Archmage Rises News

[p]It’s been 2 months since my last update, when we pushed some hotfixes to the beta branch. A lot has happened, let me catch you up to speed. This update will be more personal and corporate update than specifically about Archmage game features.[/p][p]People are asking if I’m OK. Which I appreciate![/p][p]Yes I’m OK![/p][p]We were humming along on the Events update, reached our feature and content goals, and were days away from releasing.[/p][p]In order to stay ahead of the dev cycle, I had already moved on to planning out Regions and Core Game Loop revisions. I was half way through the new project’s goals and features when everything came to a screetching halt:[/p][p]The update on the Beta branch got a lot of negative responses. It changed the game in ways they didn’t like.[/p][p]I thought it was pretty good and achieved what I set out to achieve – streamline things I didn’t like and adding more gameplay and interesting choices to the map.[/p][p]I think the problem is how the changes integrate in with the rest of the game – which didn’t change. So the problem isn’t just a few bugs, it is a question of expanding scope to change the overlapping areas or rolling back some of the changes.[/p][p]This is hard stuff that requires some deep digging, nothing insurmountable, and as a game developer I don’t expect I’ll always ‘get it right’ first time. That’s why we have early access and beta branches. It’s fine, just I need some dedicated focused time to the hard thinking work to fix it. It matters it isn’t easy/normal work because of the next thing…[/p][p]July was a busy month: It started with a trip to San Franciso with my friend and game designer Mark. It was the first time the families met and fortunately everyone got along great. The kids played well together and let the adults talk! The best part of the trip (besides the fellowship) was taking a Waymo to the new Nintendo store. I read a book on the history of autonomous driving so it was a thrill to see the tech come to life. And to put my life on the line with it![/p][p]After that I went to an annual game conference, which was amazing. There were some 30+ friends there I haven’t seen in person in years, it was so great and encouraging! And I needed it because…[/p][p]I’ve been working a programming contract, less than full time, to pay the bills, keep the lights on. As I was driving to the conference I got a call from my client suddenly terminating the contract. There is a very long complicated story packed into that moment I won’t go into here, but should I ever write a book, it will be quite the dramatic chapter. On one hand it was a total surprise, and on the other I knew there we problems with the project above me.[/p][p]When I started driving to the conference life was good: new update on Archmage about to go out, bills covered, regular work/life routine.[/p][p]By the time I arrived: I was unemployed and whatever was in my account was all I had for the foreseeable future.[/p][p]Michel was at the conference too, so I had to share with him the bad news and that I couldn’t afford to keep him working on Archmage until I get back on my feet.[/p][p]My goal, my dream, is for Archmage to support at least me and my family, but right now it doesn’t. Fortunately, while at the conference I got three project leads.[/p][p]I met a company looking to revive a DOS game in the 90’s to todays market. So when contrasting “figure out what is wrong with Archmage Events Update” vs “Pitch a game dev contract for me and the team” the latter took precedence. We had multiple meetings, presentations, and a 20+ page written proposal which was a significant time investment. Direct porting a game design from 30 years ago won’t work, so how do you change it enough modern audiences will enjoy it, but not too much that they reject it. In a way, it is the same design challenge as Events! This took up a lot of my August. They liked the design (they said it exceeded their expectations), they want to work with us, but the cost is too high. I agree, the cost is mid six digits, but games are NOT cheap to make when you bring in illustrators, animators, writers, and VFX. We’re still on friendly terms as they figure out what they want to do next.[/p][p]Someone at the conference gave a presentation on his game dev history and lessons learned making a match-3 RPG similar to Puzzle & Dragon or Empires and Puzzle. I enjoyed his talk, I thought he had some real wisdom he shared well. And that, I thought, was that.[/p][p]5 days later ,he contacted me about needing programming on the game and if I was available. I am! But the challenge is his game is made in C++ Cocos2Dx. I have a love/hate relationship with Unity, but I really love C#. Many years ago, I used to be a professional C++ programmer. The first two games I released (mobile) were built in a game engine I wrote in C++. I even built an editor for my game engine, including a 2D WYSIWYG layered layout, and a real-time Particle System editor. I intended to use that game engine for more titles going forward… but when I looked hard at Unity and saw everything they had, AND the asset store of ready-built components, AND I could program in my favorite language C#, I saw I couldn’t compete and so joined the Unity bandwagon.[/p][p]I’m rusty, but technically able to do the work.[/p][p]I took the job.[/p][p]Three days in, still ramping up on the codebase, I went to him and laid out what I saw: I could do what he asked, but it is going to take 4x longer than it should. Long term he’s going to have serious issues:[/p]

