Graphics overhaul + tutorial

We are working hard on the next release which will basically be a graphics overhaul. One of the things I can show you now are new fir trees. Here’s a screen but I should really show a video of this because these have new branch destruction effects. Also I rewrote the whole tree code. The first thing you’ll notice is that the trees fall down correctly without change of appearance.

Geti is producing more and more cool tiles and sprites. What you will see down here is part of new tutorial maps I am developing. I decided to make tutorials, not because there is a lot to learn in KAG, but because I thought they will be fun. Tutorials will be like a mini singleplayer experience. I think I shouldn’t even call it a tutorial. So expect this to be a fun part of KAG, especially for new players.

 

Premium account pre-orders are going well. Already half of the 100 are gone!
There are some questions about them, specifically availability. The only thing that you can use now is the map editor although you need a map editor code. I will send these out this week. Sorry for delaying it, we’re just madly busy and the 53+ accounts have sold really quick. 

The test version will be still available for everyone until all pre-orders are sold. After that and proper premium account logging is coded I will lock the test version. This is to ensure there is enough people available to play. So hurry up if you want to go premium before everyone else (click).

MM

Gold Servers Premium Access

Due to community request (forum thread) we are taking pre-orders for Gold Servers Access.

What are Gold Servers?

Gold servers will basically be normal KAG servers but only, so called premium players, that have paid for access be able to play on them. Pre-orders will be taken until the functionality is made and ready, which should be in about 2 weeks.

What’s in it for you?

1. You get to play with an elite group of true KAG fans
   (better, more fun matches with players that have learned the game and love the game)


2. Griefing will be probably nonexistent since doing that will mean account banning and loss of money


3. You can thank us developers for making this free game + help to pay for all the server bills

How to get it?

We decided for start to take a small amount of money, but enough to not allow everyone. That is 9$. This amount will rise in the future if the demand goes up. To buy it now you’ll need a PayPal account or credit card.

Premium accounts are limited!

In the beginning there will be just 2 servers: one US based and one European.
To make sure everyone fits and has a guaranteed playing slot the amount of premium players is limited to 100.

This means, hurry up before they all get snatched and reserve your place now!

BUY NOW or JUST READ MORE ABOUT IT + CHECKOUT THE BONUSES + FAQ

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[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wlPIErq7gQ?feature=oembed&w=500&h=374]

A preview (work-in-progress) of new improved tilesets, clouds system, separated background & foreground, new lighting model and hand-painted parallax backgrounds (watch in HD to see new gold glitter).

Notice that this is the first time I’ve recorded at 100% scale and super smooth. This is because the graphics are fully optimized now and fast!

(Source: https://www.youtube.com/)

About lag

1. Some server owners set their player count to 32 but their servers can’t take that much. This is a cause of big lag.
   Server owners! Set the player limit to less if your server lags! (variable: sv_maxplayers)


2. I need to make a servers list with ping sort so people don’t join a server far away.


3. We need some Australian and Japanese servers!


4. I will code an anti-lag technique for knights which should fix all of their issues.


5. There are some bugs that look like characters are falling down when in fact they don’t. This needs to be fixed and will improve archer combat.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73ky-DS8ge8?feature=oembed&w=500&h=374]

KAG Time Lapse made by Snoopicus. Be sure to see the second part in the suggestions.

I love videos from players. So if you have one send me the links and I’ll put it up here! (post in comments/forums or e-mail me mm[at]thd.vg)

(Source: https://www.youtube.com/)

Right, so the plan for the next release cycle is to polish the aesthetics on everything that we can.

We’re calling it the “Eyecandy” build and hopefully it’ll make KAG a little more presentable, and a little more visually informative as well.

As you can see from the preview image, dirt is a lot darker and less chunky, which should make mining a little less of a guessing game for new players. That shot doesn’t have the newly updated castle tiles in it but shows one of the draft background layers in effect (though incorrectly scaled, that’s getting fixed next time MM gets a chance).

We’re also going to give the option of using scaling effects on the game - an algorithm similar to hq2x is being used on that preview shot.

Changes are also planned to the HUD and all the actors and structures are getting given a once over to make them stand out a little more from terrain.

In short, KAG will be prettier in a few weeks!

I’m recoding a fair amount of rendering code at the moment. First of all it will be much faster, second there will be foreground and background layers. This means you will be able to hide in grass for example. Geti will post details and some eye-candy soon.

I can confirm that a Mumble client crashes the game on start for some unknown reason. You will need to turn it off.

