thing available. 

--- Why is everything taking so long?? ---

• Among Us gained incredible traction pretty late into 2020 that we weren’t expecting, and that meant A LOT of change for us. Not to dive into too much organizational stuff, but not only did we need to switch back to working on Among Us after thinking it was done, but we also needed to set ourselves up more sustainably to work on the game. We had to spend 2 months just restructuring, figuring out new processes, and getting external partners to help us manage on board. Originally it was just 3 friends working together (and now I'm here to make 4, hi), but if we wanted this to work long term and hire up, we needed to streamline things. It’s all behind the scenes work, and while it meant time away from the game, it’ll make it easier for current and future us to develop the game better. Not to mention additional platforms (like Nintendo Switch and Xbox) means more support, certifications to go through, and whatnot. We have help from our porting partners for that, but it still means we need to make sure future things we do are supported on those platforms. There’s a ton of other things out of our control (legal issues, meetings, planning), so sometimes these things take longer as well.

• Thank you SO much for the patience as you wait for the next big update! We want to do more for you to show you how grateful we are, but without sacrificing on the quality and values we had before this blew up.

2020 was a rough year for everyone, but thank you for surprising and delighting us in spite of it all. 

Seeing all the fan art and messages about how Among Us  has helped you connect with your friends and family (or helped you make new ones) is something we don’t take for granted. We’re happy to have you be a part of our community. 

Can’t wait for you to see what we have planned for 2021! 

- Victoria & the Innersloth team