Major Release - 01AUG10

looks good, can't wait to see what the other races look like :)

It's very beautiful, and I think it will be especially important from a marketing perspective.  Towns feel large, and the setting has a greater feel of fantasy and charm.

Excellent work.


...I think the usability has improved as well too.  Though the separate buildings are less distinctive and clearly identifiable, they also are easier to correctly select and click.  I used to always end up clicking on a building and ending up at one next to it.  Some accoutrement will help with the distinctiveness (i.e. barrels stacked outside the brewery, smoke coming from the forge, and guards outside the vault).  But overall, I think our gradual familiarity with the graphics will suffice, thanks largely to the variation in roof colors and basic shapes.


Edited by HonoredMule - 01 Aug 2010 at 19:21

New Town Graphics Initial Release

You may have already noticed the exceptionally fine new Town Map that glistens on your screen.

This Town Map replaces the existing map, with all-new building icons and backdrops, and is a spectacular culmination of an immense effort by:

• MOD Strategos - who organised and managed the project over many months
• GM ThunderCat - who made the UI alterations
• Painterman - to whom far and away the lion's share of all credit goes for drawing and illustrating the buildings and backdrops so excellently - and with such good grace and humour in the face of my constantly fluctuating demands!

This new map also gives us a huge amount of new flexibility in many game features - including what resource distributions can be supported; so expect to see unsettled parts of the map re-seeded soon with more interesting resource distributions such as 7|2|7|2|7.

I've used the words "Initial Release" are there are still further elements to add:

• City Growth
  The city graphics will grow with your city. This growth will be reflected in everything from the size and style of the City Wall, to representations of your total population by worker housing, to the roads and city centre, to the stature of the buildings themselves as they upgrade. The city you're currently looking at is roughly the mid-level graphic set.


• Racial Graphicsets
  Each race will have their own set of graphics and backdrop. The set you are currently looking at is the Human set, but there will be Elf, Dwarf and Orc - each with their own unique look and feel.

We hope you enjoy the new graphics, and we very much appreciate any feedback you have regarding them.