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 | January 06, 2017 EpicDuel 2017
I know it’s an overused cliche at this point, but 2016 has been a beast of a year, filled with tragedy and turmoil, but quite a lot of productivity. This year we saw the launch of BioBeasts which was a triumph for our small team. We experienced many highs and lows in the post-launch aftermath as we wrangled with trends and tried our best to improve the game and help it gain traction in a clogged and bloated marketplace. This year was a triumph for Artix Entertainment as AdventureQuest 3D entered Open Beta. There have been some snags along the way, but it’s unbelievable how far the game has come in such a short span of time. We entered December with modest expectations for the gifting release. December is typically a strong month in terms of player population and sales, but it’s been challenging to fight the downward trend of browser games. These past few months we re-dedicated ourselves to EpicDuel in an effort to address many longstanding issues. There are some insurmountable challenges concerning balance, but we took in all of your feedback and did what we could with the time we had and the constraints of an engine thrice rebuilt.
Overall, the releases have performed surprisingly well, once again leaving us in a state of wide-eyed astonishment at the enthusiasm of our players. You definitely surprised us with your passion when servers came back online after the update on December 1st. You sent a clear message that you still love EpicDuel and wish to see it thrive in the new year. We’re constantly humbled and inspired by the fervor of our little community. Of course, not everyone was overwhelmingly pleased as some balance issues were not thoroughly addressed. Some major changes, like the NPC fill system, are controversial, but necessary for the challenges EpicDuel will face in 2017. Some of those challenges we’ve been harping on for ages -- It seemed like Flash was going to die in...2012? 2013? 2014? True, it’s still here and kicking, but it’s utility is constantly eroded as other platforms and web standards consume its market share and browsers discontinue or limit support. Flash will probably still be running in 2075 on whatever hacked-together browser exists in the blasted Wastescapes between the shattered Megacities. The persistence of Flash in the face of extinction doesn’t mean we’re not still concerned by this threat. We mentioned we were experimenting with executable clients, but that approach has some challenges we’re not sure we can overcome. We even looked into porting to Steam, but the fact is that while EpicDuel on Steam would be a boon to our current players, as an aging PvP MMO it would fail to attract the new players it would need to grow and justify continuous development. The only EpicDuel-related project that could break out on the modern market is perhaps a reimagined or completely new game, but such a project would be a massive undertaking and probably at least years away. If a direct port is not feasible, could a new or rejuvenated product be born from within EpicDuel? We’ve said many, many times that Omega is the last phase. There will not be an EpicDuel Zeta or EpicDuel Gamma 2. Even if we wanted to, we can’t simply roll back some of the massive engine changes that have been accrued over nearly 10 years of development. The inherent flaws of the engine and platform are also reasons why returning to full-time development is not a viable solution either. We want EpicDuel to succeed, but we’re also facing harsh realities of aging technology, a rapidly changing the marketplace, and the current position of our company.
“What about BioBeasts? Wasn’t that supposed to be the great salvation of EpicDuel?” The fate of BioBeasts is covered in a post over at its homepage. The summation is that it didn’t reach the heights we hoped it would, but we’re still proud of it and wouldn’t trade the experience gained from working on that project for anything. In the face of these challenges, what does the future hold for EpicDuel? In the new year, you can expect the systems of the game to function normally with the continued return of seasonal rares and the reactivated war cycle. In the new iteration, the wars will run with a one week cooldown in between to keep them moving faster so there’s less downtime. Each war region will continue to have unique war prizes. The servers will remain online as long as long as Artix Entertainment can afford to do so, even if the population dwindles to one lone player battling NPCs. “If you can’t make a new phase or EpicDuel 2 or return to EpicDuel development full time, then WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” For the EpicDuel team 2016 was more trial than triumph, but 2017 will be a year of exploration and expansion -- Exploration of new technologies and expansion of our technical knowledge and skill. This will be done in an effort to look beyond the scope of our limited team with the goal of working to secure the future of Artix Entertainment. Currently, the best way to help AE in the very near term is for us is to bolster the development of modern, interesting projects like AdventureQuest 3D. Thank you everyone for all you’ve done for EpicDuel, supporting it throughout these many years of development. It hasn’t been easy and we haven’t always made popular decisions concerning the direction of the game, but you’ve stuck with us in spite of everything. Because you believed in EpicDuel. You believed in us and helped the game endure as long as it has. How long can it last? Ultimately, it’s up to you. The lifeblood of EpicDuel has always been it’s players. As long as there are players eager for a duel, Delta V will be open for business. Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| January 06, 2017 Patch Notes - 1.6.70Features/Changes
Balance
Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| January 05, 2017 New Year New Update!Happy New Year, EpicDuelists! Here's to a new year with new beginnings, new challenges, and new triumphs! I'd like to congratulate our Epic gifters this year who blew away our expectations for generosity, especially ..Cosmic Emperor.. who received my very own Founder Armor! Wear it with pride!
