A
Gods & Heroes State of the Republic post on the Gods and Heroes Website describes Heatwave Interactive's struggle to keep this "underfunded" MMOG in operation, with the game's associate producer saying it "did not perform at launch and has never even come close to paying for the cost of bringing it to market, much less the cost of keeping a team developing it for nine-months," adding: "To be honest, I’ve driven the company to the brink several times in an effort to keep the team together and to keep Gods and Heroes operating" (thanks
The RPG Reporter). As a result, the game's development team is moving to other projects, and the
dropping of subscription fees continues. Here's a bit:
To be honest, I’ve driven the company to the brink several times in an effort to keep the team together and to keep Gods and Heroes operating. However, at the end of 2011, it was clear that we would either have to let the team go, or find another way to keep them around. So, in order to keep the game alive and have a real chance at getting the free 2 play effort funded, we’ve reassigned the majority of the development team to new projects and made the service free for everyone.
The game will have to remain in this state until we find further funding. I hope my honesty and transparency about what has been going on with G&H communicates our commitment and belief in the project.
The State of the Republic may be weak, but its will is strong.
There's a
State of the Game Address on the Grim Dawn Forums with a status report on Crate Entertainment's upcoming action/RPG (thanks
The RPG Reporter). This includes a point-by-point assessment of various game systems, as well as an outlook on the game's release schedule. At this point they say they are "not far off" from a "minimalist" alpha release which will offer three to four hours of gameplay in a small chunk of the world, replayable up to level 30, adding this "will take 6-8 months to complete with our current resources." The hope is to follow the alpha with content-complete beta (think Minecraft or Path of Exile) four to six months after that, but at this point they don't have enough information on how all that will progress to offer an estimate of when the game will see its final release.
An update to the
Torchlight II Website discusses the expanded role of pets in Runic Games' upcoming action/RPG sequel (thanks
VG247). This includes
a trailer, screenshots, and details on the pets' attributes.
Continue here to read the full story.
Hey, it's
Earth Hour today! Like the old joke about children's day it could be argued that every hour should be earth hour. I'm pretty sympathetic to the concept on many levels, but I think I'm with
John Carmack on this one: "I’m going to turn on every damn light in protest of Earth Hour. Lighting the darkness is fundamental to humanity's climb." Maybe Earth Hour would be a good time to celebrate
World Backup Day (thanks
HARDOCP)?