- What We Are Working On - August 2026 - 6 August 2026
Hello, Merchants!It has been a while since our last update, and we wanted to touch base to let everyone know what has been happening behind the scenes.Unity Engine UpgradeWe have been working in a very outdated version of Unity since the beginning. While we've made a few upgrades along the way, this latest update brings us almost fully up to date. What does this mean for players?First, performance will see a massive improvement. By far the largest we've experienced throughout development. Even after completing only the initial engine upgrade, before implementing the optimizations we have planned, we're already seeing significant FPS gains. It will only get better from here.Second, we'll be able to push out updates much faster. Bringing our tools up to modern standards gives us much more power at our fingertips, allowing us to make changes, improvements, and iterations far more quickly t…
- Early Access Patch 4 (June 24, 2026) - 25 June 2026
Fixed some issues causing heroes to sometimes fall out of their dungeon group for no apparent reason. Fixed some issues causing repeated task group dungeons from trying to join the dungeon while it was still in progress. Fixed an issue causing some overworld combat instances to freeze mid-combat. Fixed issues related to the in-game timer not updating properly, especially during difficulty changes. Fixed an issue which was allowing items to be interacted with or taken directly from the Find Upgrades panel and the Item Database panel. No more stealing. Sorry. Fixed an issue causing item tooltips to go off-screen. Altered the way gold value is displayed to prevent most instances of the value display going outside the boundaries of the tooltip. Altered the way gold is displayed for items that have ranges. It now only shows the lowest value an item can be. Fixed an issue which was showing th…
- Early Access Patch 3 (June 13, 2026) - 13 June 2026
Fixed several unintended interactions with right click being able to drag items or interfaces. Fixed an issue which was causing some click-and-drag instances to alter the size of UI elements irreversibly. Fixed an issue allowing players to drag items out of the upgrade panel for use. Fixed some other miscellaneous instabilities within the user interface. Fixed an issue that was allowing multiple claims of favor rewards, trapping you in the claim interface. Fixed an instance which was causing some games to be no longer loadable from the main menu. Fixed an issue with the Silver Rim unique item not generating properly and causing game load states to break. Fixed a loading instability when loading crafting recipes, favor data, and hero positions. If a game fails to load due to an error, the load should now enter a failed state, notify you, and provide some more details. Fixed an issue with…
- Early Access Patch 2 (June 9, 2026) - 10 June 2026
-Several Right-Click functions have been added to normal play. -With an Officer selected in the Item Manager, right clicking an item will default to the ’Equip’ function, right clicking a consumable will default to the ‘Eat’ function. (To transfer between you and your officer, you can drag and drop, or continue to use the ‘Transfer’ functions.) -With the Storefront open, right clicking an item will default to the ‘Sell’ function. You may also right click to remove items from sale. -Within the Item Manager, right clicking any loot-box-type item (Equipment Boxes, Gold Bags, Scrolls, Material Chests, etc.,) will default to the ‘Open/Use’ function. -With the Item Cache or Guild Bank open, right clicking items will default to the ‘Transfer’ function. This also works to remove items from the cache or guild bank. -Note that you may still perform functions without having some tabs open by using…
- Early Access Patch 1 (June 6, 2026) - 1 June 2026
Added some new information to the Kingdom Herald: 7-Day Gold Trend, Profession Crafting XP Info, Realm Overview Section. Green Upgrade Arrows now update live, instead of only when refreshing your UI. Favor Rewards now show the appropriate item icons for rewards. Added clearer information to Favors in general, as well as updated the visuals of Favor Rarity to be less aggressive. Fixed an issue which was causing the Kingdom Herald to carry over some information from previous saves. Fixed an issue where drag-and-drop wasn’t counting toward Logbook Progress on equipping officer upgrades. We will resolve future drag-and-drop actions not counting in a future patch. Various performance improvements.
- Hotfix — Hero Spawn Fix + Performance Pass - 27 May 2026
Fixes Heroes now consistently spawn after the tutorial, even on reloaded saves. (Previously, quitting the game during the brief window after officer recruitment could leave you with only your starting officer and no world heroes ever appearing.) Custom Dungeons: Selected role is now preserved when starting a custom dungeon. Guild Bank: "Take All" now properly refreshes the player inventory grid. Performance Officer Upgrade Panel: switching between officers is dramatically smoother.
