May the Fourth be with you, Defenders! Here's what we've been working on this week:
Josh Isom, Community Manager (@iamisom)
You have until May 13th to choose the next map! This vote is between the Crumbled Bulwark and The Buried Bastille:
Crumbled Bulwark
Crumbled Bulwark is a remake of DD1’s Ramparts. A full moon hangs over this fragmented castle fortress. Medium-sized map. Three cores.
VS.
The Buried Bastille
The Buried Bastille is a remake of DD1’s Glitterhelm Caverns. This underground fortress has three wings, each filled with the distinct, lingering smell of death. Large map. Four cores.
Which one would you like first? Vote here and let us know!
Steven Collins, Lead Level Designer (@Esorath)
With the influence vote in full swing, we are ramping up on an incursion for the map that wins the vote. Gathered some good feedback from the forums about the latest incursion, and the next patch will have some quality of life adjustments to the incursion to make it more accessible.
Brian Goodsell, Random Employee (@bgoodsell)
Ever make a visual effect that you could just stare at for hours?
Made a cool visual behavior setup for one of EV2’s towers to reduce beam noise because of the way in which you can place this tower.
Currently Listening To: Sarah Jaffe - "Defense"
James Reid, Software Programmer (@Driscan)
Greetings Defenders!
This week I’m working on making sure our new UIs are split-screen friendly. They should be much easier to read and navigate on the PS4 and PC (when split-screen becomes available). I also updated the Summary Screen to be muuuuuch simpler with a little sizzle to it. The final touches are going in now that sound and art have gotten their hands on it.
For the rest of the week I’ll be working with Brys on the Server Browser.
And now for some pictures!
Dani Moore, Remote QA Manager (@Dani)
Testing continues on EV2 and more. Folks that haven’t been contacted yet, should hear back from me soon. We’re bringing in new playtesters in rounds, and the next round will be soon.
Also working on hotfixes and looking at the latest DD1 community beta patch!
Daniel Diaz, World Builder (@DanielKaMi)
We just started work on a new level! Another DD1 remake! As always, the first thing we do is to define the tileset, so we did some visual tests and built up some architecture, and then Jordan came up with this visual reference callout. Simply stunning!
Jesus Diaz, World Builder (@N3oDoc)
This week we are working on a new map. We are establishing the tileset for the level, which means creating the basic modular pieces such as trims, walls, grounds...
Tim Shannon, PS4 & Live Producer (@TimmyTrashTier)
New monthlies are out and everyone should be swimming in new pets on the PS4. The PS4 Inventory Pack is still held up in Sony’s QA, so I’ve been trying to sort that out. I’m looking into the events system as well because we’d like to do more than the triple daily mission refresh, but we have to figure out how to do it efficiently first.
If you look up at Mr. James Reid’s entry, you’ll see that we’re working studio wide on improving the split-screen experience by reducing the number of fullscreen takeovers.
Other than that, we’re working on some server and client stability improvements that should be shipping this week as well.
John Muscarella, Digital Puppet Master (@Muskie4242)
This week I’m spending a little bit of time polishing EV2's animations and making a few small tweaks. Most of my time, however, is focused on the hero after EV2, the Gun Witch!
I am also working on adding some animated elements to our new maps. So many skeletons hanging from the dungeon ceiling, so little time...
Chris Flores, Lead QA (@likethatwhenigothere)
Still chugging away at hotfixes as they come in ( _._) . But more than that, we’re full charge ahead with testing of the current milestone. That means testing on EV2, new costumes, new skill spheres, new passives, new metrics data to track, new weapons, all while making sure all the old stuff still works. I’m getting too old for this.
Dan Pingston, Character Artist
It puts the lotion on its skin...and by lotion, I mean pixels.