Hey all,
Thought I'd jump in to clarify (maybe) some of the questions and comments over the last 2 days ..
But first, iggy put up our first (actually, our third) ever Deadhold multiplayer match - ever. We frapsed it for posterity. You can view it here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPEHorBlouE
A couple of quick caveats:
This is not representative of Deadhold, this is our very first day that we got functioning myth-like baseline multiplayer working - I'm sure to the uninitiated it will look super goofy and weird, and we're missing three fundamental gameplay systems that will differentiate this from Myth ... BUT. it was a super great feeling to finally have it all functional, even if incredibly rough. It represents an enormous amount of under the hood work, building an entire RTS from scratch in Unreal4.
Even at this earliest stage we're seeing glimmers of that great gameplay, and funny moments. Anyway, just wanted to share.
Now onto some of the comments and questions: (this might be a long post - sorry!)
2) Why make Deadhold, and not Myth?
Simple, I don't want to make another Myth. I love Myth, but we have 15 years of ideas stored up, and Myth isn't ours to make or remake. Deadhold will be commercial (if there was any doubt). Make no mistake, Deadhold is a labor of love and passion, but much of that is fuelled by our need to do something fresh, and something that is ours, while paying homage to our roots.
We can't please everyone, and it's folly to try, but we believe Deadhold will make the majority of Mythers extremely happy, and as development progresses, we'll need the community's help to guide us.
1) Devtools
The short answer is we don't know yet. As vinylrake correctly pointed out there are some limitations with Unreal4's licensing, in that we can't redistribute UE4 (their editor) for free. Other issues include their .pak system isn't completed yet in a way that would allow drop in maps and packages - yet, it's on their roadmap, specifically for Unreal Tournament.
Obviously as guys who cut our teeth in the Myth community, we are strongly in favour of modding, its a question of is it doable with the resources we have, and if so, when. We just don't know yet, but we'll keep you all posted on our thoughts as more info trickles out from Epic.
Epic is amazing by the way, they totally blow my mind. I know everyone really has a lot invested in Myth tools, but I do wonder what people in the community could create if they picked up Unreal4 and started tinkering around. I was at GDC (Game developer conference) when Epic announced U4 for $19 a month, _everyone_ had their minds blown. Masterchief has been doing some really great work with U4. I wish Myth peeps would take more advantage of the best gaming engine/toolset to come out in a decade, especially if anyone has aspirations for the industry.
Anyway, aside from those heavier topics above, do check out the multiplayer vid, its hard for us to judge with fresh eyes this work, and we're curious how its perceived. Is it totally stupid looking and goofy - or can you guys see some promise in there?
Anywyay, thanks all for the interesting discussion above, as always, if you think of anything to ask, just throw it up here, and I'll do my best to answer.
Edit: Just noticed vinylrake's answer on refresh, he's not wrong.
-fisj