Rise to Ruins dev is paying back Patreon donations after Early Access success

Rise to Ruins is an Early Access 2D city builder that seems to be doing well for itself: 91% of its nearly 2,500 Steam user reviews are positive. It's done so well, in fact, that developer Raymond Doerr is offering to pay back double any donations fans have made via Patreon.

"Rise to Ruins easily sustains my livelihood and a nice rainy day account that can keep SixtyGig Games running through the hard times now, so I don't feel right taking additional money from you guys," he said in a Patreon post. He's shutting down his Patreon account, which currently pulls in $175 a month, and anybody that donated can request a refund of double their lifetime donation by commenting under the post linked above.

I suspect lots of people won't request their money back, and are happy to provide the extra support. But it's a nice gesture, and a feel-good story about the success of a well-crafted Early Access indie game on Steam.

The game has been in Early Access since 2014—it doesn't yet have a release date, but it's updated regularly. It's $10/£7.

Samuel is a freelance journalist and editor who first wrote for PC Gamer nearly a decade ago. Since then he's had stints as a VR specialist, mouse reviewer, and previewer of promising indie games, and is now regularly writing about Fortnite. What he loves most is longer form, interview-led reporting, whether that's Ken Levine on the one phone call that saved his studio, Tim Schafer on a milkman joke that inspired Psychonauts' best level, or historians on what Anno 1800 gets wrong about colonialism. He's based in London.