Greetings friend! Artix here, bringing you the latest on AdventureQuest 3D's development from the secret underground lab. We have a lot of new exciting dungeons coming for you when we begin "CLOSED BETA" on Tuesday. Round #1 of some cool new features are going to be released too including "Summon/Teleport Friend", "New Area discovery with fly throughs", and a bunch of things we have gotten so used to seeing on the Dev server that we forgot it is not in the live game yet (New sound FX including footstep sounds, volume sliders, etc)
But today, I would like to tell three stories of improvements coming to the Closed Beta:
After listening to player feedback, we changed the way melee combat works. You will now hit for damage on every swing! Unless you miss of course :P We changed the sounds, getting rid of those over-the-top comically ear piercing "meaty thwak" sounds and replaced them with well timed swing and hit sounds. I am really proud of the next change which fixed the "hard to put your finger on" irregular, delayed, laggy feeling in the Pre-Beta combat system... Warriors and Rogues have had ALL of their animations re-animated by Korin to match a tempo of 104 BPM (Beats per minute.) As a result, combat is faster. Now it "feels right." This was a major change to the characters animations, the game client and the server-- but when you play it, you will know it was worth the effort that went into it.
One unexpected "a potential problem turned into a good thing" was Auto Attack vs Skills. When we increased the Auto Attacks to hitting 4 times instead of once, we naturally had to divide the damage into a quarter. Your overall damage is the same, but the damage is divided up over several hits. Which we were worried would be a bad thing... you know, seeing lower damage numbers, until we used a skill. BAM!!!! Skills look like they do SO MUCH MORE DAMAGE NOW! Combat looks like this now... tell me if you can spot when I use a skill: 4, 5, 4, 6, 42!, 4, 5, 6, 6, 55!.
Some players are having trouble using Facebook to log into the STEAM version of AdventureQuest 3D. A new system will be going live to correct this issue with the Closed Beta release. The good news is that it works 100% of the time and is build in perfect compliance to how Facebook wants it done. More good news is it something you only have to do once to login and play using Facebook. The BAD NEWS... is it is annoying because you have to copy/paste something from your game to your web browser. (The same as you may have done if you ever authorized something for Facebook on a Smart TV)
Why? This is a pretty good behind the scenes game dev story. 5-ish months ago we finalized the game's login system including Facebook. We found an amazing "Web View" plugin that allowed us to embed the Facebook Login into every platform we were building the game for: Apple, Android, PC/Mac, and it would even work for Linux and Windows 10. We thought we were done. But a month ago some players told us that the Facebook login stopped working for them. Then we got a letter from the developers who made the plugin informing us (and all of their other clients) that they were abruptly discontinuing support for it. "WHAT!?!?" We had paid for it and were dependent on it, so it was a pretty bad blow to us. We immediately thought the same thing you are thinking now, "No problem, we will just find something else that does the same thing." Except... there was nothing else O_O. There is a good reason for that too. Time for a little technical backstory babble. Facebook requires you to have a web browser or a "web view" in order to use their standard "one click to login" flow. Which is exactly what we want. Most programming languages have a "web view" built into them... but Unity3D, which we are using to build our game, does not. At least not for the PC. Oddly enough it is very easy to use a native call to create a web view on Android, Apple iOS and even on the Mac-- but for some reason, not on Windows. Needless to say we exhaustively researched this. We looked around Steam to try to find other games that let you log in with Facebook. We only found one, and it looks like they were doing it the illegal way which is not safe. Everything and anything we do always needs to be 100% legit and safe. On Facebooks Developer site they have one official solution if you do not have a web view-- which is to simply have your users copy/pasta a little code to authorize your app. The app remembers, so you do not have to authorize it again. While this is not too too terrible, I *REALLY* want that one-click Facebook solution for a first time player on PC/Mac. Hopefully Unity will build a web view feature soon, so we can go back to the way it was. In the meantime, this new flow is only for people on STEAM (PC/Mac) -- the mobile versions will have the single click method.
These are the serious kind of things that happen pretty much non-stop during game development (or building anything really.) Between exhaustively researching solutions, trying things, laying out a final plan, implementing and testing, about three weeks of time went into fixing this. Not the glamorous part of game dev, LOL-- but if you are thinking of getting into game development this is an important thing to know. Not just that you will have problems, but you must NEVER GIVE UP and truly commit to finding a way to solve them, even if the best solution is not the ideal one for the time being.
The Fountain Fix
Before I say anything else... the most important thing... EVER.... best change made to the game yet... you will be able to easily jump out of the fountain if you fall in. *CHEERING ERUPTS!!!* *PLAYERS REJOICE!* (I cannot tell you how many times I fell in the fountain while playing on my phone and it took me forever to jump out.)
Battleon's Teleporter Crystal
A teleporter crystal is being added to the center of town. It is not coded yet, but the use of it is obvious... especially when you read the next paragraph. If you played the very original incarnation of AdventureQuest 3D you may recognize it... we are using it! If you are just logging in for a quick adventure, this will serve as the Town of Battleon's "BATTLE BUTTON" and will also be how you access the Daily Boss Dungeons. It is not going to be functional in Closed Beta. We will do a focus design notes just on the Teleporter Crystal to get all of your ideas.
Travel Menu to become locked in Open Beta (until you explore the area)
During Pre-Beta and Closed Beta it was/is possible to use the travel menu to just teleport anywhere in the game-- which was very useful for testing purposes. But as we all agree, for the live game, areas must be explored first before they can be unlocked! Late next week, this change will finally be going in. When you discover a new area, you will get a cool fly-through (where the camera flies around the area giving you a preview) and a cool notification letting you know you discovered/unlocked a new area. This will certainly be more exciting as new areas are unlocked with additional secret areas in them to find.
Shops of BattleOn are in development
Starting with the Guardian Tower and then working on the interior of each of the remaining buildings, we will be expanding the town of BattleOn. Llusion helped me put up graphics on each shop giving you an idea of what will be inside each. When Closed Beta begins, be sure to run around and look at them all. There are also some of these images in the Inn. In a controversial move, I am wondering what you thoughts are on putting some level restrictions on some of the buildings. For example, maybe the pet shop does not open until level 3, the Library opens at 5, and the Unusual Apothocary Opens at 10? What are your thoughts?
One of our designers, Circa, mocked up single "how to play" tutorial screen for mobile last week. There is a super simple one for the PC too with the WASD keys which you will see on Tuesday.
We still have so much to complete & test before we begin Closed Beta next week. I can not express enough how good of a move it was to change the schedule and get more testing time last week. Just a reminder, this is a big update and we have to do massive database changes so the game will probably be offline for a long time. When we come back up Closed Beta will officially begin! You will be happy to know you keep your character, and all of your equitable weapons, armor, and items. Vendor trash is being deleted though. Do note that your level and gold will be reset. Specifically, when you login to Closed Beta for the first time, you will be level 1 with 0 gold and you will be able to do all the quests. Oooh, and we need to get you a Pre-Beta badge. A lot of things will have changed. Many items are now different levels with different stats. Crafting has become a much more important part of the game. It is a new beginning, and the entire team will be listening more closely than ever to your feedback.
Battle on!
We are counting on you to help the game prepare for its OPEN BETA launch-- which will happen when you say it is ready.
Schedule
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Pun-slinging Paladin
Undead Legion Ruler
Scribble Scribe
Dawnforger
