The Antilia Kickstarter Goals

	Friday, May 17, 2013 3:53pm Jeff Leigh Lead Developer We've committed ourselves to bringing Antilia to Kickstarter, and project planning has progressed well. I spent several years as a professional project manager, and the skills I learned are invaluable in selecting goals, documenting tasks, and creating a realistic budget. It is quite a departure from our normal style of development. While I have set yearly development goals and milestones in the past to keep the project moving in the right direction, with the Kickstarter we will need to deliver all of what we promise. It is critical that we set the right goals and then meet them to the satisfaction of our backers. These decisions were some of the hardest I've made. Naturally, as the game dev, I want to see every feature make it to the final game. We discussed almost 50 features and enhancements for Antilia - and even then some gameplay systems relevant to Taipii culture couldn't even be considered yet. When making decisions, our mission is to make Antilia a game that: Is easy for new players to install, get in-game, and learn Performs well on computers that meet the minimum required hardware Is available for play 24/7 Is fun to play, even after hours of play-time Provides more opportunities to engage in gameplay with friends Enables players to be creative within the context of the world Will continue to grow beyond the Kickstarter With that mission in mind, and to reduce our minimum budget, we've identified the essential required improvements, while placing additional content and cosmetic improvements into stretch goals. Core Improvements First off, let's cover the server and performance improvements that Antilia needs: Official Installer - While a "zip" file gets the job done for testing, an official installer would help new players get into the game quicker and with fewer issues. Performance Improvements - We need to set a minimum target platform that is clearly communicated in the Kickstarter, and rigorously optimize Antilia's client to ensure it runs smoothly at a good frame-rate on that hardware. Moderation System - In the open alpha, Antilia's testing community has been great - there have only been a couple of incidents where serious moderation has been required, primarily involving new accounts who were often just clearly trying to make trouble. As the in-game world grows, however, we'll need a better system for moderation and managing moderators than we currently have. Server Stress Testing - While Antilia's server has been designed as a "cloud service" that can scale to handle thousands of players, testing that hasn't yet been in our reach. The server will need to be rigorously tested, and bottlenecks in the server code will need to be identified and eliminated. GUI Improvements - Centered largely on confusion that arises over crafted items all looking the same in the inventory, the 3D inventory needs to be completed, so that players can quickly distinguish their crafted and customized items. Control Customization - We're not all used to the same controls, and differences in mouse resolution have made Antilia very difficult to play for some. As Antilia's gameplay becomes more action-oriented, it is essential players are able to adjust their keys and mouse sensitivity to have the best experience. Fix Critical Bugs - From the alpha tests, there is a fair list of bugs that we'll need to fix. From friend lists that disappear to player characters that load last - we want to make Antilia the best game it can be. Server Budget - Included in the Kickstarter will be a special budget to ensure the server stays online post-Kickstarter for at least 1 year. Once all the Kickstarter goals are complete, we will release the game and start working toward expanding it. New Gameplay Systems Player Trade System - As Antilia's skills and crafting systems provide an ever growing array of custom items, players are going to need a way to share and barter directly with one another. This familiar system allows just that, while ensuring both parties agree to the final exchange before items change hands. New Workstation System - The 'workstation' concept is already established in Antilia with the cooking rack, smelting furnace, and anvil - but we'd like to replace the current stale window-based interfaces with real gameplay. The new workstation system will offer a shared, 3D, physics-enabled space where one or more players can move things around, use various tools, and perform cooking and crafting tasks together. This system is the foundation upon which future cooking, smelting, crafting, and mini-games (card games, etc) will be based. Economy System - While it may not be the first thing that comes to mind when thinking about exciting new gameplay systems, when a game's economy is broken it hurts everybody and has quickly ruined some games. The new economy system will allow us to create local economies which value rare imports over local products, and will track the supply and demand of items across time and region, as well as skill efficiency and drop rates. This will allow us to keep an informed eye on the markets, and allow us to respond quickly to bugs or exploits that might otherwise require a server shut-down. Training System - "How do I fish" is the most commonly asked question in-game, followed