January 31, 2013 Weekend Progress ReportThis morning after logging into the live server I realize that we have made roughly 2 kabillion improvements and changes over the past several weeks of Omega development. I thought it was worth summarizing all the things we've done, to show you just where we are in terms of development progress:
Rebuild the Battle Engine: 100%
- Rewrote over 9000 lines of code
- All battle actions are now modular and work on a new set of 100+ rules that can be easily manipulated
- It will be around 3-4X faster to create new skills in the future per skill
- More control than ever to balance skills on an individual basis
- This means more exciting, more dynamic, more balanced battles as we go forward
New Item Stat Editor: 100%
- All items in-game instantly become editable, upgradable and usable at any level
- The current Enhancement system is replaced with the Core system and Stat Editor
- Players that have Enhanced items will be compensated as per a previous post about Enhancement compensation
New Item Core Editor: 100%
- Primary Weapons, Guns, Auxiliaries, and Armors now have 2 editable Core slots
- Players can equip Active and Passive Cores to these slots to expand their battle options
- Robots have been overhauled to use Cores, which means we can crank out new robots about 10X faster
- Robots Core Slots will be locked when we go live, but it's likely in the future that we release bots with customizable specials
Overhaul the Character Creator: 100%
Redo the Account Creation Flow: 100%
- New players can create and customize their character prior to registering the account
- Guest Play has been removed
Create 50+ New Missions: 100%
NEW Omega Promotional Packages: 100%
- Omega Onslaughter and Obliterator Packages
- NEW Exclusive Omega Cores
Create Several New Yeti's 100%
- New upgrade system to train your yeti
- Improved damage as you evolve your yeti
- 2 NEw Omega Yeti's with exploding Chomp ability!
Improve 100+ Hairstyles 100%
Improve Several Interfaces 100%
- Inventory Overhaul
- Merchant Shopping Overhaul
- Simplified Varium Store
Create 6 New Base Class Armors 100%
- Prepare scripts to update every character existing in the game with the new armor when Omega goes live
- Allow players to upgrade this new armor
- Update armor logic so the character will always have armor equipped.
Improve Damage Bubble System 100%
- Damage bubbles now display health gains from Reroute, Lust, and losses from Other Effects
- Makes it easier to visually see the HP/MP gains and losses that are occuring
Recreate NPC Artificial Intelligence 100%
- NPCs now work more similarly to the way a real player does
- This makes it far easier for us to create unique NPC battle experiences as we move forward
- NPCs can now equip auxiliary weapons
- We will take further advantage of this improvement later on in Omega
New Golden Yeti Tournament System 100%
- Players will use their Golden Yeti Tournament tickets to participate in a new tournament
- The tournament will launch a few days after Omega launches.
- This gives players some time to adjust their builds and learn the new system
- It also gives us a window of time to resolve any issues that arise during the launch
Create NEW Basic Cores: 100%
- The plan is to release a handful of simple item Cores for players to use to try out the new engine
- These cores will be reasonably priced, and available to everyone at launch
- With each subsequent release after Omega launches, we'll roll out more exciting Cores
- Remember that this system is super-new to everyone, so let's get it right!
Final Balance / Testing Pass 100%
- Prior to going live we'll be working with ALL of our testers to perform several balance tests and make adjustments accordingly. We'll use this time to uncover and squash any remaining engine bugs.
- This step is critical and I will NOT release Omega until I and the team are confident that we will launch you the best update you've ever seen.
We'll keep you posted on updates to these percentages to give you a better idea of how things are coming. Tags: Titan | 
