Whoa, this game is coming out in 2016 now? Well, it's for the best.

[nas1m]

Ah, this reminds me of the one question I forgot to ask in my response email.  If you're going with the idea of premade rooms/floors/areas/something or whatever, is this something you might be able to get outside help with?  Not just myself, I mean, but even just some random people in the community being able to submit possible room designs.  I know *I* at least would find it entertaining to do, that sort of thing is usually my favorite part of game design actually. To be able to do it for this sort of game, it working the way you described it so far, would be even more entertaining.  I bet plenty of others would find it entertaining too.  And the more rooms the game has to select from, the better.

I'm definitely hoping so!  It was popular with Valley 1 and 2, so maybe we'll see that again.

Anyway, it sounds like you were getting waaaaayyyyyyyyyy too stressed out over this here... I know it's not really my business, but I always think you guys put in far too many hours. I really dont know how you manage it. Or maybe that's just me being lazy, I'm about ready to throw something at the wall after about 2 hours.  But still, blackouts and such.... ugh.  Definitely sounds good that you'll be able to get some distance from the whole thing.  Frankly, it just sounded very frustrating, making all of those constant changes, and as Gnosis said, it still seemed far from done.  Which hopefully doesnt sound mean here, and I think I've said as much before anyway.  I hope you recover quick from that though, feeling like that aint any fun at all.

Yeah, definitely too many hours.  Mostly I try to keep everyone else insulated from that or at least compensate them for it, but the sense of burnout has been strong with a number of us.

And I hadnt realized that Valley 1's development time was that long!  Agh, I swear that game's beta feels like a bazillion years ago or so.

Like a different life to me, too, yeah.  Some vestigial memories of a past life.

4 when you say private do you mean in the same way that stars is or even more private?.

I mean something super brief, a week or less, and probably just involving a handful of people that we'll reach out to (or who PM us proactively, as is often the case).  And then opening it up more widely.  We did this prior to the main beta of SBR starting, too, actually.

5 are act 3/4 going to be implemented at all before you lock stars away temporarily? mainly so people can do some better clarity on the balance certain things.

Nope!  All work on SBR stopped yesterday and is on hold for now.  We just need to move on for a bit, and dragging out the transition doesn't help anything.  We'll be back on it in February, but in the meantime we just stopped all in one big jolt.

Sounds like a wise decision to me all around.
I am too looking forward to the new game -especially more details being leaked by you Chris .

I appreciate it.   And some are over there already, heh.

Regarding SBR: Would you consider to at least release the currently completed fixes?
That way Act 2 would be actually winnable and allow players to have some fun with the current state in a way that allows them to actually complete a given game.

Unfortunately there are some half-completed things in the codebase right now that would bust it if we released them.  And if we finished those, it would take another half day or so, which I'd rather just wait on.  Sorry about that!

Well, maybe in a few weeks time then .
Until then: The best of luck with your new venture.
I am looking forward to a more structured synopsis of what is coming up .

[Draco18s]

Things go as things go.  The best you can do is make the most of it.
The Christmas season is always hard for a new release from a smaller company, so do what needs to be done: make it good, make it right, release when ready.

This persistence-roguelike concept is one I want to see more of, I really liked Rogue Legacy, even if it took bloody forever to figure out.  And there was another game for one of Nintendo's handhelds, I forget which one now, involving a magical shovel....ah, Master of the Monster Lair.  You would dig the dungeon yourself and populate it with items, which would then spawn specific monsters, which you would then go in and beat up.  Even if the first thing you fought beat the crap out of you, you still got stats, because your mom would make you dinner after you got home.  The more stuff you killed, the more money you'd have to buy ingredients for dinner.  Worst case, you'd buy nothing and you'd still get 1 stat point.

Combine that with SHMUP and you'll have me hook line and sinker.

[Cyborg]

Sounds like a wise decision to me all around.
I am too looking forward to the new game -especially more details being leaked by you Chris .


Regarding SBR: Would you consider to at least release the currently completed fixes?
That way Act 2 would be actually winnable and allow players to have some fun with the current state in a way that allows them to actually complete a given game.

Why would he spend money releasing these updates for people who are supposed to be testing, at a period of time where development is on hold? Makes me think people are unaware of what beta testing is or the service we are performing.


