Updates

Update of the Avatar #239 – 2017.04.08: Etceter and South Paladis Scenes, Norgard Garments, Travian Partnership, Portalarium is Hiring, R44 Telethon, Dragon Con & PAX, Trailer Contest, and More!

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

The Latest Game Progress

News Announcements

Community Updates

Etceter Polish (cont.)

Etceter was cloned from Kingsport originally and while we made significant changes to the scene to make it unique we still felt it needed more polish. It also needed more obvious visual references to the historical locations mentioned in The Sword of Midras (the prequel novel written by Tracy Hickman and Richard Garriott). Additionally after building Xenos we established a characteristic Greco-Roman ruins look for that region of the world and we wanted to propagate that look to nearby towns. For instance Aerie now has a “Little Xenos” quarter.

Since Etceter is the main port that takes you to Xenos it only made sense that it should have some strong influences from that style.

[A Dev+ Forum Post by Scott “Scottie” Jones]

Having finished my part of the polish pass for Etceter, I wanted to share some of the final results for the areas I haven’t had the chance to showcase to you fine folks yet…

Read more…


Community Livestream – Etceter Revisited

Scott “Scottie” Jones, Senior Environmental Artist, is coming back on the livestream this Friday to show you more of his latest design work! We will be kicking off the stream with Scottie driving the master build machine around the nearly complete polish work of Etceter scene.

SPOILERS: Though little has changed near the common entrance into the scene, passing through the town will eventually lead to the primary crossroads, where the port-side commerce and housing district (seen on the right) gives way to the richer estates that once belonged to the wealthiest privateers (seen up the rise of the hill to the left) who made their fortunes when the Etceter Crag Mines were at the height of production! From here we can get a better view of some of the newest points of interest I’ve added. – Scottie

For more about Etceter, check out Scottie’s recent Dev+ blog update in the forums. Not a Dev+ member? You can either get access through Bundles in the store, or check out excerpts of his blog on any of the Weekly Updates.

The fun begins on Twitch this Friday at 4pm CT. Also join the community watching on Discord chat to ask questions about this scene:

P.S. – We are experimenting with the Facebook Event feature. Join the invite and see others that will be playing the game tomorrow!


Travian Games and Portalarium Partner for Shroud of the Avatar as it Reaches Story Complete Milestone

AUSTIN, Texas, July 31, 2017 — Portalarium®, an Austin, Texas based game developer, and Travian Games, a Munich, Germany based publisher and developer, are pleased to announce today a formal partnership to bring Shroud of the Avatar™, the much-anticipated fantasy role-playing game from legendary game designer Richard “Lord British” Garriott to Europe, South America, Central America, the Middle East and North Africa. Travian Games will be coming on board as a partner immediately as Shroud is moving closer to the game’s commercial launch later this year.

“We were looking for the best upcoming MMORPGs in our industry as well as a strong cultural fit, so we are truly excited about the opportunity to work with Richard and the Shroud of the Avatar team on bringing another great game to our community,” notes Lars Janssen, CEO of Travian Games. “Portalarium’s vision is very similar to ours and we believe this is the start of a long-term relationship between our two teams.”

“Europe has always been a strong market for the Ultima games so we wanted to be sure we found the very best partner who could who truly understands what we wanted to accomplish with Shroud,” explains Richard Garriott.

“Travian Games is that partner because they really understand community and development which has allowed them to build a huge base of millions of players.”

To date, backers of Shroud have logged more than three-million hours of game testing, and the latest update, Release 44, now permits backers to complete the entire Episode 1 story, from beginning to end.

Read more…


Update of the Avatar #238 – 2017.28.07: Play R44 Now, Dragon Polish, Grannus Colossus Update, Dev+ Asset Packs, R44 Mini-Telethon, Dragon Con & PAX, Trailer Contest, Community Events, and More!

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

The Latest Game Progress

News Announcements

Community Updates

Play Release 44 Now!

Release 44 successfully launched yesterday, July 27, with thousands of backers downloading, patching, and logging in to check out the changes! There’s lots of new content to explore, including:

Read more…


Community Livestream – Celebrating Release 44

We will be kicking off this week’s Community Livestream by celebrating Release 44 at the traditional Dance Party, hosted by Port Phoenix player town in-game!

After the dance party, we’ll be bringing back Dan “PlagueOfLocust” Brennan and Travis “Vas Corp Por” Koleski on camera as we explore the final changes brought to Grannus Colossus, and perhaps summoning some dangerous dragons as well…

For more about Grannus Colossus, check out Travis’s recent Dev+ blog update in the forums.

The fun begins on Twitch this Friday at 4pm CT. Also join the community watching on Discord chat to ask questions about this scene.

P.S. – We are experimenting with the Facebook Event feature. Join the invite and see others that will be playing the game tomorrow!


Release 44 Instructions

Starr_avatar

[From a forum post by Starr “Darkstarr” Long]

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 44 access for all Early Access backers begins this Thursday, July 27, at 10:30 AM US Central Daylight Time (15:30 UTC).


