Salem is a game all about making a life in 17th Century New England. Players will craft, farm and build in a persistent open world where everyone is taking on the role of courageous colonists. This is not going to be a game for the casual. There will be open pvp, with repercussions, and permadeath (if you die your permanently dead). There will be civilized safe areas in the game where players will start building, but the farther they move away from that the more rewards can be found and the more danger they will be in. The world is inspired by H.P. Lovecraft and Edgar Allen Poe, among others who they contribute to the Gothic look of the game. The main point of the game is to take you, the colonist, and throw you out into a frontier and let you survive, thrive or die. It has some really fantastic ideas, like player driven justice, and complete player freedom.

Salem is being developed by Seatribe and published by the well known Paradox Interactive. It will be for PC and Linux and it is going to be free to play. Before I go on any further let me get straight to my original point of the post, other than overview. Salem is taking beta sign-up's, not sure how much longer, and all you need to do is head over to the their website and enter your name and email, so get on it and head on over there. The beta will be starting in April and they have a referral system set-up to ensure you beta access if you get three other players to sign up.  Now if you wish to read further I have several videos, some with gameplay, that describe the game a bit more thoroughly, seeing as to how they are the only source of information for Salem.

Here is their newest of videos which describes how players will go into the wilderness and how the farther away from civilization the more dangerous it will become. It is rather short, but it does have some gameplay. Take a look.


Now for a video about crime and punishment. This one explains how committing crimes within a settlement leaves evidence and people can track you down. It's also fairly short, but it does have some gameplay as well.