FIRE & PAPER

Pyromancer Class coming to AQWorlds

This new hot-headed art by Dage was inspired by the upcoming Pyromancer class in AdventureQuest Worlds. You can see the full Pyromancer skill list on the AQWorld's design notes. It is going to be a really interesting class to play. We expect to build a pyromancer class for AQ3D as well, but we have two sizable challenges that we are working through now. For example, as you are readnig this we are making the 3D game work in Flash. Check back here tomorrow for the inside scoop on when the current Alpha test will resume.

The last sheet of Paper

This is one of those special stories that no other sane video game studio would share. But I like letting you in on things like this... or continuing the story if you somehow knew about this when it started. 6 months ago... when we moved into the new lab and just before starting on the AdventureQuest 3D: Legend of LORE project, I <gulps> organized all my notes. Which is to say... I sifted through a literal mountain (easily 4ft tall - what I did not throw away is pictured to the right) of unorganized papers, sketch pads, notebooks and half torn paper napkins filled to the brim with my ideas, sketches, forumulas, interface designs. Everyone has their own way of communicating with others. How do you do communicate complicated ideas?  I am very visual, so I keep a notepad close and draw my ideas as I am talking about them. But it is not the filled pages I wanted to talk to you about today... it was the pages that had nothing on them. The blank pages. While organizing I found MANY sheets (120 to 150?) of empty, white, perfectly clean pages. Sometimes, when the notebooks fill up you grab some paper off the printer, but the bottom ones end up unused and somehow get left in with the used ones. So I started a pile of "unused paper." Most of them were from the days I was working on DragonFable with Zhoom. They felt like unused artifacts. Were they blank pages... or unfired ammo from an ancient battle? Sure, I could have just thrown them away, or put them in a printer. But instead, I took the giant stack of paper and placed it on my desk and made the paper a sincere promise. "You missed your opportunity to become a part of the design for DragonFable, MechQuest, AQWorlds and our other games since... but you have not missed your chance to be part of our future and you will not be discarded. ALL of you will be made part of the new projects we are building. Every single one of you!" (does anyone else talk to, and make promises to, their paper?) It has been 6 months and nearly every sheet has been used on this new game project. So, I wanted to share with you... my kept promise... and a photo of last sheet of paper -- whose destiny today, is to help design AQ3D's "talk to an NPC" interface.

Good luck little piece of coffee-stained paper... we are all counting on you.
Crafting Formula of the Day: Mix Paper + Pyromancer class to summon Fire Truck.