closely by "where is the hammer?" The training system will help new players get familiar with the game, learning the skills that they are interested in at their own pace, and in a way that is fun and introduces them to the NPCs and the lore. Player Houses & Buildings - Antilia now has collisions, and that means we are finally able to start placing buildings in Antilia. I'll admit it - I'm something of a housing junkie when I play sandbox RPGs. Saving the world is good... but buying properties and customizing them is what I really enjoy. With the Kickstarter, players will be able to own multiple buildings, furnish them to their liking, and invite friends into their space or open their door to the public. Books - In case you missed this year's April Fools, books are coming to Antilia. Books will provide needed insights into the history of the Taipii and their culture, and may serve as a springboard for some quests. Quests and Quest Journal - You may not need a quest journal to fetch Sakouv's hammer - but as the game expands and quests become more complicated, an organized quest system and journal become a necessity. This familiar system will guide players through multiple objectives, and help players get their bearings again if they have to pick up a quest again after logging off. Status Effects System - Another familiar system that would greatly expand Antilia's combat system is status effects. Well prepared foods will offer boosts to players - filling health and energy bars faster, and crafted items may boost wielders stats, or inflict special effects on enemies against which they are struck. Party System - The best part of playing an online game is, of course, playing along with your friends. Adding more multiplayer opportunities is part of our mission for this Kickstarter. The addition of a party system will make it easier for players to work together as a team with their own chat channel, and give healers easy visual access to information like health and status of party members. Improved Gameplay Systems Character Creation Improvements - When it comes to character customization, more tends to be better. More fur patterns, better color options, character history, bonuses and handicaps, and of course, the ability to pan, rotate, and zoom the character preview. Movement, Acrobatics, and Collision - We recently added collision detection to Antilia, and as you can imagine the next thing that happened was that we discovered a whole bunch of new ways the player can become stuck. Suddenly players can fall off an object between two objects, or fall off a rock into deep water. For the player's sake, some basic new movement options such as jumping and treading water will need to be added - as well as the emergency /unstick command. Skill System Improvements - While our current skill system gave us a start, it really needs an overhaul. We are discovering there are a lot of skills that it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to level up in, and needlessly over-complicates some disciplines. We've redesigned skills to focus more on leveling the discipline, and allowing players to make choices in spending earned XP to unlock boosts & perks, as well as to customize and tune their performance with the skill. Combat Improvements - With a new skill system, status effects, and the party system - combat is already going to become much more diverse in Antilia. But it needs more than just that - it needs improved hit detection, lots of new enemies, lootable corpses, ranged weapons, duel-wielding options, and a lot more interaction, intensity, and opportunities for strategy. Magic Improvements - I'm a big fan of unique magic systems in games - as I like to say, "I want a game where I finally get to weave magic". I posted a few shots of our prototype magic system briefly in the last post, and I'm eager to see a refined system like this in-game. From drawing out complex traps that specifically suit the landscape, frantically throwing simple weaves at moving enemies, to designing custom patterns and enchanting them into the swing of a staff or sword - I want Antilia's magic system to give players a true sense of learning and mastering the Taipii art of magic. Fishing Improvements - While it could be argued that Antilia's fishing system is fine the way it is, after all it provides something that is easy to do while chatting with other players - changes to the skill system are going to require it to be updated. As we make these changes, I'd like to make fishing a little more challenging and a little more rewarding. We will focus more on other gameplay systems that are in greater need of improvement. Cooking Improvements - With the new workstation system in place, we can replace the current UI based cooking system with something much more interactive. Players will design their own recipes, and then cook and combine ingredients as the flavor profile changes in real time. From a first-person perspective, players will experience the horror of overcooking fish at a fully interactive 3D workstation, and pots of mushroom soup will vividly burst into flame! (Ever wonder why the red mushrooms are called "Fire Makachii"?) Crafting Improvements - While the crafting system is already quite versatile, allowing players to customize their crafted creations for an endless variety of looks, we'd