Anyway, I think this is for the best. The game isn't fun for me, and I know that a lot of feedback revolves around people not knowing what's going on or even how to play. They don't know how to have fun with the game, and I think that's a huge issue. There are a few people on here which appear to "get it," and some people who are doing their best to find the fun. So whenever this project gets revisited, there needs to be not only a balance pass, but maybe even a video about how to play that would also serve as a publicity video. I could write pages about my thoughts on it, but I'm not sure it would be helpful. I decided a long time ago that this game wasn't aimed at me, probably just not meant for someone like me. Maybe my opinion means nothing. But if you want me to write it down in mantis for later, I can do that. But not if it's going to cause anybody distress, tremors, blacking out, or other health problems. My inability to grasp this game doesn't mean jack about Chris Park or anyone else on the team. I think you are all wonderful people, and I root for you all as people to be happy and successful. And healthy.

[Captain Jack]

I just realized that there's one release juggernaut we haven't taken into account. Paradox's Stellaris is due indefinite month 2016, not "January/February 2016" as I previously thought. If it is coming out after SBR, it's liable to cut SBR's legs off like D3 did AVWW.

My half-trained marketing recommendation is a SBR expansion timed to release two weeks after Stellaris, to restart that sales engine

[x4000]

Cheers guys.  Just a few quick notes:

1. I appreciate the bucking up, and I'm glad there's excitement on the next game.

2. I don't take it personally at all when someone doesn't like the game and says so in a respectful way.  In other words, I don't take it personally as them being rude or inappropriate or whatever.  But for various reasons to do with my past, which I'm working through, I am aware that I can overreact to varying degrees.  The longer a project has gone on, the worse it gets.  I usually seem to "reset" after a release of another project, so I should just be in a better mental state all around with it after the hiatus.

3. All respect, yes, I'm not doing any updates during the hiatus, because I'm not really expecting anyone to test.  It's not something I need from folks during this period, and as it's not support for a released product I don't view it as something that's a priority the way I otherwise would.  That feels super harsh for me to say, and I don't mean it that way.  But rest assured, the hiatus will end and there will be more updates on the other side.

4. The blacking out and all that stuff is just a matter of accumulated stress more than anything else.  It's not any one thing, it's just a matter of too long a period of too much intensity on one thing.  I should be back in good form after the hiatus, and people don't need to worry about my health.  If there's something amiss, I'll do something to try to address that.  I have an anxiety disorder as well as severe PTSD (dating back decades), and some of that gets triggered sometimes around releases.  Therapy and medication have been helping over the last years, although some of the medication comes with nasty side effects.  I think the blacking out was related partly to one of those that I started taking in March and have stopped taking in the last week.  We'll see.  Originally I got on that because I was having low-grade panic attacks literally all day every day, and that solved that issue.  But lots of other problems went with.  EMDR did work pretty well for some of the stuff, but I'm giving neurofeedback a shot now.  We shall see.  Anyway, the point is a lot of that has absolutely nothing to do with testers or specific feedback, and I try not to be a pansy about how I receive news I don't want to hear.  It's important to be able to take criticism, and if I ever hit a point where I'm dissuading people from "giving it to me straight," I'm only doing myself and the games a disservice in the end.

5. Often I find it really useful to get feedback, periodically at least, from people who a game is "not really aimed at."  Sometimes they come up with the most useful feedback.  With AI War, I was getting my mom, my sister, and other non-gamers to go through the tutorials and I was watching what happened with them.  I wanted it to be something that would not bother me to go through, in the sense of "click here to move forward," but at the same time that they could do.  That was useful.  For someone coming outside the conventions of a genre, that's not like being a non-gamer, but you are still missing some assumptions that might be inherent in the genre, and that might be precluding the game from reaching a wider audience.  Plus, there's always the chance that a game that is not aimed at you can be smoothed out subtly enough that it does draw you in, at least some, in the end.  I don't get offended when that happens, so long as others are enjoying it, but the closer I can get someone like that to enjoying it, the better the game is for it.  Core fans of the genre will overlook all sorts of things that a person like that will not stand for, is another way to put it.  So only that sort of person who's not quite in the audience can give that kind of vital feedback.

6. Stellaris looks interesting, though I'm not sure how threatening.  Diablo 3 was a kind of once in a lifetime event it felt like.  I'm not saying that Stellaris might not be very harmful in a short term, but I don't think it would obliterate the market like Diablo.  I could be wrong, though.  And anyhow, I'd definitely try to give it a wide berth.  Hopefully the interim game does well enough that we're really not beholden to any specific month of release in early 2016, but we'll see.

