Q2 2015 Schedule Update

Remember that a very large portion of SotA's graphical assets are crowdsourced. Hard working fans bust a** to contribute in-game assets. Re-assigning devs to polishing up these submitted assets would likely push back the launch schedule, which has probably already been pushed back due to the logistics of converting the game from Unity 4 to Unity 5. It'll probably get done eventually, that or a better-looking fan made asset will replace some of the existing models.

They'll put a layer of polish on everything before the game is finished. These guys have been shipping games for decades. There's just a lot of more important work to get done first. It's an iterative process that goes on throughout all stages of development, but it doesn't become a main focus until the game's getting closer to being shipped/launched.

What I'm hoping for is after/around release 20 or so, we see a big marketing effort and get a big surge of new blood interested in the title. That'd hopefully translate to a boost in funding and possibly being able to bring on a couple dedicated model and texture artists to start the shine job on a commission basis.

 

One of the things that bothers me is I can go pick up another little indie niche game off steam - Pillars of Eternity - and realize within a few minutes... Oh yeah! The armor on these modals is *really* what I imagine armor to look like in fantasy.

It's not about being historically accurate, although I appreciate historically accurate armors too.

It just looks like... Oh yeah now that's chain mail ! These 'soccer jerseys' we currently have - I really hope they are not final design wise. They just aren't good art assets.

We're supposed to be doing interactive development right ? The whole point of this extremely painful pre-alpha 16 month process is that we raise things we don't like about the development. I want to see things like this refined NOW, not do it later or modders do it somehow after release. Right now it's not even on the schedule !

Armor, outfits etc and especially rare armors need to look good. If we have to suffer with the models, lets at least get decent looking armor. It's really important to liking your character. You see it constantly on the screen, even if interface elements are minimal or off.

 

Well in a very loose way it is comparing oranges to apples, since we have much more of the multiplayer and many other systems to consider to get this game made. I still say wait it out which I'm sure you are of course, the polish to the game is coming very slowly and that is ok. I don't agree with what you say about what's happening here. POE is POE and we are not. The focus on POE was single player aspects and perhaps you just like that, and while I appreciate that very much in single player games, I don't consider the 2 games in the same exact place right now. I still don't want to interrupt what I see is happening in SOTA right now, which is magnificent steps forward. It is fine to go off and enjoy playing another game while waiting for SOTA, sometimes I do too, but my heart and faith is still in this project for the long run, and not saying yours isn't of course. Most games will come and go and I do not want that for this game. Whether we have armor befitting of the stature of our game is still in the process and feedback is still coming and going on those aspects.

 

It's not even on the schedule because it really isn't a priority. The polish will be done. Not in alpha. Alpha is not the polish state. Alpha is the "design the core systems and get them at least functional" state. Beta is the polish state. Wait for the beta, it'll happen.

Also, the "Extremely painful 16 month development cycle" is, all things considered, INCREDIBLY short for a game of this scope and size. Comparable titles might be worked on by a team twice as big as Portalarium has, with three times the budget, for 3 years or more before we even get sneak peaks (Elder Scrolls Online, for example). They have kept the development process completely open for the community to participate in.

Yes, now is the time to voice your complaints, but demanding that the game be polished and perfected when it's not even in full blown alpha yet is a little unreasonable. They have much more important things to work on right now. Who cares what the armor looks like for example, if you get 10 frames per second in a major city, combat is incomplete and buggy, the world map isn't finished, housing core systems are not done, two thirds of the major announced features do not even have tech created for them yet, and there's only a couple dozen different monsters to fight? Art assets are at the back of the list because, while they are important to the game, they do not change how the game functions, simply how it looks. Still important but not as important as having a functioning and playable game first.

They have to take a developer off of one of the above list of things to do to refine and polish armor, meaning that those core systems take longer and longer to get done, pushing back the full alpha and eventual beta phase even further. Just be patient and wait. The devs know that there are many models and textures in the game in need of major improvement. You can expect things like that to start happening quite a lot when the game hits late alpha/the start of beta.

