Lord British's Release 6 Impressions

Polish, polish, polish… and yet so much more polishing left to do! The team mainly focused on cleaning up what we had already done for this release, including shining up (and in some cases, darkening) the lighting and troubleshooting the issues that its implementation created for us. While we are VERY happy with the new lighting system, there were still some either glowing or pitch black textures remaining to fix. So there remains some work to be done, especially to the systems we switched out, and plan to switch out, like the map. Still, in the short time we delivered R6 to you, we did manage to add a few new things as well, and overall, we remain VERY happy with the new stuff we put in.

By far, my favorite part of R6 was to see how much YOU the players were able to do with it. Hedge mazes in Owls Head, parties in pubs, player towns popping up… they were all incredibly inspiring to the team and myself! We came away re-inspired to deliver even better player features for the next release. The areas I am pushing the team on now include gathering resources, and even more crafting recipes for decorations, weapons and armor. Also, I want to be sure that our adventure areas have real data behind them, so when you finish an adventure, you get reasonable rewards along the way and a payoff for finishing. It will be an important step in making sure the in-game economy keeps getting better and better!

THANK YOU again for inspiring us, sharing your feedback, and for journeying with us on this adventure. See you in R7!

 

Shining up of the first dev+ day was close to kill me! Lets fo for the R7 now!

 

Great stuff, my Liege!

I love reading RG's posts, I can hear his voice and get a great mental image of him. He's a man who writes they way he talks.

 

And the best for me: Morton finally muted!

 

What the Portalarium staff is creating is amazing, but I'm also really looking forward to what this community is going to create in the game.

 

The Lighting and fog was the best I have seen In any game (and I play lots of games) for many a year, You went from unplayable in R5 to some of the best lighting in game for a long time, It can only get better and you and your team are doing the backers proud,....roll on...., My main gripe would be frame rate (something is going on why not talk to Unity devs about optimisation, You are a main game on their site now, Its in their interest that you succeed in your dev, And the combat is nearly fun with a lot or experimental promise, Why not let us create our own spells?, Fire. rock, Weeds! , a spell that burns solidifies and entraps all at the same time!

 

PS I like the fact it took me an hour to complete a side quest where in GW2 I would have done half a continent by then, I liked talking and extracting the info I needed from NPC and when I finally discovered where I was supposed to be at it was a relief and also a rather cool joy long since missing from 3d worlds. (We create worlds)

 

Since the fog looks so good, would be interesting to see it summoned as well for some means (currently envisioning the smoke/fog scenes from Excalibur), not just a fog machine dance party.

 

'Fog' was used well as atmosphere in the Owl's Head sewers as steam rising from the sewer water. I'm sure they'll have some other uses as they go through the different scenes.

 

Thank you Lord British for all you and your team have brought to us your citizens thus far. In saying this is only a Pre-Alpha Release 6. It has come so far beyond what most would expect for a pre-alpha - often times even an alpha/beta release - Even with its off issues - Which only lead to fits of giggles if one sits back and thinks how to have fun with things (like the colour pink!) - Laugh at all things - .

With deepest respects ~bows graciously~ Thank you m'Lord!

 

Lord British, thanks so much to you and your team!

The polish was wonderful and helped me (and others I would imagine) feel more immersed in New Britannia. Watching people splash in fountains and do head stands, and experiencing the setting sun gave me a feeling of camaraderie and peace. Each of your releases allows us to explore more, adventure further, give your team feedback, and get to know each other better.

Thank you for creating this realm and allowing us to go on this fantastic journey!

 

I had a wonderful time. The world is beautiful. I agree with Winfield about the camaraderie and peace watching the sunset (and rise). The lighting effects as that happened were impressive. I also had an absolute ball decorating my house (and "acquiring" said decorations, hehe), and am looking forward to even more decorating options. I spent some time crafting and helping to thin out the elf population with friends. Got to see the Clink and find a few hidden rooms. Had a great time. The one thing I didn't get to, and I know we were supposed to, is the quests. I promise to do that in R7.

And the community is amazing. The building & decorating, the player made events, the parties, the Maze in Owl's Head, PaxLair, Bear Tavern, FireLotus Tavern, visits from team members interacting with the players & roleplay, are all icing on the cake. Overall, I couldn't be more pleased with my experience.

