avelworldcreator wrote:

Actually we've been working on stuff despite the server being down. We found a temporary workaround until we get the company machine back up and running. Less than a week lost.

Good news !

Motherboard installed. Video of my efforts recorded and being passed on to a team to check for issues and cleanup. It will be rough if it goes public ($99 camera system and it just [i]loved[/i] falling - I needed a camera person). Testing will begin tomorrow afternoon (too tired tonight). At the end I was literally connecting the last cables by the light of my cellphone!

Aye, we appreciate all your hard work!

Well, the new motherboard fires up and actually shows something on the monitor... "Initializing" and it seems to hold on this for 10 minutes or more before I give up and power down.
Tomorrow it's time for tech support. Good thing it's under a new warranty.

I don't want an update this week if it means any time away from getting that motherboard working. If it will be folks other than avel making an update, that's cool, but as far as I'm concerned hurdles standing in the way of the development of the actual game are more important than a shiny update.

They don't give any official date, just the hope to release the CC during autumn 2018. Nothing more.

TitansCity wrote:

They don't give any official date, just the hope to release the CC during autumn 2018. Nothing more.

Multiple devs have stated Fall 2018 and their twitter background is Fall 2018, I'd say that's pretty official and more than just a 'hope'. And seeing as Fall is here this weekend and we still have no more information on it than we did 6 months ago, I won't be surprised if they announce another delay.

Dark Cleric wrote:

TitansCity wrote:

They don't give any official date, just the hope to release the CC during autumn 2018. Nothing more.

Multiple devs have stated Fall 2018 and their twitter background is Fall 2018, I'd say that's pretty official and more than just a 'hope'. And seeing as Fall is here this weekend and we still have no more information on it than we did 6 months ago, I won't be surprised if they announce another delay.

I am hopeful, but I am also a realist.

At about this same time last year (late summer/early fall) Tyche had expressed his interest in getting the Avatar Builder to us in the fall (of 2017). This didn't end up happening, as we know, and resulting in various MWM Devs announcing that if they couldn't get the A.B. integration figured out by March 2018 (which was about 6ish months later) then they would announce a delay.

Since then, we've gotten only piecemeal updates on how the overall development of the game is going, as a whole product. Sometimes it was some MWM Devs saying things got "gummed up" during integration, and that A.B. was having difficulties, and that there was no need for a delay yet. Eventually Tyche himself again said that things were progressing but not as fast as he was hoping. This is another example of them referring to their internal calendar that is not visible to us. All we knew was "If Builder Integration Fail -> Then game delay".

Here we are in that time frame they've told us they wanted, but it is a year after they told us they wanted it last year. We've gotten more piecemeal updates on how things are going and integrating, but we still, unfortunately, don't get "whole picture" updates. Part of this is [b]absolutely[/b] because of their modular/physically dispersed/volunteer development team, and the concept behind that is very easy to understand. What's unfortunate is [i]because[/i] of that, we have never gotten to see "the game." "The game" isn't made yet, it isn't integrated yet, and parts(?) of it aren't completed yet. Again, the idea and concept behind that is easy to understand.

What I think is most unfortunate, though, is that nearly every update and MWM Dev post that I see relating to video game development these days is worded specifically outside of present tense.

I've read countless phrases along the lines of:

"[i]Eventually[/i] we can ______."
"With this, [i]we plan to[/i] _____."
"______ is a [i]post launch[/i] system/feature/etc."

This is scary to me because that list is growing to a point where I don't even know if someone is still documenting. Some of which seem like features you would expect a new MMO to have.

So hopefully things are going well overall with the Dev team, but we don't know. They kind of don't tell us those specifics. I can not imagine what kind of convoluted clusterfest it must be to coordinate all of these different moving pieces in different timezones around the world, and when you eventually get something nearer to integration, basically just praying that it works properly with what's already established. That's borderline insane. It really is a Project Manager's Nightmare.

I have no doubts we'll get an Avatar Builder and a city-based Chat Room to run around in the not-so-distant-future. That I believe 100%. These kinds of things already exist and have for years, plus our old game does this very thing in Paragon Chat.

I just hope we get "the game" in a reasonable time-frame in relation to now.

Fall 2018 does not mean the first day of fall. It can be released on December 20th and still be fall 2018. I would guess the target date might be November 30th, but that is just a guess on my part.

Good news!

Looks like Fall is still on for Avatar Builder! This is a great update you guys!

To be honest, The UI stuff shouldn't take that long compared to the actually mechanic stuff. If all that is left is UI that means a good majority of the work is completed and all they need to to insert the graphical UI into the bare bones of the builder. That means in my book they are on track. I would have been worried if they said that the Character Gen still needed more mechanical work. The only mechanics they are working on is the save function. That means to me most of the important bare bones stuff on the builder is complete.

I think you are being too cynical about the devs. I say this because like them I actually have some experience developing a game. The UI stuff is pretty much plug and play. I headed a team of 3 people in my senior thesis for a plat former game. The hardest part of the game development was the systems and art. Once you developed those 2 things like UI will pretty much go smoothly. I am not worried that the Devs have not shown much however I do have faith in them. I feel if you keep harping on the whole "Keeping stuff secret" you will miss the whole issue Valiance online had with that. Valiance showed people the game in pre alpha state and allowed them to play it and once players saw how incomplete it was, they complained about how the game was not worth it or how it felt empty. I thought the devs of Valiance were great for being transparent but releasing a game in pre alpha to the public and without internal testing is not a good idea. Players keep forgetting that the game is pre alpha and has a long way to go before it can look polish.

Also as an art graduate, the few things the devs here showed were amazing The movements looked fluid , the features that they are planning sound great. I am grateful that every week the devs of the three games keep us updated on their progress or setbacks. Not many AAA MMOs have a good relationship with the community. I do feel hopeful that they do have the builder almost done.

I agree with you, however the process of developing a game is pretty much the same no matter how big or small it is. The volunteer aspect should not throw you off. For volunteers these guys have done more than I expected a volunteer team to do. I'll remind you this. The only part taking so long is because things break down or systems need to be revamped like the move to UE 4. I know things takes time however I do not think they are behind as people think. Once the char generator is ready everything else will fall into place because I can assure once that is available they will be able to work full time with the 2nd chance and have the character generator to show off. The marketing aspect, I take the devs side. The CoT will show stuff when things are done. Many times games hype up something that is not fully developed. However, the reason I trust them when they say Fall is because if they only have to set up the UI and create the save costume function, that means they are right on schedule. They would have told us if the costume pieces were not ready.

I agree definitely! I have faith the team that will do a great job! However compare to other stuff, they are doing good on progress wise. I know my optimism seems misplaced at times but after being a MMO player for many years for various games, I am impress to see this team do great things in a short amount of time. To be honest, it is actually inspiring to see a group of devoted players remain steadfast and not give up even facing harsh criticism.on their first huge game project.
As a art graduate, to see the CoT team grapple so many technical and aesthetic issues and to recitfy them makes me very proud of the the developers and us old CoH players. I guess my thing is I get excited hearing the little news of improvement over set backs every week. Every week the devs are transparent with us on every little issue they run into and fix. Sure set backs suck, but I do not mind them at all because they will the pot of gold we are waiting for.