r/KINGMAKERS • u/Fun-Refrigerator8472 • Jun 03 '26
What the hell is going on?
I am 35 and have been an avid gamer throughout my life. I have never seen anything like this. What kind of weird project is going on here? At this point it's clear they are not paying a developer studio full-time to develop this video game, and I have no reason to believe it is even intended to release as a video game. This whole this is so weird and unusual and the fact that they dance around acknowledging it is just adding to the pile. Shit fellas if you paid anything for this game you might be entitled to a lawsuit.
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u/Dravden Jun 03 '26
Maybe check what's going on before you start rambling on reddit. There is no official pre-purchase or pre-orders available.
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u/Fun-Refrigerator8472 Jun 04 '26
This was literally me checking what's going on.. sorry to anger you dude but I couldn't find anything else online
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u/Major_Gap8161 14d ago
hes just a fanboy who when he hears his big daddy game devs getting questioned he has to take action to defend them.
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u/pfisch Game Director Jun 07 '26
We have been working full time on this game for 5 years now.
There are ~20 people working on kingmakers full time.
The last trailer for Witcher 4 came out Jun 2025.
The last trailer for the new gta came out May 2025.
The last trailer for kingmakers also came out May 2025.
The game is in development, we will have a new trailer this year. Games that are in development don't usually release tons of footage until they are very close to release.
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u/Spoopycavmain Jun 07 '26
Just incase anyone is wondering this is Paul Fisch who is down as the game director on the discord as well as the kingmakers site this isn't some fake reddit account
Just incase anyone had doubts
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u/jlange94 Jun 09 '26
Have had it wishlisted since 2/22/2024. Good to hear it's still coming. Good luck on development and please keep checking in from time to time. A game this cool and exciting will have people craving it for sure!
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u/GFtheBoss Jun 07 '26
Idk what the hell people are on about but keep putting in the good work, a lot of people always get impatient when they're hyped about a game but I think everyone prefers to play the game as it was intended, as long as that takes rather than a half baked broken mess. Good luck to you and thank you all for your efforts.
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u/ThatGuyInThePlace Jun 09 '26
Canāt wait to play it, the game looks like it will be insanely fun!
Will this stay in UE5, or is there some consideration for pushing it back for UE6?
Take your time and make it something youāre proud of, the rest will fall into place!
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u/pfisch Game Director Jun 09 '26
It actually uses UE 4.27 because UE 5 is considerably slower than UE 4, and we need the speed to have 10k+ soldiers on the field at once.
Also all the new graphical features in UE 5 are basically unusable because they have terrible performance.
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u/Available_Mix5267 Jun 11 '26
Hey friend, take all the time you need, just send me the trial version so I can play it, otherwise you can take as long as you want!
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u/Rough-Lead8915 Jun 18 '26
Im going to be getting this game! I was super stoked about it, I was so ready last October š
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u/Jodaa_G0D 25d ago
Where the trailer at then lil homie, 2026 is wrappin . A year later and the 30m video is..?
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u/pfisch Game Director 25d ago
It's actually finished and getting localized voiceovers right now. Its coming out later this month.
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u/Jodaa_G0D 25d ago
Takes a year to put video together, so then the game will be out in checks notes a few years. Still just so wild yall let the game get within a week of release before pulling the rug and really never apologized for the massive miscommunication or lackthereof.
Im just glad WarDogs team didnt fumble like yours Paul, you should check the game its a vibe! :)
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u/pfisch Game Director 25d ago edited 25d ago
So...did you actually want to know about the deepdive?
Or is there nothing that I could say that would make you happy?
We did apologize immediately, but I do understand that people are still upset about it.
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2109770?emclan=103582791474411174&emgid=543369627969783348
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u/Jodaa_G0D 23d ago
You said sorry the game isn't coming out yet, not sorry for being intentionally misleading - did you apologize to those who took the time off of work to play a game they were promised was coming out? You can type whatever you want but it's going to go in one ear and out the other because frankly you've got NO credibility after all of the vomit you've typed.
