The developers of Fishards, a free-to-play PvP battle arena, have issued a challenge to its players: beat them in an upcoming Fishards tournament, or the game will get removed from Steam.
The challenge was announced on the game’s official Discord server, and the showdown will take place on June 29. It will be a team deathmatch in which players will duke it out against the devs themselves. The outcome will decide the future of the game. If the players win, the developers will release the source code publicly and let the players improve and manage the game, which will remain on Steam.
Fishards is a top-down PvP battle arena where players play as a walking fish (Fish Wizard) and battle other players by combining two different magical elements. Each player starts with all elements unlocked, and they are able to swap between them freely. This creates an equal playing field because all players have access to the same spells at any point during the game.
Fishards was released in 2021 as a buy-to-play game, and despite costing a mere $7, the developer moved to a free-to-play model in 2023. While most games making this transition implement some form of monetization, Fishards doesn’t have any to speak of (not even for cosmetics).
According to an article by Rock Paper Shotgun, developer Charles Maddock dedicated 10 percent of his life to this passion project and was devastated that it never got the recognition he had hoped for.
While it’s certainly sad to see passionate indie projects wither away, it’s quite bold of the Fishards developers to put the entire game on the line. Whether or not it gets removed from Steam after June 29, the showdown will certainly be a spectacle to behold. Will the game live on in the hands of fans, or will it go out with a bang? Either way, we can’t wait to see the outcome.