Thank you for a wonderful game, and thank you for allowing us to experience it in these early stages. I can't wait to see more and watch as it evolves.

 

Thanks to the whole team for a great release. My only complaint is not having more free time to play!

It really felt like there were distinct neighborhoods popping up - the world doesn't feel empty or so disjointed now. I don't think I've ever before played a game where people will just stop to watch the world simply because it is beautiful. I know I found myself doing it.

And thanks to you LB for your creative vision and continued dedication to the community.

 

New Britannia is really starting to look like a vibrant, enthralling world. New lighting system is excellent.

As mentioned above, the fog looked fantastic.

I have to admit, after finally testing crafting/gathering I loved it. I'm glad this will be deeply explored.

Thrilled to participate, even in my small way.

 

I am just so stoked that this game and our king Lord British has made another perfect living game. Thank you, to the whole team.

 

For your continued gernerosity, including the selfie, i will refrain from trying to stab at thee... For now!

Ps. Combat is coming along nicely! Love the bludgeoning tree!! Cant waitvp to try out xbows!!!

 

Crossbow hunting was great, I found Iolo's - sadly I guess he wanted it back at the end of R6.

 

Richard, I too was very impressed with the polish added to R6. I'm also very encouraged with the player made and supported "stuff".

HOWEVER...I don't think I was ever on the same instance as you or the cool crowd because I never saw any of that "stuff". If it wasn't static and a function of housing decoration, I probably didn't see it. In fact, most of my time was spent running around ghost towns, getting beat up and killed in overpowered dungeons, and generally dreaming of what R7 might be.

Again, I'm very pleased with the direction of the game and the otherall focus to polish in R6, but I have some concerns.

1) I think there's a real risk that you and the other devs may be in a silo where you see all this great player activity going on and you think "wow this is going on everywhere in the game!" It's not. It's probably just going on wherever you are or in anticipation of your arrival. That's not to say that the community isn't outstanding and that we don't have the potential to create a very lively world where everyone can be entertained and entertaining, it's just to say that it's not currently happening that way and I trust you know that.

2) Player towns are dead. So as the game grows, one of the most important things to design and bake into the cake is the ability for player towns and housing to "attract" other players so that when people are not out adventuring there are NO towns that are in existence for the sole reason of having another place to find an NPC quest or to allow more people to own a house in SOTA. If I goto a town of any size in the game it should be relatively "active" and I should not feel like I'm wasting my time just being there. I know this is only pre-alpha, but I'd really like to hear more about how you guys plan to fix this in the future.

3) PVP. It's a core element of the game and you guys are ignoring it. I'm sure you have every intention of making pvp great someday but I think your approach is completely wrong. You can't make a game without pvp and then add it later. Just like you can secure a system after it's been built. Security has to be built into a system just as PVP needs to be built into a game (from day one). Otherwise you create gaps that can't be fixed. If you are serious about making PVP great, you need to get it into the schedule now, not 5 releases from now....right now.

 

The problem is combat is not even done. How do we expect people to be able to properly test pvp without combat even being done? Don't get me wrong I was disappointed to not see pvp much earlier on the schedule. But rushing it out before it is actually ready to be tested and before a core related system such as combat is ready to be tested would just do more harm then good.

 

You're asking a question that many people (even the devs) are asking...but it's still the wrong question.

How can you test PVP if PVP isn't in the game? The answer is, you can't.

What the devs need to do is add PVP in incremental steps, NOW. Why now? Because combat should always be PVP ready, all combat should be balanced from day one. You don't make unbalanced combat on purpose. That's just lazy and reckless in my opinion.

The first step would be to add Dueling. Just the ability to hack at another person with whatever skills and spells are available. That gives players the opportunity to say "hey, fireballs are way over powered!" or "what's up with sheilds? When I use a shield I actually die MORE against magic because it slows down my attack swings." I'm just making these examples up, but you should get the point. PVP is not something you "add" like a feature, it's a CORE ELEMENT OF THE GAME that you have to build in from day one.

It's now actually day 400 (or something like that), but the longer we wait the more gaps the combat system will have. It's not going to get easier to integrate PVP at this point, it's going to get exponentially harder.