Folks,

Sorry for the delayed weekly update; it has been a busy week. First, Tyler Rockwell has joined our crew as CSE’s Producer. He has an interesting “welcome to Virginia” story that he may share but he is now onboard and  catching up with many months of Camelot Unchained Kickstarter updates, videos, Foundational Principles and other assorted CSE stuff. As I mentioned in a previous update, he is also an accomplished environmental artist so our Founders can expect to see him show off his skills in future updates. I have no doubt that the talents and experience he brings to the team will be quite helpful in bringing Camelot Unchained to life. FYI, I’m really looking forward to what he can create based on the environmental our concept work to date and what we will do over the next few months. Exciting times. Secondly, here is a status update of last week’s goals:

• First pass at technical roadmap for some key features of Camelot Unchained. Status: Completed.
• Continuing integration of UI/Web. Implement two-way communication between client and web server. Status: First pass completed.
• Continuing work on SmackHammer-based patcher. Status: Completed, moving to next stage.
• Bring new programmer up to speed, work on implementation of new interface for particle system. Status: Completed.
• Implementation of early stages of new animation system via code. Status: Mostly completed.
• Next revision of the new Arthurian race. Possible final version for Friday but most likely next week. Status: Completed.
• Limited design work on UI artwork for demo purposes. Status: Missed. We didn’t have time to do this last week.
• Final pass at Hamadryad model, possible animation and rigging by Friday but most likely next week. Status: As expected, it is being rigged this week.
• New Community Manager comes online by end of the week. Status: Completed.
• First pass at Becoming™ story for another possible Arthurian race. Status: Completed. Story will be posted later in the week.
• Internal testing of new March on Oz free version for iOS and Android (no in-game store yet). Status: Completed.
• Final revision of our Company Handbook with legal and team. Status: Completed. Team is reviewing it now.
• Continuing discussions with certain hardware/software folks for possible partnership deals. Status: We are close to a deal with one, others are also moving forward.

Not bad, not perfect but not bad at all. In terms of this week’s list, it will be closer to two weeks due to what we are trying to accomplish but we’ll see…

• Build out patching system into “asset build” system for Camelot Unchained. What this means is that we will essentially be using our patching system to build an internal studio patching system. This is a big process and will involve multiple programmers doing a lot of different tasks over the next two weeks and more.  Rather than trying to “pad out” our tasks, I’m including all of them in this item.
• First pass at editor for world and asset infrastructure for Camelot Unchained.
• Continuing work on particle system for Camelot Unchained.
• Concept art for next Arthurian race.
• Fully rigged and animated Hamadryad.
• First pass at modeled Dvergr.
• Final Becoming™ story for another possible Viking race.
• First pass for another possible Viking race.
• Community’s first Q&A/AUA (Ask Us Anything) with Founders. We want to come up with a clever name for it so we’ll be creating a thread/discussion/contest on our forums to aid in our quest. If any Founder comes up with a name we decide to use, prizes will be involved.
• First Producer’s letter to Camelot Unchained Community.
• Free version of March on Oz enters friends and family testing on iOS.
• Continuing discussions with certain hardware/software folks for possible partnership deals.

That’s it for today’s update. I’ll post another update later this week revealing the next possible Arthurian race.  FYI, it is also based on some well-known legends.

On a truly personal note, it’s good to have the new people here and watching the studio grow again. The new folks are fitting in quite nicely and I think our three newest team members are going to add a lot to our studio and our games going forward.

Today’s early concept art features lots of different male Stormriders, some with jewels, some without and all have different musculatures. We also have two environmental concepts, one for a possible “trial chamber” and the other, well; it should be an easy caption for you Arthurian folks to figure out.

-Mark