Thanks again to everyone who participated in this event, even if you only gave one gift or just did something nice for a fellow player.
Update Time! For the first update of 2017, which should arrive tomorrow, we'll be making a few changes. First, and most noticeable, we'll be reverting the 15,000 Varium package back to 12,000. As soon as we update, you'll not be able to earn the Ultra-Rare Epic Supporter Achievement again, so if you've been on the fence, now's the time to act!
We'll also finally be removing the BioBeasts packages from the shop. The promotional items, including their cores, will also be removed from their in-game shops on Galatea and the Monkakazi until September 18, 2017, when they will be available for Credits as well as Varium.
War Online When we update, we will also reactivate the War, which should resume at Central Station. There will be a brief delay before the War region officially activates on Monday to make sure everyone is aware and prepared for it. Wars have been updated to have a shorter cooldown between, unlike the variable cooldown times of before which could stretch for months.
Balance Changes We'll also be addressing some balance issues with this update, including First Strike, Underdog, and Legendary Ranks!
EpicDuel Team 2017 What's on the agenda for 2017? We've been meeting with Artix and other team leads to determine the best direction to proceed for our personal growth and the good of the entire company. We'll post a Design Note concerning the outcome of those meetings tomorrow after the update. Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| November 23, 2016 Winter 2016 Update
Winter is coming and that means the return of EpicDuel's most anticipated event of the year: Gifting! Until then, you can stock up on returning seasonal rares available at Torgan and Edgar Boothe in Frysteland!
Since this is an extended weekend, we're offering an extended Power Weekend! That means starting midnight tonight, you'll earn Double XP and Credits until Monday! You'll need all the credits you can get for what's to come!
Coming Soon
As mentioned before, our annual gifting event is just around the corner, NEXT WEEK, in fact! This time, the #1 prize will be Nightwraith's own personal Founder Armor! The top placing players will receive the new Platinum Yeti morphs!
Other Updates Based on your feedback in the forums, we're including many more features, adjustments, and balance improvements that should shift some of the game's fundamentals for the better (hopefully!). Obviously, we can't incorporate every suggestion -- we don't have the time, resources, or engine flexibility to include them all -- but we can do our best to improve the longevity and fun-factor of the game as we head into 2017!
What kind of improvements are we making? I'll list a few below:
Improved Leveling Curve Many prominent players have remarked that one of EpicDuel's biggest problems in the early game is that it just takes too dang long to level up! We agree, so we're adjusting the leveling curve to allow players to reach the cap much faster (up to 3x faster) than before.
Founder Step-Down This feature request goes waaaaay back to the initial release of factions. With this feature, faction founders will be able to promote another faction member to become the new founder. The founder will be demoted to whatever status the promote player was. This feature has a multi-step confirmation process so it shouldn't be possible to "slip" and put a rando in charge of your prestigious faction.
Unbound Cores We will be introducing cores from promos past (excluding development phase items) as unbound cores. This means you will be able to buy and attach cores like Platinum's pride to any weapon you desire. We're doing this to give you some of the flexibilty and customization we promised at the start of Omega.
Fine Tuning We've adjusted many of the skills and cores in the game based on your suggestions. Because testing is still underway, we won't list the numbers here just yet. We will likely do another balance pass after the Gifting event goes live and more battle feedback can be gathered.
Juggernaut and 2v2 Balance Matching in these modes has been a pain for awhile now, but we're testing some solutions to improve this situation. Juggernauts will receive a buff similar to Underdog which will scale with their opponents. 2v2 partners can also receive a modified Underdog buff that's been customized for this mode.
More Development is ongoing and we'll cram as many features and items as we can in what time we have. We though about doing a promotional package, but realized that introducing several new cores in the midst of all the other balance changes would probably not be the best idea. Expect a follow-up release after the initial Gifting launch for fixes, adjustments, and a few features that didn't quite make the initial cut.
