Celebrating Our Third Anniversary []~(￣▽￣)~*

Hello, dear players. Before we knew it, three full years have passed since Cavalry Girls was released. (It has already been four years since the first demo was revealed — it really makes one marvel at how fast time flies.)

Thank you all so much for your support and encouragement along the way. This is not an empty platitude: without your words of encouragement and your financial support, this game's updates would not have lasted beyond 2023, and now we are heading toward 2027.

Over these three years, we have released 44 version updates, including 16 major version updates, plus over a hundred minor updates. Our game has grown from the simple base-defense gameplay of its early days into something with more modes and more weapons and equipment — it has been completely renewed.

Over the past three years, we have released three major DLCs and are still working on a fourth. All of this began with the crowdfunding campaign in the second half of 2024, when we received support from more than two thousand players around the world, giving us enough confidence to continue development.

Beyond the routine report above, there is one more thing to share: our budget is gradually becoming tight. Although we raised about $49k back then, more than half of it went into producing and shipping merchandise, and after also setting aside custom weapons/skins and the like, only about $22k was actually left for the planned three DLCs. For the past two years, we have basically kept development funded through DLC sales and regular promotions. Although DLC sales are less than one-twentieth of the base game's, all in all we are getting by, more or less. We have also considered running another crowdfunding campaign, but there really is not much left to offer. Moreover, for a small team like ours, handling the wildly varied requests of over a thousand people at once during a single campaign is simply too demanding. Even though hearing about everyone's various requests was genuinely joyful and fulfilling, it was truly exhausting — really, truly exhausting. (By the way, some players have not yet confirmed their custom requests with us. If you see this message, please get in touch with us!)

Over the past two years, we have devoted too much of our energy to tuning the base game. You can probably see our efforts in the updates from the past two years; we have been constantly reducing bloat and optimizing the game. We also very much agree that there is still plenty that can be optimized even today, but in reality their impact on review scores and sales is practically nil (this is not a complaint, just an objective fact), and they have also significantly stretched out the DLC development schedule. Therefore, given the situation described above, v3.1 will be the last base-game optimization update, and from here on we will shift our focus entirely to DLC development.

In addition, some players may be wondering about the major DLC (that is, DLC5, which is still pie in the sky). Although it did not meet the crowdfunding requirements back then, we have clearly stated that we will definitely make it — going back on our word has never been our style. However, how to complete it, and most importantly when it will be completed, may have to become a question we must seriously consider. We think that perhaps now is not the time to think that far ahead; for now, it would be better to keep our sights on DLC4, and once the next DLC is finished and the nominal crowdfunding requirements have all been met, decide our next step based on sales and review scores. In any case, the next DLC will definitely be delivered, so you can all rest easy.

As developers, we have only ever had one goal: to create game content that everyone finds fun. You can still send us feedback through the feedback form and the bug report tool, just as before.

We hope you all have fun, and we hope to share our past achievements and future plans with you again at our fourth anniversary celebration next year.