YQIX is a slow game collective. We don't ship — we harvest. Each game is cultivated over seasons, fermented in communal kitchens, and released only when the conditions are right. Some batches take three years. Some never leave the cellar.
A turn-based strategy where you cultivate fungal networks through soil. Victory means harmony with the ecosystem, not domination. Played over real-world lunar cycles — one move per new moon.
A year-long game about pressing apples, tending barrels, and waiting. Real-time fermentation simulation. You check your virtual orchard twice daily. The best vintage took four real years to complete.
A fire-tending game played across generations. You inherit a coal from your predecessor. Keep it alive through storms, droughts, and long winters. Pass it forward or let it die with dignity.
A pottery simulator where each vessel holds a memory. Fire it incorrectly and the story warps. Still aging in the kiln. Estimated release: 2027, maybe 2028. We'll know when it's ready.
YQIX lives on 40 acres outside Ashland, Oregon. Eleven of us share a farmhouse built in 1893, a barn retrofitted with workstations, and a root cellar where we store physical prototypes carved from local clay.
We don't crunch. We don't sprint. We follow the growing season. Winter is for planning and preserving. Spring is for planting ideas. Summer is for tending. Fall is for harvest and reflection. Some games don't survive the frost.
Our tools are deliberately analog-first. We sketch on butcher paper with charcoal from the woodstove. Code is written in seasonal bursts between planting and harvest. The internet connection is spotty on purpose.
Decides what gets planted each season. Keeps the master fermentation log. Believes a game is done when it tastes like the year it came from.
Manages the kiln and the hearth-hardware prototypes. Specializes in games played near actual flames. Her bread oven doubles as a server rack.
Writes narratives that decompose naturally. Believes in stories that return to the earth. Her dialogue trees are grown, not drawn.