1. [p]Recruiting: the world simply moved on from Cocos2dx. No one works in it anymore.[/p]
2. [p]His game needs juice (visual effects to enhance the game feel) and a lot of it! This is tedious and difficult to do in Cocos2dx which has no visual editor of any kind. Heck, you have to go to a website to do particle editing, save it as a plist, to then load it in the game at runtime. It’s just so so so hard![/p]

[p]I took the issue to Mark, just to check if I was being a whiney baby about working in C++ again. But he confirmed it was at least my professional responsibility to offer what I think the best strategy is.[/p][p]So I met with the client and laid it out: Instead of investing more in this codebase, invest that money in remaking it into Unity and gaining all the advantages.[/p][p]Remaking a game isn’t easy – that contract I had up until mid July? It was a port of a Cocos2dx project to Unity C#! I knew firsthand the challenges, but I really felt this is the best path for him.[/p][p]He immediately said, “Let’s do it.”[/p][p]I respect his openness and, frankly, his balls, in making such a serious decision so quickly. It actually made me a little concerned he was making it so quickly. Turns out, he always regretted choosing Cocos over Unity and I guess he just needed someone experienced enough in both to clearly lay out the pros and cons.[/p][p]So now I’m making a Match-3 RPG style game similar to Empires and Puzzles in Unity, and it’s great work, highly enjoyable. In 7 workdays I’ve recreated the core combat functionality, so feeling good about how this goes.[/p][p]Again, it’s super complicated, but the project I got terminated from has a new project they would like done and are interested in what I can do for them. So I’ve been busy putting together a pitch for them which is going out today.[/p][p]While all this has been going on, there are two other game projects my team has been working on in the background. One is a point & click adventure that that teaches music theory, and another is a digital card game like Magic/Hearthstone. I’m involved in these projects at a high level, we have wonderful people managing and building them, but it involves me at certain development gates and making sure we are hitting our marks.[/p][p]The music game shipped. The client is adding more content to it, which is great, because we tried to make it easy for them to do that.[/p][p]The card game is a digital demo of a new physical TCG, coming to kickstarter in October. If the kickstarter is successful, Defiance will build out the full game as our first multiplayer title. Good experience to have long term.[/p][p]While I was unemployed, I jumped onto the card game to help get it done.[/p][p]The last 2 months have been so busy! Time has flown by.[/p][p]Things are settling down now: I’m gainfully employed again, all the pitching is done, the card game demo is a week away from being done, and the kids are back in school.[/p][p]Unless something catastrophic flares up, I’ll be back on Archmage and tackling what I got wrong with Events next Friday.[/p]

[p]Thanks to all those trying out the beta branch of Map Events, your bug reports have been invaluable to find and fix some more bugs before other players happen to stumble across them.[/p][h2]New:[/h2][p]1. You can now actually get relationship bonuses when giving a giftable item to an NPC[/p][p]2. You can now control the volume of your heartbeat from the settings panel[/p][h2]Fixed:[/h2][p]1. Fixed black screen bug after fleeing a combat in the dungeons[/p][p]2. Fixed some issues with resources being culled too early after inquiring with an NPC[/p][p]3. Cleaned up some of the resource text issues[/p]

[p]We've been monitoring the bug reports coming in from the Beta for Events. [/p][p]Today's hotfix addresses these issues:[/p]

1. [p]Problem creating a new game from a previous world file[/p]
2. [p]Problem with old save files, saved in a dungeon[/p]
3. [p]Problem entering mage tower from the Mabren mage tower quest[/p]

