Alpha Survey Results

Greetings, honourable warriors and wandering vagabonds!

A Perspective on Players

Shadow of the Road has cocluded the Open Alpha stage, and we're immensely grateful for the passion and dedication you've shown as you’ve plunged headfirst into its world. The feedback we've received from you has been invaluable. It’s exhilarating to see how players from all over the globe have taken to our game, and we’re thrilled to discuss some of the key takeaways from the results of our latest community survey.

We’ve also seen a wide range of player ages, with an overwhelming majority fairly evenly distributed between 25 and 44 years old.

In line with the CRPG, Strategy and Action-Adventure genres, which are the top-3 among our players, 91% of the samurai who took time to participate in this survey identify as male. The battlefields are, indeed, harsh places - but there is more to Shadow of the Road than mere tactical conflict, and we'll be sure to communicate it clearer moving onwards. Tell your sisters, share it with your wives and mothers! We'll be happy to see them and share our stories.

We also noticed a significant crossover in game preferences, with a large portion of you also enjoying action titles like Ghost of Tsushima (49.3%), Nioh/Nioh2 (35.7%), and Sekiro (42%). It’s no surprise that the historical themes and fluid combat have resonated with fans of these franchises. Over 72% of survey participants completed the Alpha, showing the enthusiasm for getting hands-on with the game early and contributing to its refinement.

SotR's Satisfying Statistics

Combat and gameplay: tough, yet rewarding. One of the most significant areas we focused on was encounter difficulty. We’ve received a wealth of feedback, and it seems the challenge level is just right for most players, earning a 4.11 out of 5 satisfaction rating for the combat system.

From the design perspective, the visual spectacle of the game's combat was clear enough for 85% of Alpha participants, with only occasional issues needing further ironing out. We're particularily glad to find out that the unusual continuous initiative Timeline was quickly and easily understood by more than 81% of our players, and the rest of the combat UI was found intuitive and easy to navigate by 87.3%.

Despite the inventory UI being perfectly serviceable, it seems we’ve touched on a quirky issue! Only about 65% of players have used consumable items, ergo, a significant number of respondents expressed a certain… caution when it came to using them, despite the evidence suggesing there being more than enough supplies to go around.

Four out of every five players found the dialogue UI both convenient and pleasing. And we're proud of the approval scores for that dialogue UI's contents across the board: interfaces can be polished, but your appreciation of our creative efforts is what truly matters! More than 60% of you became interested in learning the Japanese names and terminology highlighted in the dialogues and texts, with explanations of their meanings provided via tooltips. The partial Japanese VO (76.6%) and cutscenes (71.3%), designed to bring an additional layer of immersion to the world, were also highly praised, with most of you giving them the thumbs up.

The skill upgrade system was another pleasant surprise, with most of you - 84%, - appreciating its clarity. And while there's room for growth for the progression system's satisfaction factor, the variety of playstyles and story choices proves engaging - reflected in your 4 out of 5 overall score for interest in