 

Thanks a lot. I really appreciate the response and that already tells me it is out to Q3 or later.

 

Unfortunately I'd not had a chance to play UO. At the time I was into MMO, WoW was a huge hit, and well, I just followed the trend. After that, I played LOTRO for a few years(it was monthly pay method).
I've no doubt monthly paying games would definately take more fortune than SotA, but what I want express was, that I'd pay gladly for finished product costs more than 100$, if I like it.
SotA is crowdfunded and crowdsourced as you know, and I assume many of the devoted pledgers invested their money on SotA devs' 'promise'. Devs are working very hard according to strict and tight plan far as I know it and I feel very grateful everytime watching my screen filled with beautiful scenery. (Seriously, devs, you guys are doing a great job!) Although I'm still reluctant to pay more for a promise that yet to be achieved.
Maybe I'm just scared.

I'm not 'fine' with what I see right now, I want it to be better, and grow bigger. If my desire means to do more than explorer pledge, well, I don't know what to say. What I see right now is development plan until Q2 of 2015 and a couple of stretch goals which don't interest me very much. For that, I think I payed enough 'for now.'

P.S. : The main reason I applied 'Explorer' pledge was to get soundtrack. I just love the music of SotA.
P.S.2 : Even while I was writting this, I was browsing tools of prosperity, riding outfit and admiral's outfit. LOL. Talking about payed enough, right? ;p

 

No matter how cool a character looks, if the gameplay does not work no player will be happy. As a long timer gamer and having worked as a beta tester, IMO getting the core game engine functioning properly is critical to future success. It is very easy ( well comparitly) to refine the appearance of a game compared to trying to retrofit a repair of the core coding.

I understand the financial commitment that have been made, which I will doing myself shortly, but everthing I have read has said upfront that SotA is in ALPHA development. While the quarterly goals are great to see, the reality is that we are looking at least 18-24 months before we see the "final" product. Remeber that during this timeframe new technologies, events and everyday life things that occur will happen and have an impact on the time line.

The transparancy we are being given to the game development and design is unprecedented. We are fortunate that there is such a level of professionalism and commitment to a crowd funded project of this size.

(Gets off the soap box)

 

I wonder what this means about future episodes once the game is complete. I personally don't mind if each episode takes two full years or so. Keeps the devs steadily employed, and extends the life of the game itself... although I'm not insinuating that after episode five will signal the end of the online portion though.

If the storyline is epic then players will return for to see how the epic story ends, and just like Ultima SotA might define an era of some people's lives. Although after 7 or 8 years we might need to see some visual improvements too I would think.

In any case my hopes are still high.

 

Unless you're a developer you don't know the schedule, when it is being done, IF it will be done, or anything. You're just assuming those things. I need to raise it while development is still occuring. Isn't that the point of the forums and whole "Open Development Model" that nobody else does ? That's what I thought !

You know... that is an excuse. They knew what they could afford and what they were getting into when they pitched us this ! It's not like this game was planned as a AAA game and all of a sudden it's "we only have a few developers !" We were told in March 2013, the game would be done in October 2014. We need a million dollars to realize it. That is a Fact. I had no idea they hadn't started work on this at the time. If I had known that, I would have thought twice about backing it. We're now at 6 times the budget and getting close to 33 percent longer of the original envisioning of the development of the game...

The development process being "Open" means you have to be able to handle when people make suggestions, during the Open development to improve stuff that is important. Especially after this experience !

I'd like to be clear. I am not asking for the game to be "polished and perfected". What I am asking for are art assets that you see all the time to be brought to the industry standards every other fantasy 3D game manages. I am not a lone voice in the wilderness here, many people agree with this ! Of course most of them are banned from the forums which is another matter entirely. Keep an eye on this post !

Are you seriously saying that we have to wait until everything is DONE- the game is in Beta, which for all we know could just be release since we are still in "Pre-Alpha" - before we can get a couple art assets improved ? Why ? There's no reason - they have to fix the models clipping issues anyway ! They're constantly putting new art assets in the game every release ? It's going to make them skip the whole schedule and vital systems won't make it ? Come on.

