Hello again everyone!
Ok. People are curious about Qasir, and when they have questions, it kinds of boil down to the same set of them. So, I'm posting here the most frequent questions we hear about Qasir and their answers.
So, that 's it, Frequently Asked Qasir's Questions, go:
Q: When is Qasir being released?
A: Cross your fingers and it will be by the end of March.
Q: When will there be a free demo available?
A: Quite possibly, a couple of weeks before release.
Q: Are there plans for a Linux version?
A: Unfortunately no, considering we are using Unity as our engine. Using Wine to run it is plausible, but it needs a very beefy setup to run properly. We are talking about a latest generation hi-end VGA and a competent CPU.
Q: The game is too expensive/cheap. Why/how did you settled that $9.99 price tag?
A: By comparing with other niche indie games with a similar approach and evaluating the subjective worth of the entire experience, we found that a $9.99 tag is a fair launch price. Pre-ordering is cheaper, but if you still find it too expensive you can always pirate it. It just means that it will be harder for us to make other games, but we'll try to manage =].
Q: How long does it take to finish the game?
A: It varies from person to person. We consider it a medium-to-long length game by indie standards. The average player will take around 3 hours to finish it, while a player which likes to explore and try to do everything that is possible could take from 5 to 6 hours to finish a single run. A speedster can waltz through the game in something like two hours. Also, the game has two different endings which makes replaying it at least once very engaging.
Q: What was the inspiration behind the game?
A: The mais inspiration was our own Tsar Project, of course. But the game draws heavily from medieval folklore (especially Persian and Arabic) and renaissance occultism to create its setting. For the tone we started with the idea of Brechtian Theatre and its theory of distancing effect, a thing we had as a goal with Tsar. At the end the tone is much more poetic, something akin to a One Thousand and One Nights poem as our Brechtian techniques simply fell apart after testings and revisions to the game, even though a lot of early ideas remained.
Q: What does Qasir Al-Wasat means?
A: The Palace In Between or The Palace of the Middle in Arabic.
Q: Why a(n) Arabic / Syrian / Middle-Eastern / Goetian theme?
A: Why not? =]
Q: Don't you worry that a Syrian / Arabian set / name will limit your approach to the Anglosphere public?
A: No. But thanks for your concern.
Q: Shouldn't you guys be doing a game with Brazilian themes?
A: We could and we will, but not now. Not doing so is not a matter of lack of pride or for being intellectually colonized, it was just our choice. Also, Qasir is a very Brazilian game, as we are Brazilians and it is impossible not to influence our game with our cultural baggage no matter what's the foreign theme we are drawing from.
Q: Is it going to be translated to Portuguese?
A: Yes! We have plans of "localizing" (funny say localizing when we are localizing the game from English to our native language, but oh well) it shortly after the release, as well as - possibly - to Japanese.
Q: Why didn't you made the game originally in Portuguese?
A: It was a hard decision, but to deliver the game as early as possible and to the biggest audience we could, we had to go with English as the primary language of the game. The game would definitely had a better writing with an original Portuguese script, but we just couldn't afford the time it would take to write all the script and then localize it to English.
Q: Considering the character is invisible, don't you worry it will be difficult for the player to create a connection?
A: This is a very common question that we would like to address carefully. Of course visual appearance is one of the most important traits in a character, specially if you are trying to reach a great number of people. But we are not necessarily interested that the player creates a deep connection with the protagonist (remember that we drew from Brecht at the beginning stages of development and this is one of the decisions that remained). The game has no catharsis, and so it shouldn't connect with the player, but rather, talk to him, which is an entirely different thing and we believe that an invisible voice does it efficiently. Also... our frail protagonist might not be invisible all the time.
Please feel free to ask any other questions at the comments! =D