Happy Thanksgiving and Duel On! Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| October 21, 2016 EpicDuel Balance SuggestionsHello! I'm dropping by to let you know that with several major BioBeasts updates under our belts, we plan to pivot towards EpicDuel development for the upcoming holiday season. We are planning a large release for late Novemeber/early December that will include, among many other things, balance changes. Please let us know what you'd like to see us address in this forum topic! I can't promise miracles, or that every concern will be addressed fully, but we'll do as much as we can before the release. We'll keep you updated as development continues. Thanks in advance for your feedback! Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| October 10, 2016 AQ3D Open Beta Starts October 18th (ish)!Starting October 18th-ish, 2016 It is almost here! This October, everyone will be able to join us as we continue creating AdventureQuest 3D. The release date says "-ish" because that is when we will start rolling it out onto each platform (STEAM PC/MAC, APPLE, ANDROID) and some will go live before others. Being able to login play your character on the same server as your friends no matter what device you are using was our dream goal... and it is happening! A True Cross-Platform MMORPG... Watch the official OPEN BETA Launch Date Announcement Trailer. Coming in Open Beta!Thank you to everyone who made amazing project a reality. It is October.... and we have two magnificently dark and exciting releases coming your way. Also here is a few things to expect! SHADOW SKULL TOWERFirst, is ShadowSkull Tower which will open with the launch. Players will need the best items in the game and to work together to battle to the top of the tower. The floors of the tower are randomized. Some floors are puzzles, some kill-alls, and some mini-boss battles. At the top of ShadowSkull Tower you will find the NecroKnight-- and he has a surprise. Mogloween & Haunted HouseWe will be celebrating our yearly tradition of Mogloween this year... but this is the first year it will be in 3D! Town will go dark and along with glowing pumpkins, a haunted house will appear. More on this coming later. Game Re-balancing & New ItemsWe have been carefully reading your feedback and re-re-re-re-balancing the game. This includes changes to crafting and being able to buy items with gold. Will it be perfect on launch? Heck no! But it will be an amazing start to a game that we are dedicated to working on as long and as hard as the previous two AdventureQuests-- which for the record are STILL updated every week :D Volcanic Dragon AreaIn November, we will be opening up our next major area, a volcanic region filled with Dragons... and Dragonslayers. and possibly Dragonslayer slayers. And Forseeably Dragonslayer Slayer Slayers. Closed Beta BadgeIf you have participated in Closed Beta, you will be getting a shiny new badge for your character page. Want in Closed Beta before it ends? Then good news... follow my Artix Krieger Twitter and keep a look out for Early Access Key give aways. Crunch time!Thank you for making this all possible. As you can imagine, our small team is going to be in hyper GO MODE these next two weeks! So much to do!!!! If you were not with us for the launch of previous games like DragonFable or AdventureQuest Worlds then hang onto your helms, it is about to get crazy. As the veterans will tell you things will change fast and frequently. It is vital that we go into Open Beta so that we can release the public version of the Apple iOS (Phone/Tablet) versions. Then, with AdventureQuest 3D playing on all of our 1st round targeted devices, and with your help, we can begin the sprint to LIVE RELEASE-- which I would love to see us hit Summer of 2017. QUESTION: What device to you think you will play AdventureQuest 3D the most from? (Steam, Apple iOS, Android) Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| September 01, 2016 Biological Warfare and TLaPD
Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| August 25, 2016 Live Now: BioDome Battle
The Biological Preserve War is currently underway. Login and play now to turn the tide in the latest flashpoint in this ongoing conflict!
The Biological Preserve is the last bastion for all that is green and growing on Delta V, and it is being used as a weapon by those occupying the region. By using Davarril's research on mind-controlling Spores, Exiles have engineered a massive tree to become a spore-launching factory, spreading spores throughout the region.
The Legion, under the watch of Cinderella, are attempting to stop this threat with Purifiers. These devices launch spores to counteract the Corruption Spores launched by the Corrupted Tree.
Exiles will attempt to use this to their advantage by planting Corruption Spore on the Purifiers, infesting them and turning them into Corruption Spore factories.
The only way to stop the spread of the spores is to cleanse the Corrupted Tree. When it is fully cleansed, the Legion will take control of the Biological Preserve. If the Exiles prevail and infest the Purifiers, the region will fall fully under Exile control.
Davarril has been moved one screen to the left of the Corrupted Tree. You'll find him next to the Ammunition Depot stocked with war drops. Davarril's mind still isn't right from the Arborgeddon event so he won't be much help to you. Good luck, and war on!
DragonCon!
Wow! Hard to believe a year has gone by, but it's time again for Artix's pilgrimage to DragonCon! That means it's time for an updated survival guide written by Cysero! For those of you who just want to jump straight to the point, the Artix panel information is as follows:
Hopefully you can stop by if you're in the area!
