Attention Officers,
Welcome to our 81st Ready or Not Development briefing, December 20th, 2024!
To start off, we’ll see you all again with more development briefings in 2025! With our studio going on holiday over the next weeks, we wanted to do a special development ‘debrief’ in the form of messages to you— our community— from across the team here at VOID Interactive.
We’re immensely grateful for the support you have shown Ready or Not since our 1.0 launch in December 2023, and for your reception to the Home Invasion and Dark Waters releases that have happened since then. It’s remarkable to leave things off on a high note and to work towards an even better future for Ready or Not and our community next year!
Note: These development briefings serve to keep you in the loop about parts of our ongoing support for Ready or Not, however the briefings do not encompass everything that we’re working on at a given moment. Please keep in mind that the content in our development briefings may still be a work in progress and subject to change.
Messages from the VOID Team
Our team strove to learn as much as we could from our 1.0 and Home Invasion releases and to put those into practice in delivering the Dark Waters Release. Communication, coordination, and iteration across the board pulled together to a new degree, spanning quality assurance, narrative, engineering, animation, game design, playtesters, level design, audio, art, production, operations, our partnerships, marketing, and more.
We’ve also been paying attention to countless community posts and reviews, tracking feedback/bugs in the process and ensuring that your voices from all angles are able to be heard in the development cycle.
Without further ado, here’s some of our teams’ messages to all of you in our community heading into the new year:
Zitat:
As the Art Director on Ready or Not, it always fills me with such joy and motivation knowing we have an incredible, passionate, and supporting player base. Really, it’s the fans of our game that are our biggest inspiration for what we do, and I am personally very grateful for the opportunity to wake up each morning and keep making content for you all.
For all those who have been with us on this long journey to where we are now, in all our triumphs and struggles - I want to personally give a huge heartfelt thank you for the continued love of RoN. We wouldn’t be here without you all, and I personally can’t wait to keep growing the game in all kinds of fun directions.
Thank you again fellow LSPD officers, I salute you all and I hope to see you in the game.
Best,
― Mark, Art Director
For all those who have been with us on this long journey to where we are now, in all our triumphs and struggles - I want to personally give a huge heartfelt thank you for the continued love of RoN. We wouldn’t be here without you all, and I personally can’t wait to keep growing the game in all kinds of fun directions.
Thank you again fellow LSPD officers, I salute you all and I hope to see you in the game.
Best,
― Mark, Art Director
Zitat:
From all of us in the audio team - sending season's greetings to new and veteran players. We're delighted with the response to the Dark Waters DLC and are very excited for next year. Keep your ear to the ground... put em on safe and let em hang!
― Zack Bower, Sound Director / Composer
― Zack Bower, Sound Director / Composer
Zitat:
Among many things, I would like to acknowledge all the fantastic work that our Engineering department has accomplished this year.
From our internal VOID Interactive developers, to our development partners, they have all put in a massive effort to get this update over the line and work on the game over the year. Each of them have helped to deliver a fantastic end product all within the timeframe we set out to deliver in.
Their ability to work multi-disciplinarily with teams such as Design and QA departments have been inspiring; all while facing and overcoming some of the challenges of working fully remote across multiple different time zones.
In recognition of our team's work, VOID as a whole, and our community, I believe that there is wonderful space to grow as we continue to improve RoN into the future!
― Kobe Taylor, Programming Team Lead
From our internal VOID Interactive developers, to our development partners, they have all put in a massive effort to get this update over the line and work on the game over the year. Each of them have helped to deliver a fantastic end product all within the timeframe we set out to deliver in.
Their ability to work multi-disciplinarily with teams such as Design and QA departments have been inspiring; all while facing and overcoming some of the challenges of working fully remote across multiple different time zones.
In recognition of our team's work, VOID as a whole, and our community, I believe that there is wonderful space to grow as we continue to improve RoN into the future!
― Kobe Taylor, Programming Team Lead
Zitat:
Being a part of this amazing community has made the experience one of the best I’ve ever had. Thank you all for contributing to such a positive and inspiring environment! Wishing everyone a fantastic end of the year, and I look forward to seeing you all in multiplayer lobbies!
― Alan Keune, Lead Technical Artist
― Alan Keune, Lead Technical Artist
Zitat:
Hey, it's Dan, VOID’s SWAT Technical Advisor. It's been a great year working with the team here to bring some really cool content out for Ready or Not. Since the beginning of the project, the goal for me has always been to bring authenticity to the game while still working within the artistic and creative visions that have made RoN so much fun to play.
There's certainly more work to be done, with some reworks and tweaks from my list on the technical accuracy side of production, and a future with still more content, but boy how far we've come!
It's always satisfying to lurk on the internet and find fan comments that hit on suggestions I've made knowing that the team is working on something, sometimes entire systems to address them while keeping RoN's unique gameplay and style. 2025, here we come!
