John Smedley’s enthusiasm for his indie MMOARPG Hero’s Song hasn’t faltered — Pixelmage Games gets to keep the $94,231 raised through Indiegogo, after all, and he didn’t have to go vegan.
“Hero’s Song is shaping up nicely,” he told backers last night. “We’re currently in internal Alpha (2) and we intend to launch Alpha (3) on on the 27th or 28th of October.. so it’s just a few weeks away.” Characterizing parts of the game as “rough,” he reminds players it really is an alpha: “I don’t want anyone to think this is going to be a polished gameplay experience. It’s going to have lots of bugs, and lots of balance issues. That’s to be expected in Alpha.”
The alpha will include limited multiplayer, 15 of the 21 classes, points of interest, basic loot, selected monsters, basic dungeons (no monsters or traps in those yet), partial NPC AI, Steam integration, and bugs — “we have plenty for you to find,” he quips. The gods aren’t fully implemented yet, and the Underworld — where you’ll be sent if you die — still “needs a lot of love.”
Notably, fancier custom server management tools won’t be ready for the first phase of backer alpha but “will come online within weeks.”
The studio’s also hunting for a community manager. Check out our post-crowdfunding interview with Smed from last week!
