The MassivelyOP team has been covering Project Gorgon since even before MassivelyOP was born, so it’s with relief and cheering that we are pleased to say Project Gorgon is indeed finally launching today.
The indie MMORPG was originally run by a husband-and-wife team, Eric Heimburg and Sandra Powers, an MMORPG power couple seeking to inject a more Asheron’s Call-esque design vision back into the genre. With a tiny playerbase and a tiny team that truly personified “indie,” the game has plodded on for the last decade of super weird skills and poetry slams – and tragedy too. In 2022, Powers told players that she was living with a rare cancer, which had taken a toll on her productivity. In 2023, Heimburg admitted that the team was out of money (owing to medical bills) and had to slow development further.
But in response, the MMORPG playerbase rallied around the devs, blasted the game with cash, and not only kept it online but accelerated its development. And then just a year ago, Powers passed away, sending a ripple of shock throughout the genre. So last fall, when Elder Game started making noise about finishing the capital city and getting new character models in for a real launch, it seemed impossible.
But here we are: launch day. As of this morning, the devs are telling players that the server should be up “afternoon US EST.”
“We’ve stopped hunting bugs and started the official 1.0 build,” Eric Heimburg wrote in the wee hours of this morning. “Time for a nap here; we’ll put it up when I’m awake enough, early afternoon EDT (hopefully).” Steam launches are often around 1 p.m. EST, so that seems like a safe ballpark, especially for a game that’s already been around for years. However, we’re also expecting an influx of people.
“I’m excited to see the VIP report after daily maint,” Elder Game’s Jackencola teased Discord. “Walking into launch day 1900+ VIPs strong will feel good.” Previously, the team had said it would open a new fresh start server if daily concurrent counts stayed at 500 consistently, though we’re not sure waiting for a fresh start server is the wisest decision in a game like this. “The fresh starts are going to get a harsh lesson on what having no elders means,” Jackencola quipped. “It’s going to be total Hunger Games when that server opens.” Sounds like a challenge to us.
Incidentally, if you’re aiming to become one of those VIPs, definitely shop around your options before just buying a Steam sub. If you think you’re gonna stay more than a few weeks, the packages are the best deal; the $50 horseback explorer version off Steam, for example, includes nine months of sub and a horse and saddlebags.
