Five Years of Solo Development – Interview with Fountains Creator John Pywell
Fountains is a solo-developed Metroidvania inspired by Dark Souls and Hollow Knight, built over five years by creator John Pywell.
Why am I seeing this Ranked on source trust — Microsoft
It ranks mainly on source trust: Microsoft is the most reliable outlet we track on this subject, and is the only one on the story so far.
StandardStandard, because a first-party source is on it, the subject was identified from the text, and it scores 0.54 against a bar of 0.50.
| Factor | Weight | Score | Contribution | Where it came from |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Corroboration | 0.35 | 0.39 | +0.135 25% | 1 independent org on the story. Tier-3 aggregators never corroborate — they can show something is circulating, never that it is true. |
| Source trustleads | 0.25 | 1.00 | +0.250 47% | Microsoft is the highest-trust source on this story and is first-party — the organisation announcing its own news. Trust is taken from the best source, not averaged. |
| Pickup rate | 0.20 | 0.00 | +0.000 0% | One counted organisation, so there is no spread to measure — nothing has picked this up to set a rate. |
| Freshness | 0.20 | 0.75 | +0.150 28% | Halves every 10 hours from the newest item on the story. This is the only factor that rewards a story for nothing more than being recent. |
Corroboration counts distinct organisations, once each, and only from tiers 1 and 2. Freshness halves every 10 hours, so this ranking is a snapshot and will differ at the next build.
What happened
Fountains is a solo-developed Metroidvania inspired by Dark Souls and Hollow Knight, built over five years by creator John Pywell. With the game now launching on XBOX, we spoke with Pywell about its development, influences, and unexpected international success. Sam: So firstly, tell us a bit about yourself – a brief introduction of anything you’d
How this story arrived
Ordered by when each source was first observed, which is what the velocity figure is computed from. Publishers backdate; observed order does not.
- 01 Microsoftfirst-party first seen Five Years of Solo Development – Interview with Fountains Creator John Pywell
Overclock clusters coverage from independent sources and grades it automatically. The figures above are computed, not editorial. This page summarises and links to reporting by the outlets named — follow the links for the original work.