like to again move away from the UI based gameplay toward something that is more interactive and multiplayer. In place of a set of sliders, players will select what part of the crafted item they would like to change by heating it up in a furnace - and then adjust that area by applying various tools such as hammers to shape it. By turning crafting into a game system, the system will be a little more difficult to abuse by using boosted foods to quickly restore energy and mass-producing non-custom items. New Content Lantros Peninsula - A vast new area of Antilia to explore, more than doubling the size of the explorable world! The Lantros Peninsula includes the City of Lantros from which the Kisan gods rule, the Tent Forest, the Red Fields from which silk can be harvested, and is known for its cold and windy weather! Ruins to find and explore on Kasau and Lantros - Also included will be ruined structures on both Kasau and Lantros. These structures can be explored repeatedly for treasures, and will include secret paths that require magic, a key, or solving a puzzle to access. New Caverns on Kasau and Lantros, and Underground Ruins - The caverns will be expanded with new areas - including underground ruins and new, dangerous enemies. New Clothing Designs and Accessories - While few color variations of two clothing sets got us through Alpha, we all want to see more clothing options and of course, armor. (Not to mention a wider selection of head gear...) Improved Audio & New Music Tracks - While Antilia is visually stunning when the detail settings are turned up, sound and environmental effects have lagged behind, and should be improved. Stretch Goals That's quite a list! But there is yet another list that goes with it, containing even more things that have been requested and we'd like to see - sewing, alchemy, mounts, pets, boats... Considering this post has become an epic wall of text, however, we'll save the discussion of Stretch Goals for next time! When I wrote the first draft of this blog post, even I was surprised by the number of things on this list, which prompted more developer discussions over what items we could make stretch goals, or split into an improvement with additional content in a stretch goal. I delayed the post by several days, and I scrambled to do a rough budget for the project to see if we were still near our ideal funding goal. By the time we tuned the budget and accounted for the 'costs of doing a Kickstarter' - we're a little above where I wanted to be, but I believe it is well within our reach. I think it is better for the project to get the job done right with the right goals and the right budget than to get it wrong. Antilia Newsletter For a long time, there has been an option in your user profile to "Subscribe to the Antilia Newsletter". Starting with our next blog post, we will begin emailing the contents of the post to those of you who have checked that box, to make it easier for those of you who are eager to hear the latest news, but don't have time to check the website every hour, day after day. So if you're interested in receiving the Antilia news posts via email, please edit your profile! New Concept Art I'd also like to present another enemy concept from Kathryn - one which might find lurking just outside of base camp: From her description, it would seem this critter is fairly passive unless you bump the bamboo it is resting on - but if you do, be prepared for some "hate". (There is also an odd note which Jeremii contributed regarding the harvesting of its hate, but that might not make it to the game.) Discuss "The Antilia Kickstarter Goals"

Crowdfunding Update and Magic System Prototype

	Sunday, April 28, 2013 7:07pm Jeff Leigh Lead Developer Now that we have announced our intention to crowdfund Antilia, there is a lot of planning that needs to take place to make it a success. The first question being: What crowdfunding service makes the most sense? There are certainly plenty to choose from, but for this particular project only a few of those services are really appropriate. Different services require a different crowdfunding approach, so it makes sense to make this decision first. To make the long story short, we have decided on using Kickstarter. There are several points that went into this decision, but primary among these was "all or nothing" vs. "keep it all" and the odds of success on each service. Kickstarter has a good reputation for funding projects, and after discussion, we prefer an "all or nothing" campaign. With a "keep it all" and "ongoing" campaign - there isn't as strong a sense of scope or goals. By going with an "all or nothing" campaign, we can set specific goals that we will communicate clearly, and backers can be assured that we have the resources we need to deliver for them. By choosing Kickstarter, we simply maximize our chances for success. With our service selected, we can start to plan out the campaign details... scope, promotional materials & videos, backer rewards, public reach, etc. In my next post, we'll take a look at project scope - exactly what is and isn't included in the scope of this kickstarter. Magic System Prototype With nearly any crowdsource system, you need a strong video presentation - something that explains the who, why, what, and how. To illustrate some of our goals, I've started