Meanwhile, in EpicDuel... To celebrate DragonCon, the classic Dragon Weapons have returned to Delta V:
Visit the Slayer in the Barrens Outpost to browse dozens of phenomal draconic weapons! Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| August 12, 2016 Our Biggest BioBeasts Update EVER is LIVE! | ||
| July 29, 2016 Make sure you can play EpicDuelEnable Flash Player to log in to your account!We want to make sure all our heroes can continue to log in and battle on along side us, but over the last year, browsers like Chrome haved changed how they handle the Flash Player plug in. To make sure you are able to log in and play Artix Entertainment games, please do the following:
Instructions by browser typeEach browser has a different method for enabling the Flash Player plugin, but lucky for you, we've got a list of each of the main ones below!
Internet Explorer
Edge
Firefox
Chrome
Safari
More helpYou can also refer to Adobe's help articles for more information:
Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| July 22, 2016 West Naval Yard War!
After a long period of relative peace, war has returned to the West Naval Yard! For those who've forgotten the minutia of this particular region's conflict, here's a brief refresher.
Prepare for War!
The West Naval Yard is the latest flashpoint in the ongoing alignment War. Battle for dominance and new prizes now as the war has already gone live!
The Legion forces have control of the full-restored Pirate Flagship sitting ominously in the Naval Yard.
Obviously, this could be very bad for Exiles, so they'll use Naval Shells and Super Naval Shells to bombard the ship from turrets located around the Naval Yard.
Legion forces on the shore can take out the turrets with Naval Bombs and Super Naval Bombs.
Pick up Super Naval Shell and Super Naval Bombs at the Ammo Depot located right of Big Tuna! Good luck, and war on! Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| June 09, 2016 Infernal Aftermath 2016
This Friday, the coveted Pyro Fly buzzes back to the Infernal Mines! Claim this powerful bot from Kraggor and unleash it's potent special attack against unsuspecting foes to strip them of a random skill. The quantity will be limited, so make haste to grab this incredible insectoid!
Infernal War Aftermath
Another war has ended, and this time the Legion emerged victorious, seizing control of the Delta Vault! AO, the designer of the War Prize, created more weapons that we could offer with the current system so I decided to offer them as prize code items. The winners still received a unique item, but the rest could be claimed by anyone lucky enough to snag a code. These codes were offered without any warning so to give more players a fighting chance to grab this gorgeous gear, I'm offering scheduled prize code drops starting tomorrow through the weekend.
Below is a complete schedule. All times are in Easter Standard Time. The codes will be issued from my Nightwraith Twitter account. Each batch will be small so as to make the players who get the items still feel special. Infernal Sword P -Friday June 10 4AM 10AM 4PM 10PM Infernal Sword E - Saturday June 11 4AM 10AM 4PM 10PM Infernal Battlegear P - Sunday June 12 4AM 10AM 4PM 10PM I will post an hour in advance to give you a heads up. Times are all in Easter Standard Time, and I will not translate the times to your specific time. Think of it as an opportunity to work on your Google-fu. Good luck, and happy hunting! There's no perfect way to distribute codes, somebody will always miss out, but hopefully this will give a fair chance to some who missed the first batch. If you've already received the weapons, please be courteous and let other players claim them!
Power Weekend
After you've claimed all the prize code items, you can power them up during Power Weekend (starting Friday). This means double XP and credits all weekend long. This is a great way for players of all alignments and factions to ascend in level and economic status to better contribute to the next war event, which will be the Overlord Facility! Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| May 12, 2016 Friday the 13th!The Frysteland War has concluded and the Exiles have prevailed, maintaining control of that frigid, but vital, outpost. After a few weeks of cooldown, the War will reignite in a much warmer region: The Infernal Mines! This was a close fight, closer than we've seen in awhile. The outcome of the next region will be anyone's guess!
The myserious menace of Delta V, Caden, has just received a stock of interesting new Friday the Thirteenth weapons and items! These limited quantity items, crafted by the most demented individuals in the star system (Guest Artists Theon, Assassin Order, Deuce, and Valoroth) emit a threatening aura of dread destined to strike fear in the hearts of anyone unfortunate enough to be on the sharp end.
The Dark Omen weapons crafted by the legendary Charfade will come pre-equipped with the vicious active core Dark Omen. This core will cause you to strike your target, inflicting a Curse-like effect, diminishing them in physical size while debuffing Support. Because this skill is similar to the aforementioned Curse core, it cannot be stacked on top of Curse or Curse Aura.
