Rewriting The Lost Chapter

Official Development Blog for DIRT: Uru Live

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Development - Nicks Office

Who remembers the D'ni History Puzzle? This was a puzzle game developed by Patrick the Futographer, Rusty and Korteenea back in the Ubisoft days of Uru. Rusty later put out a 3d version of the area. Both the Puzzle itself and the 3d explorable area can be found here. 

Rusty later went on to create the wonderful cavern area of Vothol that can be found on The Open Cave and Gehn shards. Several years ago I contacted Rusty about implementing Nick's Office as an explorable area in Uru. He was kind enough to provide me with the Max file and textures for the area, so that I could merge it into it's proper place in the city for DIRT - Uru Live.

This is a WIP photo of the area so far, in its proper place within the city.

There's still a bit more to be done in terms of texturing/uv mapping. But the area will be a nice little addition to the city. Once the rest of the floor is finished, an entire floor of a building within the city will be able to be opened up and explored in all its D'ni history loving goodness.

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WIP of Baron City Office. Now all thats left to merge into the main city is the Great Zero.

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Who remembers these? They're Ba-ack...

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Some late night testing in Kahlo.

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Cyan's Myst Online Announcement

Since MOULa was given back to the fans they’ve wanted fan created content, but so far the game’s been basically in stasis. They’ve been working with a group of 10ish people, have a trailer to show, hoping it’s up by end of year. Also, they plan on releasing the never before seen concept art from Uru to the community

Trailer:

-Avatars waking across something that looks like the Great Shaft

-Direbo, Noloben, Laki’ahn ; looks like the Myst 5 content is going to be brought into Uru?

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News - Sometimes Things Have a Way of Working Out.

With Mysterium out of the way, I can finally explain the reasoning for the shard's delay.

By now some of you may have heard via Cyan's Mysterium announcement, Cyan has been working with a group of fans within the Myst Community to bring fan created content to the MOULagain shard. I am a member of that group.

There are times when hard work, determination and persistence pays off. I am pleased to say that the future development of DIRT - Uru Live content that is done by me, will be done with Cyan’s acknowledgement. Under the guidelines of my FCA, I will be able to continue to develop ages like Descent, and other ages that show up on the DRC project list.

I want to make it clear that not everyone in the group working with Cyan (The Intangibles) is working on DIRT directly. There are some that are, and others that are not. All of the group's members have offered of course to lend a hand either in testing, and have helped critique stuff etc. Anyone in the group is of course welcome to actually help jump in and develop DIRT related stuff if they so choose. However moving forward as a member of the group as well as a project leader for DIRT I always need to remind myself that the group and DIRT are not the same thing, and no one should think they are. We all want to implement  content in different ways and we will butt heads on occasion on how to do that, and sometimes that means that I have to make two versions of something. One thats group oriented and one thats DIRT oriented. Descent for example is an age that falls into that category. I am happy to do that because I want everyone to enjoy this content, not just people that come to DIRT - Uru Live.

This of course doesn't mean that the ages I make are "canon" that will of course ultimately and always be up to Cyan should they choose to recognize them as such. However it does open up the path to make my progress on things a bit more clear about what I and others are doing and where it stands in the "is this okay to do" department.

So now, I hope that all this is clear of why DIRT's release schedule was pushed back. As all of my content developments go. i wish to release said content as close to Cyan’s original vision of Uru that I possibly can. Because of that I, and because it was up to Cyan to announce to the community our group, I delayed DIRT's launch. Now though I can change directions and update stuff on my end to be closer to what was released. This new change in direction will mean that I will now be able to develop this content not just for DIRT - Uru Live but configure it so that, if Cyan chooses to do so, they can include it in the official MOULa server and hopefully, in all the other shards out there.

I want to thank everyone that has followed this blog, and shared it with others, as well as everyone else who has followed my work over the course of the last seven years. I started this project seven years ago because I truly believed that Uru could flourish. I started it because I believed that Cyan’s original vision of a underground world, with never ending story and content, could come true. It has been a long road to get to this moment, with many bumps along the way. Now that I have arrived here, at a destination that I was always,cautiously optimistic that I would reach, the road ahead looks bright and promising. Thanks to everyone out there I can now upgrade that cautious optimism to excited anticipation.

