BAdler

We will make sure to get the backers their keys before the release date. I misspoke in the update. Probably a few days before or something.

We are looking into creating variations on current portraits. We want to get in as many portraits as possible, but it takes a lot of time to do ones that are of a high quality level. Do you have a general idea, a set "goal" for each, say, "three per gender per (sub)-race"? Anything along those lines? Also, are you still working on more character customization settings? Very personal opinion, I realize, but for example the female deathlike has less gaudy (more helmet-like) heads than the male deathlike (and a portrait to match) and vice versa (I am sure someone wants to play a female deathlike with a truly monstrous shape). We would like to make a few variations per portrait that already exists. As for additional portraits, we have a list of them that would be a bit more ambiguous and could work for multiple races. Things like helmed or hooded faces.

It should be available at the same time (barring unforeseen problems). It is running pretty well right now.

We are looking into creating variations on current portraits. We want to get in as many portraits as possible, but it takes a lot of time to do ones that are of a high quality level.

The 49ers may not have made the playoffs, but they have owned the Packers over the past few years. Also, the Packers wouldn't have made the playoffs if they had to play in the NFC West. Have fun getting trounced by the Seahawks. Fan>

I don't get to spend as much time on the forums as I would like, but updates are a great time to answer people's lingering questions.

Most of the unique weapons are sharing icons with the Fine or Exceptional icon type of that weapon, will they end up getting unique icons too? (I know there's a lot of weapons though). Most of these should get unique icons.

After release we will not be able to send out any additional physical copies that were pledged from the Kickstarter (or Slacker Backer). Most likely those orders will be cancelled.

Lots of little things that we knew about. Polish stuff can sometimes be pushed to the back throughout development. A larger change is going to be a revision to the grimoire UI. People were very confused, so we are going to take another pass at it. Any chance you could have a couple of different Art styles for the Grimoire Icon (Even if it's just a different coloured stripe) at the moment I can't tell them apart once I've a couple in the quick slots. Or allow us to name them so when we hover the mouse over the icon we see the custom name in a tool tip? It's make it a lot easier for me to tell apart my AoE spell book from my, single target or Buffs spell books if each had at least some minor visual difference. Kaz is creating a few different grimoire icons. That should help out a little bit with the confusion.

Lots of little things that we knew about. Polish stuff can sometimes be pushed to the back throughout development. A larger change is going to be a revision to the grimoire UI. People were very confused, so we are going to take another pass at it. Ah yeah. While not really a "Kaz" UI issue: Attack Speeds/Recovery times in sec/msec would be very handy too I will bring it up to folks.

We are going to try to hit the release date exactly (or as closely as possible). Boxes are in production as we speak. Will boxes go out from Sweden (per Paradox) or how does that work? Since I added international shipping, I'm wondering (I'm in Sweden)... I assume no change is needed there? Paradox should be distributing from Europe and the U.S.. I am not sure about the exact shipping locations, though.

Lots of little things that we knew about. Polish stuff can sometimes be pushed to the back throughout development. A larger change is going to be a revision to the grimoire UI. People were very confused, so we are going to take another pass at it.

It is still on Kaz's plate. Just recently we did more internal (friends and family) play tests. We got quite a bit of UI feedback so that is his current top priority.

I typically need to make lots of little notes throughout the day. A laptop is nice, but it can be a hassle to lug it around everywhere. Plus, those notepads have grid lines... and there is just something about grid lines that I love.

It depends on a few different factors, but mostly it has to do with what tier your have. The higher cost tiers did come with digital copies. The basic boxed copy off of the Backer Portal does not come with a digital version. Thank you. If I decide to buy an Extra Ditial Download Add-On, do I get a choice of the service I will get it on or does it default to Steam? Or will Obsidian provide the download through their own site? (The same question would go for the DD of the expansion I ordered along with the physical copy) All digital downloads that go through our Backer Portal will get the choice of where they would like to redeem their copy. Currently that is Steam or GOG, but we are looking into adding more places to that list.

