Isn't it more like Desperados? Or at least the trailer looked that way.
Anyway, I really like the setting and the Japanese voices that are apparently in it are a huge plus. But the graphical style is killing it for me (and I heavily dislike Unity as an engine anyway).
Basically, a Desperados 15 years later in that setting would have been perfect.

/edit: Also, what the others said is definitely true. Demo, day 1 and the like is excellent developer/publisher conduct (missing the physical (collector's) edition though :P). If not for the above, I would have been a customer.

Relatively high price or not, the demo left such a good impression that personally I don't mind that price tag at all. Will happily support the team with my money.

Same here.
Also for the fact that the game is on gog day 1 which unfortunately a lot of indie developers/publishers still shy away from. By supporting devs and games that "take the plunge" you're also supporting the cause and it gets more and more likely that other devs and games will be less reluctant to release on gog.

And if the first one does well enough chances are that there will be a second Shadow Tactics, which hopefully improves on some of the things the first one could have done better (smoother animations, indoor areas, more HUD customization, a 4th even harder difficulty mode feat. no disappearing bodies among other things, time-sensitive missions, a branching storyline that locks and unlocks missions exclusive to the path you've taken or that affects the approach to solving objectives based on decisions you've made in earlier missions, and more content in general).

I`ve just finished the demo, good job Minimi. Wishlisted for now, as my backlog is too big.

Had a chance to play the demo - promising! This definitely has my interest now.

My primary advice would be to continue to look to Commandos/Desperados/Robin Hood for inspiration when it comes to improvements and to take player complaints with a grain of salt - for a lot of new players this will likely be the first time they encountered this type of game, so complaints may arise from simple not getting it yet. Look at the games that you want to emulate instead, otherwise you're at risk of getting Blackguards 2, rather than Blackguards 1.

As for the price, it doesn't bother me but I can see how constant sales have given people different expectations on what a reasonable price for non-AAA game is, plus indies having an image of taking little money to make. This isn't exactly the cheapest niche to develop for, though, so the price might be more palatable to you if you think of this as being produced by what used be small to mid-sized companies, rather than as part of the mass of indies we see now. Quality is worth a price as the alternative is massive amounts of DLC, which is something I'd rather see less off.

Well compared to Grim Dawn that cost $20 less was in production years longer and offers 100s of hours of game play it still comes up short for $40 in my opinion. But I wish the game and the devs well and will probably get it on sale.

Would be cool if one could turn off the tutorial-scrolls and the key assignment-overlays on the map.
If you play a mission for the second time there's no point to have those around and pop up anymore, right? By then you already learned the ropes and don't need to be reminded how to do a non-lethal attack or that pressing H highlights objects of interest.

Loved the demo and can't wait for the 6th to buy, thanks for this awesome game!

And I love the 21:9 support, not everything but even the intro graphics is in 21:9 and scales nicely, love it!

Everyone should decide for themselves what they think is worth buying at what price, but I do feel like comparing this to Grim Dawn doesn't work. Grim Dawn started as a kickstarter and had early access afterwards to help fund a long development cycle, which already meant that they couldn't set the price too high without scaring away backers during the campaign, buyers in early access and not making it look like they were fleecing people when they finally released it. ARPGs like Grim Dawn are also less of a niche than a Commandos-style tactics game and decent sales can compensate for a game that is cheaper than it should really be.

That said, I'm still waiting myself to hear at release whether the rest of the game can maintain a good level of quality before I buy it at full price. It needs to be something I want to play right away if I'm going to pay full price for it.

Any update on the Linux demo? Still waiting to try it.

Thanks!

The Linux demo is out on Steam. I hope GOG one is coming soon as well.

Thanks! I hope GOG will sort it out soon.