[shiv]

Most of you probably think we’re a very dead project since we have released many of our assets which are used in Earth Defence main campaign. But that isn’t true. No, we’re not dead.

For last two weeks I’ve been working hard (Tantalus53 and LordPomposity too) on polishing Act I missions, which are basically all done except one mission by Rodo. He promised me to finish it in reasonable time, so you can consider main part of fredding done.

Now we are in the middle of the hardest job: bugfixing and mission adjusting. This means for us a lot of work on small things that can be annoying, but are necessary to do. This covers grammar checking and spellchecking of missions as well as dialogue adjustements by our brave writer, LordPomposity. With fredding and playtesting our missions we have detected numerous weapon balance issues which I’m also solving as soon as we detect them. Some time ago LordPomposity said:

I don't see how the balancing of the ships and weapons could possibly be complete until they've been evaluated in the context of the missions. FREDing and tabling need to be a concurrent process that are informed by one another.

I know we have no pretty screenshots for you to show, but we are in the middle of missions adjustments and it’s some kind of boring but important thing. We want to keep you informed and that’s why we tell you about those things.

Look sharp for more updates soon,
--Shiv

[WouterSmitssm]

good work when will released and done and finishhed

[shiv]

Good news on the lacking mission  by Rodo. This morning he has posted on internal that it's pretty much more or less finished and he attatched mission file for us. I had a chance to playtest it several times and it works like a charm. Rodo has done amazing job with in-game cutscenes, ship movement control and beam control. That means for us, that all Act I missions are basically done

--Shiv

[Dragon]

So, what's the status?
I can beta test this anytime (well, anytime after I've finished WCS). You said you'll be releasing soon, but the board's been quiet for very long.
Any reason for keeping the campaign to yourselves for so long?

[General Battuta]

It's not done and people work on it in fits and starts but there are a ton of talented people involved (Rodo, Pomposity, Tantalus among others) so just hang in there

[LordPomposity]

Any reason for keeping the campaign to yourselves for so long?

Me.

Well, that's not entirely true as there's still some FREDing to be done, but our main bottleneck is writing and I'm our only "active" writer with English as a first language. I put "active" in quotes because graduate school has left me with little free time over the last several weeks, and I've been using it on things other than ED.

That said, the fact that people are posting here to show interest has given me the kick in the ass I need to get back to work on this, and I'll hammer out some dialog this week. I know that this post violates the time-honored HLP tradition of responding to any and all project status inquiries with "I'm doing this for free and it'll be done whenever I damned well feel like it, **** you very much for asking and I'll delay the release for a month just to spite you", but **** it.

[Dragon]

Maybe I could help. Sure, I'm from Poland, but I'm also really proficent at English, so I have no problem writing in it (in fact, I prefer English to Polish in some cases, and FS is one of them). I don't really have much time, but I should be able to do some work on ED in the free time I do have. From what you've said, that should double your "writer capablility". I could also do some small, miscalenous things that need doing, but nobody seems to pick them up.

[shiv]

Well, I really wanted to do some stuff but it looks like I'm useless in this project now.

[Nighteyes]

I don't really have much time

Thanks for the offer, but our team has more than enough people in it, main problem right now is lack of motivation, not manpower.

[Dragon]

Well, I do have motivation, it's just school is eating a lot of my free time. It's lightening up though, exams are coming and I'm not taking them this year, so, combined with easter and the assorted holidays, I'll have almost a month off. Not to mention I submitted for testing in ancient history of ED (before it came to HLP). Funny thing, they said they'd soon be ready for beta. 

[General Battuta]

There is only one thing that has ever completed projects on HLP, and that is a dedicated FREDder - or two - sitting down with the resources he needs and a clear but flexible story, a few good coders and artists available to help out in a pinch, and plowing through everything that needs to be done. Tantalus, Pomposity, Rodo, and a couple others have stepped up to this job whenever they have had time, and for the project to be finished, they simply need more of that dedicated time.

I wanted to be that person but I can't even take care of that for BP the way I used to. Pushing a mod to completion is very nearly a full-time job, and I could only give it my all when I had neither school nor a job to answer to.

[Dragon]

*knock* *knock* Anybody here?
We haven't heard from ED for quite some time, is there anything progressing?

[General Battuta]

Tantalus has been able to put a more time into missions now that school's out for him. Otherwise no.

[The Blue Lions]

can't wait till this is done

[Mobius]

Any news, guys?

[mjn.mixael]

Mobius, are you just asking that on every project board you have ever been interested right now?

[shiv]

Hey guys! Long time no see. And long time no updates

We are getting close to finishing this thing and we need your help.
We'd be glad to see someone to volunteer in finishing two ships. We've got it converted to POF, tabled nad uvmapped. However we need a texture artist to give those two models some love.

If you want to help us get Earth Defence out, please help us with those two ships We pay back in our great gratitude

[Black Wolf]

Shiv, it will probably help to specify the class and species of ship you want textured. Texture artists with free time are rare enough as it is, and not everyone can do every species - you might get different people willing to offer to help for a Shivan bomber vs a Terran corvette (or whatever, random examples).

OF course, for the maximum chance of getting people's attention, you're probably best off showing off the models themselves (assuming they're not completely plot critical). No better way to get people to help out than by giving them a reason to be excited (i.e. some cool new ships just waiting for a texture to be in-game-ready).

[mjn.mixael]

Yeah.. I would consider offering if I knew what I was getting into. I care about species less than I care about ship class. I don't have time to blindly offer to texture an installation.

[shiv]

Sure. We need to get pretty renders of those objects for you first