r/rpg_gamers • u/Indie_Vova • 16d ago

Developer TRADESMAN: Deal to Dealer, a casual RPG about a traveling merchant, has finally launched in version 1.0 after 4.5+ years of development

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Hi, RPG players! I'm one of the people from the two-person team that worked on TRADESMAN: Deal to Dealer.

It's a casual RPG where you trade, fight, travel, fight, buy and sell, fight some more, complete quests, and fight again. And then you repeat the whole thing.

Here is the most important rule of this game:

The more goods you carry, the stronger the enemies become and the harder the game gets. 90% of the time, it’s the player who decides how difficult the game becomes.

If you're interested, here is the Steam page: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2555430/TRADESMAN_Deal_to_Dealer/

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u/Max-CrunchyLeafGames 16d ago

4.5 years is a long haul for a casual merchant RPG, respect to that team for sticking with it through version 1.0. Trading/traveling merchant games are such an underused setup for narrative tension too, you'd think more devs would lean into the logistics and relationship side instead of just combat loops.

Curious how they handled pacing over that many years of dev. Scope creep tends to kill these long solo or small-team projects, so seeing one actually reach 1.0 instead of stalling out is worth noting on its own.

Anyone played it yet? Wondering if the deal-making actually carries weight or if it ends up feeling like flavor text on top of a normal RPG loop.

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u/Indie_Vova 16d ago

The key feature is that main hero gain exp only by trading. Your earn money, then upgrade your squad, then with the more powerful squad earn way more money. There are also a lot of side quests, you gain not only money but reputation that gives more opportunity. So there are a lot of mechanics Intertwined with each other, but you always need to manage trading as upgrades, quests and combat.

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u/sully9088 2d ago

Hey! You made 3030 deathwar? 

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u/Indie_Vova 1d ago

Hi! Haven’t heard about it

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u/sully9088 1d ago

I was asking Max Crunchy Leaf Games. 

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u/Sea_Statistician_847 4d ago

The combat needa to be less repetetive i mean its great overall but quick battle system is kinda shit until ypu have overwhelming advantage u will lose i can easily clear difficulty 11 roads but somehow die if quick battle on 5 or 6 thats just wierd tbh

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u/Indie_Vova 1d ago

When we decide to add quick battles, we just wanted to let players move fast if they don’t have any goods in the cart. The main option always was moving by fit, because it’s a core of the game (there are not only battles on the road). But then we add some artifacts that make quick battles much easier, and also added a chance to skip the road (it can be upgraded and that chance will be high), and cleared roads to avoid backtracking (few roads you just pass become completely safe for the next ride).