Journals
Dev Journal
Dev Journal #19: Preview of Beta 2
Let me start out with a thank you! As some of you know, I was against doing an Early Access, especially one this early. The game was just so buggy and so many people these days think “Early Access = polished release candidate”, which is NOT what Early Access was ever supposed to be. But nevertheless, here we are. Despite how buggy and janky Beta 1 was, you guys stuck with us and we appreciate it. This week I want to share with you what to expect in Beta 2. Let me give you the high leve... [read more]
Dev Journal
Dev Journal #18: Dynasties in Beta 2
For those of you just joining us, Elemental: Reforged is a remastering and reimagining of the previous Elemental games all rolled into a single game. Specifically: Elemental: War of Magic, Elemental: Fallen Enchantress and Elemental: Sorcerer King . We are using Fallen Enchantress as the starting point for Beta 1. We ported it to 64-bit and gave it a new graphics engine, updated visuals, the crafting system and global inventory from Sorcerer King , and a lot of new quests,... [read more]
Stardock Entertainment Announcements
First Gameplay Trailer Released for Ashes of the Singularity II
Check out the first gameplay trailer for Ashes of the Singularity II Command vast armies fighting for control of entire worlds in this massive-scale RTS game Add to your Steam wishlist The first gameplay trailer for Ashes of the Singularity II is now live, offering a closer look at the game’s current visuals and gameplay mechanics that fans have been eager to see. This trailer provides a first look into the strategic depth and immersive experience that the sequel pro... [read more]
Dev Journal
Dev Journal #17: New vs. Remaster
While this game is a remastering of the Elemental games (War of Magic + Fallen Enchantress + Sorcerer King), we are also keen to make sure there is new content for players to enjoy. With Beta 1, we did add a lot of new quests, units and items. But those kinds of things can be tricksy for an experienced player to know if they are new or just things that they didn’t see before. The improved tooltips, UI, hot keys, etc. are probably not that noticeable to someone looking for something ne... [read more]
Dev Journal
Dev Journal #16: The Road to Beta 2
As I write this, we’re putting together the first Preview of Beta 2. Beta 2 will have 3 major new changes: Steam Workshop support for modding First pass at localization Dynasties Let’s see where we’re at. Localization For Beta 2, we are going to focus on 3 languages: French, German and Spanish. This is because they don’t h ave as many unique characters as say Russian or Chinese. Baby steps. For Beta 3, the focus is going to be on Russian, Chinese, Japanese, ... [read more]
Dev Journal
Dev Journal #15: So viele Sprachen
The original Elemental: War of Magic was not just “English-only”. It was hard coded into English in such a way to make it nearly impossible to localize it. Under the covers, the game and the underlying engine, Kumquat, uses char * everywhere. This means that all text is byte-oriented, single-code unit that only works nicely with ASCII. Even German is tough because of ä ö ü ß and so on. And our code is full of toupper(myText) which can only handle A-Z. The code was full of sprintf(). I... [read more]
Dev Journal
Dev Journal #14: In a Sea of Bugs
Have you ever had a home project where you’re dealing with “imperial” units and “metric” units at the same time? The wrench looks like it will fit but it’s just…slightly different. That’s the world of Elemental this past week. We have War of Magi c, Fallen Enchantress and Sorcerer King . Each of them have quests and goodie huts and units and 3D assets that are… almost the same, but not quite. Guess what happens when you have a unit with just one more animation annotation than w... [read more]