When will ADOM Deluxe get its advertised features?

[Lars]

Hello folks, I'm hoping one of the devs can shed some light here for me;

I'm a huge fan of this game since the mid 90's, and I was thrilled to be able to support the devs a little by purchasing this on Steam.

That said: It is now well over a year since ADOM Deluxe released on Steam to the public, and there's still no global/friend leaderboards to be found. Crowd Mode as implemented leaves a lot to be desired designwise, not to mention it flat out doesn't work as intended either.

Haven't seen a ghost of a character in half a year or so now so I assume that just broke completely as well.

I'm starting to gradually get a bit ♥♥♥♥♥♥ at this. Despite ADOM being wonderful as it is already, it does not get a free pass on not delivering what it advertises.

Sorry for the somewhat sour post, but this needs to get sorted out.

[Jarinex]

Yeah, I'm getting a little impatient myself for these features, along with the other things.

TB broke his arm a month ago (ikr ) so I don't known how much time he needs to heal. I know he's busy with real life and such, but it would be nice if he would start showing some activity again.









Also, inb4 ster comes in and stirs trouble.

[errantstar]

try again in 2035

[FierceCapybara]

As Jarinex mentioned, TB broke his arm, that really ground dev gears to a halt, as he's critical in many areas.

To reiterate on our current status in the issues mentioned by OP:

- Leaderboards are part of a larger campaign promise - a community site. We have a core site design ready based on adom.de. Not sure how the server part is going, but one way or another it needs to communicate with ADOM so that's one area where TB is really needed.

- Crowd mode is again largely on TBs shoulders. No news here as it's entirely outside of my area of expertise, don't want to spoil/announce anything and bring false hopes up. I'm sure TB will be back with more news once, you know, he's able to type with both hands ;)

Lots of backend stuff has been added to ensure quicker releases. Hopefully you guys can benefit from that soon. Also brings hope for the free version.

My core focus right now is to bring NPC animations to the table. The system is there, so it's not taking up other devs' time. Just gotta brun through ~600 sprites again ;) fortunately it's quick and heavily automated at this point. It's literally a breath of life for tiles, setting us apart from nearly every "core" roguelike out there. Though I know ASCII fans are only after content meat ;)

tl;dr: We're still working hard, TB will be back with more or less regular updates as soon as he has both hands working again ;)

[Lars]

I was afraid of this, TB breaking his arm in early december being used as an excuse. I do sympathize and hope he will make a full recovery soon, but this is still 13 months post launch when this happened.

Edit: Thanks for getting back to me though, Ravenmore.

[Jarinex]

Originally posted by ster:

try again in 2035

right on schedule

Originally posted by Lars:

I was afraid of this, TB breaking his arm in early december being used as an excuse. I do sympathize and hope he will make a full recovery soon, but this is still 13 months post launch when this happened.

Edit: Thanks for getting back to me though, Ravenmore.

Well let's be honest, it can definitely be hard to do some things with a broken arm. I know I wouldn't be able to function where I work if my arm was broken, and since this stuff involves typing with both hands, I'm sure it's hard.

Not saying it is an excuse for not getting more updates, but I think it's a valid excuse for the moment. Not like he PLANNED on breaking his arm to get out of developing, right? .....right? ;)

[Lars]

Christ, people... You don't need to explain to me that it is difficult for TB to do coding as of right now because of his condition.

I don't need to explain to you guys that his arm hasn't been broken for over a year, I hope ?

[Jarinex]

Originally posted by Lars:

Christ, people... You don't need to explain to me that it is difficult for TB to do coding as of right now because of his condition.

I don't need to explain to you guys that his arm hasn't been broken for over a year, I hope ?

When did I say it was a valid excuse for the year? When I said "for the moment" I mean for the past month (the time his arm was broken)

Unfortunately, while Raven and the rest of the crew have been busy with all the cool graphics, music and such, content bug fixes and all the stuff you have described falls on TB himself. Sadly, the updates and activity have been rather scarce. Whether you attribute that to laziness or being busy is up to your opinion.

Hopefully TB will rise from the grave and give us an update, and hopefully sooner than the year 2035.

[Yulgash]

Well, to cover the rest of 2016:

• Several weeks of vacation
  
• Several weeks (months?) of illness
  
• Finishing up ADOM Lite for the people who have been waiting four years
  
• Doing some major behind-the-scenes changes to ADOM (which completely broke the game)

As for the longer-term issues:

• ADOM development still mostly depends on TB
  
• TB has a full-time job that he isn't going to quit for the sake of ADOM

Don't know that anything can be done about that.

[Lars]

If I was interested in a list of all the possible excuses for the delays, I would have written all of the points in these replies myself.

I can't help but wonder why you assume I don't know anything about the development history of this game. Oh well.

I started this topic to remind the devs that this is actually not a game in 'Early Access' which is so popular these days, where you can sell anything on ideas and promises that may never be delivered.

No, this is a complete product available for over a year where almost all the features that make up what they're charging for is either missing or really poorly implemented to the point they're not actually working at all.

In normal situations this is called a scam or a fraud. So please, get this ♥♥♥♥ sorted out or find another solution, for example revising if you can realistically deliver what you're selling, and if not, work out a system for compensating your customers.

[Jarinex]

I mean, I'm definitely not gonna argue the fact that it DOES say that those will be features on the main page (although it does say TBD, so it does give you fair warning I suppose).

And your right, it's not early access(minus the features that are supposed to be on there), but IMO the game IS complete, barring the global leadership not being implemented and the crowd thing not working. The version on steam is much more updated than the one that currently free, and it does have star sign selection and point based generation now so I wouldn't really call it a scam.

I'm not sure what you want us to tell you. Raven has told you everything to his knowledge, and once TB is back he will let us know himself what is happening. Until then, you will either have to wait until that happens. While I definitely believe the frustration is justifiable, griping isn't going to make it go any faster. (Or maybe it will, who knows? )

[Yulgash]

Originally posted by Lars:

If I was interested in a list of all the possible excuses for the delays, I would have written all of the points in these replies myself.

At least you are now spared from TB posting this list as a response to this thread.

Originally posted by Lars:

I can't help but wonder why you assume I don't know anything about the development history of this game. Oh well.

Being familiar with all the stuff I listed would require following TB's blog, which I didn't assume that you (or other Steam users) did.

[Lars]

Originally posted by Jarinex:

While I definitely believe the frustration is justifiable, griping isn't going to make it go any faster. (Or maybe it will, who knows? :adom_lich: )

I don't know, I suspect a verbal kick up the rear might be just what the devs need to wake up from this stupor where they seem far too comfortable about selling the game for a year without its features.

Worth a shot, at least.

[Lars]

Originally posted by bercovici:

Being familiar with the stuff I listed would require following TB's blog, which I didn't assume that you (or other Steam users) did.

As mentioned in the original post, big fan of the game since its mid 90's. Got in about a year after the first public release. This is almost 10 years before Steam was published. Of course I follow adom.de and other sources of news about the game.

[Gluecost]

Personally i think they are doing fine.
Keep it up, and take the time you need to recover and execute it properly.
I am happy just knowing it is actively being worked on and improved to this date.

[errantstar]

Originally posted by Gluecost:

Personally i think they are doing fine.
Keep it up, and take the time you need to recover and execute it properly.
I am happy just knowing it is actively being worked on and improved to this date.

but it's not actively being worked on, the last update was 4 months ago lul