Greetings Fellow Avatars!

Here’s what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar:

• Sneak Peek: Brittany, Capital of Novia
• The Making of Skrekk – Part 3
• The Making of Shores of Malice – Part 3
• Sandillox Wrestling Federation
• EVL Saint Patrick’s Day Pre-Party
• 52 Day Countdown to Spring 2016 Pledge Expirations
• Backer Shipping Addresses
• In-game Community Events
• Upcoming Events
• Recommended Projects to Back

Sneak Peek: Brittany, Capital of Novia

[From a Dev+ Forum Post by Esteben “SorcerousSteve” Zaldivar]

Hey guys, SorcerousSteve here to give you a teaser shot of the upcoming city of Brittany!

Captured below is the South Port side Gate. A hub of commerce and trade, its streets are littered with cargo from afar, muddy sludge from the wagons covers the cobblestone, and the stench of fish penetrates the air. Not the classiest part of town but home to some quite rugged folks. From here we can catch a glimpse of Brittany Castle in the far left, home to Lady Arabella, wife of the King of New Britannia, Lord British! If you look to your right, you can also catch a glimpse of a lighthouse, that section is currently under construction and will lead to the North Port side Gate. To put things into perspective, in this frame is one of the five city gates that will feed into Brittany Central, 4 of which will come from surrounding neighborhoods/suburbs and 1 which will lead in from the Brittany Graveyard.

Read more…

Greetings Fellow Avatars!

Here’s what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar:

• Spring 2016 Pledge Expirations
• Kobold Themed Areas
• SotAMap.com
• Recap’s Second Album: “Pronoia”
• Hangout of the Avatar ~ Release 27 Postmortem
• NBNN News: Lazarus Interviews Starr Long
• The Gallery of Wonderful Horrors Wants You!
• Backer Shipping Addresses
• In-game Community Events
• Upcoming Events
• Recommended Projects to Back

0 Day Countdown to Spring 2016 Pledge Expirations!

As we march toward the Final Wipe and Lot Selection milestone this summer, we are expiring seven of the seventeen remaining pledges during the Spring 2016 Pledge Expiration Event, which will occur at 10:30 AM CST, May 2, 2016 (following the next wipe for Release 29). The remaining ten pledges, as well as new Player Owned Towns, will be expired during the Summer 2016 Expiration Event.

Spring 2016 Pledge Expirations

The following pledges will no longer be available for purchase or upgrade after May 2, 2016:

• Immortal Adventurer
• Virtual Collector
• Collector
• ** Navigator [originally expired August 31, 2015 for backers below Patron level]
• ** Developer [originally expired August 31, 2015 for backers below Patron level]
• Citizen
• Knight
• Lord
• Baron 1/2/3

The Spring 2016 expirations DO NOT affect any backers that are already entitled to these rewards as listed in the pledge description at the time you pledged or upgraded. These expirations only affect new backers, or existing backers that have not upgraded to the specified pledge tiers before the expiration date.

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Greetings Fellow Avatars!

Here’s what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar:

• Shooter Jennings’ Countach Breast Cancer Make a Difference Charity
• Countach World Premier Party Recap
• Play Release 27 Now!
• Avatars Radio Presents: The FireLotus Release 27 Party!
• R27 Patch Notes
• Player Housing Update: Player Owned Towns, Player Run Towns, and Water Lots
• RizeUp Gaming Seattle Children’s Hospital Charity Drive
• Hangout of the Avatar ~ Release 27 Postmortem Invite
• NBNN Interview with Starr Long
• Kilts and Canes
• Final Weekend to get Your Stretch Goal Store Items
• Backer Shipping Addresses
• In-game Community Events
• Upcoming Events
• Recommended Projects to Back

Shooter Jennings’ Countach Breast Cancer Make a Difference Charity

We’re excited to announce that we are partnering with outlaw country musician Shooter Jennings, son of country music icons Waylon Jennings and Jessi Colter, and his label, Black Country Rock, to raise money through Shroud of the Avatar’s Make a Difference Store, using Shooter’s newest album: Countach! Fifty percent of the net purchase price* of the Countach Make a Difference items will be donated to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation. The Countach Breast Cancer Make a Difference items include:

Read more…

[A SotA Public Forum post by Starr Long]

Greetings Avatars,

Please read this entire message, as well as the linked instructions and known issues.

