OrbusVR Teaser Trailer + Stress Test Information

First off, we're pleased to present a short little teaser trailer that I created this morning based on some of the footage I've recorded during recent play tests. Enjoy:

As you can see we had three people in the game playing at the same time -- and it was a lot of fun!

Stress Test October 8th

This Saturday, October 8th, we will be holding a Stress Test for the game. It will start at 7 PM US Central Time and last for around 2 hours.

How do I participate in the test?

Start by creating an account on https://orbusvr.com . Just sign up with your email and a password. Then head over the to the community forums, at https://community.orbusvr.com . That's where we'll be posting information as the test gets underway, where we'll be able to take questions during the test itself, and where you can leave feedback after the test is over.

Once you've created your account you're all set. We'll post on the forums, blog, and tweet out a link to the actual client download probably on Friday afternoon. It's about 1 GB in size.

What can I do during the test?

During this test, you will have the opportunity to download the current alpha version of the game client, log in, and do pretty much everything you see in that video. Specifically you can:

  • Try out 4 different combat classes: the Ranger, Barbarian, Mage, and Healer. Some (like the Ranger) are more polished than others (like the Barbarian). None of them are anything more than alpha quality at this time.

  • Fight 4 different types of Monsters (and maybe more if I have time to get it done before the weekend).

  • Interact with up to 30 other people on the same server. There is no official "grouping" or anything like that right now, but everyone can just attack everything.

  • Explore part of a zone that we are currently building. It's around 1 square kilometer.

  • If you can figure out how to summon it (hint: it requires more than one person), you can fight a boss (the giant plant from the video). Note that it will not be located in the village like it is in the video, it's out in the zone someplace and it must be summoned.

What's not ready yet?

While it would take forever to list all the things that aren't in the game yet that we plan to add, a short list would include:

  • There is nothing but combat -- no crafting, fishing, etc.
  • The combat is pretty unbalanced right now; we're still working out all the internal stats and math. So don't get too frustrated if you die a lot or think the fights are too easy.
  • If you die you just go back to the village, there's no resurrection or death penalty right now.
  • You can change classes by standing by the stones in the village. In the real game it won't be that easy :-)

Perhaps most importantly, there is no tutorial of any kind right now in-game. I am trying to put together a short little document for each class that tells you how to play it, but honestly there's just going to be a lot of self-exploration and trial and error for now :-)

What's the purpose of the test? Where should I focus my efforts?

The purpose of this test is two-fold. Most importantly, we are trying to make sure that when we get a lot of people online at the same time, the decisions we've made thus far about the networking architecture hold up. Basically, it would be bad if the game plays fine when 3 people are online but falls apart when there are 30.

So in general we want feedback like is the game lagging when you play it, are you getting disconnected, are the monsters in the game behaving like you think they should, etc. A lot of what we want to know we'll be able to see just by looking at the server's load and bandwidth usage, but it's always helpful to get feedback from the community as well!

The other purpose is to finally get the ball rolling on getting the community engaged. We want to know what you think about the game (so far), if you're excited about it, who you are and what you're looking for, etc. To that end, we have set up some forums and you can now make your own OrbusVR account.

What feedback is not helpful?

Generally anything on gameplay mechanics. The classes are only in their rough stages right now, so feedback like "the Archers charged shot doesn't do enough damage" or "the Mage needs more spells!" isn't what we need at this point.

Whatever feedback you have we're more than happy to hear, it just may not end up mattering as much as we'll largely rework the gameplay as we approach Beta.

Does this mean the game is almost ready to launch?!

We wish! At this point we are in Pre-Alpha. I estimate that we have around 2-3 months to go before we'll be ready to do Alpha, and then another 2-3 months before Beta. Alpha meaning "not everything that we want to do is in the game yet" and Beta meaning "everything is in the game but it's full of bugs and doesn't work right." We'll post more info on how you can sign up to help test those phases when it gets closer to time.

We'll also be posting a more in-depth schedule and more information on the game itself (the classes, the lore, etc.) in the coming month.

Enjoy the trailer and we look forward to hopefully seeing you in game this Saturday!

You can discuss this post on our official forums here: https://community.orbusvr.com/t/blog-post-orbusvr-teaser-trailer-stress-test/26

If you're planning to attend the stress test, please let us know here: https://community.orbusvr.com/t/orbusvr-stress-test-october-8th-7-9pm-cst-are-you-coming/25

Director

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