A year ago, CDO was still running in the Blender Game engine, and our vision for the game was very restrictive. The original plan for alpha 4, was to fix some of the bugs discovered in alpha 3, maybe work on improving the netcode, if that task wasn't too scary, and fix problems with some of the game systems like crafting in order to make gameplay more workable. Alpha 3 had gone better than expected, and was the first time people were able to connect and play around without too much hassle, but the gameplay was still largely missing. It was a good example of what the Blender Game engine could do, but we were all worried about how much more that engine could be pushed.

Around January 2007, using a new engine started to look very attractive. We weren't looking to greatly expand the game, merely to make the framerate smoother and the graphics nicer. We ran some tests in python-ogre, which was a new engine that would hopefully not require most of the game code to be rewritten. Pleased with the tests, we moved forward in that direction.

A few months later, and our new technology choice gave us more hope for the future, and rekindled some of our ideas that we had previously been holding back. Instead of having a limit on the amount of objects in a scene, we could go wild, and make the world much more dynamic. Some of our older shots from this time show and overabundance of stuff littering the landscape, (the landscape though still hadn't changed much from Alpha 3. In a short amount of time, the game had changed a great deal.

The beauty of our team though, is that even after long delays, we are always able to come back fresh and push forward with new energy, when life permits. This happened many times over the last year, and the game has improved immensely with each push.

Over the summer, the landscape was revamped with much better textures and a better texture technique. The creativity in scenery design is strong, and will only get stronger as we learn new techniques. On the gameplay side, trading and quests were added, which will support the economy and gameplay - as soon as content can fill in the blanks. The crafting system was also developed, with a large resource and tech tree which, although it needs much further refining, was the first sign of the gameplay we are striving to create.

The last few months after the summer have seen even more improvement. Several zones were added making the gameworld feel much larger, and ai creatures were finally implemented. With a small amount of work it would be possible to grind mobs, although that is not the direction we are planning on going. Fortunately, more can be done with the npc creatures than simply kill them, and we have much more planned in this regard. At this stage in the game, the foundation is nearing completeness, with the actual direction of the game very open.

Finally, the network code has moved from a dumb client to a smart client system. What this means, is that instead of always waiting for the server to respond before the client is updated, as much as possible the client will try and predict the outcome. Translated, this means it should be smooth and you shouldn't have to wait too long for the outcome of most actions. Walking around is very smooth, and you can watch a screenful of creatures moving about without it feeling laggy. Still more needs to be done in this area, but it is much better than it has been. Most of the time, it won't feel like a networked game at all.

About this time, our vision for what Alpha 4 should be changed. There are basically 2 paths we could take at this point. Release now, get people to come try it and find bugs, and then have everyone quit after a few weeks, like alpha 3, or continue to work on improving and refining the game, in order to make alpha 4 represent what we expect Crescent Dawn Online to eventually look like. Show something to folks that makes them realize what we are trying to eventually achieve.

It does us and CDO a disservice, I think to release it too early and allow people to form negative impressions of it, merely because it's not finished yet. I think we may have already made this mistake with previous alpha releases. So although the game has been invisible for over a year, we have changed our focus. Above all else, alpha 4 should be a polished, fun game, representing some fun things that CDO will offer not found in other games, and it should leave players wanting more and salivating until the next alpha release. More than ever before, the quality of our ideas are starting to become visible, but you have to know where to look. Just because we can see it, doesn't mean players will.

As soon as we believe that players will be able to at least hear whatever it is we are trying to communicate, will be a good time to actually look into the idea of another test release. At this point, that simply is not the case, and as far as bug testing goes, I just don't need to know what the bugs are at this point. It would greatly slow down our momentum, of which we have a lot.

So, thanks for listening, over the next few months I will be updating this page more often, with a new series I call "Feature Focus". Each few weeks I will post an article explaining in more detail one feature or system in Crescent Dawn, looking at the state of that feature in the current game, and possible directions we may go in the future. We have failed, I believe, at communicating our vision to the public, which is what this website ought to be about - at least until there is something to play which will be a large part of that communication.

Next week I will talk about crafting, so stay tuned!