'COMBAT BUILD' 90 RELEASED

After a long period of play testing this build it is finally time to make a final test, that is, release it publicly! I like how Minecraft names major releases so I decided to do the same and have named this build the “combat build”. We have worked mostly on Knight & Archer combat. I decided to slightly overpower each class to make the game more dynamic and fun. But this was of course balanced during play testing. What you will experience here is a result of hours of testing so please play for at least that much time before criticizing, I’m sure you’ll see the changes are for the best. From this point I’d like to also THANK YOU everyone that play tested and posted their comments on the forums!

The game auto-updates by itself when you launch it. When it updates, the first thing you will notice is that you have to login to browse the servers list. Game accounts are from now on mandatory. This was probably one of the most requested features. It will help prevent anonymity and griefing, so that we can all have a better gaming experience. 

Account registration is super easy now. Just fill in your user name and password on this page (click).

Your username is also your nickname in the game so choose it carefully (clans can add a clan tag in Player menu). If you experience a user is abusive please report this on the forums.

Some other highlights of this build…

UPDATE - revised a little, the perspective issues are still there but the scale is decreased and there’s more detail. The castle is now a little more ruined, too.

old version here

ORIGINAL POST BELOW

So, we decided KAG needed a little more ambiance.

I’ll be polishing what’s already there up over the next few days and adding a few more layers for a bit more depth but I’m fairly happy with the mood, I just need to work on foreground/background separation a little more.

Keeping in mind that these are draft parallax layers, what do you think?

99% chance these will come into the game

ModDB community seems to dig our game. Current popularity rank 2 of 4,116.

KAG on ModDB

Added King Arthur’s Gold to ModDB. If you have an account there you should track the game.

http://www.moddb.com/games/king-arthurs-gold

New test build released.

Changelog: http://kagforum.com/viewtopic.php?pid=4160#p4160
Details on how to get it, at the beginning of the post.

Should outposts give out supplies?

There is a bug in the current game version causing outposts not to give out supplies on start (like the tent does). However this might also be a feature. How would you like it to be in the next version?

This week

What’s coming this week?

• Some new movies in the cinema


• Some boring foreign affairs


• and…


• There’s a 90% chance the KAG MacOSX port will be out. I finally have the system all setup, I just have to compile the damn thing.


• A new test version with new more interesting fighting mechanics


• Probably some eye candy

Hey guys, figured I’d run something by you with a picture to boot that I think would help cut down on griefing - a server lobby.

We’ve all been a part of a game where someone logs in, bombs an outpost and leaves, or starts cutting up the castle, or something equally unscrupulous.

I figure a server lobby and the ability to lock teams and prevent people joining mid-game would prevent those sort of frustrating events because you’d know who you were going to play with before jumping into the game.

The server lobby would also serve as a configuration GUI for some of the more pressing options - Game rules, which map file or generator to use, whether teams are locked in-game, whether players can join mid-game, whether to only allow registered users, whether to only allow paid users, the minimum reputation to allow users to join, etc. Server admins could elect moderators to change some of these settings in their absence.

I think preserving the ability to have a fluid base of players would be important to some people so note that there’d be the ability to turn off all the additional options and even the lobby itself - ESPECIALLY TEAM LOCK AND JOIN BLOCKING.

So, KAG players, what’re your thoughts? This may or may not happen but we’re interested in what you think of this possibility.

Running KAG on OSX

(This is only a workaround until we get a proper OSX build up and running)

Forum user gersaky has reported that you can get KAG running with Winebottler!

In his words:

It’s a pretty simple process. You just point wine bottler to the setup file, and it packages it all up for you. Takes 5 minutes. Only downside is that I often have to launch it a few times for it to actually start, but if you know that going in, it’s not a big deal.

If anyone with access to a Mac could try this and report if and how well it works, that’d be excellent - we’re still working on getting an OSX build together but this could let you get into the action in the meantime!

Subscribe to the feed

You should subscribe to the RSS feed to be informed first about any updates to KAG. Do it here: http://feeds.feedburner.com/KingArthursGold

Alternatively you can become a fan of KAG on Facebook to get your news there:
https://www.facebook.com/KAG2D

BUILD 80 RELEASED

Official forums thread for discussion

Lots of changes in the new version. A brief explanation:

There is a lot done in terms of gameplay balance in this version. Please see the changelog for details.

• Archer works a bit differently (slight tweaks to Knight & Builder)


• Catapult is different


• Outposts should be easier to capture
  
  

New block added: Gold Bullion

Used for storing gold. This feature is temporary so it might be removed once I add gold (and other materials) being dropped as items.

New block added: Drawbridge

This bridge block works similarly to doors but the other way around. Team members can freely walk on it but if an enemy steps on it, the whole bridge retracts. It is fragile though so you will have to think carefully how to use it for traps and such.

