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Tabula Rasa Interview with Starr Long, Retail Expansion Scheduled for Late Next Year
Posted November 13th, 2007 by Cody Bye
Questions by Cody
"Micajah" Bye, Managing Editor
Answers by Starr Long, Producer for Tabula Rasa
In the past, the release of an MMORPG was fraught with bugs, delays, server queues, and more. Gamers would often have to wait weeks to play a finalized version of their game, and many would drop their subscription before those fixes ever took place. In the case of Tabula Rasa, the launch has been incredibly smooth, with only a few other MMOG titles even comparing to the problem-free release of the game.
With Tabula Rasa finally out the door, the NCsoft developers can begin looking ahead and plotting their course for the next few updates and expansions. While Cody "Micajah" Bye was visiting NCsoft this last weekend, he sat down with TR's producer, Starr Long, and asked him what the plans were for the future. In response, Starr talked about briefly about their first retail expansion and in-depth about the next few Operations that are set to impress MMO gamers.
Ten Ton Hammer: How have things been progressing since launch? Everything seemed to go pretty smoothly, but we just wanted your take on the process.
Starr Long:
Things have been pretty smooth. The game’s stable. *he knocks
on the top of his desk* Knock on wood, but people are having fun.
That’s the biggest thing that I care about, and I think that
people are enjoying the game.
Everything that we wanted to come out of launch seemed to happen. Things are relatively well balanced. The key features that we wanted people to enjoy – the control points, character cloning, class system, and the whole RPG-Shooter blend – they all seem to work!
On top of that it was all very smooth, so I have no complaints! Of course, I would always like more people to play the game, but I feel that with the buzz and feedback we’re getting, more people isn’t going to be a problem.
Ten Ton Hammer: When are you going to release your first post-launch Operation?
Starr: Operation 1 is going to go out in late January or early February, and it seems to be on track. We always need to get the development done well ahead of the actual date, so we’re going to be wrapping that up in just a few weeks. I think the official date for that is December 10th.
Ten Ton Hammer: That’s less than a month away!
Starr: Yeah,
and that’s going to have Hybrids in it.
Ten Ton Hammer: How are the Hybrids going to work?
Starr: We’re going to give out those details really soon! I’m not really allowed to say much about that….
Ten Ton Hammer: Just that they’re called Hybrids, right?
Starr: *laughs* Yup! And it’s contrary to what April told people; it’s not going to be Star Wars characters meets musicians like my Toby Wan Kenobi costume. Although hilarious, it’s not what Hybrids are going to be.
Ten Ton Hammer: Any other future content plans in the works?
Starr: The artists are actually working on our first retail expansion, which will come around the end of next year. And so they're working on the new “secret planet.”
They’re also working on the new Personal Armor Units, which I can’t tell you about right now. (Editor’s Note: He actually did tell me more about them, and you’ll be able to read all about them in tomorrow’s article that will run on our Tabula Rasa Community Site!)
Ten Ton Hammer: Aside from the last bit of Operation 1, what else have you been working on lately?
Starr: We’re just continuing to make ongoing balances to the gameplay. We’re looking at all the abilities on all the classes and determining the ones that are cool and the ones that aren’t. We want every ability to be as bad-ass as possible, and some of them just aren’t as bad-ass as they could be.
Ten Ton Hammer: For my
final comment, it seems like the game has been received very well.
However, there are still people who are hesitant or downright
aggressive towards the game, even going so far as to say certain
elements of the game are broken. What would you tell those people who
are naysaying Tabula Rasa?
Starr: I think a lot of people’s opinions were formed during the early stages of our beta test, and we were really rough around the edges. We had a lot of problems, and I think we really pulled it together in the last phase of beta. That said, there are always things that we’re working on and every patch is going to have continual optimizations. We will continue to improve performance and stabilize the game.
We will continue to work on the abilities that may be “broken,” but there really aren’t that many performance issues regarding the abilities. That said, we’re going to continue on this two week publish cycle that we got on during beta, where every two weeks we put out a patch with literally hundreds of bug fixes. We’re just trying to stay on a really fast turnaround and continue to stay on this really aggressive schedule. If something isn’t working like you want it to, just wait a couple weeks and it will probably get fixed.
Ten Ton Hammer: And do these two week cycles include new missions, quests, items, etc.?
Starr: Yes. So every two weeks players can see new items, armor, weapons, recipes, maps – something new in addition to the bug fixes.
Ten Ton Hammer: Thanks again and I hope Tabula Rasa continues to do well!
