Thank you and Farewell
I won’t ever get used to the strange sensation of ending a tabletop campaign. Even if the players succeed in their quests, it is sad to part from the characters, their goals and stories, in which you got so invested in. The heroes (probably) accomplished what they set out to do even with the odds stacked against them – they’re heroes afterall. And when it’s time to end the campaign you can look back at what you’ve accomplished as a group. It’s more bitter if you should’ve failed (or if you lost parts of the party along the way). But to say goodbye – at least in my experience – comes with a heavy feeling of nostalgia either way. “Well, no need to become sentimental! On to the next adventure at hand – the hobby doesn’t end with one finale.” Right? It’s tabletop roleplay and this is what’s great about it: it goes on as long as we can imagine.
Unfortunately it’s different for YARPS. As you may have gathered from the intro, we have come to an end. It’s not the one any of us hoped for. And there’s no way to sugarcoat it: We did not succeed. As you know it has been a rough path for us until here. We still hoped to be able to manipulate the dice in favor of YARPS – as a kind GM might have in the crucial moments of a tabletop campaign. We struggled, hoped and fought, but in the end we couldn’t turn the dice and we won’t be able to in the future.
As painful as it might be: It’s now time to acknowledge and announce the end of the project. We have kept you waiting and hoping (as we did) for too long now. Despite promising conversations with our potential partner, the last opportunity we saw – the one from the latest announcement – was dropped recently. Of course we reacted like we usually do… with one of our late-night crisis meetings, where we try not to dwell on lost opportunities but look forward, trying to find new solutions. Only this time we realised we have now exhausted all avenues, unable to catch a break. Failing is the worst way to end a campaign. Nobody likes a party wipe – well, maybe some cruel GMs do, but that’s beside the point. Failing can be unavoidable sometimes. And it’s what happened to us: We are just not able to finance the further development of YARPS any more. We won’t be able to finish the software. As we had our fair share of apologetic posts and explanations I will try not to repeat them. But know this: We tried everything to make this happen and we are truly sorry we didn’t achieve it.
What does this mean?
We have now stopped the development of the software. Ending this project, we’ll sadly have to shut down the prototype as well. Even with hardly any traffic left, the running costs for the server, domains and certificates are still piling up to a certain amount. So much so, that we are not able to offer refunds for the Kickstarter campaign like we did before. As we promised to keep your data safe and soon there won’t be a platform to view them on, we may offer you a file export. Please contact us under support@yarps.net mentioning your instance name to avoid losing your data. From there we will get in touch with you directly and talk about the details. Please note there will be no possibility of recovering the data after the Prototype shut down.
The question stands: How do you end a failed campaign? Of course you have to acknowledge the path taken, even if you did not reach the destination on it. In our case it was a path lined with amazing supporters and partners along the way. Thank you all for believing in this idea, that once wasn’t more than a fleeting day dream. We are grateful for all you’ve done for YARPS. You were the best companions anyone could’ve asked for. Thank you from everyone that has worked on YARPS over the years:
Parting from this passion project is a hard thing for us to do as a team and individually. While we are not sure what the future holds, we know our love for tabletop roleplaying is not fading. And we hope yours isn’t either! Our hope remains that there will be a tool to simplify managing roleplaying worlds (it just won’t be YARPS). By now others have picked up the torch and are developing promising tools. We’re glad. The idea doesn’t end with one failed project – thankfully.
Keep those dice rolling!
All the best,
on behalf of the YARPS team,
Chris