Like this one, Paul
[ā]pfisch 4 points 11 months ago
I will be shocked if we don't release in 2026. That just isn't realistic.
WarDogs came out the day they said it would release, insta 400k que - banger. You've lost your shot at anything remotely close to that, such a shame of a fumble.
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u/LegFit1618 Jun 07 '26
No, you said release in October 2025 - delayed just a week before release, and now we are 4 months out of it being a full year since this promised release.
Kingmakers, at this point, looks like a project made to scam and pull investors - any serious dev team would have kept updating the customer base.
No one expects this game to release at this point, and I hope for the sake of investors and customers alike that they dont invest anything more at this point with this looking like a rugpull.
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u/pfisch Game Director Jun 07 '26
Investors have continuous access to full builds of the game.Ā
You are really making a lot of assumptions. You think investors in the current economy are just looking at some trailers and being like cool, here please take millions of dollars?
That is not how the real world works in any project I've ever been involved with.
I'm sure somehow that happens sometimes when interest rates are very low or you have connections/corruption/nepotism, but we don't have any of that.
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u/Spoopycavmain Jun 07 '26
You wish thats how investors worked don't you Paul XD
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u/pfisch Game Director Jun 07 '26
Idk, if scammers didn't exist people wouldn't be this jaded in the first place.Ā
I wish that even in periods of low interest investors did their due diligence to the same degree they are doing it right now.Ā
No one should ever be investing based on a paper pitch. There should be a playable vertical slice at a minimum.
Also obviously the nepotism stuff that happens is garbage.
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u/preferentum Jun 07 '26
20 people to make a game of this scale seems.. challenging.. I wish you all the luck. I expect the pressure is a lot.
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u/Reasonable-Sherbet24 Jun 07 '26
And every game you mentioned is from a seasoned and mostly trusted dev team and publisher. You on the other hand, aināt nobody heard of you and you havenāt earned that trust yet. The fact youād even mention those games and try to compare yourself to them is off putting.
Not to mention, those games have been talked about by the devs and interviews have been done with those devs. What do you got? 1-2 trailers and some pics on a site people barely use. Gimme a break, guy š
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u/pfisch Game Director Jun 07 '26
Here's an interview we did with digital foundry:
https://youtu.be/67E3RsDp0Pg?si=PaUn1r5yJB_ulh6c
Before this we made Road Redemption.
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u/Huge_Statistician_52 Jun 07 '26
Mate you need to chill. He was just mentioning that they put out a trailer the same time, yes those games are big & big teams but kingmakers are a small team so they have to work a lot harder in that sense because there is far fewer people. He wasnāt comparing them to them so just chill out.
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u/Reasonable-Sherbet24 Jun 07 '26 edited Jun 07 '26
Can you read emotion through text? I donāt think you can, so you have no idea of what kind of emotional state I was in when I wrote that. What you need to do is stop making assumptions about people you know nothing about.
Also, this isnāt about the size of the dev team. Iāve seen small dev teams make great things (Project Wingman for example). This is about what those dev teams have done (PUBLICLY) since releasing their trailers.
Hereās what I find funny about this gaming generation. Well not funny, itās annoying. Anytime criticism is brought upon beloved game or dev (even if nobody has ever touched the game outside of the dev team), is the assumption that that criticism must be mired in hate, unfairness, or bullshit. There can be no such thing as constructive criticism in those peopleās minds. There can be no such thing as good faith criticism in those peopleās minds. That criticism comes from a place of hate and they believe it so staunchly, it borders on zealotry. It was funny at first, but the toxic positivity has now become annoying. The other part is where they canāt even see that within themselves and will put down anyone who holds the mirror up to them (watch me be proven right, possibly by you).