Thank you for being a loyal backer and follower of Shroud of the Avatar. Release 27 access for all backers at First Responder level and above begins this Thursday, February 25, at 10:30 AM US Central Time (16:30 UTC).

Release 27 is the first release where our pivot to focus on Final Wipe is becoming very visible. It can be seen in the rapid expansion of scenes, filling out entire regions, albeit with scene clones (that we will later make unique). It is also the beginning of major polish passes and rework of the starting scenes to make them more playable and more directed. It is also visible in the new creature behaviors of play, resource guarding, Oracle scanning, Escort Quests, and NPCs talking to each other.

Even though this was a short release at only four weeks (which means just three weeks of development) and we had a LOT of R26 patches, we still managed to add a bunch of new content to the game. Additionally, behind the scenes, we continue to optimize performance and improve our data tracking/reporting (heatmaps are the latest addition). We have also begun a complete overhaul of our avatars, including mesh, texture, skin, hair, clothing, and animations. We hope to reveal those changes next release when we plan to have the new male avatar in the game.

Yet again, I want to express a huge amount of gratitude to our Dev+ backers who tested all of the items below on the QA server and uncovered lots of bugs. They also provided editorial feedback on this post, so they are a big reason that this post actually matches what is in the game, and that it is easy to read.

While we are getting closer to launch, we are still in a constant state of change, and we do not yet have in-game systems to inform players of these changes, or to share ways to help them to explore new content and systems. This means we rely entirely on this message, and the linked instructions and known issues to convey the current game state. We regularly have to answer questions or filter bug reports because some players elect not to read this valuable information. By taking a few moments to read through this information, a great deal of our time and efforts can be redirected to focus on new “unanswered” questions, and addressing critical issues impacting each release. We greatly appreciate you taking the time to review this post, and for all the truly valuable feedback you continue to provide.

Also, remember that while we are providing new content with each release, our community is working overtime to make new events for you to enjoy. So, be sure to check out a couple of the Community Events Calendars run by our community members (via in-game book or the player run websites Avatars Circle Community Events and Events of the Avatars calendar).

Without further ado, here are the R27 deliverables.

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Greetings Fellow Avatars!

Here’s what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar:

• The Making of Shores of Malice – Part 2
• Shooter Jennings’ In-Game Worldwide Premier of New Album “Countach”
• The Making of Skrekk – Part 2
• Release 27 QA Build Available for Dev+ Backers
• Public Cache Chests Now POTable
• RizeUp Gaming Seattle Children’s Hospital Charity Drive
• Final VIP Roundtable, Studio Tour, LotM Visit & Dinner
• Story in Scene
• Sandillox Ent Presents BINGO Bango!
• Release 26 All Player Towns Gathering
• The Gauntlet [EVL]
• Round Elven Greenhouse
• 10 Day Countdown for Stretch Goal Store Expiration
• Backer Shipping Addresses
• In-game Community Events
• This Week In the News
• Upcoming Events
• Recommended Projects to Back

The Making of Shores of Malice – Part 2

[From a Dev+ Forum Post by Esteben “SorcerousSteve” Zaldivar]

Hey guys, SorcerousSteve chiming in with an update on Malice, now focusing on the interior Dungeon and its surrounding chambers, including the Well of Sorrows!

Malice is populated by the vengeful dead, an army being raised to sweep down over the lands of the living and avenge Anapa and the injustices done to him and the dead of the Drachvald.

Read more…

Greetings Fellow Avatars!

Here’s what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar:

• Happy Birthday Avatars Radio!
• The Making of Skrekk
• The Halls of Artifice (A Work In Progress)
• Valentine Scavenger Hunt & After Event Party
• The New Britannia Breast Cancer Awareness Biathlon
• Happy Valentine’s Day!
• 17 Day Countdown for Stretch Goal Store Expiration
• Backer Shipping Addresses
• In-game Community Events
• Upcoming Events
• Recommended Projects to Back

Happy Birthday Avatars Radio!

