Slitherine

Hello guys,

First of all, let me tell you that we know it was a loong time from the last update, and I want to personally apologize for this. Is no one else's fault than me, as I tend to get buried deep into my personal coding cave, and not get out unless I'm forcefully dragged out by some event or the other.

Beside that, the main reason for the relative silent is the fact that we're very deep into the last period of the development cycle, mainly consisting in polishing (the GUI, the input) and resolving whatever hard crashes were still present into the code at this point (mainly caused by some aspects of the file formats, replay and MP communication code). And as you can guess, there's not much which can be seen at this point as most of the coding we're adding is deep under the hood of the game, without any consistent and visible outcome (excepting the lack of fixed crashes).

Other than that, the dynamic bar code is finished and the final form of the BG control buttons (face changing, form changing, evade behavior changing, etc) was decided and implemented into the game. There are many alternative BG control buttons forms we've worked on in order to pick the best suited, and while we've decided on which is the best from our point of view, the rest of the alternative control forms won't be deleted, but just disabled (in order to can be present some of them as alternative options later on). The work on the remaining AI code was temporary halted for a while, waiting for finishing the methods to actions conversion (mainly replay and file formats related), which is almost over by now, allowing us to resume the work on the AI starting with the beginning of the next week.

Digging through the code while looking to fix crashes also meant that the basis for some new features was added in (like for example the possibility of dynamic computations the terrain movements costs with applications like a dynamic weather system ).

A new beta build containing the new controls will be released as soon as we've finished with the major crashes towards the beginning of the next week.

Thank you for your patience and support,
dan

Thanks very much for the update, Dan. I am sure we are all very relieved to hear that work is still continuing on the new version. When there is a long break in communication it is inevitable that some of us begin to wonder if the project is in trouble, or even has been abandoned. It is my belief that this game can still be absolutely massive in the future, particularly if something like a campaign editor can eventually be added to it.

well, regarding the communication, guys.. You know that you can always reach over to me via PM in here or email (with the address from the beta readme) in order to drag me out of my cage in case I'm not giving any sign of life and you need anything from me

Thanks for the update Dan!

Will watch for the update. Been too long since I kicked some Mouser-derriere!

Thanks for the work your doing , Ian

I join the others... Thank you for all the hard work. Looking forward to the next beta.
Dave

It's been 2 months. Have I missed the next release candidate or has nothing happened in all this time?

Blathergut wrote:It's been 2 months. Have I missed the next release candidate or has nothing happened in all this time?

Nothing has been released within that time.
Ian

Hello guys,

I've just got the notification of a new post in this thread, so here's a very very short update (as I am in the middle of coding something pretty complicated): this Friday was the first day two AI's clashed against each other in FoG(U) ever. Actually in any FoG game (as the old FoG(RB) version doesn't provide an AI against AI feature). AI was coded from the beginning having this in mind: namely that the AI should be able to play in all positions a human player could (and allowing for all sort of interesting situations, like AI joining and playing MP games, or like scenarios in which the player only controls a portion of his side's army, having an allied AI controlling an allied nation and of course, another AI(s) controlling the opposite side's nations).

The battle was Marathon (of course), and the game went on until the end, without any kind of crashes and/or errors. Oh, and the persians were routed badly..

That being said, I'm working on refining the AI movements, and then add the deployment code, and the first AI will be ready for testing. I might even release a new beta build without waiting for the deployment code.

Cheers,
dan

Well done, Dan. We are still here waiting patiently.

well, the latest weeks were some loong weeks, and I was totally burned out (for a second time from the start of the project) at some point during the latest part of April and starting of May period. I've gathered myself and I've made a lot of progress in the latest weeks.

the latest build has all sort of new features you guys never saw or felt yet (button bars relying on actions, GUI features like hiding the whole game interface, the AI, stability, optimizations, and so on)

Thanks for the update Dan ,
Great news
Ian

Thanks for info, looking forward for the next release candidate.

Thanks for the report Dan. It is greatly appreciated. Sounds like the long wait is going to be well worth it.

Any further progress or approaching beta?

yes, towards the end of this week

Looks like I'll be reinstalling FOG soon!

Great news, look forward to trying it out!