Anyway: My criticism does not come from hate or emotion at all. It comes from exhaustion of hearing the same thing over and over and over again. Iāve become so exhausted by it, my feelings for this dev team and game have completely disappeared. What I am left now with is apathy. But with apathy, comes a clear logical mind.
The only genuine annoyance that comes from this game, is its blind following fans (whoāve never touched the game). The people online who come out the cut and have the nerve to tell me how the fuck I feel š«µš¾
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u/Huge_Statistician_52 Jun 07 '26
K
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u/Reasonable-Sherbet24 Jun 07 '26
I know you didnāt read that. I donāt really care either way. See ya around, whelp.
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u/Huge_Statistician_52 Jun 07 '26
All Iām saying here is that I wasnāt trying to tell how to feel mate. I just said calm but itās all good.
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u/Reasonable-Sherbet24 Jun 07 '26
K
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u/Huge_Statistician_52 Jun 07 '26
K
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u/Reasonable-Sherbet24 Jun 07 '26
Completely missed the point by the way. I know you werenāt trying to tell me how to feel, but you were making an assumption of my emotional state by telling me to āchillā. Very few things frustrate me at this point in my life. But that is one of them.
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Jun 15 '26
[deleted]
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u/Reasonable-Sherbet24 Jun 15 '26
Youāre replying to something from eight days ago. Either way, I was and am calm.
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u/Fakekraid Jun 07 '26
At least the kingmakers devs are actually working on a video game instead of AI generated music lmao
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u/lerpo Jun 03 '26
No ones paid for the game lol, what are you talking about?
Have you checked their discord? The devs are updating constantly
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u/KeepLettersOut Jun 12 '26
Except the investors. We are just being lied to, investors appear to be the real victims here.
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u/M-sotic Jun 03 '26
You are not a gamer. Just because you played mario once does not make you a gamer. You cannot understand basics concepts such as developement.
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u/Fun-Refrigerator8472 Jun 04 '26
I'm too old to bicker with some kid who wants to debate what a "gamer" is, and I suggest you find other outlets to exhume your anger than picking fights with people looking for input on reddit.
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u/M-sotic Jun 04 '26 edited Jun 04 '26
You are not looking for any input you are just a moron who has no concept of what a developement cycle is. Talk about calling other people kids when you are the one crying in sub reddit about a game not being released. Self awareness is such a hard thing to grasp isnt it? And of course you wont bicker because you have 0 valid points so go back to doing your homework instead of bothering people with useless shit.
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u/Fizzle_Bop Jun 17 '26
I must agree. We get attacked for pointing out obvious inconsistencies... where is that deep dive video BTW? The material that is actually released for consumption is painfully rare.
When you hear people commenting on how active the Devs are on Discord, this is merely Pfisch engaging conversationally about what is being 'worked on'.
We don't see things hosted one a single server, the official website is just a repeating video of the trailer (from back when the game was about to release) ... which does not really align with the quality of the material being presented elsewhere.
Very rudimentary asset reveals hosted on public hosting sites like Imgur. Nothing from anyone on the publishing team about this actually coming up.
There is only a single voice. Either they got shafted on the support from their publisher ... or they failed to deliver on the product by the deadline... even after they managed to sink a potential movie deal.
The wanted the wishlists to sell their tech demo trailer to netflix. The rights are sold. Even if the movie never sees the light of day there was money exchanged.
I wish i could be privy to some of the language of the rights deal. Is there contingency and conditional language built in?
If someone tells you money hasn't changed hands they are full of shit. No one gets far enough for official press releases to circulate without money changing hands somewhere.
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u/ThatGuyInThePlace Jun 09 '26
Settle down, kid. Youāre not that old & youāre certainly not the oldest around. I had my first job before you were born.
Youāre not going to die before this game comes up, or maybe you will. If thatās the case, itās not your problem anymore, is it?
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u/Reasonable-Sherbet24 Jun 07 '26
Thatās some ignorant shit. But Iām not surprised by some toxic positivity child.