I've updated our project list with the full list of ages  that are going to hopefully, someday, find their way into DIRT - Uru Live, and, with hope, onto MOULa.

Chloe Rhodes

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To our fans,

I wanted to make an official announcement of sorts of a delay in our release schedule. Circumstances beyond our control (Good circumstances not bad) have caused us to push back our release schedule ever so slightly till later in the year. Obviously this raises some interesting...

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Development Phases

In an effort to update you all on the status of things, I've added a column for our Development Stages within the sidebar. Here is the breakdown of each of the phases, so you can get a general idea of where things stand.

If an age is categorized as "Unnamed" that means that we're aware of the name, but we don't want to reveal the name of the age just yet as to avoid spoiling you guys and gals. If the age is categorized as "Unknown" that means we haven't given the age a name yet or are debating what to call the age based on it's design concepts.

These design phases follow the same rough principle as Cyan's design phases:

Phase 1: Initial Design - During this Phase, basic maps and documents are created for the Age or location being designed. This includes the design of the puzzles and story for the Age. 

Phase 2:  Massing Model - All structures are made in rough form to show their basic shapes and sizes. Little or no texture/lighting are done at this stage.

Phase 3: Detailed Analysis - The Age or location (massing model) is given a through examination by the design team. We can walk around and get a "feel" for the Age and make changes while the Age is still in the early stages. Design documents are updated to reflect any changes in the Age's design. 

Phase 4a: Detailed Modeling - Models are refined to final forms (structures are secured and cleanup is performed), textures are added, lighting is added, etc. Once phase 4a is finished, the Age will "look" complete. Some of our screenshots may come from this stage of design. 

 Phase 4b: Wiring - This is where everything in the Age is made to "work". Machines, elevators, doors, buttons, levers, triggers, puzzles, game-play, etc. Once phase 4b is done, hopefully everthing in the Age works as it was designed. The Age is almost ready, now.

Phase 5: Testing - In this final phase before completion, the Age or location is opened for testing by those who be in our Beta Release. They'll get to hammer on it, find bugs, and send it back to the development team to make fixes as needed. 

Just like Cyan's own development schedule works, the actual phase of an age may be in two phases simultaneously. For instance an age may be in Phase 2, while at the same time we'll still be able to walk around in in game like we do in Phase 3. However once an age has actually completed a phase is when we move up the counter and update the age's actual Phase to the higher level.

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Release Schedule Delay

To our fans,

I wanted to make an official announcement of sorts of a delay in our release schedule. Circumstances beyond our control (Good circumstances not bad) have caused us to push back our release schedule ever so slightly till later in the year. Obviously this raises some interesting questions regarding the reasons for the delay, and I'll try and go over them here:

What caused the delay?

I cannot comment on what caused the delay, I will comment however that there is no cause for alarm in the reason for it. There's a good and necessary reason for it however, and once I can I will explain as much as I can at a later date.

Can you give us an updated release schedule?

I can't at this time pinpoint an exact timeframe for our beta release, only to say that I will be able to give a rough time frame sometime after Mysterium.

Is the team still in development?

The team is still hard at work on a number of projects. I myself am over looking Descent, while our newest team member is working on D'ni-Tomahn.

I know all of this sounds very vague but I ask only that you trust us in that all will be clear soonish.

Chloe Rhodes and Team

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The DIRT team is pleased as a dog with two tails, to announce today that we have partnered up with the Mystitech Production team to provide them locations for shooting their exciting machinima project "The Lost Art". For those of you unfamiliar with their project please check out their YouTube channel Mystitech Productions.  

As long time fans of such projects as the DRC Public Service Announcements and The Deep City Documentary us here on the DIRT team are excited to work with this new group of machinima artists as they toil to bring their exciting story to life for us all to enjoy.

As part of this new partnership, the Mystitech Crew will be able to scout ages like Descent and film episodes within the shard, allowing everyone a great chance to preview the content prior to its public release.

