As many of you have noticed, we’ve deviated from our normal weekly community schedule over the last two to three weeks. We made some tough decisions based on how close we are to the release of the Alpha, and decided to put all of our energy on releasing sooner than we were planning. Today, I’ll outline the remaining elements we’re focused on in regards to progress, and pave the way for a series of larger blog posts from our Systems Director.

Alpha Status

We know everyone is tired of hearing SOON, and we’re tired of saying SOON, but after so many content, systems, and art changes we don’t want to mislead our supporters. During the early weeks of June, we set a hard cutoff for what we had to have in the Alpha, and what we could patch into the game after launch. We set a path to the Investor Alpha release, and spent the last few weeks plowing through development and getting the last features of the Alpha complete:

• Server-To-Site Testing And Further Expansion
• Character Generation V3 Development
• Combat Mechanics V3 Attribute Implementation
• Gameplay Tutorial Completion
• Content Testing And Polish

We were close to what we were considering our release candidate during the first week of June. After further testing and focusing on the overall user experience, our Systems Director felt that we had to get a few major system elements in before he was happy with the player experience. We were expecting to overlook a few of the combat mechanics, the tutorial, and other minor gameplay elements to get the product into your hands, but we have decided to spend the extra time completing these elements to ensure that you all have the best experience within the new Alpha release.

Content

It’s very important for us to conclude the implementation of the tutorial and transition it appropriately into the player experience. We’ve completed the first pass of the tutorial and its implementation, but are changing the era in which it takes place and aligning it with the low-level experience. Originally, it was focused on the Dark Magic element of the game’s universe, but we have decided to repurpose the tutorial to be set during the Uprising event that devastated San Diego, leaving it in absolute ruin. Therefore, we’ll be retexturing assets, designing new assets, and tailoring the story to fit the Uprising event. Dark Magic’s presence comes at a later time in the gameplay experience, so we’re trying to keep the tutorial as close to the player’s initial, in-world experience, as we possibly can.

The Content team is also working on the introduction of a new mobs for the first act of the game’s story. The new mob is the Starborn, a wealthy group of young adults that have spent their fortunes augmenting themselves with psionic implants and biotics enhancements in order to more easily wreak havoc on the people of Skyeline. The next mob under construction is The Perpetrators, who have been redesigned from their original direction to be more fitting, low-level aggressors for the starting area of Skyeline. They are now a well-outfitted mercenary group looking to prove themselves to competitors and ready to put down anyone in their way.

Systems

Combat is by far the focus of our latest systems reassessment. Not only are we reworking most of the animations to fit the new combat system’s dynamics, we’ve made the decision to include far more powers sets, enhancements, craftable items, and combat attributes. Initially we were going to avoid allowing access to some power sets such as those that applied attributes like absorption shield, armor carapace, and those that featured unique elements that weren’t quite finished. However, we’ve decided to take the time needed to complete the entirety of the third iteration of the combat system. Many of the new properties being implemented are essential to the combat experience and we don’t wish to compromise on their inclusion.

Another area where our Systems team has been focused is on enhancement management and crafting. It is essential to include these elements as they are now extremely important to the overall gameplay experience. I won’t go any further into explanation here as our Systems Director has a huge blog coming in regards to these elements. Just be aware that they are very much in-development and will most likely appear in a future livestream in at least their most basic forms.

Conclusion

We’re in the final stretch and are putting the final touches on content, coding, and systems and look forward to sharing more details on the Alpha with everyone. Next week will be a week of many more blogs from both myself and other staff outlining, more elaborately, what is coming in the Investor Alpha, a new video of the latest version of the character generator, and livestream of the latest version of the game. We’ll be back on our regular publication schedule as of next week as well, so expect a week full of information and media.

As always we’re thankful for your support and patience as we know you are all eager awaiting and are as excited to get back into our world as we are to have you in it. Until the next post...