ABOUT THE VIDEO
• Just
over one year ago, the team at Ship of Heroes showed off a video of
their first really cool detailed mission map. One year and fifteen
videos later, they’ve gone back and upgraded this same map with a new
look. They’ve also adapted the map for a much newer engine version.
The devs are relentlessly moving towards launching Ship of Heroes.
• The
Sci-Fi setting for this superhero MMO is extremely current; most of the
hot superhero movies and shows we’ve been seeing combine superheroes
with spaceships or aliens in some way. Ship of Heroes does the same.
The use of props, lighting, and changing size of the rooms and corridors
gives the feeling of a larger-than-life world full of exciting new
places and inventions.
• The
dev team is building a game with two primary settings for combat and
missions. There is a large outdoor map called Apotheosis City, which
has already been shown in several other videos and one combat Alpha.
This video shows one of several indoor maps, which will generally be
dedicated to a solo player or a single team, and will use instancing to
prevent players from having to compete for valuable drops or progress.
• One
conclusion from the release of this revised map is that this dev team
does not have the frequent stops and re-starts that plague other teams.
They go back and improve game elements, even ones deemed good enough in
the past. The original map shown in this video was first published
twelve months ago. Now an upgrade is being released, and there will
probably be more changes in the future. SoH is evolving, and the
direction is good.
• We’re
told that this particular map will support a mission instance that will
typically take about 30-40 minutes to complete. However the devs at
SoH are pretty flexible about player strategies. If a team figures out
how to complete the mission in 5 minutes, more power to them!
• The
Ship of Heroes team is almost uniquely willing to show us what they
have developed, warts and all, even in the early stages of Alpha. Even
some major studios shy away from letting prospective players see in
detail how their games look before launch.
• This
video proves that the SOH dev team can produce environmental art at AAA
studio levels, despite being a small independent team funded by
donations and volunteer work. It also shows how SOH's look and feel
reflects their focus on having a positive community. This is utopian
future, not a dystopian one. It looks like a place where most people
would be happy to live.
• One
thing I noticed is that Ship of Heroes has published over 20 videos,
and they have the same powerful announcer doing the voice over
narration. This creates a sense that all of the videos are part of one
immersive game, and it creates confidence that this indie team will
actually launch their MMO on schedule – 2019, for those who are keeping
track.
Ship of Heroes has conducted two
successful Alpha tests with community members, and is about to begin a
large-scale login test, which is an important prerequisite for any
serious MMO. The devs are expecting to conduct a big raid test later in
2018.
