July Update: It’s music to our ears!

Summer is there, it’s time for sun, fun and resting… but not for the Return team which as you’ll see has been quite busy in the last month!

But first and foremost we are happy to report that music production for Return to the Serpent Isle has officially begun. We are blessed to have to have Panu Aaltio (known to some as Grotto Dragon) doing the music for Return. Panu is a professional composer who has already done soundtracks for games and movies and who has quite simply godlike talent! (If you haven’t: be sure to check examples of his works on his website).

I’m afraid you will have to wait a little more before we share the result of Panu’s work with you all, but let us just say that it lead overwhelming positive receptions by the entire dev team, with words such as “Phenomenal” and “Awesome” being thrown around. This is basically the kind of music you just usually don’t get for an amateur project, and it’s motivating all of us even more to craft content that will honor it!

In addition a lot of work has also been done in term of gameplay systems and mechanics since last month.

For starter, some might have already noticed that, but a new version of the Spellbook system was uploaded to NWN2 Vault earlier this month, with a new (albeit not quite final) UI and GUI much more in line with traditional Ultima spellbooks.

Pretty much all of our spells and skills have been implemented and are now working properly in game – and while these are aspect that will definitely need some balancing down the road, this already means that two more of our core systems are now working and implemented.

Jaakko also continues to be a miracle worker, and has been hard at work implementing new systems or reworking existing ones. Notably we have reworked the way NWN2 handles experience points to fit more how it traditionally works in Ultima games, and we have also modified the Inventory screens which will allow for less cluttering and junk than modern RPGs usually do.

We have also added a new Injury system that triggers when a party member is “knocked dead” and works in a way that is somewhat similar to Dragon Age Origins. We’d actually hoped to release it this month, but some unexpected technical issues have forced us to postpone it.

But in spite of this, we are still happy to share two more new releases with you all that you can find at NWN2Vault

The Death and Resurrection system is a system which will allow for a traditional Ultima resurrection: thus instead of having a game over when the whole party is wiped out, you instead get teleported to a specific place upon death with a small XP loss.

The currencies system is a way to allows for multiple currencies to be used in the game depending of the kind of coins used by a shopkeeper, and the possibility to exchange from one money to another at a specific NPC. Aye – exactly like in the original Serpent Isle!

Other than that work is about to begin on a guard and prison system to punish dishonest players, and several new design ideas have been brought to the table which could come up with some very interesting results if we manage to do as we envision.

So needless to be said: things are going very well on this front. The core gameplay systems are now implemented, and we’re confident that by summer’s end pretty much all features should be implemented and working – balancing not withstanding of course.

We have also decided for a new scale for the overland map, which while it will cause the overland to use many more zones, will allow for much more fun and exploration to be had.

On the writing front we have finished writing and polishing the 36 (!) Ophidian Virtue Questions that will be used for character creation. It was not an easy process, but we are quite proud of the result, and feel we do offer some really interesting moral dilemmas.

Development for Moonshade NPCs have stalled somewhat for the moment as focus has shifted to a new aspect of the project which we feel you’re all gonna find very exciting. But I’ve already said too much…

And don’t forget you can know follow us on our Twitter to get a quicker look at our development processes.

But of course, we can’t conclude an update without a reminder:

WE NEED YOU!

We still need many more motivated team members, and we are notably sorely lacking in both 2D and 3D Artists – so if you feel you are up to the task, do not hesitate to contact us! This project will not be finished without you!

See you all again next month!