Gnostaria, alguno mas???

State of Gnostaria Report

Before I get too much into all the issues I know the number one thing on everyone's mind is the start of Gnostaria Alpha 2.

Some of you are probably wondering: Is it ready? Can we download it on Saturday, March 6?
The short answer is: The game is not fully ready, however we will be putting a download out by this weekend.

So, what does that mean?
We will be releasing the main installer, patcher and game launcher for download. Whenever an update is available the patcher will be able to automatically download the content for you. The actual game is not going to be ready for this weekend. Which leads me to..

What happened? Why can't we play this weekend?
No one wants Gnostaria in the hands of the players more than we do. That being said the realities of the current global economy came crashing down on us unexpectedly. For the past 2 years we have been outsourcing all of the artwork, animation, modeling and level design work to a great company in Russia. To our surprise (and dismay) this company suddenly closed its doors a few weeks ago. This, as everyone can imagine, has had a major impact on getting Alpha 2 out the door. The art team was working on the new level and all the related models, terrain, water, rivers, foliage and so on.

From out of this chaos we've already emerged stronger than before. We've recruited some of the artists that we previously worked with as well as some additional talent. In the past week I've seen daily progress on the new level and I'm extremely impressed with what the art team is doing. They picked up right where they left off and have been easily a magnitude more productive than in recent memory. Everyone is really working hard to make this happen.

Finally, postponing the gameplay release by a little bit was not an easy decision, not only because we don't want to dissapoint the players who have been waiting very patiently but also due to various business-related (Which I can't discuss ).

So what now?
I wanted to make this post today so as not spring this news at the last minute and invoke even more dissapointment than some may be feeling. That being said, we essentially lost the progress of about a month, and only need about a month to get back on track. With that in mind we are still targeting a release THIS month (March, 2010).

I have a bunch of other items to share that I'll go over quickly here.

RealmSource LLC
We're very excited to announce that we've officially established our business entity, RealmSource LLC. Our website is up at www.RealmSource.com.

IRC
The Gnostaria Dev team now has an IRC channel on irc.gameradius.org

For those of you unfamiliar with the term IRC stands for Internet Relay Chat. It's basically an online chat service / protocol that's been around for a long time.

Most of the developers (including myself) are in the #gnostaria channel throughout the day so feel free to stop by.

Gabriel was kind enough to write up some detailed instructions on exactly what you need to do to join us on IRC:
Download

Goto: http://download.cnet.com/mIRC/3000-2150_4-10001733.html
Click "Download Now"
Your download will begin in a moment. If it doesn't, click the link to try again.

Install

Run the downloaded file "mircXXX.exe" where XXX is the version you downloaded.
Allow any security dialogs that appear to run the file.
Follow the prompts in the installer
eg: Click Next, I agree, Next, Next, Next, Install, Finish

Running mIRC for the first time

Run mIRC by clicking the icon on your desktop or selecting "Start->Programs->mIRC->mIRC"
Select "Continue" or "Register!" if you wish to support the developer.
Enter your Full Name, E-Mail Address, Nickname, Alternate nickname
Select "Servers" under "Connect" from the Category tree to the left.
Click "Add"
Enter "irc.gameradius.org" into the Description, and IRC Server fields.
Click "Add"
Double click "irc.gameradius.org" in the IRC Servers list
Click "Connect"
Allow any firewall permissions to make the connection

Once you are connected, type this into the server window:
Code:

/msg [email protected] REGISTER <account> <password>

Where account is your desired account name and password is your desired password for your GameRadius account.

Select "Tools" then "Options"
Select "Options" under "Connect" from the Category tree to the left.
Click "Perform"
Click "Enable perform on connect"
Enter the following into the Perform commands text area:
Code:

/ns auth <account> <password>
/join #gnostaria

Click "Ok"
Click "Ok"

From now on each time you open IRC it will automatically authenticate you with your GameRadius account and join the #gnostaria channel.

You can either close mIRC to test this or type "/join #gnostaria" into the server window to join our channel.
Alpha Forums
Finally, as some of you may have noticed we have two new forums: Gnostaria Alpha 2 General Discussion and Bug Reports. These forums will open up with the release of the installer this weekend. Any problems experienced with the patcher, launcher, or any other part of the application that we release can be immediately posted into the Bug Forum. Once the game play content is available any bugs related to the actual game will be reported here.

In closing I thank everyone for your continued patience and look forward to joining you in Gnostaria Alpha 2!