[p]You should be good to play now![/p][p][/p][p]Thanks for trying and reporting![/p]

[p]Travel the world and encounter dynamic narrative Events. These are unexpected situations that offer choices, skill tests, opportunities to roleplay, rewards, and consequences.[/p][p]We’ll run the beta for 2 weeks, seeing what issues come up. If everything looks good we will release to everyone July 11.[/p][p][/p][p]Mods[/p][p]Please note, the purpose of the beta is to see if what we made works well and what needs improvement. First we'll make sure it works, then after public release we'll tell you how to modify it to make your own events. [/p][p][/p][p][/p]

• [p]We’re starting with 30 events, more will be added as we develop other features[/p]
• [p]Added a new icon system for map events - patrols, resources, etc. They appear directly on the map.[/p]
• [p]Replaces the old Tracks system - you now spot tracks from afar and choose to engage with them or not[/p]
• [p]Replaces the old Resources system - you now collect resources by walking over it and the terrain type determines the resource. If it’s a mundane event you get the resources. If there is a special one, you play it out.[/p]
• [p]Removed "hex view" - where clicking a hex showed a background and menu of options. This has been streamlined to just walk into the thing and the right thing happens - collect a resource, enter a town, enter mage tower, enter a lair. A pop-up will ask you to confirm entering a lair.[/p]
• [p]Added a new Item type - a “giftable”. These can be sold, but they are special unique items that can be gifted to NPCs to provide big relationship bonuses.[/p]
• [p]Some events are repeatable, some are once per lifetime. Some of the rewards can be quite significant.[/p]
• [p]Campsite items are now useable at any time on the map[/p]
• [p]Ambushing/following monsters back to a lair is only available through tracks-events. Hiding from a patrol is just a different skill check for running away[/p]

[p][/p]

• [p]Removed the old forced 'events'. Events are now 'opt in' by walking into them.[/p]
• [p]Resource events can be spawned by inquiring with the locals, just like before[/p]

[p][/p]

• [p]Night time no longer drops the temperature so much it causes the world to be coated in snow every 15 seconds - that drove me nuts![/p]
• [p]Frozen lakes and oases no longer spawn out in the middle of the ocean[/p]

• [p]We significantly changed how resources are spawned and collected. Let us know if you think the balance is off for amount of resources you get and how many you need for quests. [/p]

[p][/p][h3]Accessing the Beta Branch[/h3][p]You can access the beta branch by right-clicking Archmage Rises in your library, selecting Properties, then Betas, then select Events Beta from the dropdown list of branches.[/p]

[p]I’m pleased to announce the Events feature is ready enough to set a ship date![/p][p]We’re performing an internal QA next week, and as long as we didn’t break anything serious, we’re going to put out the new Events system for you to play on the Beta branch Jun 27.[/p][p]We’ll run it in beta for about 2 weeks before launching it to everyone.[/p][p]Example of the events on the map[/p][p][/p][p]While traveling the world, you’ll now encounter dynamic narrative Events. These are unexpected situations that offer choices, skill tests, opportunities to roleplay, rewards, and consequences.[/p]

• [p]You’ll see events appear directly on the world map as you explore[/p]
• [p]We’re starting with 30 events, more will be added as we develop other features[/p]
• [p]Replaces the old Tracks system - you now spot tracks from afar and choose to engage with them or not[/p]
• [p]Replaces the old Resources system - you now collect resources by walking over it and the terrain type determines the resource. If it’s a mundane event you get the resources. If there is a special one, you play it out.[/p]
• [p]Added a new Item type - a “giftable”. These can be sold, but they are special unique items that can be gifted to NPCs to provide big relationship bonuses.[/p]
• [p]Some events are repeatable, some are once per lifetime. Some of the rewards can be quite significant.[/p]
• [p]For the first time, you can add custom content to the game. Write events in JSON and the game will use them. Instructions will come after we do the public release, for now you can see what it is like in this video [dynamiclink][/dynamiclink][/p]

[p]The events system is quite robust and dynamic. It’s one reason it took so long to make. It will be used by the next two features we will work on: Regions and Dynamic Quests.[/p]