Not on the Steam version. Reason is because the Backer and non-Backer SKUs of the game will share the same depots. We could technically split the depots out so that one SKU has a DRMed executable and another doesn't, but it could get messy so we probably won't.

I don't think we would have any objections, but I will need to do a bit more research on it. I assume it is just a setting that we can set on our Steamworks page, but I will have to look into it.

We are going to try to hit the release date exactly (or as closely as possible). Boxes are in production as we speak.

Since I am sure some of you are wondering, we will be trying to get physical copies in people's hands as close to the release date as possible. It is somewhat inexact because shipping times can vary around the world, but it should be pretty close. We will let everyone know once the physical goods have started shipping out.

It depends on a few different factors, but mostly it has to do with what tier your have. The higher cost tiers did come with digital copies. The basic boxed copy off of the Backer Portal does not come with a digital version.

Update by Brandon Adler, Lead Producer Hello, everyone. As most of you know, the Eternity team has been hard at work squashing bugs and polishing the game for release. Every day the build is getting better and we are inching closer to when we can share the full game with you. We have some important information for you, such as the... ... Release Date! If you have been waiting for word on a release date, the Pillars of Eternity team has some exciting news for you. The final game will be released on March 26th, 2015! At that time you will be able to purchase it "for reals" on Steam, GOG, and other online retailers. This is also when we will be posting information about how you can redeem your game (and other backer rewards) on our Backer Portal. If you’d like to make sure your order is correct, you can visit the Orders tab in your Account Profile. Any order there listed as “confirmed” is what we currently have confirmed for you. You can click on orders specifically to get more detail about your completed pledge. If you’re a backer getting physical goods, we’ll be sending an e-mail around the end of February that will ask you to confirm your shipping address for us. You can verify and edit your address now if you’ve recently moved. We’ll keep you posted on when we’ll need final address edits! Leads Meeting Our Executive Producer and Lead Programmer, Adam Brennecke, shot some footage of our leads meeting yesterday. We thought you guys might get a kick out of seeing one of our daily meetings. I can't promise the most riveting 20 minutes, but it will give you a bit of insight into what we do every morning. Sprint to the Finish In these last few months the team is laser-focused on a few keys areas: Polishing and Bugs. The entire team is busy fixing as many bugs as possible. We are also going through the existing content and polishing it up – check out the brigandine! Finalization of... Everything. We are also in the process of finalizing everything from backer reward items to game boxes. It is quite a bit of stuff, but we are making great progress and everything is on track for the release date. Showing Off the Game. In addition to finishing up the game and everything else surrounding it, we are also going to be showing off the game. We will be doing a live stream tomorrow at 1pm PST (21:00 GMT), on Paradox's Twitch page. Also look for us at PAX South later this month and PAX East in March (PAX East isn't confirmed yet) where some of the Pillars team will be giving a preview of the game and answering panel questions. It may even be live streamed! That's it for now, be on the lookout for our next update where we go over backer rewards (including redemption on our Backer Portal).

I will talk to folks here about doing another update soon. Probably won't be until next week, though. The programming crew are doing some important save/load fixes. Hopefully, this will be the last big batch of changes to that system and it should be much more stable.

If their QA is anything like what they had on previous games, then we are doomed. Bugsidian was not given to them for no reason. Normally I don't respond to comments like this, but that is a pretty uninformed statement. QA is just one part of the overall process and, as bizarre as it sounds, they don't typically have final say over what bugs get fixed. It is pretty rare, in my experience, that a game goes out with bugs that QA didn't report. Most of the time the development team just runs out of time/money and the publisher decides to push the game forward. There are some studios that empower QA with more responsibility (as in, they can completely stop a game release if they don't sign off), but that isn't the norm from what I have seen/heard. Point being that you can't usually just point to one person or department as the cause of all of the ills of a project.

That is a good point. I will ask Adam to look into that when everyone gets back from break.

Thanks for the feedback. I will discuss your suggestion with the development team.