creating prototypes of future gameplay systems. These aren't working systems, but enough to illustrate how these systems might look and work in the final product. This week, I focused on the proposed magic system... which looks something like this: Holding a magic crystal or device in each hand, the player will be able to 'draw' magic weaves into the 3D world. Different patterns will behave in different ways. For example the thin orange fire lines burn up from one end to the other with a running flame effect, like a spark traveling up a line of gunpowder, damaging enemies along the way. Naturally, we're thinking of using these weaves beyond just combat as well - with players drawing weaves onto magical items or using magical weaves as part of a crafting task. Players will also be able to create their own magical devices - complete with customizable weave patterns. As for the Magic Vision described in Antilia's lore - magic vision now becomes a gameplay element - allowing players to see the weaves of other players and creatures - and then unravel or work together to create more complex magics together. Enemy Concept Art Kathryn has also been busy, conceptualizing and illustrating new enemies and flora for Kasau and areas across Antilia. This is one of her recent submissions - a koura that can hover via a balloon of explosive gas. I picture these hanging out in places like the tangled land... shooting at those who pass beneath, and exploding in chains if attacked with a fire arrow or magic. There is a lot of discussion, prototypes, and concept art to come - so stay tuned! The Antilia Kickstarter is on it's way! Discuss "Crowdfunding Update and Magic System Prototype"

Speeding Up Development

	Saturday, April 13, 2013 9:54pm Jeff Leigh Lead Developer For those who have been around for a while, this won't come as a surprise, but if you are under the impression that Antilia has a full staff that works on the game daily - well, not quite. Not to take credit from the excellent meshes, textures, and concept art provided by our volunteers, but the reality is that 95% of development: all of the programming, web development, modeling, texture painting, animation, user interface, world building, project management, and documentation is done by a single person. When I'm not working a part time job to pay the bills. Obviously, I've received some wonderful contributions from volunteers over the past couple years - and look what we've accomplished! We've gone from a basic engine with a few content editors to a working game with a growing audience. Still, in both developer discussions and forum comments I'm hearing the same thing: we all would like the game to be developed faster and be available to play all the time. Personally, I wish I could work on Antilia more! All of this begs the question - "Where could Antilia be in another year with a few developers working on it full time"? Crowdfunding Previously, I have dismissed crowdfunding as being the wrong fit for Antilia. Since then, however, I have been paying much closer attention to crowdfunding sites like Kickstarter - frequently browsing the site, reading campaign postmortems and crowdfunding news. I've come to a better understanding of crowdfunding, and we are reconsidering how it could change and improve Antilia's development. What we've achieved on our own without any funding is impressive, and it speaks strongly to our skills and dedication to the project. One misconception we had was that we would need to commit to delivering a large, complete mmorpg - an overwhelming prospect. That doesn't necessarily have to be the case, however. We could commit to a smaller, more reasonable set of goals: Improved gameplay systems. Not all of Antilia - but a new region of Antilia to explore. A city, some ruins, and new enemies. A budget to keep the server online for at least a year after release - keeping the game online even as we plan Antilia's next step. We don't need to talk office space and 10 employees - but maybe 2 full-time developers and a few contractors. We would set reasonable goals that we know we can achieve in a reasonable amount of time. I think approaching crowdfunding in this manner makes a lot of sense. If we reach our funding goal, we can make Antilia better, faster. If we don't reach our funding goal, nothing is lost - Antilia's development will continue slowly but surely as it does now. Expect to hear more as these plans develop over the month to come - we'll be updating the blog more frequently as these plans solidify. Stuff!! Of course, everyone wants to see some new stuff. March was spent continuing work on collision detection and AI/enemy movement (enemies get stuck by objects on the client - so it is important the server now knows how to walk monsters around obstacles instead of through them). And of course - time had to be spared for our April Fools event, which continues to inspire and amuse. Even with planned events and a long list of development tasks and improvements to be made - as developers we can't help take the occasional time out to just make things we've been wanting to see in the game: Tettix was also inspired to illustrate a character wandering in the Black Desert surrounding Chalei: (Click here for larger version.) I really love this unexpected illustration. It is our first glimpse of a distant region of Antilia which until now has only existed in text. Discuss "Speeding Up Development"

