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Cysero
Open Call For New AQ3D Testers! posted by Cysero on

Hey guys, passing this along for Gjappy, the AQ3D Lead Tester:

Gjappy Icon

AQ3D Alpha Testing team’s first call for Staff Testers!

 

AQ3D Staff Testers, short history.

Greetings and a shiny, blessed day fellow AQ3D Alpha testers! My name is Gjappy. People know me as the Human Angel and the AQ3D Lead Tester. This is the first ever DN’s post that I have written since I’ve been with Artix Entertainment.

Back in 2013, in the very first version of AQ3D; Legends of Lore, there was another official AQ3D testing team with Blade, Taini, Xellos, Perfectshadow, Rysox, Clarion, Dmage, Lothalis, Lycus and Plasma Charge. Nobody knew we were there, but we were all super motivated and we were a happy team. When AQ3D; Legend of Lore got shelved because of the Flash issue we were all distributed to different teams so when the time came for a NEW AQ3D, most of us were all busy with our new positions and responsibilities within the other game teams.

AQ3D Legends of Lore

At the beginning of this year Artix von Krieger asked me to pick up my position as AQ3D lead tester again. It is a big honor for me to get my favorite task back and be part of this new project. This is why I dropped most (and lately, all) of my AQWorlds duties and moved on to AQ3D. We quickly formed a new testing team out of the available volunteers and testers working on the other games.

The current AQ3D testing team is small and does a lot of work behind the scenes. So far we have Bido, Blood, Chrysus, Kaage, PlatinumLady, Relaxbleu, Rysox, Undead Lunatics, and Xellos as existing AQ3D testing team. Recently a few of the other testers had to leave us for various reasons and we have found ourselves a little under-staffed so we are holding an open call for NEW AQ3D TESTER volunteers!

What do AQ3D Testers do?

First of all, AQ3D Testers are part of the big Artix Entertainment family. They have to behave themselves like staff since they represent Artix Entertainment in game. For any information about how to be a staff member I refer to Cysero’s post.

AQ3D Gjappy 1

AQ3D is in its Alpha phase of development and we have a log way to go until we are ready for the game's full release so we are looking for Testers and not moderators. These will come later.

If you want to help us test AQ3D and make the game as shiny as possible by pointing out bugs, you will need the time and the motivation to help us. In general, being a tester is one of the most intensive voluntary positions and we spend way more time online than moderators will.

What Testers do:

  • We test new releases/content before it goes to the live server.

  • We test new patches for bugs and confirm bugs are gone… or not.

  • We find new or duplicate reported bugs and describe these in detail to the developers.

  • We work together with the developers to get things done on time.

  • When we can, we answer the questions on the Forums, Artix.com, in-game and on the website.

  • We interact with the players as professional game staff, and make the game fun for everyone.

What do I need to be an AQ3D Tester?

Well, let me give you a summary of my how-to-be-a-tester-101. As tester you certainly do need skills, but also personality. It’s a balanced combo. To start off with the ideal testing skills; Testers must be able to:

  • Find a bug/glitch/exploit and describe or clearly explain how it works in a way that everyone could understand what exactly the issue is.

  • Think of strategies on how to possibly break/glitch a feature.

  • Use testing tools like a Flash tracer, the bug tracker and game commands.

  • Testers should be able to reproduce an issue aka. make it happen again.

  • Understand the priority of a certain bug, as in how important it is.

  • Help players fix common or known issues that can be easily solved.

Though, personality is just as important. I used to say that someone can have amazing skills but if they lack the personality then it’s a pity but no. What are some good personality traits of Testers?

  • Creativity in how to approach things.

  • Being clear and understandable.

  • Team play or teamwork, testers always work together.

  • Being open to feedback and instructions.

  • An positive attitude and inspiring.

  • Being motivated to do your task.

Where can I sign up to be an AQ3D Volunteer Tester?

Apparently, if you read this, then you still have the motivation and courage to go on. And you see a future for AQ3D! That’s awesome, I do too!

A while back I heard all the rumors over social media about fairness and I thought; “When I am about to select new members for my team, I’m going to do everything I can to show people that AE gives everyone an equal chance.” Plus I am convinced that new, fresh testers are way better then testers that already have multiple side-tasks. So everyone, current AE staff/volunteers and players alike need to apply the same way.

