WHAT IS IT?
TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY is the paid Expansion Pass to TLD's Survival Mode. It represents a 12-month update campaign, featuring the release of 6 large Parts (roughly one every 8-10 weeks).
WHO IS IT FOR?
TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY is for fans of TLD Survival Mode, who want to buy into a paid update stream and get the latest and greatest content and features that expand Survival. As the Expansion Pass content will be released in multiple Parts over the 12-month campaign, the best time to jump in is always right now.
What is it an add-on to?
TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY adds on to the existing THE LONG DARK game (combined WINTERMUTE + Survival), as well as the new entry-level THE LONG DARK: SURVIVAL EDITION.
How much does it cost?
At launch, TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY will cost $19.99 USD, for 12 months of updates. As the campaign proceeds TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY becomes more complete. The price will increase twice, in $5 increments, to represent that “risk” is removed from the equation. At the midway point, the price will increase to $24.99 USD, and once the full campaign is completed, TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY will continue to exist as DLC for $29.99 USD. Early Adopters benefit from a lower initial price, while Late Adopters benefit from being able to see completed, tuned, and tested content and features added to their game. If you're looking for good value and you love TLD, today's price is always the best price.
What happens to the content at the end of the campaign?
If you bought TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY during the Expansion Pass campaign, you keep it, forever. Once the campaign concludes, TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY will still be available for purchase as DLC for THE LONG DARK or THE LONG DARK: SURVIVAL EDITION. So if you missed the campaign, or just prefer to wait until the content is complete, you'll still get your chance. And we'll never remove content that you have already paid for. We have no plans to remove TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY as a product, so you don't need to feel pressured to buy it. It will be there when you are ready.
Which platforms is it available on?
TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY will be available on Steam and Epic Game Store starting on December 5th, 2022, and it will be available on consoles early in 2023. For more information on the reasons for this, please read the October Dev Diary.
When does it launch?
TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY launches at $19.99 USD on: December 5 2022 (Steam, Epic Game Store) March 2023 (Xbox, PlayStation, Mac) Coming soon (Switch + Others) TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY will increase to $24.99 USD at around the mid-way point in the campaign. The completed campaign will be available as DLC for the full $29.99 price, around the end of 2023. Please keep in mind that release plans and dates may change based on development progress.
What is included in TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY?
Because this is our first paid expansion content for The Long Dark, we want it to be more robust and impressive than what we've been able to give away for free over the past 8 years. Our plan is for TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY to include a range of new content and mechanics, including: Three new Regions: Airfield, Industrial Mine, Mountain Pass Three new Tales, narrative-based Challenges that tie into the mysterious history of this Part of Great Bear Island. Several new gameplay systems including the Travois, Safehouse Customization, Handheld Shortwave, Weapon & Tool Variations, etc. A bunch of new improvements to existing systems, like Clothing Items, new Harvestables, etc.
What will happen to my save after the update?
Unfortunately, your current Survival saves WILL NOT work with the game once it has been updated. This is true even if you don't buy the Expansion Pass, however, you will not lose your saves until the Expansion Update is available on your chosen platform. This means that you can continue to play your current save until TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY is available to you. The reason that saves will not be compatible following the update is that we've made many changes to the Save system, and the underlying architecture of the game itself, to improve, future-proof, and optimize it. These changes mean that all “old” saves (meaning from a version of THE LONG DARK from before the Expansion Pass launch) will be incompatible with the new Save format. A few more clarifying points: All unlocked Feats, Feats progress, and Achievements will be carried over to the Expansion Pass and updated Survival Mode. You will not lose these! All previous WINTERMUTE save files and general episode unlocks will continue to work in the updated Story Mode. For anyone who has the game on Steam, you will be able to continue to use your current Save Games on an older version of the game, using our Time Capsule feature. You'll be able to keep your “old” save games going using the older Time Capsule build (any build before the Expansion Pass release, actually). But since this is an older version, you won't have access to any of the new content or enhancements that are going into both the Base Game, and the Expansion Pass. Unfortunately, Steam is the only platform we can offer the Time Capsule feature on. Our recommendation is that if you have a Survival run you'd like to finish up, try to do so before the Expansion Pass launches on your chosen platform.
How do I track development of TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY over the course of the 12-month campaign?
You can review a full roadmap of planned content and features on the TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY page. Please keep in mind that priorities may change over the course of development, so while we will deliver the entire listed roadmap by the end of the campaign, we've left some open slots to be filled based on community feedback and development progress, and also we may need to move some things around from one Part to another based on how development unfolds. Every Part will be accompanied by an update video that summarizes all the new content and features in that Part, as well as the general focus for the next Part that's in development. We'll also maintain the Expansion Pass page with up-to-date information about development progress, build status, known issues, links to bug reporting and support tools, the community hub, and an ongoing developer blog.