Answers by Starr Long, Producer for Tabula Rasa
In the past, the release of an MMORPG was fraught with bugs, delays, server queues, and more. Gamers would often have to wait weeks to play a finalized version of their game, and many would drop their subscription before those fixes ever took place. In the case of Tabula Rasa, the launch has been incredibly smooth, with only a few other MMOG titles even comparing to the problem-free release of the game.
With Tabula Rasa finally out the door, the NCsoft developers can begin looking ahead and plotting their course for the next few updates and expansions. While Cody "Micajah" Bye was visiting NCsoft this last weekend, he sat down with TR's producer, Starr Long, and asked him what the plans were for the future. In response, Starr talked about briefly about their first retail expansion and in-depth about the next few Operations that are set to impress MMO gamers.
Ten Ton Hammer: How have things been progressing since launch? Everything seemed to go pretty smoothly, but we just wanted your take on the process.
|
People are generally having fun in Tabula Rasa, and that's the biggest thing Starr Long cares about. |
Everything that we wanted to come out of launch seemed to happen. Things are relatively well balanced. The key features that we wanted people to enjoy – the control points, character cloning, class system, and the whole RPG-Shooter blend – they all seem to work!
On top of that it was all very smooth, so I have no complaints! Of course, I would always like more people to play the game, but I feel that with the buzz and feedback we’re getting, more people isn’t going to be a problem.
Ten Ton Hammer: When are you going to release your first post-launch Operation?
Starr: Operation 1 is going to go out in late January or early February, and it seems to be on track. We always need to get the development done well ahead of the actual date, so we’re going to be wrapping that up in just a few weeks. I think the official date for that is December 10th.
Ten Ton Hammer: That’s less than a month away!
|
The Personal Armor Units will function like a smaller, more personal version of the mech. |
Ten Ton Hammer: How are the Hybrids going to work?
Starr: We’re going to give out those details really soon! I’m not really allowed to say much about that….
Ten Ton Hammer: Just that they’re called Hybrids, right?
Starr: *laughs* Yup! And it’s contrary to what April told people; it’s not going to be Star Wars characters meets musicians like my Toby Wan Kenobi costume. Although hilarious, it’s not what Hybrids are going to be.
Ten Ton Hammer: Any other future content plans in the works?
Starr: The artists are actually working on our first retail expansion, which will come around the end of next year. And so they're working on the new “secret planet.”
They’re also working on the new Personal Armor Units, which I can’t tell you about right now. (Editor’s Note: He actually did tell me more about them, and you’ll be able to read all about them in tomorrow’s article that will run on our Tabula Rasa Community Site!)
Ten Ton Hammer: Aside from the last bit of Operation 1, what else have you been working on lately?
Starr: We’re just continuing to make ongoing balances to the gameplay. We’re looking at all the abilities on all the classes and determining the ones that are cool and the ones that aren’t. We want every ability to be as bad-ass as possible, and some of them just aren’t as bad-ass as they could be.
|
If you're having a particular problem with TR, you can probably wait a week or two and the problem will get fixed. |
Starr: I think a lot of people’s opinions were formed during the early stages of our beta test, and we were really rough around the edges. We had a lot of problems, and I think we really pulled it together in the last phase of beta. That said, there are always things that we’re working on and every patch is going to have continual optimizations. We will continue to improve performance and stabilize the game.
We will continue to work on the abilities that may be “broken,” but there really aren’t that many performance issues regarding the abilities. That said, we’re going to continue on this two week publish cycle that we got on during beta, where every two weeks we put out a patch with literally hundreds of bug fixes. We’re just trying to stay on a really fast turnaround and continue to stay on this really aggressive schedule. If something isn’t working like you want it to, just wait a couple weeks and it will probably get fixed.
Ten Ton Hammer: And do these two week cycles include new missions, quests, items, etc.?
Starr: Yes. So every two weeks players can see new items, armor, weapons, recipes, maps – something new in addition to the bug fixes.
Ten Ton Hammer: Thanks again and I hope Tabula Rasa continues to do well!
Excited to hear about an
upcoming retail expansion? Want to discuss the new PAUs? Talk
about it
on the forums!
Ten Ton Hammer is your unofficial source Tabula Rasa news and articles!
Looking for a solid Tabula Rasa guide? Check out our TR Community Site!
Ten Ton Hammer is your unofficial source Tabula Rasa news and articles!
Looking for a solid Tabula Rasa guide? Check out our TR Community Site!
Genre: Science Fiction
Status: Cancelled
Release Date: November 2, 2007
Fee: F2P
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