Medievia in BETA Mode

Medievia is temporarily in BETA mode. This means that we are in a phase of development where we understand that the game will not be complete, have balance issues with classes - gold - etc, and generally should not be judged 'as is'.

When developing a game as massive and as deep as Medievia there are many challenges. When doing this with a game that is also open with many players playing is even more challenging. For the most part we make very slow gradual changes and plan with great detail how to make changes without upsetting gameplay. We are now in a phase of the plan where that will no longer be possible.

This announcement exists to simply tell you to accept the fact that you are playing a game that is currently in BETA mode and to treat the game as a new game that has yet to open to the public. You are a BETA tester if you wish to play Medievia right now.

Medievia has been open 17 years. We cannot just close for upgrades, as Vryce would probably be assassinated. We will stay open. We will do our best not to totally ruin the price of gold, class balance, and the hundreds of features of the game world we all love. We are in BETA mode because we know from experience that when making this many changes 'our best' will not be good enough when it comes to keeping everything as balanced as our players have grown accustomed to.

Before you complain or get upset, please remember that you are playing a game in BETA mode that is not truly 'open' for the public. We are not marketing for new players and we have not for some time now. When all of the features of Medievia version V are in we will market and quickly grow the playerbase up to record levels.

Thanks for your continued support and for your ideas and vision. We all share the same vision for the future of Medievia, for it to be the best - most deep - most fun - most immersive multiplayer game world ever made. We hope all players ride through the changes and continue to play but we simply ask you not to complain too much or get upset as changes are made.

Why do we know 'our best' will not be good enough? There are simply many chicken and egg problems when making such massive changes. This means many features must depend on others, all of which are only partially done and awaiting another change on another feature. It will be messy, some weeks more so than others.

Player data will always be retained and remain stable and reliable, but that is it. One day you may find all deckhands to be new because we had to purge their data and upgrade it. One day you may find that you cannot buy any wagons or trade in the wilderness because the feature is temporarily turned off. The value of gold may swing back and forth and be a real problem as we add one feature that makes a lot of gold, then another that causes players to spend vast amounts, and back and forth. We may have to purge all clan businesses after you spent time setting them up, we may have to do this many times. Your bloodline may design an awesome abode, maybe a fort or a castle, just to have it purged and have to remake it. The pet you have been training for weeks may be suddenly gone as we had to rethink the plan or change the data. Nothing is guarenteed except that we ask you to understand that we are in BETA mode.
There will be many issues great and small. Just remember that you are a BETA TESTER until further notice.

We cannot make all players always happy with all changes. We do promise and guarantee that every player will like the changes overall. The world coming will be a vastly superior and much more fun game world to play in than the one you played before we entered BETA mode. The plans are amazing and all players will be blown away by it, that is also a promise.

BETA mode may last 6-12 months. The plan is basically to RUSH the changes in as fast as possible, much faster than players are used to by far. The reason for this is to get it done and also the fact that it is really the only way to go. The changes from here on out all rely on each other for full affect, so there is no real choice.

Kingdoms relies on the justice system which relies on workers which relies on clan businesses and it all relies on townland which relies on islands which needs new deckhands which need worker houses, etc. I could go on like that for many paragraphs. Just know that we have no choice to force all players to be BETA testers, complete with their understanding that the game will be a bit of a mess and not polished for a while.

We will also use this time to blow up and rebuild all spells and skills. There will be tons of new spells and skills. Class balance will be out the door for a time. We will not expect classes to be balanced for 3-6 months. Please be patient. Seraphyr will soon be making an announcement about class changes and what that means, what we need from players, and what to expect. We will change it all, get every good spell and skill idea implemented as fast as possible, and then go through the long process of feedback-tweak-feedback-tweak until the 4 classes are somewhat balanced again.

Please, again, just understand that you are a BETA tester. BETA testers know not to complain about a game partially complete. You cannot judge a thing until the thing is ready to be judged, it is just not fair. We will not allow it on public channels.

Thanks for understanding, for supporting the game, and for reading this long explanation of BETA mode!

-Vryce