- Major UI Overhaul is LIVE! - 26 May 2026
Hello, Merchants!We come to you today with very exciting news! We have finally reached a point where we feel the UI Overhaul patch is ready to move out of beta, into Early Access!Before we get into it, we recommend that even if you don’t read this whole post, you read the sections below for both new or returning players! Now then! For those unaware, this is a massive patch nearly two years in the making. With that, the first thing we want to do is…well…say we are sorry! This patch was always going to be a massive undertaking for us, as we were not just overhauling the visuals and gameplay of the entire game, but while we were under the hood, we were doing massive system changes to build a stronger foundation for the future of the game. However, as we really got into the deep inner workings, the patch ended up taking much longer to get here than we thought. With five jobs between the thr…
- Open Beta is Here! - 16 May 2026
Hello, Merchants!The time has come, and Open Beta is here! This is close to the final iteration of the major UI overhaul patch that will be going live, including the Logbook/Tutorial. For those who just want to jump in and give it a try, here is how:Right Click The Merchant’s Guide to the Kingdom in your Steam Library.Go to ‘Properties’.On the left panel, select ‘Game Versions & Betas’.Select ‘beta’. Allow the beta version to install/update.All set!Please keep in mind, this is indeed a beta and we do have some known issues that we will actively patch, but you will likely encounter bugs or issues.That said, most of the features and changes we wanted for the full UI update are implemented and ready to test! This changes the game so substantially, that we made a video to cover the major changes when we initially launched the Closed Beta, linked below. However, the Logbook is implemented in…
- Closed Beta Announcement Date - 2 February 2026
Hello, Merchants!We are very happy to finally be able to reveal when closed beta will be available, and the details behind it!Straight to the point, closed beta will be made available to play on Friday, February 6th at 5:00pm PST! With that out of the way, we want to give a very clear picture on what this is, and who it is for. We strongly recommend that if you are interested in the beta in any way, you read this full post. Details on how to participate in the beta will be at the bottom in the ‘How to Participate’ section.The beta itself will have two phases. First, the closed beta, which we recommend that if you are not a veteran of Merchant’s Guide, you go into it cautiously because the first phase of the beta, the closed beta phase, will not include a tutorial of any kind in-game. We will be releasing an instructional video to go over the majority of the changes at the time of its re…
- Closed Beta Final Update! - 26 September 2025
Hello, Merchants!We wanted to jump in and give another final update on the status of the Closed Beta. Our progress had slowed recently due to some issues not related to development, but we have made consistent progress nonetheless, and we are now almost back to our normal pacing!With that said, the reason we are calling this our final update is because our next post will be the actual announcement of the release date for it! And we don’t expect it to be a long wait from announcement to release. Most likely when we make the announcement, it will be within days of the actual time we intend to release the Closed Beta.So, we also wanted to remind everyone of what exactly the Closed Beta is, as it is going to be a very odd state of the game.The live version of Merchant’s Guide has a few major issues that we are wanting to resolve before implementing the final features and leaving Early Acces…
- UI Closed Beta Soon! - 3 June 2025
Hello, Merchants! We are fast approaching the finish line for the first wave of our UI Update! We expect the closed beta to begin this month, but can't quite nail an exact date. However we wanted to clarify exactly what this entails. The closed beta test will have the majority of the game functions in what should be close to their final state. However, we are expecting that there may be several things which need more visual improvement, and we are also expecting bugs to occur. This update touches every single system in the game, and massively overhauls most of them at the same time, and while we have been testing it as much as possible, internally we are comprised of 3 testers, so getting the proper amount of testing in is just not something we are able to pull off in a reasonable timeframe. So that means that if you participate in this closed beta, which we very much hope you do as we…
- State of the Game Volume 10 - Let's Talk v1.0, Part 2 - 14 March 2025
Hello, Merchants! As we mentioned in our last State of the Game, the feature list for v1.0 was too large to fit into a single post. Rather than keep you waiting for too long, we’re back sooner than usual with the second and final part! Star Power Overhaul Right now, Star Power is a basic system: Earn Star Coins → Apply Star Coins → Gain minor bonuses based on Star Rank. We want it to be more than that. You’ll still earn and apply Star Coins to rank up your officers, but instead of a static system, you’ll choose specific bonuses for each rank based on the build you want to achieve. For example, let’s say you’re into Frenetic Warriors—I mean, really into Frenetic Warriors. So, you make all five of your Officers Frenetic Warriors, but you want them to have different builds. With the new system, Star Power can be a powerful tool to fine tune each build. One could have Crit Chance, another A…
- State of the Game Volume 9 - Let’s Talk v1.0 - 1 March 2025
