Lots of things have been happening so I'll report on a few.
New Logo
One of the problems with having named your company 14 years ago, is that trends change.
While I have never really been able to change Ethereal Darkness Interactive (who uses interactive anymore, eh?);
I tend to use the more informal EDIGames when speaking about it.
One thing I do change, every half-decade or so, is the logo.
The last change was around...2009 and I felt it was time for an update.
It drops the moon & clouds imagery that It used since 2001 (since virtually everyone uses that logo combination); and goes for a simple clean look, with a customized font.
Revel Immortal Progress
I've continued to plug away at the large amount of work standing in the way of releasing the next version of Revel (with all of its awesome improvements).
A key feature which is just about done, is modification to Archon, which is the user account management system that we built.
...you know, the thing that stores all your save games; makes them accessible everywhere, and keeps track of what you purchased.
While the new revel GUI is rendered immediate mode; the Archon api is still retained mode DOM GUI, but that's okay it feels sort of like the Steam overlay when in use.
So, aside from having to make these changes due to changes in the Revel GUI; what are some benefits?
The first is that you won't need an account to try Revel during the early alpha requiring users to get an account beforehand was very beneficial in getting quality feedback of truly interested people.
However it illustrated the burden of having to provide pre-game materials (screenshots, gameplay video, etc. etc.) in front of the game itself.
One huge benefit of writing a game for the web is to get that instant-play ability; so now that will exist.
Note: At the moment... in order to save the progress of a game beyond a single game session (i.e. refreshing the browser); you will need to create an account. But you can create an account and save a game in progress without issue.
My hope however, is to also allow for device-saving, that is saving your game to local storage only, which wont require an account; but we'll see how that goes.
My plan for this weekend is to release an update to the version 22 sneak peek so people can test out some new features.
We'll see if that comes to pass.
-Raymond
