GunFlame

How do you class the game as, "Game of the Year"? Is it by favourite or the ones that you simply think is the best?

I'm not too fussed about any changes. The PAL version was an incredibly meaty package as it was. So just an update would be fine. I'm more interested to see what they do with some of the pre-rendered backgrounds that it still used in some places. It was a mix of 2D and 3D, so I'm intrigued by this. Re-balancing on magic? Mmm, maybe, possibly. I think how X implemented a lot of enemies that had weaknesses still made magic a viable way to attack. Most of the time, a lot of spells wouldn't be used. But you'd rely on them sometimes, and usually pump through them during boss battles. The only thing I would want, is an alternate way to get the Sigil's for Ultimate Weapons. Dodging 200 lightning bolts sucks, winning a race under 00:00:00 seconds sucks. Keep it, but offer an alternative. Battle related or something. It's a great, great game, and I'm really looking forward to have an additional incentive to play through it again.

Thing's are a-go once more..."we're getting the band back together". It's going to take a little time to get everything moving in sync, as there are a couple of member changes, with a new (additional) artist, and a new programmer - which is hopefully a supplement to the current programmer. I've seen some of the latest art work. We have another background created (that's out environments), and the work on some character assets should now be finished. Just to answer you fuchikoma; it can happen this way, but larger, more committed developments don't tend to be affected by this. But if the company has an aggressive release mentality, it's changed up often to try and complete as many projects as possible, and with Christmas dawning, we wanted as much out as possible during the holiday season. Although this took resource away from me, it has relaxed my development schedule a lot, and we may even be able to drop in a little more content that first scoped. We'll see.

Borked. I love that word.

Okay, so it's been a while since my last update. But it's going to be even longer until I can share any new information regarding the development. For the time being, the project has been set on hold, and the resource reallocated. This is expected to last for around 2 weeks, so it's a pretty big hit. The most annoying part is the complete loss of momentum, and the drop in familiarity of the project when people return. it sucks, but myself personally, have plenty else to be taking care of in the meantime. It's not gone, it's still there, it's just resting at the back for a short while.

Well, you might wear the clothes, but I can see you straight away! Man, either you suck or I rock. (I'm happy to go with the second scenario, it's win-win).

I liked what it was supposed to symbolize, but it's just all screwed up now. It has no meaning. If someone has a Star, it doesn't really mean anything, well, it could mean they made an editor laugh, or a nice Photoshop. Who knows... Some have mentioned a like/dislike addition, but that is just something that trolls would love to take advantage of. And the confusion people have when trying to separate fact from opinion, will only make a bad idea worse. I think one way it could work, is if they have just add "Like" button, like Facebook. It might not be the most popular suggestion, but just give me a minute... With Like, it seems that people are less inclined to use it as a tool for trolling. That's not to say it won't be, but if you look through forums that use the Like/Dislike, you often see more marks on dislike. It's rarer for people to actually go out of their way and 'Like' a comment. There should also be a direct 'Report' button for silencing trolls or assholes as soon as possible. It can then be tracked, assessed and removed if deemed unsuitable. They'll never be a perfect solution. We will always argue that people shouldn't be silenced, and who is anyone to judge anothers thoughts or right to speak? But sometimes it just needs to be grounded, not everything is about freedom of speech. If someone is being a dick when you and your brethren are talking games, then there should be an option to shut them up.

I think they should do a purge of the Star's anyway. They have changed the Starring format so many times now, that having one doesn't really represent anything.

I think the fact that many were surprised by it, means that it really wasn't clear enough. Somewhere, something went a miss. I would expect that only a few people, a tiny amount would have bought it because of the free game. But still, they would have seen it as a bonus even if they didn't buy it with that as the incentive. EA should really have done more to clarify this. Now, you could say it isn't a huge deal, but if that was the case, why would they go out of there way to offer content earlier to PS3 players and then also try and justify how cool a deal that really is? To be honest, it's a shitty deal. They lose something they where told they would have for free, in exchange for something they might not want, and if they did, they would have to pay for.

Well, there has been an interesting turn of events. Due the original schedule being as tight as it was in an attempt to make a Christmas release, the release has now been delayed. Obviously, there are some immediate positives that can come from this like more polish and better stability. Because of that, I'm okay with the change. Unfortunately, we will lose some resource due to the delay. Because the release has been pushed back, it is no longer the priority that it was. For around 3 weeks, we will not have a dedicated artist on the project, and this falls inline with the current break that the composer is on right now. So we are short of some content development for the rest of this month, and the first week or so of next month. Although it's frustrating to have these areas lag a little, the last couple of weeks has been on UI development, so it hasn't been a delay on any of the programming really, as most of the assets were already created before the news of the priority shift. We still have about a week or so of UI to put together, and then that should be all of the base elements in place. It'll make a huge, huge difference. The project missed the last milestone due to some of the resource changes, we are about a week behind. But because the timeline has now changed, I'll take the latest resource changes and adjust the milestones and development timeline. We are looking to push it back by about a month, so we are aiming for mid December. This should mean that we get an early-mid January release. The last couple of weeks have been productive in regards to what we have been able to do, but it is not what was expected. The second engineer that was coming on board was also put back, so we won't have that added headcount until perhaps another 3 weeks. But by that time, we will likely not even need it. Initially, the added headcount was requested so that we could push for the mid November finish. But that is no longer a goal. One thing that does bother me, is that I cannot adjust the scope a little. We will still develop within the original plan. With the added time, and the simplicity of adding content, I was looking to add another stage. But this won't be happening. It's just a case of tuning up what we have, which I am more that happy with, it's just, well, we always want more right? Anyway, I should be receiving the last of the sound effects files today, so we can start to add them in possibly later this week if it looks to be suitable to do so.

I won't doubt that it will have some kind of heavy link towards cloud based gaming and streaming, but I would be surprised to see them move completely in that direction with the next console that Sony release. I mean, the Vita is an impressive piece of technology, but Sony have made sure that it supports hard copies of games. They would know that with the failure of the PSP Go, that the world just isn't yet wired up to take an online only type of home console. OnLive may slowly start to prove that wrong, but right now, and even in 2 years, I just can't see it. A lot of money that companies make comes from the less than dedicated gaming audience. Is that audience ready for this move? I'm not sure about OnLive's audience, but is it a mixed bunch of more relaxed as well as enthusiast gamers, or is it only engaging enthusiasts? I really believe that we will end up with most forms of gaming being Cloud based, but I can't see it being the case yet. Maybe in about 8-10 years, then we'll see. But for Sony to go purely Cloud based in about 2-3 years time? That would be one hell of a risk, and if the PSP Go taught them anything, it's that you can't put all your eggs in one basket.

That's what I'm saying, that they don't really mean anything anymore. Test Cases are built not for Alpha and Beta checks, but Milestone and Build Log content. They are much accurate and not at all subjective. This is the same with Content and Feature complete. Heck, there's not even a definition for a Release Candidate, for that, it's what the time permits. Alpha and Beta are terms that companies can employ if they wish, but they don't mean anything standard.

No, a placeholder means that the content isn't ready, so something has been put there in it's place. For example, an NPC is missing, so all NPC's use the same model. The alternate models are counted as content. So it isn't content complete. And like I said, the terms Content Complete and Feature Complete are much more readily used, than Alpha and Beta. I only ever see Beta now when working with 3rd Parties or viewing Press Releases.