This section has been edited to reflect just the facts.
May 22nd
"The Engine
We have been working on the conversion to Ogre for quite some time now...and there have been good days...and bad days. The team has really done a great job and it has been amazing to watch AO slowly move towards a day where we could release the game "fresh" with the upgraded look the AO world deserves. The problem with this journey is a matter of time and the destination. While the Ogre engine is an excellent choice it is just not providing the full featureset that we originally hoped to would deliver...moreover to add those features seems to be a task with ever growing estimates....which is something our small team can not afford, nor expect our players to wait for. When the decision to go with Ogre was made the engine used for Conan was in its adolescence...it ran but it was gangly, awkward and had stability issues. After two years of constant work by a large and brilliant render team the engine used by Conan runs beautifully and stably and offers a great number of complete features that would require additional years of work in Ogre. With the delays due to difficulties associated with optimization of Ogre to work well with current AO and the estimated timelines for a full implementation of the Conan engine (Dreamworld Engine/Cheetah) being nearly identical we were faced with a difficult decision."
May 29th
"Balancing Efforts
Some criticism (understatement) has been made concerning the "band-aid" style fixes to some professions. Keep in mind some of these changes ARE temporary while we work out the larger issues of retooling all specials and healing. A temporary fix means that the most affected professions can perform adequately while we make more significant changes without having to wait until we are done to be effective. Slapping an AS weapon on everyone is not the current team's idea of balance...big changes are necessary. We know and we are working on it."
Reply With Quote
Connect With Us