― Dan, SWAT Technical Advisor
There's certainly more work to be done, with some reworks and tweaks from my list on the technical accuracy side of production, and a future with still more content, but boy how far we've come!
It's always satisfying to lurk on the internet and find fan comments that hit on suggestions I've made knowing that the team is working on something, sometimes entire systems to address them while keeping RoN's unique gameplay and style. 2025, here we come!
― Dan, SWAT Technical Advisor
Zitat:
I’m very appreciative and incredibly lucky to be able to work among such talented and passionate people, and I can’t wait for what 2025 will bring :)
― Sam Beaman, Associate Lead 2D Artist
― Sam Beaman, Associate Lead 2D Artist
Zitat:
As the team behind Ready or Not, we're blown away by your fearless dive into the intense and raw reality of Los Sueños. Your bold engagement and feedback challenge us daily, pushing us to grow and inspiring us to enhance and evolve this wild ride we are on together. Keep on bringing order to chaos and keep your feedback coming: we are here for it. On behalf of the entire team, thank you for your incredible support this year.
― Behrad, Marketing and Brand Lead
― Behrad, Marketing and Brand Lead
Zitat:
Wow, what a year! I’d like to extend my deepest gratitude to our incredible team for their diligence and hard work throughout 2024. Following a monumental year like 2023 was no easy feat, but I’m fortunate to work alongside such talented folks who got us there. Also a huge thanks to our community; your attention, feedback, and support make all the difference. The critique, praise, suggestions, modding, and thousands of hours of content online is what makes RoN something truly special.
This year began with a clear focus: improving the 1.0 release content, introducing new features, and kickstarting work on our DLCs.
As the year progressed, our team expanded. With growth came the need for better processes, and while those presented challenges, it also laid the groundwork for long-term improvement. Growth can be tough, but it brings subtle, foundational shifts that strengthen the team. We came out the other end stronger.
2024 was a year of continuous improvement—for the game, our team, and how we release updates. Thanks to this mindset, each release this year saw fewer issues, greater attention to QA testing, and stronger production practices. This culminated in the successful launch of DLC 2, Dark Waters, a testament to our evolution as a company and as individuals.
Looking back to the Steam Early Access period, where we often worked right up to deadlines, cramming content without adequate internal QA or enforced timelines, the difference is night and day. While that period allowed for a free environment to experiment and add more content quickly, it came at the cost of content quality and team quality of life, often resulting in late nights patching and amending builds, attempting to quell issues highlighted by dissatisfied players.
Today, I’m incredibly proud of how far we’ve come. I’m personally very grateful that our workflow has been improved to a point where after a release we can close the Jira boards, log off Slack, and touch some grass.
Thank you all for an amazing 2024. We have exciting plans ahead for Ready or Not and VOID Interactive. This journey is far from over. We’re just getting started.
― Stirling Rank, Game Director
This year began with a clear focus: improving the 1.0 release content, introducing new features, and kickstarting work on our DLCs.
As the year progressed, our team expanded. With growth came the need for better processes, and while those presented challenges, it also laid the groundwork for long-term improvement. Growth can be tough, but it brings subtle, foundational shifts that strengthen the team. We came out the other end stronger.
2024 was a year of continuous improvement—for the game, our team, and how we release updates. Thanks to this mindset, each release this year saw fewer issues, greater attention to QA testing, and stronger production practices. This culminated in the successful launch of DLC 2, Dark Waters, a testament to our evolution as a company and as individuals.
Looking back to the Steam Early Access period, where we often worked right up to deadlines, cramming content without adequate internal QA or enforced timelines, the difference is night and day. While that period allowed for a free environment to experiment and add more content quickly, it came at the cost of content quality and team quality of life, often resulting in late nights patching and amending builds, attempting to quell issues highlighted by dissatisfied players.
Today, I’m incredibly proud of how far we’ve come. I’m personally very grateful that our workflow has been improved to a point where after a release we can close the Jira boards, log off Slack, and touch some grass.
Thank you all for an amazing 2024. We have exciting plans ahead for Ready or Not and VOID Interactive. This journey is far from over. We’re just getting started.
― Stirling Rank, Game Director
Conclusion
Ready or Not would not be where it is today without each one of you, and once again for that we are unendingly grateful.
Next year will be an eventful process of improving the game in concert with continuing to grow our small but mighty team. We’ll see you in 2025 and wish you all a restful period accompanied by friends, family, and fun.
If you’re looking to bring more officers into the fold or get into it yourself, Ready or Not and its LSPD Bundle are now on a major discount for the Steam Winter Sale:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1144200/Ready_or_Not/
https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/48378/Ready_or_Not_LSPD_Bundle/
You can also now find our merch on 20% off for the Winter Sale period too!: https://merch.voidinteractive.net/
This concludes our 81st development briefing, thank you for joining us. Be sure to fall in next time for more development news!
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