April Fools 2013 Screenshots

	Tuesday, April 2, 2013 4:48pm Jeff Leigh Lead Developer For those that missed it - the theme of this year's April Fools was an in-game event - "Monohorn Appreciation Day" (or M.A.D. for short). Upon logging in, players found themselves required to wear a "Mandatory Monohorn Awareness Headband" which gave all players monohorns who didn't already have them. Medai was also in Base Camp handing out pamphlets to irritated Taipii survivors. The dev team had a lot of fun coming up with this, writing the gags, and designing the monohorn band, flags, and pamphlet. For those that missed it, here are a few screenshots taken near the end of the event, and perhaps more will be posted in the forum thread that follows - Unlike last year's April Fools which simply involved changing a scaling factor, this year's event required not only new content, but improvements to the server and a book reading system. These additions will be ported over and preserved in the 5.7 source code following this years event. You can also read the Monohorn Awareness Pamphlet that was passed out in-game here! In addition to Monohorn Awareness, many of you noticed a pair of ships which had wandered into Maulei Bay - likely spotting the campfire there. As the crew of these ships looked to the shore, they were shocked to discover what appeared to be a Taipii colony consisting entirely of monohorns: Afraid that they may have discovered some sort of "training camp" - possibly devised by Gynnsaula the Wicked - the ship captains decided it was unsafe to bring their boats ashore. Sadly, they left Maulei Bay without making contact. Hopefully their story will spread, and perhaps someday curious explorers will return to investigate the strange colony of monohorns. Discuss "April Fools 2013 Screenshots"

The New Design of Antilia

	Thursday, February 7, 2013 11:59am Jeff Leigh Lead Developer One of the interesting things about giving gameplay a second pass is that we can look back in time via the blog and compare our design goals and attitude to the first pass. When the alpha tests started in November of 2011, we put ourselves under a lot of pressure to have something in the game beyond just walking and chatting. We wanted some sort of gameplay, and the first hint of it came in November: I still have a couple weeks of tuning and testing to do before I can release - and we are working to include a surprise bit of actual gameplay in the initial release as well... so stay tuned - we'll be setting sail to the Isle of Kasau very soon now! Over the course of just a few weeks, I put together a skill system, an inventory system, a hotbar with warm-ups and cool-downs, created a crude fishing animation, and Alex modeled and textured a dozen fish. That fishing system has since been improved here and there to include more fish with tweaked catch ratios, but overall it is still very close to the original design. Throughout 2012, gameplay was kept simple, so that it could be added as quickly as possible. Antilia needed a lot of systems interacting before any of them were really useful, and I believe it was the right approach to get the game off the ground. Now, it is time to make the game fun and interesting, and the development team has had several awesome brainstorming sessions working out Antilia's new gameplay systems. From our experience in designing a 'standard' mmorpg model in 2012, we've learned a lot about the process, and we have re-invented what Antilia gameplay is going to be based upon. I've posted a couple news posts now dissecting areas where Antilia falls short - the unanswered question is, "What is the dev team planning to do to fix it?" Keep in mind, this is stuff that is in active development right now - some of it still fresh on my whiteboard - and we'll be refining this along the way. (Mushrooms! Because I didn't show them last time and wanted an image here. :) A New Focus on Disciplines I'm letting go of the idea that every skill is individually learned and leveled, in favor of a new focus on skill disciplines. The disciplines have existed all along, but only as categories. In the future, disciplines will be expanded to include: Experience - Experience will be changed to be tracked per-discipline, but will not be used to determine a base level anymore. Earned experience will be something the player can 'spend' at their own discretion on perks and customizations. Special Moves - Special moves are the nearest equivalent to our current 'skills'. For each discipline, there will be a base activity (such as fishing), and special moves can be activated to do something specific or complex. Special moves must be learned from NPCs or books. Perks - Perks are what I am calling boosts and constant effects that change a particular discipline. For example, in fishing there will be perks to identify fish underwater at longer ranges, as well as perhaps displaying those fish on the mini-map or displaying which bait the spotted fish prefers. Perks can be unlocked by spending EXP. Techniques - Techniques are similar to perks, in that they expand a discipline or offer an additional ability or constant advantage. Unlike perks, however, they cannot be unlocked by spending EXP, and instead must be learned from