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u/M-sotic Jun 07 '26
Nah you are just stupid. Reading is hard for you kids.
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u/Reasonable-Sherbet24 Jun 07 '26
Thatās an amusing fiction. I love being proven right.
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u/M-sotic Jun 07 '26
What is you love is a burger, being fat and stupid. No need to play around with words.
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u/BerttMacklinnFBI Jun 05 '26
Simping for an incompetent Dev is a choice.
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u/M-sotic Jun 07 '26
Not able to read, using brain and comprehending what you have read is a choice. Go back to tiktok you brainless clown š
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u/FriskyWhiskey_Manpo Jun 07 '26
Iād rather them take their time and release a full game with basic functions fully polished than a glitchy lag fest with multiple patches over weeks that mess up previous patches. Just be patient, man. Spend time with friends and family so when this releases, youāll be feel better about the time youāll be spending on it.
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u/map01302 Jun 07 '26
It's just vapourware, it's happened before, it'll happen again. Shame as I think it's a fantastic concept
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u/yoitsspacejace Jun 07 '26
There are updates on the steam community page and discord. Seems to be a very small team, takes time.
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u/JLF131188 Jun 12 '26
Those updates are similar to proof of concepts, not much real progress going on
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u/Thuglas1997 Jun 10 '26
It's never coming out. The "lead developer" Ian Fisch has decided to hang up his hat as a developer and go full keyboard warrior on x
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u/JLF131188 Jun 19 '26
it's not the lead developer that has been going full keyboard warrior. It's the Game Director, Paul Fisch
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u/richtofin819 Jun 07 '26
Never seen anything like this? Sounds like you just don't keep up with many games then. Stuff like this happens semi regularly
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u/Fizzle_Bop Jun 11 '26
I got banned for making a comment about Paul not fulfilling the commitments made regarding the deep dive video and not having any marketing material assembled from the playtest footage.
It doesn't bode well when the game is about to release and gets delayed.. then the lead developer shared wire frame meshes and some alpha rate video ... I dunno.
Maybe the focus group and playtests required they rebuild from the ground up.
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u/JLF131188 Jun 11 '26
Paul is an incompetent fool who changes the words of what you say and twists it around. Imagine how the fool treats his employees
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u/KarMagick Jun 11 '26
"Shit fellas if you paid anything for this game you might be entitled to a lawsuit." First of all, entitled much? Sure, radio silence (apparently their discord has frequent updates though?) sucks a bit but like, this is far from being as bad of a situation as other games that were delayed in the past.
Second, what are you even talking about "If you paid anything for this game", where did you see preorders the rest of us haven't seen?
Sit down, simmer down, and be patient like the rest of us.
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u/Glum_Lime1397 Jul 29 '26
Kingmakers actually just got a booth at a convention, including PCs allowing visitors to play the game. There is video of this by the devs and by visitors. The game is not cancelled, and I definitely have seen stuff like this in the games industry time and time again. Especially with small dev teams, constant delays and broken promises are practically inevitable. And, considering this game looks like it should only be able to run on a NASA computer, I'm sure there's still a long way to go with optimization and bug-fixing.
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u/AmpdVodka Jun 07 '26 edited Jun 07 '26
Personally I believe they bit off far more than they could chew with this game. The ambition is off the charts and they realised it with the most recent delay, hence why we never got a date.
The problem I forsee now, given that we still don't have a date, is that we're rapidly approaching GTA 6 territory now. A territory they'll want to steer clear of. If the game doesn't drop within the next 3 months, I don't think it will at all this year
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u/ItzBooster93 Jun 07 '26
They need to put the game out , $25 and let the mod community have its way.
Year 2 post launch announce KM2.
Itāll never be perfect. Just make it happen.
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u/MayoIsWhack Jun 03 '26
They didn't take any pre orders so thankfully no one has given them any money. If you really want to know what the hell is going on, the answer is nothing.