We're grateful that we get to help them bring their beautiful story to life, and we're happy that they've chosen DIRT - Uru Live as one of the shards to shoot some of that amazing story at.

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Development - Content

We've gotten some questions recently regarding some of the content that's going to be implemented into DIRT - Uru Live and how it's going to roll out. We've already detailed how episodic content was a bad idea for MOUL, so we want to treat the rolling out of new content in a similar manner to Prologue and MOUL pre-episodes.

Storyline

Much like MOUL we do have a planned story intended for most of our new ages/areas. We're aiming that story to be a mixture of Prologue/MOUL. Some of this story will be revealed by live-acted NPCs. However player interaction in the story is a vital key to how it plays out. Part of our content is based upon the idea that collective choices will actually affect life within the cavern. As an example: 

(Note, this is not part of the intended story but to give an idea of the direction we're moving in.)

Many of Cyan's original ideas, like the Lake Lighting and Great Zero Calibration we'd like to redo in a similar manner. However learning from some of the mistakes with those stories we're aiming to implement visual changes that can let the player know that they are affecting those projects, if only in slight ways at first.

In addition to collective changes, our planned first year story line will be influenced by individual player choices and interaction. Similar to Rils trip to Negilahn, with Douglas Sharper and Nick White, or the tearing down of the barricades at the Kahlo Pub during Prologue.. We want people to individually and collectively feel like they can influence the story, change the story, and direct which way the story may move.

Repeatable Content

This is a vital component to any MMO. Player's need to feel like there is enough to want to come back on a daily basis. DIRT - Uru Live will include things like Heek, Jalak, Marker Quests, pellet drops and door runs. In addition there will be old repeatable content that will finally be opened up, like the Gahreesen Wall. Several of our ages are being planned for repeatable content use like the D'ni equivalent of ice-hockey, where players compete in teams or one on one. There will also be non competitive repeatable content, like the aforementioned Lake Lighting and Great Zero calibration. As well as player involved restoration efforts such as a clean-up of city areas, and D'ni - Human translations of journals.

Content Rollout

Rolling out of new content is one of the primary reasons we started this project. The idea that every day you could return to the cavern and find something new is what continually keeps us excited about the project. So we've aimed our content roll out to a monthly release of new ages/areas, with daily changes to those and prior ages every day. So we may release a new part of the city in one month, but daily change the blockades in that area so that it is opened slowly over the course of the month rather than all at once. Or a broken lever in one of the ages may be non-functional one day, but the next work and turn on new previously unusable machinery etc. Furthermore new clothing and customization options/bahro slates will pop up in a similar manner to how they were unrolled during MOUL.

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Social Media

We've rounded out our social media presence with a Facebook page and Twitter account. Be sure to Like and Follow us so that no matter where you are you'll know when DIRT - Uru Live goes...well...LIVE!

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Celebrating 30 Subscribers! Here's our YouTube Channel Trailer!!!

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Plea Bargain

So, here's the deal. The blog is very close to 30 followers. Starting with 30 followers and moving up in increments of 30, I'm going to post something REALLY big that I've been sitting on. So now I'm reaching out, if you want something REALLY COOL that will BLOW your socks off, then start reblogging, sharing these posts in your social media etc. Its up to you guys to decide how much you want to see. :D

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The farther down in our Descent you go, the darker it becomes. Don't worry though, the bats don't bite. Much.

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Development - Transparency and Openess

Just a quick post. It has occurred to us that there might be some question regarding integrating our stuff into MOULa at some point, and if that would be feasible with Cyan’s server’s not being open sourced. In an effort to remain open and transparent as to how our client side stuff works, the team at DIRT - Uru Live is opening up and updating our organizational repo for everyone to see prior to our beta release. This process may take a few days, so we hope you are patient with us as we go through this code and properly separate into branches that can be easily pulled from by others in the community if they choose to do so. Our repo can be found at DIRTUruLive

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Interior 0013 - Originally designed as an industrial area in D'ni for the now defunct Subterranean Restoration group. This area will now be stripped down to serve as an industrial digging complex within Descent.