 

---> You can only apply if you are at least 18 years or older. <---

 

So this is what we do; and what I need of you. Write an e-mail and provide us with the following:

  1. AQWorlds or AQ3D name (Both, if possible).

  2. Your e-mail address.

  3. Your age and date of birth.

  4. The languages you speak.

  5. The name of your Master Account.

  6. Forum Account (if you have one)

  7. Facebook or Twitter accounts you use for our games.

  8. Possible testing devices; (PC, iOS, Android, Tablet, Occulus Rift. Be specific about models)

  9. A short description of yourself and how you could help us.

  10. Which experiences you have with testing games.

Send this e-mail to bugs@aq3d.com with the title “AQ3D Tester application” before September 30, 2015.

AQ3D_Gjappy_alone

How will I know I got hired?

Like with any other public calls for voluntary staff we will not have the time to reply to everyone. We need to boost the team up to a maximum of 20 active testers because the testing forecast predicts heavy testing. If we are interested in you, then we will send you a replay e-mail back with additional information and a question to get in contact after the application closes.

I am aware I am one of the most responsive AE staff on Facebook or Twitter and anywhere else. But please do not contact me, the testing staff nor the developers directly about applying. All information you need to know is in here, and here you have your chance to apply for AQ3D tester in the official way. If you apply to me directly that only tells me something about you.

So, battle on and my blessings, fellow adventurers!!

I will see and read your applications all personally and hope to make a lot of you happy, to make the rest of you guys happy as well. Then we build an AQ3Dsome mobile game together with the Artix Entertainment development team!

-Gjappy, The Human Angel 


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Cysero
AQ3D Alpha is (almost) here! posted by Cysero on

We are SO close... but we're not there yet. 

AQ3D MMO offline


AQ3D is leaving behind the fun Tech Demo phase today and entering a new, exciting stage of development... Alpha! But right at this VERY SECOND, the servers are offline while we perform some merging of tables and databases and make sure the server hamsters have state of the art wee tiny running shoes. 

AQ3D Login

Once we enter Alpha Phase, a lot more people are going to be able to play. Not just active AQW members, but former members, AC purchasers, DragonLords, StarCaptains, Guardians, those who have bought Varium, Soul Gems and even Smash Coins. 

Tech Demo testers can expect their Tech Demo badges and Star Swords to arrive by the end of today, and remember that all Tech Demo testers, our new Alpha Testers and even those who tested Legends of Lore will (toward the end of Alpha) recieve the Alpha Knight armor and access to the rest of the Alpha Knight Set.

Get your Firefox and IE ready (because AQ3D doesn't work on Chrome. They dropped support for Unity)... before the sun suts here in sunny Florida, you will be able to create your shiny new AQ3D account, and get a very early shot at grabbing the coolest character name you can think of. 

Hold on to your hats.

Cysero AQ3D 


 


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Cysero
WHAT HAPPENED TO AQ3D, LEGEND OF LORE? posted by Cysero on

AQ3D logo

Most of you guys know me, and most of you know that I try and answer your questions when I am able to. A lot of you have been wondering what happened to our 3D browser game, Adventurequest 3D: Legend of Lore so I'm going to try and explain it. 

First, I think it's important to say that the project has been shelved. This does not mean that we've given up on it but it DOES mean that halted most work on it (pretty much everything, really) several months ago. We have no CURRENT plans to continue developing it but we hope that our situation changes and we will be able to continue working on it at a later time down the road. 

We were a Flash based company. All of our games had been built in Adobe Flash and we were building AQ3D in Unity with plan of delivering the game through the next generation of Flash Players (Kind of like how YouTube plays video files through the Flash Player) After about a year of development on AQ3D, Adobe (the company that puts out Flash and other programs such as Photoshop) announced that it was halting all work on the next generation of Flash to change direction. With Adobe no longer making the next gen of Flash Players, Unity dropped all 3D support for Flash, meaning that we would NOT be able to deliver our game. 

This left us in a REALLY bad spot. We had already spent a year making this game and suddenly, over night, we had lost the ability to deliver the game to our Flash enabled players which, being a Flash game company, meant everyone. 

Making games is expensive. Just the programs alone cost heaps (and you can't use cracked versions for legitimate games), not to mention the skilled developers, the server costs for an MMO, the bandwidth bill for (hopefully) hundreds of thousands of users, and advertising costs because you need players to survive and you can't just build a game and HOPE that people show up. That's just the tip of the iceberg in terms of how much money it takes to keep a single game going. If we couldn't deliver the game to OUR players then we would have wasted a lot of time and money in a time when we can afford to waste neither.

So, either we keep working on this very expensive 3D project knowing that our market penetration would be pathetic and the game would essentially be dead-on-launch... keep making web-based Flash games in a world where more and more gamers were leaving the web for smartphones and tablets... or shelve the 3D project, continue development on our currently active and profitable web games and set a new course into the Mobile world, where we might be able to build smaller, faster and less expensive projects and maybe even reuse the 10 years of fantastic art that we've gathered over the last decade. The choice was obvious.