[P3X-639]

Sorry for being late to the party. Just saw the old thread. For what it's worth, if you can make this new thing work, I think this is the best option. When I was reading the old thread, I was thinking, "Damn. It'd be great if they could just hold out untill the end of December or next year. I also think taking a step back from SBR would do some good. There's been a lot of changes recently and having some time to examine it from the outside and rejigger your thoughts about the game you want with a clear mind is for the best.

Looking foward to the new game

[x4000]

I appreciate it.

[P3X-639]

Just read the official post writeup on the main website. Yes! As a kid who sunk a lot of quarters in that B14 or whatever it's called shoot'um up, color me super exicted for a endless roguelike version! Was looking foward to it when you mentioned it during TLF development. Nice to know that's the new one coming up.

[mrhanman]

Good luck, guys!  I didn't pile on in the November-misgivings thread, but I will pile on now with my support.  Of course, you had that anyway.   

As bummed as I am to hear that SBR will go on ice for a while, I'm really excited to hear I'll be seeing another new Arcen game soon.  Whatever it is, I'll be there day one to help however I can!

[Rythe]

Well, as an update on November Doom, the Rock Paper Shotgun community has already given up on the Star Wars Battlefront game via its beta. The vocal types over there are expecting it to fizzle out in a month, and I get the sense from their complaints that the doom and gloom they're expecting isn't far off. Then again, it's stripped down model could appeal to people who breath Star Wars and live nothing but Twitch.

More pertinent though, I discovered Steredenn on Steam the other day and thought to myself 'If this had some persistent elements, I'd actually buy it.' So kudos on you for predicting that. Also, easy source to crib some design notes from something close but not quite?

[wwwhhattt]

2 games to get excited about? I don't know how I'll cope...

Can't comment on business things, but with health problems like that business (and games, really) start to seem almost irrelevant. Hope the new stuff sorts things out - change is always good

(and while I'm here, sorry for not contributing much to the SBR beta - but by the looks of things I'll be great for breaking tutorials)

[Misery]

Things go as things go.  The best you can do is make the most of it.
The Christmas season is always hard for a new release from a smaller company, so do what needs to be done: make it good, make it right, release when ready.

This persistence-roguelike concept is one I want to see more of, I really liked Rogue Legacy, even if it took bloody forever to figure out.  And there was another game for one of Nintendo's handhelds, I forget which one now, involving a magical shovel....ah, Master of the Monster Lair.  You would dig the dungeon yourself and populate it with items, which would then spawn specific monsters, which you would then go in and beat up.  Even if the first thing you fought beat the crap out of you, you still got stats, because your mom would make you dinner after you got home.  The more stuff you killed, the more money you'd have to buy ingredients for dinner.  Worst case, you'd buy nothing and you'd still get 1 stat point.

Combine that with SHMUP and you'll have me hook line and sinker.

Yeah, that's pretty much the reaction I had upon hearing more about the game.  I"m *really* excited for this one.  I play sooooooo many games of this sort already... there's traditional roguelikes, and of course 5 bazillion traditional shmups, but then there's also action roguelikes, like Binding of Isaac, Rogue Legacy, Vagante (I *highly* recommend giving this one a whirl, if you havent seen it before... VERY good), Spelunky, Nuclear Throne... and plenty more.   It's such a very fun genre.  Every one of those games can get hundreds of hours out of me, I just dont tire of them.  Heck, I'll just be lost to the world entirely once the Afterbirth expansion for Isaac comes out.

So the idea of doing that sort of thing with alot of shmuppy elements.... yeeeeep, definitely wanting that, indeedy.

Just be prepared for what might end up being a bit of difficulty overload during the game's beta, whenever that part begins.  I'm doing a bunch of attack pattern design again (which is likely to not JUST be bullets this time), and in ANYTHING I design of any sort, I've got this tendancy to seriously underestimate the difficulty.  I know this, yet I still manage to do it.  And then I watch as players die, over and over and over, to something I thought was easy.