a book or NPC. Customizations - Customizations involve a 'radar graph' of mutually exclusive directions in which a player can customize the discipline to their tastes. Would you prefer your fire magic effects to be tinted more blue instead of orange? Would you prefer more power or lower energy use per cast? Are you willing to sacrifice speed for extra damage (slowing down the game a little for a causal player, for instance)? Players can adjust these options however they choose, and if they don't like the result, simply spend EXP to move back in the other direction. Lastly, we are redesigning disciplines to narrow the gap between a new or social player, and a seasoned or hardcore player. Who really enjoys it when after a few days away from your PC you discover you can no longer play with your friends in-game, as they got too far ahead of you to party with? Whatever your experience, however often you play, Antilia should allow players to have fun with their friends without stats getting in the way. New Gameplay "Modes" System This week, the thing I've been spending my time on is in a new gameplay mode system. Previously, Antilia was completely mode-less. Whether it be cooking, fishing, or combat - everything was done via execution of skills, and the game always felt the exact same way. With the new mode system, player equipment can radically change the way the game behaves - optimizing controls, the camera, and the minimap. This allows us to offer a more diverse range of player experiences, optimized for the task at hand, and solves several issues that made the implementation of some skills - such as ranged combat skills, difficult in the past. With this system in mind - we've redesigned the movement, fishing, bushcraft, combat (melee and ranged), and magic systems. The first of these to be completed will be movement and fishing, which I'll begin work on as soon as the new system is complete. New Workstation System But wait? What about modes for Cooking, Mining, and Crafting? These skills will all share a common mode and theme - that they require a workstation (much like they do now). These workstations, however, will be greatly expanded into an actual activity center. The camera will zoom in, providing a first person or over-the shoulder perspective, and the player will be expected to perform a task - in 3D at the workstation. To summarize where this is coming from, it all comes down to a simple concept I expressed to the dev team: "I don't want to just fill in slots and click 'cook'. I want to reach into a 3D scene and flip my fish over mid-way through grilling it before it starts smoking." (You'd never know it looking at current screenshots - but those players are probably cooking.) From there, you can extrapolate the rest - we're removing the recipe skills and replacing them with techniques like "grill", "boil", "chop", etc., and it'll be up to the player to create their own recipes with whatever ingredients they have and techniques they know... to match that flavor profile. Depending on the results - calories and special bonuses will be calculated. Everything Is Multi-Player We never quite got to working battle parties in 2012, but in our new design every discipline will include activities that require multiple players to complete. From sharing a workstation with a friend and crafting something together, to fishing and combat - everything will be made more fun (and at times, chaotic) with the addition of a friend. (As the Taipii culture centers heavily on the use of magic, we're also working to ensure magic is relevant to nearly every system as well.) Put the Pretty Characters In the Spotlight! One thing that Jeremii keeps saying in the dev meetings is "players want to see their pretty character do things in the world" - and it is absolutely true and fundamental to these changes. The way character's heads look around as a player looks around has added a lot of expressiveness to the game. When you consider that you can sit, look at someone, and frown - that adds a lot of social possibilities to the game. (Thanks to the addition of head-look and emotes, things like this started happening.) Our new systems are all being designed with that in mind - that whatever you are doing in Antilia, your character should actually do it and other players should see your character do it. If a player is cooking - they want other players to see that they are cooking (and not just standing next to a pot or anvil). Character expressions can be used to automatically reflect the player's success in the task at hand. When a player catches a fish, a notification is... functional. Seeing the character hold their catch up for all to see and express pride or embarrassment is a lot more fun. Final Thoughts... and More Teasers Really, I hope to get everyone as excited as we are at the prospect of these new gameplay systems coming in 2013, and I've barely even scratched the surface here. We have a new mining/smelting system designed that I can't wait to try. There is a magic system planned that actually involves real-time creation of magic weaves - I finally discovered a way to make that practical. In the weeks coming, we are planning a new fishing contest as soon as the new system is ready - and I aim to make this year's contest the best social event yet. Discuss "The New Design of Antilia"