To prevent matches that last 1 minute and that are no fun I introduce a 2.5 minute warmup time before the match starts. In this time you cannot go past a red barrier in the middle of the map. You also can’t build catapults and outposts. On the other hand you get free 100 stone & wood in the tent at this time, so this is ideal to put up a nice defense. This makes the game much more interesting when there is something to attack when the game has started. The match countdown starts by default when there are 3 players on each team (modifiable in Rules/CTF/gamemode.cfg)

Changes build 71-80:

- fixed network map load memory leak
- fixed more network memory usage
- changed camera so it is less sensitive close to player
- fixed auto_bots spamming lots of bots
- added archer bow & catapult progress bar
- “friendlydamage_modifier” in gamemode.cfg works as it should (multiplies friendly damage)
- remade arrow damage
  * the faster the arrow the more damage it inflicts
  * max velocity arrow always kills (unshielded)
- added half second draw arrow time for archer (jumping is suppressed while drawing) 
- fixed arrow hits not registering against wall
- knight shield goes down after powerful hit (fast arrow, explosion)
- fixed random disconnecting on map restart
- fixed spawning on enemy respawn
- auto team balance shuffles only new players
- auto team balance doesn’t allow to change teams if teams are unbalanced
- modified no vote time to 5 minutes
- empty servers are kept alive on master
- gold is at least 7 blocks underground
- minimum_players_inteam set to 3
- warmup/break time (increased to 2.5 minutes)
- can’t build outpost or catapult until match started
- barrier set (at 1/3 to 2/3) of the map until match started
- tent has automatically placed bedrock beneath
- fixed outpost capturing bugs
- more rock parts/debris to pick up after collapse (and they stay longer)
- new wooden parts after destroyed wood structures (pickable)
- builder can’t give materials to knight or archer (only bombs and arrows)
- fixed scroll lock in chat box
- bomb block damage is based on distance (the farther the less damage)
- outposts and catapults slowly regenrate damage
- fixed background castle destruction exploit
- added gold bulion block [temporary]
- knight jump velocity is same as other classes
- rearranged block menu so castle wall and ladder are closest to mouse
- removed pilar castle background wall change
- added drawbridge
- arrows can destroy catapults and outposts
- new team emblems
- fixed crash on outpost destruction
- fixed spike stone collecting exploit
- resupply happens automatically on team tent (every 10 secs)
- during warm up time builder gets 100 wood and 100 stone in tent [temporary]
- player labels are a bit higher
- fixed knight gore machine bug
- fixed catapult creation displacement
- door requires just 40 wood now
- scoreboard sorted by kills instead of deaths
- map is restarted on server after 1 minute of being empty and only after match has started
- archer can’t collect arrows while charging bow
- archer can’t jump with fully charged bow
- remade catapults to work more as close siege weapons
  * cost half (120 wood)
  * deal twice more damage
  * range is smaller (1 screen)
  * arrows damage
- captured outpost restores health
- respawning on outpost being captured take 2 times longer
- builder jump smaller down when placing blocks

hotfix:
- fixed outpost not resupplying on change class
- fixed castle background not depleting materials when placed on ladder
- castle blocks placed on castle background can’t be placed if nothing below

Team chat usage poll

New test build

I welcome you to playtest a new Test version. Details are here. Please be sure to read the changelog as to not confuse features/bugs. I’ll be on the Dev Server.

Please post bugs/suggestions from test version with [TEST] prefix on forums or google moderator.

Google Moderator suggestions

I must say I’m not entirely satisfied with GetSatisfaction (there’s too much discussion there were you can do it on the forums; you can’t moderate or vote ideas in the free version etc.). I’ve looked into Google Moderator which is a simple and clean way of posting suggestions or voting on ones you like. Let’s try it!

A collection of recent epic battle screenshots.

Linux client fixed

I’ve made a terribly stupid mistake, that’s why the Linux client didn’t work for some time now. It should all be fixed now. I packed it with TAR to preserve executable rights.

Download

Build 71 hotfix

This is a hotfix release compatible with the current build. It will download automatically.

Hotfixes:

- fixed Windows XP startup crashing
- fixed respawn counter crash
- fixed initializing text not appearing in console-XXX.txt
- game window automatically is set to smaller resolution if desktop is smaller
- added fail safe methods when video driver is not supported

If these are still a problem please report.
Additionally if you run the Linux version now it will download a debug version. So please post any debugger output if you can.

—-

If your game resolution got screwed please open KAG/Base/Scripts/autoconfig.gm and replace these lines:

global v_width = 1024;
global v_height = 768;

I had a few days off but am returning to work on KAG Monday. Geti is on vacation a bit longer. I will be fixing most important issues, like the dreadful crash on startup bug and memory leak on servers. I’ve also taken first steps to compile KAG on MacOSX.