Forsaken Virtues Story Complete: We have now completed the Path of the Oracle with the introduction of the Destiny Pool, Confluence Chamber, and the final audience with the Oracle. This means that players can now play through the entire Episode 1 story from beginning to end including all three paths of virtue: Truth, Love, and Courage. In Release 45 we will add the Outskirts scene for the Path of Courage (Highvale Outskirts), some additional side quests along the Truth and Courage paths, some visual polish, and of course general bug fixes. That is when we will also provide the story reset token so that players can start the story over while preserving their character.

Read more…


Time is Running Short to Join Portalarium!

Time is running short to join Portalarium on a journey from being just a developer to also becoming a full fledged publisher! We are currently using the SeedInvest platform to take investments in the company that will make it possible to expand our marketing resources for Shroud of the Avatar and future products.

Those of you who’ve made a reservation, please convert it to an investment!

To convert, head to the official SeedInvest website, log in to your account, and from there you will be able to complete your investment.

You can also go to the above link to become an investor! A reminder that there are now several new in-game gold perk additions, including detailed images of the perks, and entire new perk tiers for more investing options.

Thank you Avatars!

Lord British and the Portalarium Team

*Disclaimer: Portalarium is offering securities under Regulation CF and Rule 506(c) of Regulation D through SI Securities, LLC (“SI Securities”). The Company has filed a Form C with the Securities and Exchange Commission in connection with its offering, a copy of which may be obtained here: https://www.seedinvest.com/portalarium/series.b


Update of the Avatar #237 – 2017.21.07: NEVERDIE, Norgard Clothing, Scene Polish, Trailer Contest, New Flash Sale, Origin PC Offer, Free Trial, Comic-Con & PAX Dev, Community Spotlight & Events, and More!

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

The Latest Game Progress

News Announcements

Community Updates

New Norgard Garments

We have begun creating the Viking-inspired clothing for the NPCs in the Northwest regions of Novia, including Norgard and Verdantis. This will complement the already established architectural character of the region and help to better define the area as a whole. We are creating garments for Guards, Citizens, and Merchants/Nobility, all of whom “courageously” display the color yellow which everyone knows drives the Kobolds mad, or so they say.

For Release 44 we hope to have the Guards in the region updated. In Release 45 we will update the other NPCs (Citizens, Upper Classes, and even enemies) in the region and we will create player wearable versions of these outfits.

[A Dev+ Forum Post by Fletcher “SkullMuncher34” Kinnear and Kevin “UglyFist” Wells]

Hey all! So we thought we’d make a post showing our current progress with Norgard clothing. So far we’ve modeled out a few variations of basic shirts and pants for NPCs and are starting to create player wearable versions of everything. Keep in mind that these images are subject to revision as we move forward. Cheers!

Read more…


Partnership with Neverdie Studios – Initial Coin Offering (ICO)

Today we announced a partnership with Neverdie Studios to support the company’s Initial Coin Offering (ICO). Neverdie Studios produces games, live action movies, records and virtual products. Their ICO is a blockchain-based project aiming to create an Ethereum-based gaming platform. Shroud of the Avatar is the first game outside the Neverdie product lineup exploring how to utilize Neverdie Coins (NDC). The two companies also announced today that Garriott would become an advisor to Neverdie Studios.

Jon “Neverdie” Jacobs, Neverdie Studios founder said, “This is a historic accord between two iconic avatars aligning to champion avatar rights. With the wise council of Richard “Lord British” Garriott, a legendary avatar, adventurer and world builder, providing priceless insight into the development of the gamified virtual reality infrastructure to unite MMORPGS and virtual worlds, I’m confident that our noble ambitions will remain virtuous and have the greatest chance to succeed. Richard’s council on the structure and balance of universal gaming tokens will be invaluable.”

“We are devout believers that people living in and contributing to our virtual worlds can and should earn real world value for the time and value they bring to our world,” said Garriott, Portalarium’s CEO and Shroud’s creative director. “Having direct access to a publicly tradeable currency is a great way to provide this. I’m also extremely pleased to be invited to advise Neverdie on this exciting and ambitious project. Additionally, Shroud of the Avatar already has a deeply committed player base while in early access. We are exploring how our players can earn market based value with NEVERDIE NDC and TPT tokens that are both useable directly in the game as well as traded on the open market.

To learn more about the offering and how you can get Neverdie coins, visit the official ICO page. The copy above came from today’s press release.


Community Livestream – Aerie and Vertas Scenes

We will be kicking off this week’s Community Livestream by giving players a first look at all the new changes making their way into both Aerie and Vertas scenes! Esteben “SorcerousSteve” Zaldivar will be driving the master build machine as we explore around the scene and discover its hidden secrets.

As we are focusing on the Path of Truth we are spending time to not only polish the story elements (dialogue, NPC names, quests, etc.) we are also updating visuals along the path as needed. For Release 44 this includes polishing the visuals for three of the towns you visit along the Path of Truth: Aerie, Vertas, and Jaanaford. Each of these towns is getting updated to include more color (especially blue, the color of Truth), more visuals related to Truth (books, libraries, statues of the Titan of Truth, etc.), and general polish (terrain, foliage, etc.).

For more about Aerie, check out SorcerousSteve’s recent Dev+ blog update in the forums.

After these changes go live, we have even more content, including quests, you can look forward to in future releases!

The fun begins on Twitch this Friday at 4pm CT. Also join the community watching on Discord chat to ask questions about this scene.