These items will be available tomorrow, Friday the 13th, along with the returning Friday the 13th achievement. They will be limited quantity so once they're gone, they'll stay gone until the next Friday the 13th which looks like...January 13, 2017? Yikes! Don't let this opportunity pass! Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| April 20, 2016 EpicDuel State of the Game Report
Howdy!
A few months ago, I made a huge post about the status of BioBeasts and the future of EpicDuel. I explained that BioBeasts would still need more attention for features and fixes, and the best course of action for EpicDuel would be investigating a downloadable client to future-proof the game against the dwindling support of the Flash plugin.
Here we are, several months later. How did we do? BioBeasts has seen a substantial uptick in installations from the time of that old post.
This chart represents the steady increase in total installs of BioBeasts on Android since launch. While we would have obviously liked to see those numbers climb much higher much sooner, we’re encouraged that the the installation rate has been steadily increasing despite little advertising for BioBeasts outside the AE network. A steady climb is generally a healthier chart for sustained growth than a steep spike that drops off quickly. “Wait!” you may think. “Why haven’t you advertised?”
Advertising is INCREDIBLY expensive. Mega-hit games like Clash of Clans can justify spending millions on hiring famous actors for Super Bowl commercials because they know empirically that for every dollar they spend, they’ll get much more from each player they gain. BioBeasts doesn’t yet have the features or content to make such a huge investment, but we are nearly there. We’ve made great strides since launch to add features that boost retention, but we still need to improve monetization in order to justify such an investment. Over the past few months, we’ve built leaderboards, new beasts, survival mode, and (soon) cloud saving, but with each new feature, we brainstorm a dozen more based on player feedback and our own experiences. As with every game, enthusiastic players have given us an endless wish-list of features from PvP to upgradeable beasts to new attack options and more. Our initial projection of early April for BioBeasts being feature complete was ambitious. Given the added complexity, the update process with mobile is much slower than the browser games we’re used to.
Just to give you an idea, BioBeasts is supported on over 10,000 devices on Android! Each devices brings with it a unique set of challenges, including differences in resolution and hardware.
Game developers at all levels are notoriously inaccurate at estimating the time costs of features. A lot has to do with the amount of unknowns involved in tackling something completely new: A perfect example occurred recently when we received notice from Apple that we needed to implement changes to BioBeasts cloud saving functionality as soon as possible. This news performed an epic table-flip maneuver on our timeline and sidetracked the development of other important features and improvements. Such events are nearly impossible to anticipate.
What does this mean? BioBeasts development will continue until we are completely satisfied with the state of the game. At that point, we will conduct a large-scale marketing campaign to put it in front of as many eyeballs as possible. That will be the best chance the game has to fully succeed. Our immediate priority is cloud saving. Many players have indicated they are hesitant to play until they can be assured their progress will be safe. We understand that the mobile marketplace is extremely competitive so our window of opportunity to promote a feature complete iteration of BioBeasts is small. We are by no means operating at a “leisurely” development pace. Key areas we’re looking to improve include:
In the meantime, the best long-term direction for EpicDuel remains a downloadable client to future-proof against the dwindling reach of Flash. Another massive, Omega-scope overhaul would be exciting, but would both 1) have a massive time requirement and 2) not address the platform problems of Flash. EpicDuel 2 would also be exciting, but it also wouldn’t address the outstanding issues of EpicDuel. On that front, we’ve actually had some recent successes. This week, Titan and Yorumi managed to create working prototypes for client versions of AQW and EpicDuel.
This is big news because it means 1) EpicDuel will be future-proof against the death of Flash, 2) we can potentially be supported by a robust, popular platform like Steam, and 3) the client may even perform better than the current browser version! We remain cautiously optimistic on this project as there are still many unanswered questions and rework required to get the games to 100% functionality (older games written in AS 2 may have more trouble converting), but it’s progressing well and seems to have the most potential of all solutions we investigated.
A downloadable version of EpicDuel could, indeed, go fas. I wish I could say, “Get ready for EpicDuel Zeta!” or “EpicDuel 2 2016” and get applause and excited emojis from the forums and Twitter, but I can’t. We remain committed to the long-term success and development of EpicDuel, but BioBeasts will continue to hold the majority of our development focus for the near future. The bottom line is BioBeasts’ success is the best chance EpicDuel has for a bright future. Despite this turbulent present, we will do everything we can to ensure EpicDuel and BioBeasts can be enjoyed by players for years to come! Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| April 14, 2016 Power Weekend War and More!
