Elemental - Now Fallen Enchantress

[Ingmar]

The state the lore is in should be right up his alley. 

[Typhon]

I'm happy that he's finally getting the job to go with the recognition (especially since it didn't seem like Firaxis was ever going to pull the trigger).  

I'm also happy for myself - what's lacking from Elemental (now that the engine bugs seem to be cured) is what I thought was lacking from Civ 4 - flavor and faction differentiation (ideally he helps with unit/squad/champion tuning as well).

[Sky]

Oh fuck. 

[Ghambit]

Why would this be anything but a good thing??

[Typhon]

Sky wants Kael to work on FFH3 (on Civ 5, but really Civ 5 is coincidental) rather than polishing the turd that is Elemental (I'm putting words in Sky's mouth).

I think that the lore is incidental to playing a game that has systems with depth.  Kael has proven that he's more then capable of taking bland games and making them very diverse.  Given that frogboy's was most proud of how the game (Elemental) could be used to create something interesting, I have high hopes.

Who knows, they might even release FFH DLC.

[Soln]

Oh fuck. 

this

[Merusk]

Sky wants Kael to work on FFH3 (on Civ 5, but really Civ 5 is coincidental) rather than polishing the turd that is Elemental (I'm putting words in Sky's mouth).

I think that the lore is incidental to playing a game that has systems with depth.  Kael has proven that he's more then capable of taking bland games and making them very diverse.  Given that frogboy's was most proud of how the game (Elemental) could be used to create something interesting, I have high hopes.

Who knows, they might even release FFH DLC.

Exactly.  TBH, Elemental is a better slate for FFH3 as a deep and complex game than Civ5.  I enjoy Civ5 but there's far too little empire management there at a core systems level.  In 'streamlining' things they took out a lot of the real engaging parts.  Individual city food management, materials, unit customization, diplomacy and political dynasties. Elemental has those systems and a much more entertaining combat model (IMO. I love turn based tactical.)  Plus he won't have to screw around with trying to get magic and such into Civ5 since they're core features of Elemental.

The real question is; when he inked that FFH deal with Firaxis that fell through, did he sign away the right to use the name.

[Yegolev]

Oh fuck. 

FFH3 = Elemental mod

[Kitsune]

Well, that improves my opinion of the likelihood of a successful outcome for Elemental by a wide margin.  Be interesting to see what becomes of it.

[Kail]

Exactly.  TBH, Elemental is a better slate for FFH3 as a deep and complex game than Civ5... (snip...)

The real question is; when he inked that FFH deal with Firaxis that fell through, did he sign away the right to use the name.

The real question for me is whether he's been hired to make an FFH mod for Elemental, or to "fix" Elemental.  I haven't played Elemental, but I don't get the impression that it suffers from the kinds of problems that a freelance modder can stroll in and fix.  And while I have no reason to believe that he can't pull off a decent FFH-esque mod for Elemental, I'm not sure if Stardock would jump at the same chance to pay to develop another MoM-ish fantasy game when they just released a MoM-ish fantasy game which is struggling for sales.

[Yegolev]

I suspect if you are hired then you are not modding.  At the very least you're working on an expansion pack.  Which, I might add, is how Stardock games get better.

[Ghambit]

Stardock is already well ahead of the financial curve with Elemental my friend.  Everything from here on out is gravy.
And the game was always intended as a mere 'intro' into what they intended to do.  Quick xpacs and mods were intended in its design (part of the reason the core game seems to be missing polish).  In this way, it's no different from SoaSE, which also went through some management shifts and nice expansions.

There is no negative to this at all and Merusk has it spot on.  And truth is, Civ struggled to successfully portray what FFH was trying to do.  Elemental wont have that problem.  Altogether now, let us drink teh koolaid.

edit:  what Yegolev said

[schild]

I'm still waiting for the inevitable 50% off deal for Elemental when you invite a friend to buy it.

It's guaranteed to hit email boxes any day now if it hasn't already.

[Ingmar]

Stardock is already well ahead of the financial curve with Elemental my friend.

Only because they make it nigh-impossible to get a refund for their piece of shit game.

[Typhon]

Found this interview with Frogboy and Kael off of BlueNews.

Only reason I'm pasting it here is because of Kael's comments about his role at Stardock and possibility of further FFH development.

Short version: 1) for now he's focused on Elemental, 2) he'd like to return to FFH at some point

[Paelos]

Some point being after he gets layed off.

[Sky]

I read that as "Come fix Elemental and we'll back FFH." If they allow Kael to have the reins on the project firmly, the IP is probably the strongest Stardock has. And the wonderful thing is that it's not really a solid IP, just Kael's mashing of different IPs and ideas together...which is actually a very strong way to present very unique civs for that type of game.

I'm only about a third of the way into my third Civ 5 game and I'm already bored with the blandness. Hail Sid Caesar, emperor of rome, sure we are almost exactly like every other civilization in the world...but we have legions! What shit.

Looks like I'll be looking for the Elemental sale now.