We’d like to wish a heartfelt “Happy Birthday” to Avatars Radio! Founded by Amber Raine, Avatars Radio is the first, and oldest, Shroud of the Avatar radio station, dating all the way back to SotA Release #1!

Read more…

Greetings Fellow Avatars!

Here’s what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar:

• The Making of Shores of Malice
• The Entrance to Artifice
• Hangout of the Avatar ~ Release 26 Postmortem
• New Greenhouses
• New Player Owned Town Templates
• In-game Community Events
• This Week In the News
• Upcoming Events
• Recommended Projects to Back

The Making of Shores of Malice

[From a Dev+ Forum Post by Esteben “SorcerousSteve” Zaldivar]

Hey guys, once again its SorcerousSteve here with my latest map: The Shores of Malice entrance to the Malice Dungeon (final love quest location)!

The Shores of Malice are located on the banks of Stormwater Lake on the northern section of Drachvald bounded by the treacherous peaks of The Sirens.

Read more…

Greetings Fellow Avatars!

Here’s what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar:

• Play Release 26 Now!
• The FireLotus Release 26 Party!
• R26 Patch Notes
• SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT: Final Wipe and Lot Selection
• Shooter Jennings’ In-Game Worldwide Premier of New Album “Countach”
• The Entrance to Artifice
• Valentine Goodies
• New Player Homes
• Checkers Anyone?
• The Giant Yew Tree
• In-game Community Events
• This Week In the News
• Upcoming Events
• Recommended Projects to Back

Play Release 26 Now!

Release 26 successfully launched yesterday, January 28, with thousands of backers downloading, patching, logging in, and checking out the new changes! Lots of new content to explore, including:

• Full Wipe to allow for fundamental changes to several systems, including crafting and quests
• New Summon Chaos Daemon Spell, plus polished/balanced dozens of existing spells & skills
• New Consider System to show level difference between player and enemy
• Points of Interest polish added to 16 existing scenes
• 5 New scenes including Resolute, Aerie, North Varisalla Foothils, Sanctus Spine, and Dysborg Ruins (PVP zone)
• New Valentine’s Day and Lunar New Year items
• New Grasslands Biome Template for Player Owned Towns
• 21 New Player Owned Towns
• New Crafting System that allows for material modifiers, gear naming, components, etc.
• Agriculture System Balance/Polish
• Performance Imrovements
• Language Translation Progress
• …and more!

Read more…

UPDATE: JULY 12, 2016: Updated the group numbers to current backer numbers.

[A SotA Public Forum post by Starr Long]

Greetings Avatars,

We are incredibly excited to announce that we have scheduled final lot selection and our final wipe, including all social data (names, friends, guilds), [UPDATE: 06/21/2016] for Release 32, July 28, 2016! After Release 32, we will no longer be wiping the game state. Your characters and your properties will be persistent from that date forward.

Please understand that final wipe is not “launch”. We will continue to be working to finish the game’s story content well past final wipe, while we remain in Early Access. Until then, the game is neither “launched” nor complete, but as mentioned below, the concept of “launch” may not even be applicable to this development model. Launch will be when we pull the game out of Early Access and we start marketing / public relation campaigns to pull in new customers. We have no plans to do those things in July. We know that this plan will generate a lot of questions and stir up plenty of emotions, but we firmly believe this is the best possible course of action for the project.

By Release 32, our goal is that the virtual world and economy will be fully functional and reasonably balanced. Additionally, the Love storyline will be polished and playable from beginning to end, with all characters and quests complete. The Truth and Courage storylines will also be completely playable from beginning to end, although not in as polished a state as Love. We are purposely holding the finale part of the storyline that ties the three threads together until the entire plot has been polished. This allows us to really focus on the new user experience and one storyline instead of spreading that effort out too thinly. ***Please note that the story is nonlinear and non-exclusive. It is designed to allow free movement between the three storylines and it is only until all three are complete that you move to the finale (this structure will be very familiar to Ultima players). So just because you finish the Love story, you are not excluded in any way from experiencing the other plots.

As part of all of this, we are also announcing the 2016 Spring and Summer Expiration Events.

Read more…