Last week, the Legion broke an impressive streak held by the Exiles to seize control of the Delta V's illustrious capital, Fortune City. This was the closest war yet and it was a geniune thrill to watch the last desperate volleys of bombs and batteries befor the event concluded. Both sides fought hard, but I like the think Alydriah would be proud of her Legion, if she were capable of feeling such things. The next stop in the war will be a departure from the bustling metropolis to the frigid wilderness of Frysteland! Can the Exiles reaffirm their dominance or will the Legion extending their victory to the farther reaches of the world.
Power Weekend
This weekend, starting tomorrow (Friday) we will be activating a Power Weekend. This means double XP and credits all weekend long. This is a great way for players of all alignments and factions to ascend in level and economic status to better contribute to the next war event!
What Else? We know you're probably wondering what the status is with the current development of EpicDuel and BioBeasts. We're writing a much larger post to address those issues which will be posted soon! Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| March 18, 2016 Power Weekend and War Preview
Since there's no update today, it's time for another EpicDuel Power Weekend! Get double experience and credits all weekend long as you prepare for the reactivation of the next crucial war region: Fortune City!
For those of you who missed the event in the last war cycle, Fortune City is currently powered by an Energy Core in Alydriah's Spire. Rather than destroying the Core, the Attackers are determined to drain the Core to fuel their own war efforts using Sappers located around the city. The defenders will defend the core by destroying the Sappers. The citizens of Fortune City will follow whomever can keep the lights on. Will the Legion reign, or will the Exiles wipe the traces of Legion influence in Fortune City?
Easter Treats! Next week, in addition to activating a new war region, we will be releasing new seasonal Easter/Springtime rares crafted with care by our amazingly talented Guest Artists!
Gifts from Dage! In celebrations of their birthdays, Dage the Evil and Laken have been kind enough to lend their exquisite talents to EpicDuel for a restock of Dage's shop and the Legendary Shop in Titan's Peak! You may even be able to test your mettle again Dage himself!
Murdoc's Madness! In addition to loads of new loot and a war event, we're releasing a small, but interesting mission chain starring everyone's favorite ill-tempered Yeti Trainer, Murdoc! Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| February 26, 2016 War GoofSo it would seem that in our recent update I switched the IDs for the war drop and the war prize in the database! Obviously, this was not intended and a VERY big problem so we stopped the servers as soon as possible.
While we were down, we corrected the error in the database. We then found all the players who received the item. Before we removed the prizes, we reimbursed the players for any credits spent on upgrading it. If anyone equipped cores to it, we returned those to the player's inventory. If anyone equipped the armor, it was removed and reset to default. Sorry for the inconvenience, confusion, and brief delight/outrage this may have caused! Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| February 18, 2016 The Dread War Returns!
This Friday, for the first time in over 2 years, the Dread Plains will be contested once again! Collect Dread Bombs and Dread Shells to gain or maintain ownership of the Control Array!
The winning alignment of this region will also be eligible to receive a new, rare war prize!
The Legion took a beating in the last war cycle, as the Exiles rallied and overwhelmed their ranks. Can the Legion surprise this time and use their brutal tactics to unseat the Exiles?
Prepare for Celtic Gear
The coveted Celtic Gear will be available from Naomi March 1st! Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| January 18, 2016 BioBeasts Launch DateAfter several months of rigorous development, BioBeasts is finally ready to erupt from its containment cell at the Underground Lab and escape to the iOS and Android App stores! We’re extremely excited and proud to officially announce the launch date: WEDNESDAY JANUARY 20, 2016
Woah! Woah! What is this Bye-Oh-Beasts? I’m glad you asked! If you don't want to read the whole FAQ, BioBeasts a challenging new free single-player action game for Android and iOS! You are a powerful mutant beast battling through a terrifying laboratory run by merciless mechanical guards. Defend yourself against endless hordes of robots, lab defenses, and hulking bosses as you claw, bite, blast, and bash your way to freedom! Unlock new beasts with unique powers, and upgrade potent mutations to experiment with for endless variety!
Meet the Team
BioBeasts was created mainly by the EpicDuel Team, but nearly everyone at Artix Entertainment had a hand in the project, whether it was contributing artwork, Unity expertise, testing, or simply helping us spread awareness! Why BioBeasts?
BioBeasts is nearly ready to launch, but we need your help for it to succeed! When we first started BioBeasts, we wanted a way to learn the ropes in Unity and mobile development while incorporating some familiar EpicDuel elements. We knew a huge multiplayer game was out of scope for such a project so we narrowed the focus of the project to an intense, challenging action game with surprising depth.
