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  Weekly Citadel Developer Blog, Vol V: Byreford

  Monday, May 19, 2008

  by: Shane

  It is said by historians that Byreford is a land that cannot be conquered. Throughout its recorded history, the province of Byreford has never been successfully and totally annexed by any one nation. This is not due to lack of interest. Byreford is a rich and fertile land, strategically situated and possessing two safe harbours. And yet the province remains home to the dispossessed, the misfits of larger societies. It seems fated to forever remain a divided frontier, never home to one nation but to many.

  Byreford is the first zone of Citadel we plan to make available to players. While it may be a small fragment of the larger world we have designed, and one designed for lower-level players, it is still a richly-detailed place full of dangers, intrigues and mysteries. More…

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  Dragon Tavern is LIVE!

  Friday, May 16, 2008

  by: Thomas

  After many months of hard work, I’m happy to announce that Dragon Tavern is now open and ready to play!

  It’s been an absolute blast creating this game, and I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

  What Is It?

  Dragon Tavern, a web based adventure game where everyone is a champion.. to some degree.. Explore the wilds, beat up monsters, steal their lunch money, and use it to buy a bigger stick. That’s the life of all true adventurers! Create your very own today, and make a name for yourself as the most powerful in the land. What are you waiting for? There’s treasure out there to loot!

  More…

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  Dragon Tavern Launch Day

  by: Glen

  The first title to be released under the Trident Games banner, a little web game called Dragon Tavern, is only hours away from being launched into the wilds of the internet.  We’re all pretty excited about this, and crossing our fingers that we’ve created something as fun to play as it was to make.  While we have no illusions about the fact this won’t be the next WOW killer, what we do hope is that everyone who plays the game, whether it be daily or weekly, only once or regularly for years, gets something out of it. A sense of achievement, an enjoyable distraction, or at the very least a few chuckles at some of the loot and traps.

  Before we launch, I’d like to personally thank everyone involved in the process, for just being there to bounce ideas off, or playtest the game in its various incarnations during different stages of development. You’ve all played your part in helping us to get this over the line and out the door, which despite being for a faily simple looking game, was no small task.  So, with all that said, please jump in, pick a realm and class, and go get some loot! I’ll be in there myself.. just look for the guy losing all his money playing Mungskull in the gambling dens.

  Glen

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  Weekly Citadel Developer Blog, Vol IV: The Gearing-Up Montage

  Monday, May 12, 2008

  by: Shane

  Citadel’s combat system does not attempt to reinvent the wheel, but does try to bring together some of the best aspects of real-time RPG combat systems. Depending on your class, the way you develop or “spec” your merit points, and your choice of weapon setup, you’ll have a different suite of passive, active and reactive combat abilities to draw on. This is nothing new, but we’ve put it together with an aim towards keeping things fun and tactically rich without getting too complex, and giving you a broad choice of how you want your character to fight.

  This is the greater part of the reason we do not restrict armour or weapon types by class. Certainly classes, their merits and their abilities will suggest certain weapons, armour and stances. Additionally, some classes will find it harder to advance their skills with certain weapons than others. The bottom line though, is that if you want to be a sorcerous Invoker who gets about in plate armour and a sword and shield, we wouldn’t dare discourage you from doing so. More…

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  Weekly Citadel Developer Blog, Vol III: It’s Who You Know

  Monday, May 5, 2008

  by: Shane

  Be honest. When you play an MMORPG, how often do you actually read the quest text? If you’re an insipid little fanfic-writing manchild like myself, that would be “fairly often”. But let’s pretend for a moment that you’re an average person with a life to lead and limited time for repetitive virtual-life activities. You don’t really care why you have to go slaughter 10 imaginary people with no relevance to you or your character. You just want the cash and experience points. Hurry up and click that “accept” button. There’s killing to do!

  So what of the quest-giver? The person who stands there in the same place every day, enticing adventurers to engage in possibly questionable acts with the promise of money and a fleeting sense of accomplishment, presumably for no better reason than that they’re too lazy to do it themselves. What’s their deal? Do these NPCs seem to have believable motivations for doing so?

  Amazingly, in some cases, they do. And that can make for a great quest. Sometimes there’s a story there that is actually interesting enough for players to give a hoot about the NPC and what they hope to accomplish. But what if on top of that, the player could get involved with that NPC’s life, influence them, befriend them, recruit them as an employee, even betray and ruin them? More…

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