The King is Watching, a new hit game, comes from Serbia
The King is Watching saw the light of day on July 21st, and not even three weeks later, it boasts 3,500 very positive Steam reviews. Just a few days after release, it has sold over 150,000 copies and reached almost 18,000 concurrent players, becoming the game with the highest peak CCU in tinyBuild’s portfolio.
But if you were living under a rock and have no idea what we’re talking about, here’s the gist: in this roguelite kingdom builder, you rule by the power of your royal gaze. Progress thrives where you watch; however, the moment you turn away, there’s laziness and chaos, so you need to be careful of where your focus is.
The game was developed by Hypnohead and published by tinyBuild. We asked for the ins and outs of the production from the Publishing Producer and Director of tinyBuild Serbia, Vladimir Tolmachev:
“The King is Watching began as a jam project at Ludum Dare. Initially, the team created a Steam page and considered self-publishing. However, after discovering the project, we reached out and officially signed the game in March 2024, when it was still in an early development stage. Our first significant step was relocating the two founders, the main Programmer and the Head of the Studio, to Serbia and supporting them as they settled here. Essentially, the majority of the game’s creation took place here, in Belgrade, and the team hired another Programmer locally.
The primary goal was to create a game with strong replayability that was accessible yet engaging enough to motivate repeated playthroughs. Midway through development, however, our greatest challenge was realizing the original game concept wasn’t broadly appealing enough. Although there was a dedicated fanbase for the initial design, it was small compared to our target audience. After extensive discussions with us, developers significantly pivoted the game’s direction: the roguelike mode initially planned as a bonus post-release feature became the core gameplay. This decision led to a major redesign approximately 8-9 months into the project. We iteratively improved the game through continuous refinement and player feedback, achieving its polished current state.”