Our goal with BioBeasts was to create a game that was a counterpoint to the current trend in mobile games that harkens back to a time when games focused on skill and reflexes. BioBeasts captures that classic feel of intense, old-school arcade games that could be understood in seconds, but took days to master. With BioBeasts, there aren’t any timers or energy systems or social gimmicks to interrupt or limit your play that have become so common in the mobile gaming generation. You can play as much as you want, whenever you want!
Bring the THUNDER!
One of the biggest challenges new mobile games face is simply getting the word out! Fortunately, we have many tools at our disposal to extend our reach as far as possible. Did you know you can dedicate your own social media reach to support the BioBeasts game launch? It's super simple and 100% FREE: Check out the Help Share BioBeasts campaign on ThunderClap Select which social platforms you want to dedicate to the BioBeasts launch: When the game is ready, we'll smash the GO button and our message will reach tons of players! Like BioBeasts? Want to know more? Following our development blog for the latest BioBeasts news: Follow @BioBeasts on Twitter: Become a fan of BioBeasts on Facebook: Watch our latest development videos: Join us on Google+: Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| January 14, 2016 Central Station War!
At long last, next week, the highly anticipated Central Station War goes LIVE! Join the Legion or Exile forces to gain or maintain control of Central Station to win incredible prizes and secure control through the next war cycle.
Central Station has been Delta V's starting zone since Alpha, and it has been oddly calm throughout the War. Legion and Exile forces have coexisted here for many years, but that calm is finally coming to an end. This time, rather than the objective being a superweapon, it's something far more powerful: the Communications Array. This array controls the messages for all newcomes to Delta V returning from the Void or recouperating after running dangerous missions. Those who control the array will control the hearts and minds of Delta V's most vulnerable citizens!
The defenders will commandeer the Communications Array in the middle of the station and seek to destroy Propaganda Towers broadcasting unsanctioned materials, while the attackers will attempt to subvert the alignment propaganda being spewed towards newcomers with some of their own.
This war will be the final event in the current war cycle. What will happen after the Central Station War ends? The current cycle will end, but then the next cycle will start (after a brief cooldown period) and will loop back to the Dread Plains, where the former winners of that region will have to defend their region against being lost to the opposition! The next cycle will feature new prizes and incorporate all the War balance changes we added throughout the first cycle. Are you ready...for WAR? WAR ON! Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| January 06, 2016 Coming Attractions 2016
New year, new list of goals and milestones. 2015 was a hard year with a lot of late nights and steep challenges, but much was learned and accomplished, enough to prepare us to attack 2016 head-on!
AQ3D Kickstarter 200% FUNDED!
This is old news, but still fantastic! I’ll just use Cysero’s post since he put it so eloquently:
The incredible success of the AQ3D Kickstarter is an incredible opening to 2016! “Why is this good for any other game,” you ask? “How does it affect EpicDuel?” Well, Artix Entertainment is more than one product: it’s a network of games. When one game does REALLY well, the traffic to all the other games increases. This benefit extends to our mobile games, including BioBeasts, of course. If AQ3D delivers on the promises of the Kickstarter, there’s no reason it won’t be orders of magnitude more successful than AQW, which could mean a new breath of life into the legacy games as new players discover them for the first time while veterans return after many months or years away, their hearts brimming with nostalgia.
Gifting Conclusion
This week, the 2015-2016 gifting event reaches its conclusion. We had a bit of a hiccup as addressed in the previous post, but we’re still very impressed with the amount of gifting in this second iteration of the popular event. After the event concludes, we will award the prizes as soon as we are able. Keep in mind that this is a manual, not automatic, process so it will take some time to distribute the prizes.
BioBeasts
BioBeasts is so, so very close to releasing. After many weeks of polish and overcoming technical setbacks from Unity, BioBeasts is probably as ready as a game could be to launch. We were hoping to possibly release before Christmas, but since even a company as huge as Apple takes a vacation around that time, we weren’t able to get a final build approved.
Yes, we were already approved, but if you change anything in the game, even nudging a logo or fixing a typo in the game, a new build must be submitted for launch approval. This is part of the reason it’s so difficult to put an exact launch date on mobile titles. The Android process is much easier, but we feel it’s crucial to the success of the game that we launch on iOS and Android simultaneously. In the name of full-transparency, let me show you the final tasks remaining for BioBeasts:
Central Station War The Central Station War is still coming later this month, as Legion and Exile collide once again in Delta V’s classic starting zone. The defenders will commandeer the communications array in the middle of the station and seek to destroy Propaganda Towers broadcasting unsanctioned materials, while the attackers will attempt to subvert the alignment propaganda being spewed towards newcomers with some of their own.