What are the system requirements on PC for TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY?
While THE LONG DARK and TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY will run on some older operating systems, we strongly recommend (and currently support) Windows 8 or newer. Windows 7 is no longer supported by Microsoft; at this time, most PC platforms, including Steam, set Windows 8 as the lowest minimum requirement. For more information on PC system requirements, including minimum and recommended requirements for Windows, macOS, and SteamOS + Linux, please click HERE
What about players who don't buy the Expansion Pass? Did you forget about them?
Not at all! Along with the TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY paid stream, there will be a parallel stream of FREE updates to Survival Mode (in both THE LONG DARK and THE LONG DARK: SURVIVAL EDITION). This helps ensure that even if you don't buy the Expansion Pass, you'll still have a nicely updated Survival Mode and not become too far out of date. The Expansion Pass page has a list of free updates that will be included in each Part, so there's something for everyone to celebrate with every Part, whether you've spent additional money on the game, or not. Keep in mind that if you've bought THE LONG DARK before the Expansion Pass launch, you will be pulled into the Free update stream. You only need to pay if you want access to the Paid Content stream of the Expansion Pass.
How did you choose what goes into the Paid stream, vs. what is in the Free stream?
In general, we're trying to balance putting maximum value into the Expansion Pass for an accessible price point, while ensuring that what's added in the Expansion Pass is attractive to people! The whole exercise for us is to experiment with creating a long-term sustainable revenue stream around Survival Mode, so that we can continue updating it for years to come in our human-friendly, no-crunch approach to development. Since in the past we've focused on giving high-quality content away for free, this is a pretty big shift in our approach, and is also an adjustment for our players. Fortunately, we've been strongly supported by the player community, who have expressed to us for years that they would like to see us create paid DLC for THE LONG DARK. We also want to ensure that the players who have supported us over the years but don't want to or aren't able to buy more content, aren't totally left in the dark. We wouldn't be here without your support, and we want you to feel appreciated. Our general rule of thumb in how we've split the updates between Paid and Free streams is: big pieces of new content like Regions or Tales (narrative Challenges), that represent many many months of development effort across the team, are being put into the Paid stream. There are also some gameplay features that relate specifically to the new regions or characteristics of the Far Range area of Great Bear and depend on those new regions to make sense, so those features will only be available in the Paid Stream. Updates to existing systems or regions in the existing base game, will generally be Free. This includes major retunings, enhancements of existing gameplay systems (ex. Fishing, Firestarting, etc.), and new harvestables that exist across the entirety of Great Bear, and visual enhancements. The Expansion Pass page provides a roadmap for which features and content are targeted for the Paid Stream, and which are intended for the Free Stream.
Why this Expansion Pass business? Why not just make the thing and release it when it's done?
One of the most vibrant, buzzy experiences of THE LONG DARK's long development history was the Early Access period, where we were able to put out very frequent updates and have ongoing engagement with the community over new things being added to the game. We've lost some of that energy while focused on creating WINTERMUTE, which has massive episodes that require much of the team to focus and “go dark” for months and months. We'd like to bring some of that “early access” energy back into the game and community, and for the team as well. Building and releasing things incrementally meshes perfectly with our highly iterative approach to development, and creates a healthy communications loop with our players that helps us validate, test, and improve the game's systems based on feedback. We also see the Expansion Pass approach, or selling something as completed DLC, as being complimentary approaches. Our players want choice, and some of them are excited to share in the buzz and energy created around the ongoing stream of regular updates. Those who don't want to participate in it can wait to buy the Expansion Pass content at the very end, or not at all! There is no obligation to purchase anything. The content and game you own currently will continue to operate completely fine, and you will still be provided all the Free updates to the base game that will be released along with the Expansion Pass Parts.
Will you do more Expansion Passes in the future?
We're approaching this as an experiment. It's not something that has been done a lot in single-player games, so we're testing it out to see how our players feel about it. We're hopeful that players will find value in it, and see it as being additive to their experience of THE LONG DARK. If players like the approach, and the Expansion Pass is a financial success, we will consider repeating more annual Expansion Passes in the future. We're also gathering information that we might use in future games from Hinterland. But for now, we're focused on TALES FROM THE FAR TERRITORY, and we'll evaluate the future of paid Survival Mode streams when we're much further into the current campaign, and have a lot more data to back up any decisions we might make.
PART TWO: AVAILABLE NOW
- Purchase The Long Dark on Steam
- Purchase The Long Dark on Epic Games
- Purchase The Long Dark on XBOX One
- Purchase The Long Dark on PlayStation
Coming soon to Nintendo Switch
