After quite a few mishaps, and a lot of real-life related delay, I am happy to announce that the first milestone to Beta 6 is finally ready.
As was said in the initial description, this release is not anything like Beta 6 should be in terms of game or interface. It is meant to be a test of the system’s architecture. As Tim’s preview pointed out, a few things have changed – some in the right direction, some … not.
The release can be found at http://b6m.legacyworlds.com ; it is open for registration as of now. The game itself will start on July, the 15th.
While the most important new feature in Milestone 1 is the minute-by-minute game updates, quite a few improvements made it into the release. For example, M1 offers customisable e-mail reminders for various types of messages, a better planet overview, an integrated bug tracking system… On the other hand, a great many of Beta 5′s features have been removed (trusted allies, forums, beacons…) or simplified (research management, fleets…) The interface itself is much simpler, relying solely on good old HTML. While the new rules are listed on the game’s site, a short, general introduction will be posted on this blog on Wednesday.
The game, however, is not what Milestone 1 is about. There is absolutely no code shared between Beta 5 and this new release (with the exception of some parts of the interface, obviously). It is a complete rewrite, in a different language, using a different architecture, which will be described in a later post.
The new version was designed from the start with ease of administration in mind (which was really not the case with Beta 5): it can support administrators with various sets of privileges, and most of the system can be affected through the administration interface. Because this is an important part of the work that was done here, and because most of you are unlikely to ever see this interface, there will be a post here on the subject.
Last but not least, reaching Milestone 1 means that… well, work will start on Milestone 2. However, because I do not have much time for it, it will be released in quite a while – a consequence of that being that it should include more features than originally indicated. Another, more important consequence is that Milestone 2 will actually be what was announced as Milestone 3, in order to make the game a little more interesting. Of course, expect yet another post on the matter.
In the meantime, enjoy M1!