The Starry Expanse Project

We don’t usually do this sort of thing, but we got such a big traffic boost from Reddit the other day, we just had to share. We’ve never seen such a drastic spike – those horizontal bars are counting thousands of unique hits, and all of the non-Reddit days still average in the hundreds – still nothing to scoff at.

We got about $55 in donations, over 100 beta signups, and some other interesting side effects. More news soon!

We’re feeling generous, so here’s a re-shoot of the Prison Island walkthrough that was posted before. We tried to capture video from a newer build, but none of the results worked properly, so this video is from the same build as the last video was, so it lacks the newer features that we’ve completed since Mysterium. Still, it’s a much smoother demonstration of what was done at that point – and it has sound, which I think really adds to the experience.

As with before, this is very much a work in progress, particularly the sky, water, and firemarble dome.

Enjoy!

Ok, so yes, we’ve been pretty quiet as of late, and that sucks. It’s not because we don’t like you guys, it’s not because we have given up, so stop it with all that nonsense. No, in actuality, there are a number of factors contributing to our current downtime, one being the fact that almost all of us are students. That means, of course, that we’re incredibly busy during the fall. We are still working on the project whenever we can, it’s just much slower going than it was during the summer.

There are a few other things holding us back at the moment, but in some ways, it’s a good thing. Don’t worry, everything will be fine in the end.

All that being said, here’s a little treat, to show you that we’re still alive and kicking:

Still no awesome reward for reaching the funding goal, although this is pretty cool, too.

We’ve noticed an increase lately in discussion in the comments section on our posts, so we decided to look into alternative methods of discussion. We had a forum set up, but it was causing us all sorts of headaches. Instead, we found a service we like a lot, called Convore. It’s kind of like a hybrid between a forum and a chatroom, in that it’s live-updating, but it’s topic-based, like a forum. It’s very cool.

So come talk to us! You know you want to.

As of this morning, we’ve achieved our primary funding goal of $2000! Thank you so much to everybody who’s donated so far, you’ve really made this project a viable possibility. If you haven’t yet donated, please don’t let this deter you, we could always make use of extra funds. The more we have, the faster we can work, in theory. We’ll keep updating the progress bar on the right, until it hits the edge of the page.

In the meantime, we’re working on pulling together a treat for you guys to show our appreciation. We went from 90% to 100% a little faster than we expected, so we don’t have anything quite ready yet. We’ve got something coming, though!

Thanks again, everybody.

Edit: There have been a couple of recent instances of people, for whatever reason, accidentally donating twice. If this happens to you, we’ll fully refund the second donation as soon as we notice it. If we don’t contact you, please don’t hesitate to contact us and point it out.

We just passed the 95% mark on our journey to the first funding goal, $2000. That means we now have over $1900 raised! To celebrate, here’s another sneak peek at the journal system, this time with Catherine’s journal. Remember that these are not necessarily final graphics or animations. It’s not in-game footage, just a prototype.

Update: Here’s the Prison Book, as well:

Some of you might already know this, but one of the 59 volters gave a surprise presentation at the DutchMystCommunity gathering this weekend. It was quite a success, and we’re working on getting some footage of the event.

In the meantime, there have been some requests, from both english-speaking and Dutch communities, for downloadable Powerpoint slideshows, so you can all relive the magic of being at a Myst gathering this year. Here they are!

• English powerpoint
• Dutch powerpoint

(These should both work whether or not you have PowerPoint installed. If not, let us know and we’ll do our best to fix them up for you)

These are for personal enjoyment only, if you’d like to present either of these at some kind of a gathering (like Mysterium or DutchMystCommunity), please let us know first.

Here’s another not-in-game prototype of an element from Riven. This time, it’s Atrus’s journal. Enjoy!

In other news, we just passed the 90% mark on our journey towards our first funding goal. We’re almost there, guys!
Note that we’ll of course continue accepting donations after the first goal is reached, and the more donations we get, the faster we can work. Just some food for thought!

Ok, ok, ok. You asked for it, we promised it, here it finally is. In-game footage from Prison Island, circa Mysterium 2011. This is a good example of what the game looks like at the moment, though not at all a good example of the final level of quality we’re aiming for.

Unfortunately, due to a quirk in our video-capture solution, the recording came out a little jerky. This is especially noticeable in the cursor. We’ll try to fix this in future videos, but for now, just remember that the actual game plays nice and smoothly.

Be sure to see the video in HD!

More to come soon!

Edit: We appreciate the comments and critiques, everybody, but please keep in mind that this is a work in progress. We’re constantly working on making the game look even better than it does here, in fact it’s mainly what we’re focused on right now. We’re taking your comments into consideration, along with our own plans for improvement.

Edit 2: We’ve re-rendered this video so it’s smoother, and it includes sound and more! Check it out!

Here’s a treat, while we get the high-quality presentation video edited up – a pre-rendered lighting test for Prison Island. These are the same assets you saw in the Mysterium presentation, but in a pre-rendered environment. This video is NOT gameplay footage. It was rendered in Blender, in order to demonstrate how the environment should look at sunset. Enjoy!