Here we are in the present. Adobe has more or less abandoned Flash in favor of HTML5 and Java. Unity continues to produce a very powerful 2D and 3D engine that is getting better release day and MIGHT (one day) once again give AE the power to make a 3D MMO that we can deliver right to your browser. 

Until that day, we will store the work we did somewhere safe and cherish the memories of running with you guys through one of our buggiest and funniest Alphas ever.


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Artix
Winning Monster - 3D & Animated posted by Artix on

Acevorah (3D Monster, in Flash)

Miguel Mendes is the winner of the 1st AQ3D monster design contests with his entry, the Acevorah. The team modeled and animated his monsterous creation. Give it a little bit to load, then use keys 0 through 8 to trigger animations. To change the camera angle, click and drag. Below is the original monster entry.

QUESTION:

Does the file load? Is it animating in your browser? Let us know if it works and what you think! Comment below. 15% chance I will see your Twitter post... but 100% I will see if you post here.


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Artix
AdventureQuest 3D - CLAWG posted by Artix on

3D redesign of an AdventureQuest Monster

With the 10 year anniversary event, OverSoul and our Mogloween releases, we temporarily took the spotlight off of our 3D game project. But during this silence, the AQ3D team has done incredible work and made progress. The biggest news is, as of last Friday, we have a working combat system! It is not ready for you to help test yet -- but as soon as the animation, pathing & colision bugs are fixed we will be re-opening the servers for all of you AlphaKnights (no ETA, but we are going as fast as we can. Promise!) Meanwhile, would you like to see some of the new monsters that have been made? (There are a lot of them!)

AQ3D The Clawg

First up is the Clawg. While AQ3D will take place on a new world with a fresh new plot -- it will feature many monsters based on the lore we have created together. The Clawg is a famous monster from classic AdventureQuest. I drew the original Clawg nearly 10 years ago. 6 weeks ago, Thyton re-envisioned it and created a new concept sketch. Xero took the sketch and turned it into the 3D Clawg. I think this new version of the monster sets the tone for how this game will be. Bigger, more dangerous, more mature.

QUESTION: What other classic AdventureQuest monsters would you like to see re-envisioned for AQ3D: Legend of Lore?

 

Random Thoughts

  • The Clawg was most famous from when it appeared in the Frostval event as "Santa Clawg"
  • Of all the monsters we have completed, this is one of the few that has not been animated yet.
  • I bet when it walks it will use the arms like a gorrilla. It might even have an attack that uses the feet.
  • Would the Clawg hunt alone or in packs? Seems like a solitary creature.
  • 10g says a Clawg tastes like lobster. We need to add a cooking skill in ASAP.

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Yergen
AQ3D Monster Contest Winners posted by Yergen on

 Yergen here! There were well over 450 submissions to Legend of LORE’s first ever contest. Each and every submission was awesome in its own right. The monsters ranged from cute, silly, gross, to downright frightening. Oddly enough I didn’t see any monsters that shot lightning out of their butts. Anyhoo - The battle was tough, so tough in fact that we extended the deadline to let a few more monsters get in. In the end, however, a winner (or shall I say - winners) has emerged. What better way to celebrate a 10 year anniversary, than with winners! Here is how it all breaks down:

Monster Design Contest

Gargantuan Grand Prize Winner!

The winner’s monster will be “Thytonized,” 3D modeled by Xero, painted and animated by the 3D team and will be put in one of the first playable maps in Legend of LORE. The winner will get a print of the monster, signed by the entire Legend of LORE team, and 4000 Artix Points.

And the winner is...... Acevorah: by Vypie

Acevorah

 

Rightful Runner Up

The runner up will get a limited edition black variant Artix or Sepulchure figure, or a signed poster of your choice. (You may only choose one of the previous items.) And 4000 Artix Points.


And the runner up is...... Cappy the Guardian in a Box: by Jaikon

 guardian in a box

Terrific Team Favorites

All submissions below will receive 2000 Artix Points.

Miho: by Col3ra

Miho

LORE Ghost: by Callado123

LORE Ghost

Steampunk Scorpion: by Ergotth

Steampunk Scorpion
Snakephant: by Gossj1000

Snakephant
Oblivion Diwata: by JuanKunai

Oblivion Diwata
Greenmist Guardian: by Kantro

greenmist_guardian
Zeitgeist: by LordKaho

Zeitgeist
Monsturtle: by Monster AE

Monsturtle
M.A.M.A.: by Nitramier

M.A.M.A.