I'm being patient and waiting. What else can I do ? The game is already pushed back close to a year or more. What bothers me is that people feel a need to tell me this when I'm simply asking for something to be done. What is the point of that ? I'm not criticizing the game's developers or anything. I'm just telling the truth. It's not "be patient and wait" it is "don't say anything negative at all, only say positive and glowing things, or wait until the end of the development cycle to raise anything."

I respectfully disagree, I think the players this game is supposedly being made for should feel comfortable raising issues in a visible thread like this without having to defend themselves all the time because people say the same things over and over again about it's just pre-alpha and don't judge it.

 

Hmm. I was going to type out a long response picking apart your post one point at a time, but instead I've decided it's not worth it. You're welcome to your opinion but I can tell from the content of your posts, you know very little about game design.

Also, offering negative critique on the game is constructive and players are encouraged to do so. I myself have done so. There's a proper way to do it that doesn't make it sound like you are attacking the developers. Saying, "The model armors look bad. They really need some improvement," is one thing, as long as you're offering an example of a way it could be improved, that's constructive. Saying (And I quote)

Many of those are inflammatory and insulting statements. It's not constructive criticism, it's destructive.

By all means, head over to the Feedback section of the forum, and leave your feedback there. It gets read and often responded to by developers. But speaking from experience as a programmer and developer myself, I can tell you that the way to get your complaints (which are, mostly, legitimate) heard are to be constructive in presenting them. Destructive or insulting posts often get completely ignored.

Also if I could direct you to this post. I think you'll get more of an understanding of why graphical advancements are so slow, and what effect destructive comments have on game devs.

 

Okay. Well, I didn't intend them to be inflamatory or insulting. I wanted to be blunt. I wanted to be honest. I wanted to give the feedback that I've heard from other people who I've invited into play this game. People that won't play this game with me because of things like this. This is the real world - it's not going to be all pleasant all the time. I'm sure the devs can handle this. I know their job is hard. I am still here - unlike many people. So obviously I care, and this is coming from a place of caring. I'm not trying to pull an InsaneMembrane here. The dev need to know the assets aren't good enough as they are for armor. Many other things - house decorations, infrastructure, even trees, are all in much better shape.

The game does many things well. I can see it's improving every release. It still isn't really ready for prime time. Deep down, you know this. You don't need me to bring it up. All I am bringing up is ways to improve it, and one of them would be to improve the armor assets which to me, are not competitive compared to many other indie games.

Okay - I'll wait until the end. But if we don't see big improvements to it, then remember this conversation.

 

Trady has good points. We agree the armor isn't there yet. Thank you everyone for defending us but I do not think Trady did anything in his post that required that defense. As Trady stated the point of all this Open Development is for you guys to give us honest critique, which he did.

 

To be honest, the only armor set i really like is the augmented armor plate set. I said it!

 

Will there be a way we can move skins? For instance I like the chaos cloak, but since it is not crafted I can't enhance it. Would love to be able to get or buy a new cloak and then move the chaos onto it.

 

Upcoming events page could have details added now to R17+. Even if just linking to the forum thread.

https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/?page_id=35475

 

Mad Max,

I am almost sure that your level of pledge also gets you the follow up games as well. So you may want to consider that as well. I know I went through that process when I was deciding what level to pledge to.

 

DRAGONS!

 

Starr I didn't see anything in the schedule about any Blacksmithing repairs, so you know where i'm going...

Any Love to the *repair kits*

 

Chris has said they are implementing quick, cheap crafting repairs for R17 (30 April). I'm not searching for any quotes, and there is always the chance that things slip. However, from what I recall of the postmortem discussion (between both Chris and Darkstarr) there should be a healthy number of fixes to existing recipes and crafted materials name, as well as new things to craft.

I'm sure someone took notes somewhere.

 

Music! yes!