May-June Update

Unity Underground
The Unity beta test ended May 31st. We got some great feedback, which led to some fairly big changes. As a result, I decided that we could probably use another round of testing and feedback before the release. Right now, I'm working on the gamma playtest document, which will be released freely when it's ready. I'm also going to use the gamma doc as a practice run for the layout, so it will (hopefully) look a mite better than the beta doc did. I'll even be slotting in a few pieces of the final art. It should serve as a nice preview of what the final game will be like.

The Changes
Right now I'm knee deep in the gamma draft. Most of the changes are small things: terminology, tweaks to weapon stats, pruning the psychic powers, etc . . . The biggest change is to the way that the character classes work. In the new version, each class receives a very simple special ability that more strongly defines its role in the game. Some of the mechanics for these class abilities are totally new, while others were existing mechanics that were previously assigned to equipment. We've done a small amount of testing with the new classes and I think they're going to be a HUGE improvement. Of course, the changes are significant enough that I'll have to completely redo my character creation tutorial, but c'est la vie.

Here's one of the new additions:

The Brawler
Brawlers are street fighting name-takers who specialize in pummeling opponents with their bare damn hands. Many brawlers are accomplished martial artists, while others gain their skills through a hard knocks crucible of bar brawls and domestic disputes. They draw upon their massive strength and martial training to fist-frag their way through enemy ranks.

Class Ability: Brawling
Your unarmed melee attacks have a damage rating equal to your Strength stat.

I'm mostly proud of this one because I got to use the term "fist-frag" in a sentence.

Don't Walk in Winter Wood
All the unexpected revisions to Unity have left me a little behind on Winter Wood. I've still got some new content to write up and some playtesting to do. I hope to be digging through the dead leaves in the next couple of weeks.

That's it for now. Apologies for the gap between posts. I'll try to keep up better in the future. Thanks, as always, for your interest and support!