9/27/2007
Should I Post a Public Beta of Sanctum II?
I’m probably within one or two test runs (which I hope I can do tonight) of having my beta test of Sanctum 2 ready. I’ve thought about the remaining scenes, and they actually shouldn’t be particularly difficult to do – so hopefully, I may be able to finish them in a few days. I’m taking off tomorrow from work to give myself a long weekend to see what kind of progress I can make.
What I’m thinking of doing, though, is actually posting the Beta version to the Vault over the weekend for everyone to try out. I’m both comfortable and nervous about that at the same time; I think the mod is pretty tight, but I was hoping to have some feedback on the how it plays before going "public" with it.
Any thoughts? Should I post the beta version this weekend?
9/24/2007
An Update on Sanctum 2A
An update on Sanctum 2A:
I’ve been occupied recently with some other projects, so progress on Sanctum 2A has been slowed a bit. However, I’m pleased to announce that I finished a playtest of the first 75% or so last night. Aside from a few spelling errors and minor bug fixes, which should only take a couple of hours to fix, the first three quarters or so of the sequel is done. I only have one area and a few more scenes to build, which shouldn’t take more than 2-3 weeks with luck.
The first three quarters is complete and self-contained, though, so I think I should be able to allow a few beta-tester volunteers to check it out by this weekend. So if anyone is interested in beta testing, please let me know!
9/1/2007
Status Update on Sanctum 2
I was surprised to realize this morning that I’d let all of August go by without blogging. That’s a good thing in a way, because it’s an indication of how busy I’ve been, and work on Sanctum 2 has been front and center on the list of things that have been keeping me busy. I’ve made some decisions about how to move forward with releasing the work I’ve been doing on it, though, and I wanted to make all of that "official" with an announcement here.
I still very much want to keep working on the sequel modules to the Sanctum of the Archmage saga. It’s become very clear to me now, though, that the only way I’m going to be able to manage that is to develop them in relatively short pieces, on the order of 2-3 hours in length – similar to the format of Adam Miller’s "Shadowlords" and "Dreamcatcher" series. In line with that decision, I’ve decided on a good point in the story to break and end the current module, and I’m now working toward that as my goal. If all goes as planned, I should be able to release the first installment of "Sanctum of the Archmage 2 - The Miracle Worker" in about a month.
For those who may have read my previous remarks on the idea of releasing my current work as a "demo" module, I want to stress that "Sanctum 2A," as I’m now thinking of it, will not be a demo. It will be a short but fully completed piece, probably a little over 2 hours long. Although there will be a couple of challenging fights, it will be light on combat, and very heavy on dialogue and roleplaying. I also spent a good deal of time working out how to do some (I think) fairly creative things with scripting cutscenes, structuring dialogue, and the like – all of which I hope will give the module the same feeling of novelty that many players have come to expect from Sanctum of the Archmage.
Here’s where things stand right now. I’ve fully tested the module up to the current scene, which should constitute a little under 2 hours worth of play. I have one more conversation and a little script debugging to do, and then the current area will be done. After that, I have one more area to create, and 2-3 scenes to write, along with about a dozen or so journal entries. Perhaps more importantly, the remaining scenes will be straightforward, not involving any of the complicated scripting or cutscene testing work that tends to slow things down a lot. With some sustained effort, this should be a few weeks worth of work at most. And since I have most of the current 3-day Labor day weekened free to work on it, with any luck I should be able to get a fair chunk of that work done right away. 