Brad Wardell's views about technology, politics, religion, world affairs, and all sorts of politically incorrect topics.
Published on August 25, 2008 By Draginol In Demigod Journals

I write this from the plane on the way to Redmond which is where Gas Powered Games is located. 

Normally, publishers and developers have very explicit division of labor on projects. The developer makes the game, the publisher takes that game and markets, distributes is, and supports it.

As people observed with Sins of a Solar Empire, you can get tremendous results when the developer and publisher combine their teams together into a single "big" team.

That means Gas Powered Games will be intimately involved in the marketing of Demigod and it means Stardock will be very involved during development.  At GPG, I'll be sitting in the "bull pen" with the development team working on the game itself.  And together, we will be able to tap into the combined team's resources to get things done much more quickly.

Of course, the crucial element that can't be forgotten is the public beta program.  Here's how it works:

We get the first beta out to you sometime in the first week of September. The goal here is to just see how well the thing works on people's computers. It won't be anywhere nearly fully functional.  But we'll rapidly be enabling features and getting feedback which we'll be able to address.

AI needs help? AI developers at Stardock (including myself) can help.  Need more map elements? Let us know and we'll see who is available to help on that too.

Similarly, advertisements and promotions for the game will get posted here before they go live typically. Art work, ideas and concepts won't be from Stardock's marketing team alone but rather the Gas Powered Games development team as well as anyone else. 

One of the reasons why the Sins of a Solar Empire ads came out so well is because Ironclad (the developer) was so involved in the actual creation of the ads. It also didn't hurt that we put out the ads on the forums before they went to print where fans could make suggestions on how the ads could be improved.

Right now, we're playing the internal beta.  The part that we're most challenged by at present is how quickly we can implement the Hamachi-like multiplayer system so that players who don't know what router ports are and such won't have to worry about them anymore.  The first beta won't have that in there (I'm not sure as yet how much, if any, multiplayer will be in the initial beta 1 engine test portion).

One other thing players may find interesting is that GPG and Stardock have nearly a full year of free updates planned for Demigod. While the single player portion of the game is very important, our hope is to make Demigod the preeminent multiplayer strategy game for tournaments and such since the actual game-play is supports a lot more team mechanics than the traditional Starcraft or even Supreme Commander model would. 

We'll have a pre-beta 1 showing at PAX in Seattle this weekend.  If you're in the Washington area, be sure to stop by the Penny Arcade Expo.  Chris Taylor and I will be giving live demos.

-Brad Wardell = Frogboy = Draginol


Comments (Page 3)
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on Aug 26, 2008
Well, Unclean Beast has 4 legs, so kind of fox-like. Um, close enough?
on Aug 26, 2008
Didn't look like fur to me.
on Aug 26, 2008
You have to use your imagination on that one.
on Aug 26, 2008
I think it should use a point system, what if some one doesn't like multiplayer, or likes playing a support demigods (and therefore getting few kills). With points for each achievement then you know how experienced the player is, and they can choose which demigod appeals more to them.

Also unclean beast has fur! if you count bone as fur... and spikey metal as bone...
on Aug 26, 2008
I think it should use a point system, what if some one doesn't like multiplayer, or likes playing a support demigods (and therefore getting few kills). With points for each achievement then you know how experienced the player is, and they can choose which demigod appeals more to them.

This I really like. In most games, I work best as a supporting unit.

Also unclean beast has fur! if you count bone as fur... and spikey metal as bone...

I'd love to see someone pet a cat or dog with fur like that.
on Aug 27, 2008
All this sounds good. Looking forward to testing the Beta
on Aug 27, 2008
i also support the point/unlock system like how Cod4 was or universe at war :earth assault
but mostly like cod4 just with unlocking heroes and items that cant be bought otherwise
on Aug 27, 2008
<@kryo> [21:57:07] timmyfred> so SD and GPG are combined to do Demigod...anyone know what the division of labor is like?



we're doing the impulse reactor stuff and publishy things



That seems in direct contrast to what your stating Draginol=Frogboy. Could we maybe get some more answers regarding this issue. As someone who tried making suggestion on Sins, but it felt like not being the loudest child in a playpen. Honestly I didn't think Sins turned out that well. The AI is a joke on any difficulty setting and the online community fell apart after only a small time. It wouldn't surprise me if Ironclad declared bankruptcy after their next release.


The information of post release support is nice to hear as most Supcom players felt abandoned by GPG after 3-4 months and much faster with the release of Forged Alliance.
on Aug 27, 2008
Sortof jumping ahead in the discussion about free updates, given that beta hasn't begun for the public preorders yet.

Looking forward to testing with everyone in a week or two.
on Aug 27, 2008

That seems in direct contrast to what your stating Draginol=Frogboy.

Mentioning a couple things we are doing doesn't preclude us from doing other things

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