Weekly ADOM update: Shifting dungeons, character generation & stuff

Hi everyone!

As promised here is a quick weekly update on what is going on (and what not):

• Programming has slowly restarted. Current areas of work are:
• Getting the new character generation process completed in graphical mode (there are still a lot of kinks to work out but it's more a question of discipline than difficulty). Jochen and Zeno are on this for the actual coding and Krys is doing the graphics required.
• Work on the new shifting dungeon sections. Basically there are some problems left with map updates and we also seem to be chasing a weird crash bug. Zeno and I are trying to have the map updates ironed out.
• Fine-tuning the tome of donors. It's in but it still has some kinks related to its placement and functionality. 
• Adding a kind of introductory story to the start of the game to get new players better involved in the story. I'll post some more details in the next couple of days once we have discussed the structure internally. Krys and I are working on this mostly, receiving input from the rest of the team.
• Adding more soundtracks. Lucas is working like a machine on more and more awesome compositions.
• Things I have not progressed on:
• ADOM RPG. Programming felt more important to me so that's what I focussed on during the last couple of days.
• The community highscore stuff. Another issue very dear to my heart but sadly somewhat complicated and quite a big topic. For now we'll be concentrating on the next release which definitely will not include any of those new community features.

So that's it for tonight. I hope to return to a more continuous information flow soon.

Happy New Year (& short review of 2014)

A Happy New Year to everyone!

2015 is upon us and I am very determined to make this the best ADOM year ever (together with my compatriots in Team ADOM).

About the current ADOM development progress...

As many people have asked over the previous weeks I'd like to give a short summary regarding the progress of the promises given in the crowd funding campaign and what we actually are working on right now:

Currently we exclusively focus on getting ADOM to Steam. This task for us has highest priority for several reasons:

1. We have been greenlit and as long as the green lighting process still exists it is a very useful barrier against a threatening myriad of mediocre games. Or in other words: If we get ADOM to Steam before this barrier falls exposure will be much more effective and we have a much better chance to be noticed by tons of potential new players. 
2. Being very successful on Steam might mean immortality for ADOM as the possible funding gained might help us to continue developing ADOM for a very long time (far beyond what was achieved in the crowd funding campaign).
3. Tuning ADOM for Steam makes it a much more modern and accessible game and this is good to entice a much larger community. Which in turn is good for ADOM.

Thus all our current work focusses on the milestones laid out for the Steam release.

Specifically

• I am currently working on the new game options settings and next will be tacking lots of internal additions in order to allow for a graphical inventory (and much more - what we call 'the tome of knowledge').
• Jochen is transforming our save file structures. In the future we will be able to have compatible save files, even if this will slow development somewhat. But very important for Steam.
• Zeno and Krys are refining the interface and adding tons of graphical bells and whistles.
• Lucas is churning out scores of sound effects to enriched the game experience tremendously.

Many of the things we right now are doing are far beyond the scope of what was promised in the crowd funding campaign. And this comes at a temporary price: The other important activities (like finally finishing the RPG) currently rest. Not indefinitely but they rest. I have to ask and hope for your continuing patience. You all will receive the physical rewards and I want to have them out before Christmas but as long as we are not yet on Steam we'll focus all energy on that endeavor. Even at the price of delaying other promises more.

As explained above we do this in the hope of being able to work on ADOM far beyond the budget of the crowd funding campaign which should be beneficial and fun for all of us.

Comments welcome, but that's how it is right now.

(BTW, if you are one of the donors receiving physical goods - fear not. I will ask for a confirmation of your current shipping address well in advance of beginning the shipping process, so you are safe, even if you have moved in the meantime).

Below you find a quick teaser to the new ASCII game options menu for ADOM Deluxe to your enjoyment (hopefully ;-) ):