[Murgos]

BTW, Age of Wonders Complete pack is on steam for 20 bux.  You can get just Shadow Magic for 10 bux.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/61520/

[Ard]

Welp, Stardock is at least trying to appease people for this mess.  Giving away the first two expansions to anyone who bought the game before the end of this month free.  The expansions may or may not make the game worth playing, but at least they're trying.  Here's to hoping they don't chop them down in size since they're giving them away though.

http://forums.elementalgame.com/399482

[Sir T]

Welp, Stardock is at least trying to appease people for this mess.  Giving away the first two expansions to anyone who bought the game before the end of this month free.  The expansions may or may not make the game worth playing, but at least they're trying.  Here's to hoping they don't chop them down in size since they're giving them away though.

http://forums.elementalgame.com/399482

They announced that a while ago, people who bought the game and stayed with it would get the first expansion free. The second one is new though.

[Sky]

Missed this one:

http://forums.stardock.com/399705

Kael officially ensconced as the PM of Elemental. Brad says they're pushing out 1.1 asap, Frogboy says it's a substantial rules change and save-incompat with 1.09. It's the last Brad-helmed patch.

Kael's comment:

Thanks to everyone for the good wishes.  I just spent my first day onsite with the folks at Stardock and I had a great day.  It’s a team of brilliant people and I’m honored to join them.  Any job that uses Monty Python trivia to test new hires is okay by me.

  I’m currently in the process of interviewing the elemental team members for feedback. After I get that I will incorporate it with feedback from this forum and my own experience to build a post 1.1 design doc and implementation plan.  We have big ideas for Elemental and I’m excited both to play the game once we get these ideas in, and to work on the project.

  Thanks to the folks at Stardock for welcoming me so warmly, and to Brad for offering me this opportunity.  Now I’m off to work!

Sounds like 1.2 is when it starts getting interesting, I'm crossing my fingers for some kind of xmas sale.

[Ghambit]

Hard to believe he hadn't already had a design doc before taking the job.  Guarantee he already knows what he wants to do, otherwise why hire him?

[JWIV]

1.1 Patching In The Fun was released yesterday.  http://forums.elementalgame.com/402305

Didn't get to fool around with it a lot, but there seems to be some definite improvements in UI and enemy AI so far.

[Yegolev]

I was tempted but not quite enough.  I will likely wait for the next patch.  Won't be long, they say.

[Sky]

Fingers crossed for an xmas sale on this one.

[Reg]

I doubt you'll see a Christmas sale for Elemental. The deal is - if you buy it before the end of the year you get the first expansion free.

[tazelbain]

Played it last night. 2 crashes over 3 hours.  Really expected more progress.

[Sky]

I doubt you'll see a Christmas sale for Elemental. The deal is - if you buy it before the end of the year you get the first expansion free.

Oh, I don't expect one, either. There's a reason I never ended up getting GalCiv2. Stardock is not Valve.

[Reg]

Yup I know. They really have no sense at all. They're still trying to charge full price for the GalCiv 2 expansions that are years old at this point.

Edit: Spelling

[Speedy Cerviche]

I can wait 6 months until this is polished more. Let someone else beta test it for Stardock.

[Kodan]

Sadly if its like Demigod it may never be finished. They will probably give up on it in a few months when they are no longer getting revenue. They promised long term support and wonderful great things for Demigod that never got delivered either. I dont buy Stardock games anymore because of Demigod.

[Murgos]

Sadly if its like Demigod it may never be finished. They will probably give up on it in a few months when they are no longer getting revenue. They promised long term support and wonderful great things for Demigod that never got delivered either. I dont buy Stardock games anymore because of Demigod.

The culprit you should be annoyed at is Gas Powered Games.  Stardock was just the publisher.

[Sky]

Kael is one of a diminishing number of people I believe can Get Shit Done.

When you can have decades-long fans of the civ series scoff at the newest shiny millions of dollars iteration and go back to his garage mod...yeah. Dude's got talent.

My only question is how hobbled he is by the Elemental engine, looks like he's diving in with both feet...well, you don't dive in feet first, but you know what I mean....looks like he's tackling some underlying mechanics to open the game up for what he needs to do to it. And I still hold out hope he did it for a retail FFH deal.

[Kodan]

Sadly if its like Demigod it may never be finished. They will probably give up on it in a few months when they are no longer getting revenue. They promised long term support and wonderful great things for Demigod that never got delivered either. I dont buy Stardock games anymore because of Demigod.

The culprit you should be annoyed at is Gas Powered Games.  Stardock was just the publisher.

 Actually Frogboy and Stardock themselves promised to continue support for Demigod. It was NOT all Gaspowered Games fault but I dont buy their products either anymore.

[Kail]

My only question is how hobbled he is by the Elemental engine

This is my big hangup for this project, the fact that he's limited by Elemental.  FFH was great for me because it valued gameplay diversity over balance; you could play as everything from golem building dwarves to vampires to angels to demented circus warriors.  I could be wrong (haven't played it), but as far as I can tell, Elemental only has five factions, all of which look like fairly stock human races (knight, barbarian, mage, foresty-archer type, etc).

If he can make this game as fun as FFH, I'll definitely be buying it.  But making a game stable, fixing the AI, patching up the problems which Elemental (as far as I've heard) has suffered since release are all very different issues from adding five or ten interesting new races, which is what he'd have to do to get me to see this as any kind of FFH style game.