I'll not say more about it because I dont want to point out gameplay details that I shouldnt, but if something I did seems overly nasty, feel free to yell at me about it.  I aint the only one doing the enemy stuffs though, so there should be ALOT of variety with them.  I'm particularly excited for that part.  With Bionic Dues, which is one of my favorite games, that was one of my absolute favorite aspects, the incredible amount of variety with the design and behaviors of the enemy bots.  It really added a ton to the game.  Even if I do get just a BIT tired of the ever-clingy EMPBots after a time.  Those little jerks... They could at least have the decency to fire at me or something.  But no, they get up next to you and just start repeating taunts over and over again.  They're not as annoying as a certain type of bird in a certain Arcen sidescroller, with a certain tendancy to fly up your nose very abruptly (will anything ever quite match those?), but still...  Definitely the Goddamn Bats of that game.  Or the Stupid Flying Medusa Heads of that game, depending on your point of view.

But yeah, in other words, just... EVERYTHING about this new game sounds just grand.  It's the new game I'm most excited for right now, by far.  With the new Anno coming in second, so that's really saying something, since that's freaking ANNO of all things.  Anno in spaaaaaaaaace, for that matter.  Coming in second.

[nas1m]

Sounds like a wise decision to me all around.
I am too looking forward to the new game -especially more details being leaked by you Chris .


Regarding SBR: Would you consider to at least release the currently completed fixes?
That way Act 2 would be actually winnable and allow players to have some fun with the current state in a way that allows them to actually complete a given game.

Why would he spend money releasing these updates for people who are supposed to be testing, at a period of time where development is on hold? Makes me think people are unaware of what beta testing is or the service we are performing.

In think I have been around here long and contributed enough to qualify as "knowing that betas are for the game/the company and not for the players", I think.

My main cause for bringing this up (aside from the one mentioned above) is that I know how bad it get get to (have to) go back to a codebase that as unfinished changes still lurking in various checkouts from a professional standpoint.

If there are none, or if they will get reverted when the time comes to start with a clean slate - fair enough.
Consider my request as non-existent. But if there are local changes that are still of interest to the game it is my form conviction that it would be better to get them in while there still is some contextual knowledge about what is going on.

My point was never to ask you guys to throw money at something only benefitting the current beta players.

What ever you decide, its good with me .

[x4000]

Thanks everybody.

In think I have been around here long and contributed enough to qualify as "knowing that betas are for the game/the company and not for the players", I think.

My main cause for bringing this up (aside from the one mentioned above) is that I know how bad it get get to (have to) go back to a codebase that as unfinished changes still lurking in various checkouts from a professional standpoint.

If there are none, or if they will get reverted when the time comes to start with a clean slate - fair enough.
Consider my request as non-existent. But if there are local changes that are still of interest to the game it is my form conviction that it would be better to get them in while there still is some contextual knowledge about what is going on.

My point was never to ask you guys to throw money at something only benefitting the current beta players.

What ever you decide, its good with me .

You know, I apologize -- I in particular really should have given you the benefit of the doubt on that.  Goodness knows you've earned it.  Sorry about that!

Well, as an update on November Doom, the Rock Paper Shotgun community has already given up on the Star Wars Battlefront game via its beta. The vocal types over there are expecting it to fizzle out in a month, and I get the sense from their complaints that the doom and gloom they're expecting isn't far off. Then again, it's stripped down model could appeal to people who breath Star Wars and live nothing but Twitch.

That's a bummer, actually.  But the system requirements on that thing for the minimum are kind of nuts.  I've been trying to mostly game on my laptop so that I can get away from my desktop when I'm not working.  I guess a 1GB card is anemic these days, but jeez.

More pertinent though, I discovered Steredenn on Steam the other day and thought to myself 'If this had some persistent elements, I'd actually buy it.' So kudos on you for predicting that. Also, easy source to crib some design notes from something close but not quite?

Yeah, I saw that too.  For the record that's really not my sort of game and not the sort of thing that we're making here.  That's way more like Rygar from what I can tell, and that was never anything I got into.  My favorite SHMUP was Tyrian.

But really, I need to stop saying that word I think, because this is really more of a dual-stick-shooter than a SHMUP.  It has SHMUP elements, but it's more of a dual-stick shooter in a roguelike structure, with shmup-style enemy patterns.  Of course playable with keyboard and mouse as well.

[crazyroosterman]

the one I think I'm looking forward to is coming back to this game in months and being able to see it from the perspective of a new player better than at the moment also more relevantly I have a question I've been reading in the life part of the forum and apparently your in the middle of a big war and I was wonder what/who exactly is waging this war? are these new race or already established races? or is that sort of thing being completely ignored right now?.