Been gone a while, how are things?

How's SotA doing? Have things been getting better under the new ownership? Steady player base? Progress on Episode 2?

Thanks!

 

Hi @MightyUnclean. Yeah well we do get updates you can check out. Look on the home screen for updates. One of the Newest additions is mounts. To acquire a free Mount tame a horse and trade tamed one at npc's. I'm not sure of all locations of them but I think desolis is one place. The taming requirement of horses is set low like level 1. As always jump on in. Lots of deco things like items placeable on blocks, castle walls and more. Also if you have any fouls from supporting mount stretch goal these can be traded in as well to receive a mount and domesticated foul. If you have ep2 new areas are coming in as well.

 

Thanks! I know you're a long-term player. Thank you for the response. How is Episode 2 coming along? Steady progress? Did they optimize the game at all? I have a new system with an SSD now, so I'm thinking it may run a lot better.

 

Significant changes to the game for returning players

Can at least see a list of stuff that has been added since you last played.

 

My pleasure. They are always trying to make time doing optimization and game improvements. It is ongoing. Congrats on the new system. I rarely have problens running the game. I got a new system a few years ago with 32 g ram to sustain improved playing capabilities for longer. I also play on ssd. I say give it a try. You can catch a boat to the new lands and look around if you have ep2. There's new content but spend some time leveling for most of it and if you have a guild or friends even better.

 

Also, I do regret being so critical of the game over the years. I harbored a lot of resentment because the Ultima series was a huge part of my childhood, and I was disappointed with some of the elements of SotA. I lashed out and even wanted to see it fail. I sometimes attacked the player community, which I shouldn't have done. The game may not be perfect, but over time, I've come to appreciate that it does have a dedicated player base, some of who truly love the game.

 

Hey Unclean, glad to see someone else wanting to give the game another chance! To answer your questions, there are some great changes since the new ownership, as well as some very bad habits that just wont go.

For the positive side, Bug fixing has been seeing a steady increase with entire releases focused 100% on bug fixing (like the one currently in the works). Also, a few reworks on some bare systems have happened, such as the Food Rework that managed to make the majority of the food worth using for someone or another. Late game content has seen a steady additions, with EP2 having pretty much only T10+ zones. Playerbase seems relatively steady, I myself have seen a lot of new players.

For the negative side, a lot of systems are still unfinished and buggy, and they keep on releasing bugged content which had been bug reported during the QA cycle. Crafting is due for a rework, which has been talked about for a while now but always pushed back. Group content is becoming a bit more fun nowadays as well.

All in all, new and old players are still enjoying the game quite a lot, and if you do decide to give it another try, feel free to hit me up with any question you could have, and I'll either answer if I do know the answer or direct you to the person who might!

 

You can say that again. You were pretty mean over on MMORPG in particular.

But that was a nice thing you just said. I guess it has been a transformative year for all of us.

 

Always worth giving something another try, in my point of view they have made some really great strides in performance. I play a lot ( at least in the winter) and really enjoy the game. The best bet, slip in and see what YOU think. Welcome back.

 

I guess it's better to play through the direct client rather than Steam, because Steam results in very large updates? Are there any other differences?

 

Steam has to do a full update for every patch. I use the stand alone mostly. Steam for a second account

 

It doesn't have to. They just don't do it right. But using the stand alone can backfire if you don't log in frequently enough. Steam single-updates to the latest, but the stand alone launcher increments you through each and every single patch, whether each patch a full update (which sometimes happens) or not, or whether those patches are redundantly updating the same parts, or not.

 

You know, there is a way to use 2 accounts without using steam for the 2nd one! The trick is to go into the game folder and find the executable that doesn't go through the launcher, can't remember how its called, but I usually open the launcher first to update, and once I launched, I use the executable and it works fine, no 2nd download, no 2 copies of the game, so less storage used up!

 

You can right click the running sota program in the Taskbar and open additional copies to multibox that way as well.