Journals
Dev Journal
Elemental Alpha: Invites going out
We’ve picked a tiny handful of the pre-order group to become alpha testers based on how many other betas they’ve participated in, forum karma, and a number of other criteria. Those of you not in the alpha, fear not, you’re not missing very much. The beta is scheduled to come out around PAX (Penny Arcade Expo). Be forewarned, we plan to close the beta shortly after PAX and it will remain closed for some months. Those who want to get the beta can pre-order the game. I am leaning tow... [read more]
Dev Journal
We've got a new coder starting on Monday and in order to help him out, my co-workers and I have been compiling a list of guidelines about our coding practices. Up until now, I've just sat down with new coders and given them a tour of our codebase and tried to convey our coding practices at that point, but new people always have a lot to remember and having a document to refer to might help. I thought that I'd share our list with you and see if you have any suggestions to add. ... [read more]
Dev Journal
Could the beta program be an experience unto itself?
In my mind, the fun of Elemental resides in the fact that you’re not just trying to conquer some fantasy world but the world itself is designed to be so organic and unique from game to game. A lot of the difference between games is a result of things like a tech tree that has different techs in it, a huge library of special content that is integrated into map generation randomly each game, quests, integrated community content, and the divergent paths to victory. Now, as some of y... [read more]
Dev Journal
One of the things that will make Elemental different from anything Stardock has developed before is that we will view the release date of the game as the beginning of its life rather than the climax. The reason for this is that a big part of our objective with Elemental lies in the engine underneath it. It is our dream to slowly evolve Elemental to be so modable that a user familiar with Python 3.x will be able to use Elemental to create virtually any kind of land base computer game. ... [read more]
Dev Journal
July is almost over and that means it’s time for another FAQ answer list! Q: What are channelers and how do they work? A: Channelers are beings who can harness the magic locked inside the elemental shards that are scattered across the world. When your faction (or an ally) controls a shard, you gain access from its type of mana (which is either earth, air, fire, or water magic). Channelers also generate on their own either life magic or death magic depending on the path they’v... [read more]
Dev Journal
This is a very very early implementation of the research screen. We have a lot of work to do on research as we’ve been experimenting with lots of different ideas for the past few months. The goal was to have something very different from Galactic Civilizations but also something that is easy for people to add their own techs, distinguish different factions with their own techs, and allow for infinite researching. In this UI, the player has researched the ability to res... [read more]
Dev Journal
This week our friends from Ironclad were visiting to discuss strategy on an assortment of future projects. One of the fun things was showing Elemental and comparing notes on different engine techniques – ways of doing cool stuff on screen without having requiring crazy hardware. One of the things the team here has spent some time on is on fonts. It’s amazing how crappy font handling is in Windows IF you’re not putting it on a dark background. DirectX 11 apparently will fix... [read more]