Eye Durr: by RedKutai

Eye_durr

Rune Calibur Knight: by shock_troop

Rune Calibur Knight

Nagmaul: by Wion

Nagmaul
Serpiend: by Zined

Serpiend
Talonius: by Draconerix

 Talonius

Awesome Art

General Esrow: by FlameXero

General Esrow

Advare: by Heartdragon

Advare

ToxicLeechDragon: by Boxdragon

Toxic Leech Dragon

We Didn’t Expect THAT!

2000 Artix Points.

Aracat: by Amymist

Aracat
Eldritch Beast: by Pygar 2

eldritch_beast
Sarian: by Ryumin

sarian
Pwnicorn: by Karpousi

 pwnicorn

Craziest Creations

2000 Artix Points.

Orncoia: by Therril Oreb

Orncoia






Arachnida monster was disqualified.





Dr. Q: by Darth Necroktus

 DrQ

Cutest Creatures

2000 Artix Points.

Chuppa: by Ammarnight7

Chuppa
Jarkel: by Ownzer

Jarkel
Screttly: by Sorro Asjurai

Screttly
The Squoat: by iSwim

TheSquoat
Thintle: by Animalking

 Thintle

Delectable Descriptions

2000 Artix Points.

Serpent Dragon Like Thing: by Akikane

SerpentDragon
Ars Custos: by Crepusculum

ArsCustos 

So many amazing submissions! You all are amazing, and talented, and wonderful. Keep up the good work, and we’ll see you in the Legend of LORE! Yergen OUT!


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Yergen
AQ3D: Legend of LORE Video posted by Yergen on

Yergen here! How is everyone doing? I have something special for everyone. It’s the internet premiere of the AdventureQuest 3D: Legends of LORE trailer!

But first -

The flythrough trailer premiered at DragonCon at the end of our now infamous panel. My guess is there was no panel that was even near as loud as our panel. AE fans are the best! The trailer was a perfect end to an amazing panel.

While we were working our butts  off to make get this game ready, I knew DragonCon was on the horizon. Our work was looking so amazing (especially for a browser-based game) that I wanted to do something that really showed off what we can, and have, done. I had the idea of a flythrough of sorts, showing off some amazing environments and hinting at things to come. I figured we could come up with 4-5 cool environments to fly through. We had finished Ravenspire and had the Skulldoor Dungeon. But we needed 3 more, so Geopetal, Thyton, Artix, and I thought chose three new environments that we called the Ice Giant Kingdom, Northpointe, and the Sky Pirates Lair (*note: Location names are subject to change, and probably will). Did I forget to mention that we had a month and a half to finish them? A month and a half!!!  The team dug in their heels and worked like mad to complete the three full environments in the unbelievably short time. It was an impossible task and they did it!  I can't wait to show it to you.

But first -

This video wouldn't be possible if it was not for our amazing team working on it. First off, Zhoom and Minimal have been building this thing from the ground up. They have been (and are still) feverishly working to build a kick-butt engine that will blow all other browser-based MMO’s out of the water. Thyton, being the master of monster making, brings his unique blend of awesomeness, and epicness (“Epawsicness”) to the game and makes some of the most epawsic monsters, armors, and weapons you can imagine. Next, Xero, the dimensional dominator, takes those hand-drawn designs and brings them into the third dimension. He and Thyton are so in tune, it’s scary what they can accomplish... Scary AWESOME! And then Korin takes those newly created 3D models and makes them move. That bag on his head must be used to hold in his talent, and am I glad for that. I suggested he double bag it, to ensure that we don't lose any of his talent. Next is Llussion: Not only does he help in designing most of the landscapes and architectures, but he then turns around and begins building them in 3D. He has really shown how multi-talented he is. Then comes Tamarann. He takes all of our drawings and scribbles and turns them into amazing 3D models. Lately we have given him many challenges of making extremely modular houses and architecture. He accepted the challenges, and created some amazing looking and highly modular pieces, that helped make one house look like twenty. We have begun to borrow Geopetal more and more to have her start building a rich and lush world that will be LORE. She will take her experience and success of creating the world of DragonFable, and add jetpacks, nitrous, and iron armor to it to create a story that will be Epawsic! Lastly we have been lucky enough to borrow Samba. Her amazing animation skills in AQW make her perfect for jumping in and helping out with animating some of our monsters. Now, without further distractions let’s show this video!

But first -

Ha! Just kidding...

I give you the AdventureQuest 3D: Legends of LORE Flythrough Trailer!




NOTE: This was screencapped with FRAPS from a browser! (That is right, this is actual game footage, right in the web browser.) What did you think? Let Artix or Yergen know. We’d love to hear from you.


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