Hey guys!
It's surely been a busy year for us. These past few months have been dedicated to fixing a lot of
problems within the engine. Like many times in the past, we have had “Engine
developing” months where we crack down and start fixing bugs and adding new features.
We're pleased with the progress so far and will begin adding new features to
the game in beginning of December. December will be an exciting month for us,
hopefully we will be able to release 3.4 before Christmas. It would not be fair if we didn’t tell you what we were up to, so here goes!
Dark Energy (Launching platform) has been
completely re-written in a much more reliable programming language. This fixes
all the previous bugs and allows for more flexibility. We have added a built in
live support chat so we can respond to problems A.S.A.P. Among many other
improvements, like making way for built in account features, Dark Energy makes
it much easier to download our games and install them. We have also continued
working hard on the graphical improvements to the game. All media will feature PS 3.0 shaders, along
with some cool new shadows replacing the blob shadow. We really wanted to give
the environment a better look and feel. We have also worked extensively on
shader problems noted in last patch. Shaders and lighting should be noticeably
more realistic now. We have made many changes to the lighting system in the
engine. We are able to produce more realistic shadows on the environment as
well, not just characters.
We mentioned briefly last time that we have
completely re-written the multi-player. We have ripped everything out of the
last build, and started fresh. This allows us to be able to add many new
features to multi-player without too much work, which is why it has taken us so
long to release this patch. The networking is extremely important to us; it
really makes or breaks the game. Everything has been optimized now and lag has
been reduced to allow for smooth animations and gameplay. We have also added
many new features like grenades, and a friendly-foe name system. Enemy’s names
are red and ally’s names are green. In addition to all of this the next patch
will feature a dedicated server application for people who own servers. We have
also improved the server selection screen - the server listing is now much more accurate.
As part of the re-write of multi-player, Dark Form has gone back and started tweaking the maps to make sure we have eliminated any problems with physics, and make sure the map conforms to
fairness for both teams. This includes adding new media or re-arranging already
existing media. For example, the Forest map featured in the first ever beta was
taken out of beta three because of physics bugs related to trees, players would
get caught inside the trees and there would be no way out. With some ODE
modding, we have been able to fix these issues and add more realistic trees
that you won’t get stuck in. When all the maps have been revisited and we have
fixed the last remaining problems stopping us from releasing 3.4, we will begin
work on new things like ranks, achievements, etc.
Most likely before the end of November, we want to show off some AI improvements for single-player since the last time we posted an AI video (A long time ago), we have changed some core elements of gameplay that we will discuss when the time is right. Some changes to the story have also taken place and can be viewed above. If we have the time, we would also like to show off some game-play improvements we have made overall.
We have added two new screen shots we think you guys will
like of two new maps (Silo and Training) we hope you enjoy! As always you can
check out Desolation: Earth at www.darkformentertainment.com/Des/homepage.html
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See you next update!
