Bettering the Beta

I'm pleased to say a lot's happened since the Beta release. Not only did I have valuable feedback and encouragement, but I've also now addressed all the bugs that were reported to me (fingers crossed!).

It doesn't end there though. There's also been some changes since the Beta meaning that the playtesters will see new things should they decide to play the final version, something I strongly hope they choose to do as I'm convinced a second play through may reveal things they did not realise were present first time round.

Allow me to elaborate...

• There are at least 2 side quests I can think of that can easily be missed should the player fail to take a certain route in a conversation.



• The success/failure of certain actions make the game behave differently later on. Nothing major, but enough to make the player stand up and take notice I think. The most noteable one being a brief interaction with an NPC in which he may either die or survive and move on. If he survives, he gets encountered later in the game and announces that he has dealt with some troublesome Orcs, with their bodies present as evidence. If he failed to survive, then the favour is of course impossible and the player is forced to deal with the Orcs themselves.
  


• There are several items in game that can alter the route of a conversation if held by a player. In one case ownership is not enough, with the item needing to be worn to influence a conversation later.
  


• Then of course there is the henchman, but I feel I've harked on about him too much already. Suffice to say that he has character, and will behave differently depending on what he thinks of the player. I dare say if someone chooses to play the game again they will be tempted to be deliberately horrible to him just to see his "flavour" change.

Although the game has a defined ending it steers toward, I am seriously considering making a subtle alternative based on the final henchman/player relationship. Nothing that will change the actual ending, but enough of a difference to give a nod to the player. I think that will depend on how long everything else takes. At the moment I have one conversation file and sidequest to finish, then I have to equip the scroll shops (a fairly big task because of the way the mythology works), then make the end movie and that should be it! There's still some work that the Hak file requires, but I may seriously consider shelving that as it's only really needed for a future chapter, and I feel this first installment has been too long in the making to postpone it further for the sake of a hak that will have no influence on it.

Other changes since the Beta include the completion of a scene involving a book that was only hinted at in the Beta. Quite some work has gone into it and I'm very pleased with the results. It all adds to the storyline nicely and includes an extra scene where the player summons something he has to converse with and then defeat, resulting in the obtaining of an object that further adds to the story and gives the player some temporary help in the form of a grateful ghostly warrior.

I've also implemented an extra building where the player can rest, fitting it in nicely without it feeling out of place. The atmosphere is on par with the rest of the module. Anyone who's played the beta should know I pay a lot of attention to the finer details.

For anyone intrested, I've created a project on the bioware forums where I hope to put some screencaps of a final play through at a later date.

That's all the news to date... I've got a conversation file to get back to. :)