about 4 years ago - /u/Metamoth741 - Direct link

Hey there Reddit. We wanted to reach out to our community about something troubling we've been seeing over the last little while. Over the last several weeks, we've noticed an influx of new players who purchased keys for the Closed Alpha from backers who had extras, or who decided they were no longer interested in the game. We would like to strongly caution users from doing so, as this will only get you access to the Closed Alpha, not the actual release of Dead Matter.

Like many games, Dead Matter is using a separate 'product' on Steam for our Closed Alpha. As a backer reward for some tiers, we offered extra keys with CA-only access to the game so that backers could bring their friends on to play with them and help with the testing program as we worked towards the Early Access release of the game. As such, keeping the CA and main branches of the games separate was necessary - given that quite a few users have a large number of spare keys on their accounts, it's not really practical for us to selectively deactivate keys, so this allows us to easily run the CA, and then provide EA keys to those who purchased them down the line.

As a side-effect of this, however, users who purchased a CA key from one of our backers is only getting access to the Closed Alpha of the game. Once the CA ends, it will no longer be accessible, and only those that have keys for the EA launch will have access to the full release of the game. As such, anybody who purchases a key for Dead Matter at this time from a third party reseller will only be getting access to the CA, while the seller will retain access to the EA release when it goes live as the key will be tied to their account, not yours.

As always, we urge caution when purchasing from third-party storefronts, and strongly recommend against it if at all possible. We've received a number of reports of users that have been outright scammed by sellers claiming to have a key and then providing nothing when paid, and don't want this to happen to anybody if at all possible.

Finally, as many of you have noticed, we've been fairly publically quiet since the start of the CA. There's been a lot of work ongoing with the game, and our focus currently is on fixing up many of our most critical issues. Once that's all sorted out, we'll begin a more formal public update scheme once again. We don't have a solid timeline for this, but we'd like to start providing public updates as soon as reasonably possible. Once we know more, we'll update everybody.

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about 4 years ago - /u/Metamoth741 - Direct link

Originally posted by 9-1-Holyshit

Hey Meta. How’s it work for someone like me who bought keys to give to my friends. One of my buddies doesn’t have a gaming pc and probably won’t until Christmas. When I give it to him will he be able to access the EA? These keys were pre ordered before the CA.

The CA is anticipated to run until some time early next year at the very least, possibly longer due to the delay in launching the CA. So, any CA keys you have should allow your friends to play around Christmas. This is all subject to change, but for the time being that's the way things stand.

I'm guessing it's a typo, but just in case it isn't - any keys you would've purchased (assuming you purchased from a third-party source,) are for the Closed Alpha (CA,) not the Early Access (EA,) release of the game, and are only good for that period of the game's development.

about 4 years ago - /u/Metamoth741 - Direct link

Originally posted by 4degreeswarmer

I bought this for my brother with the double barrel package but he hasn’t redeemed the code , are you saying his code isn’t useful anymore?

The Double Barrel package gives you two keys for both the CA and EA releases of the game - both of you should have no issue playing the game, though you will both need to redeem the keys for the EA release when they come out for both of you to get access to that, and his CA key will be good up until the CA ends - this is projected to be some time early next year, although this is subject to change depending on progress on the CA.