Dr. Kerbal

This makes me sad. But it was nice. This is a letter from Harvester to the KSP community. It been 5 years now.

Hi,

There’s no good way to ease into news like this, so here it is: I’m stepping down as Lead Developer of KSP.

For the last five and a half years, I put all my work, my thoughts and my time into KSP. I’ve watched it grow from this little unassuming idea for a 2D game in which you’d put together rocket parts to see how high you could get, into a complete spaceflight simulator, a space agency tycoon, a planetarium of truly astronomical scale, a home for little green men and their space program, a Kerbal space program.

KSP has become far more than the game I imagined half a decade ago. When we first set out to take on this project, I could not have expected anything even remotely close to what it ended up becoming. To say KSP surpassed my every expectation would be, at best, a colossal understatement.

There was a time, years ago, when any single design decision of mine had the power to drastically change the direction of the project. There was the danger that by even moving ahead on development of one area instead of another, the entire feel of the game, the intent it carried, could be morphed into something else. There was a fine line we needed to stay on, lest we let the project slip and become something other than what we intended. That is no longer the case, and that’s a very good thing. It means that conceptually, the game is complete.

This isn’t to say KSP’s development is complete, however. Far from it. Plans for KSP reach far into the future, and there are enough ideas to keep us all going for years. The console versions are coming up, there are new updates in development, the list goes on. For myself, however, I desperately need to have something new, to create more than one game in my life.

I need to make one thing perfectly clear: development on KSP will continue as always. No features, upgrades, bugfixes or anything of the sort are being discontinued because of my leaving.

This I say with absolute confidence, because I have complete trust in every member of the KSP team, and I know they are fully capable of handling anything that comes their way.

The KSP team deserves more praise than I can give them. This is a band of outstanding people, all brilliant and excellent at what they do, never tiring, never doing anything less than their best. I’m very proud of what we have accomplished together. It’s something I’ll carry with me for ever. I also know beyond any question that KSP would not have become what it is without every single one of them. I am forever grateful and in awe of all the work they put in.

And of course, I must give all my thanks to the founders at Squad, Ezequiel and Adrian, who took this wild leap of faith with me, putting their unconditional trust in me without ever requiring any failsafes or guarantees of success. We all know games are a notoriously risky proposition in the best of times, and they nonetheless extended their full support to me, at a time when none could tell what lay ahead.

Lastly, but most certainly not least, I have to thank every single one of you, the community, our players, kerbalnauts, space enthusiasts, reckless rocket engineers, our friends. All of you, who like us, believed in our weird little game and supported us throughout the years with your ever-inspired ideas, your unparalleled willingness to help, your relentless honesty and your unfailing loyalty. I cannot thank you enough for all of it, and I can only hope I am so lucky to see you again in whatever comes next.

This isn’t goodbye. It’s just farewell for now. In the meantime, however, I hope you all enjoy playing KSP as much as I enjoyed being part of its making.

Signing off,

Felipe Falanghe, aka HarvesteR 

I love KSP! Thanks for making it!