Hello, Merchants! In our last State of the Game in December, we mentioned that we would share our release date as soon as we had it. While we don’t have specifics yet, we can safely say we’re aiming for a Q2 launch window, meaning we expect v1.0 to go live before the end of June! We’ll continue monitoring our production progress, and as soon as we can confidently set a more specific date, we’ll be sure to share it with you all. However, we didn’t want to stop at just a release window—we also want to outline what to expect in the remaining time that Merchant’s Guide will be in Early Access, including both our development schedule and the final features coming at launch. Wrapping Up the UI & Logbook As many of you know, we’ve been hard at work on the UI evolution. It’s taken longer than we initially hoped, but we truly believe it will be worth it. Only a few major scenes remain to be upgr…
- State of the Game Volume 8 - Update & New Music! - 21 December 2024
Hello, Merchants! We wanted to give another quick update to reassure everyone that work is still going strong on The Merchant’s Guide to the Kingdom, and we are making steady progress toward the largest update to the game we have ever made! We still cannot give an update on when this patch will hit, but our next State of the Game will have that for you, and then soon after that we should be able to come up with a solid timeline for the official release of v1.0! We do want to give a quick reminder on what this update is and why it is taking the time that it is. Yes, it is a complete visual overhaul of every User Interface aspect of the game, but while we are under the hood changing the look of every feature and mechanic, we are making updates to the functionality both within the code, and in a lot of cases, how it actually works in the game. There are many features that we wanted to upda…
- State of the Game Volume 7 - UI Update Update - 13 September 2024
Hello, Merchants! It has been over two months since our last State of the Game, and that’s too long! We wanted to show up today and give an update on the progress that has been made with the UI Update, and a few more details on what to expect with the next big patch to hit which will include this update. UI Samples First, we wanted to show some sample photos of the update coming your way! Keep in mind that every picture shown is a work in progress, and there may still be some minor and major changes coming to everything shown here. This first image below is showing the new Heroes Panel, along with all of the bottom and left panels being shown, more details on those toward the end of this showcase. As you can see, it drastically changes how the information is presented, not only based on location, but functionality as well. We want everything to be as centrally located as possible, and s…
- State of the Game Volume 6 - Coming to an End - 29 June 2024
Hello, Merchants! To be clear, we mean Early Access is coming to an end, not the game. ːsteamhappyː We are closing in on what we will consider the v1.0 launch of Merchant’s Guide, and we wanted to share a few details about what you can expect from this version of the game. This is a very exciting time for us. While the Early Access period of Merchant’s Guide is coming to an end, we truly consider it the beginning of a very long life for the game, as we have so much more we want to add to this world that we love so much. So, let’s kick off with what v1.0 is expected to feature! User Interface There’s no doubt we’ve been talking about our UI update for a long time now. We have been working on many assets behind the scenes, but we ended up having to continuously push the UI work further and further back. Thankfully, though, the wait is almost over! Now that patch v0.9 has been released, we…
- Menu Hotfix - 5 June 2024
Fixed an issue that prevented players from adjusting menu options and deleting their saved profiles.
- Patch v0.9 Now Live on Steam! - 4 June 2024
Patch v0.9 brings about major changes to classes, enemies, combat, favors, gear and more. Those with existing games, be ready for a big change! User Interface Changed the names of some of our Primary Stats to be more in line with the other stats. -Ferocity is now Attack Power. -Ability Power is now Spell Power. -Haste is now Attack Speed. The Esc menu no longer has to disable and reenable the UI in the game, which makes for much more seamless pausing and unpausing when pressing Esc. Updated existing ability icons. Functionality We have added a new class to the game, the Arbiter. The Arbiter comes with two specializations. The Tempest Arbiter, a magic damage AoE class with multiple crowd control abilities, and the Storm Arbiter, which is a high single target and critical strike based magic damage dealer. Developer Note: We noticed that when it came time to select a magic damage dealer, E…
- Class Abilities Rework & Special Announcements! - 18 April 2024
Hello, Merchants! As many of you know, we have been working behind the scenes on an overhaul to the abilities for each class specialization. The overhaul is completed, but it is requiring a substantial amount of testing to ensure the balance is there before we release it for you all to try out. We have actually been spending the last few days implementing a whole new system behind the scenes so we can more easily test abilities, difficulties, different group compositions, etc., to ensure that we can get this done as accurately as possible. This is a large task, but with the new balancing system and the overhaul, we are confident that these new abilities will add a much more interesting set of choices to be made when you are building your perfect group. That said, while we are working behind the scenes to get things balanced out and make sure it’s all working as intended, we wanted to re…
- Crafting Hotfix - 25 March 2024
Fixed multiple instances of Crafting causing an error which was breaking future crafting and item swapping. Reduced crafting time across all tiers.
