Salem dropped by Paradox, sandbox MMO to continue independently

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Free to play MMO Salem is to part from publisher Paradox Interactive, with the sole responsibility transferring to developer Seatribe next month. The game, which has been in beta for the last year, casts players in a Colonial-era sandbox, and tasks them with surviving the wilderness, light magic and roving armies of naked players . Paradox will drop all support for the game on July 8th.

"Effective from July 8, Seatribe will assume full support management and development ownership of Salem: The Crafting MMO. Any decisions taken from that point on will be taken by and communicated through Seatribe to you - the community. Paradox Interactive will start phasing out their involvement in the project from today and on July 8 the game for all intents and purposes will be Seatribe's to run.

"We firmly believe this decision is in the best interest of Seatribe, Paradox Interactive and absolutely for the community as you will have a development team working even more direct with you and the game."

Paradox recently talked to podcast Three Moves Ahead about their relationship with third-party developers, and their desire to balance experimentation with well-made, bug-free releases - something the publisher has struggled with in the past. The ultimate aim is to foster ideas as interesting as Gettysburg: Armored Warfare, without ever releasing a game as broken and buggy as Gettysburg: Armored Warfare .

Thanks, RPS .

Phil Savage
Phil Savage
Editor-in-Chief

Phil has been writing for PC Gamer for nearly a decade, starting out as a freelance writer covering everything from free games to MMOs. He eventually joined full-time as a news writer, before moving to the magazine to review immersive sims, RPGs and Hitman games. Now he leads PC Gamer's UK team, but still sometimes finds the time to write about his ongoing obsessions with Destiny 2, GTA Online and Apex Legends. When he's not levelling up battle passes, he's checking out the latest tactics game or dipping back into Guild Wars 2. He's largely responsible for the whole Tub Geralt thing, but still isn't sorry.