What Comes Next? After the launch of BioBeasts, we expect a few content updates to add a few “wish list” features and implement the inevitable, but hopefully minimal, bug fixes. We will do everything we can to promote it through every channel available to us so that will consume much of our time immediately after launch. What happens after that depends greatly on the success of the game. We have plenty of ideas from the testers and in-house to potentially expand the scope and depth of the game if it really takes off. As for EpicDuel, we are continuing development as planned. Our Guest Team is actively conceptualizing future events, writing new mission chains, reorganizing existing content, and preparing to launch a new War. New Years and Heartbreaker gear will also return as planned. Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| January 04, 2016 Gifting Event Update
Greeting EpicDuelists! How was your holiday? Our gifting event has inspiring tremendous generosity from our playerbase. Unfortunately, as sometimes happens with contests with high stakes, certain participants will do whatever it takes to win. If you’re glued to the leaderboard, you will notice a change in the next hour. Thanks to research from the Help Team, we determined that several players were taking advantage of a third party exploit to earn Artix Points. This exploit has been patched, but not before the players climbed the gifting leaderboard. Since a prize as lofty as Alpha Gear is at stake, specifically my Alpha Gear, the players who participated in this exploit will have their achievements deleted and thus be removed from the gifting leaderboard. We discussed a proper course of action for quite awhile today and didn’t arrive at this decision lightly; we didn’t want to disrupt the contest, but we also didn’t want to award prizes to players who used an exploit to gain an advantage. Those who are punished will still be able to gift and receive gifts for the remainder of the event, but with all current gifting progress will be reset to 0. Remember, if an offer sounds to good to be true, it probably is. NEVER share your account information, and NEVER use off site services not supported or verified by AE! Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| December 23, 2015 Power Holiday!
The holiday festivities are upon us once again, and we want to ensure the holiday cheer is thoroughly spread throughout Delta V. To that end, we're keeping the gifting spirit going with a 4-day Power Weekend (starts midnight EST). Get Double XP and Credits from Thursday December 24th to the end of Sunday December 27th. So far this year's gifting event has BLOWN AWAY our expectations. It looks like RomanianSanta is eager to spread holiday cheer (and snag my Alpha Gear)!
Be sure to check the #edcodes and #edgifting tags on Twitter to find the most popular rooms for gifting!
Gifts? What Gifts? Remember, your gifts won't get better if you wait to open them. In fact, they'll expire 60 days after you receive them! There's not reason to hoard them so why wait? There's not even any gift wrapping to dispose or impossible-to-open plastic cases to rip through! These gifts are 100% eco-friendly!
Where BioBeasts?
BioBeasts is still moving forward at full speed. New builds have been pushed out to testers to tear apart over the holidays, though not many bugs have been reported at this time. We would love to have released before Christmas, but Apple completely closes it's submission process on the 22nd. Since it can take up to 2 weeks for approval of a final submission, a pre-holiday launch was impossible. The Android version is nearly ready, but we feel a simultaneous launch is the best way to maximize our marketing reach, rather than split attention between 2 versions of the game. We'd like to extend our thanks to our hundreds of Beta testers who have helped make BioBeasts one of the most stable and polished mobile games released by Artix Entertainment! Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| December 11, 2015 Patch Notes - 1.6.57
NEW CHANGES/FEATURES:
Bug Fixes:
Tags: Nightwraith | ||
| December 08, 2015 AQ3D's Kickstarter hits 75% of its goal!We are almost at 100% and full funding!The AQ3D Kickstarter campaign just broke $150,000 raised! That means we're 75% of the way to our goal, and only need $50K to go until the finish line. Thanks to every backer and everyone who can't be a backer but is helping us spread the word and get this game the funding it needs!
More Ways to Help Spread the Word about AQ3DWant to help #AQ3D's #Kickstarter become a staff pick? Email STORIES@KICKSTARTER.COM with your AE stories and why AQ3D is important to you! Becoming a staff pick would help AQ3D hit the goal before the deadline and become a reality, but they need to hear from YOU! Other ways to share:
Check out Zach Storch's AQ3D Video!Zach Storch, long-time friend of Artix Entertainment, author of Za'nar (a wicked-cool young adult fantasy novel), Lore's own King of the Nerds, and all-around great guy and gamer is super-hyped about AQ3D and created a video to help spread the word. You can check it out by clicking here or on the image below!
Tags: Nightwraith AQ3D Kickstarter 75 Zach Storch | ||
