[turbine]
Daily Update - 10/05/05
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For today's update, I’d like to talk about some of the topics that many of you have been asking about on the forums. Not everything is nailed down yet, but I did want to share the information that I do have.
Dawnsong
Turbine will be centralizing support for all Asheron’s Call subscribers at our MA offices in a few months. Therefore, the Dawnsong server will not be opened as originally planned. Adding a new server would further spread players out and splinter existing communities. We understand that some of you were looking forward to this server; however at this time we feel that opening another server would not be good for Asheron’s Call.
Face Artwork
At this time, the artwork for the faces isn’t going to change. While we understand that some players do not like the new looks, we cannot rework all of the faces. However, we are discussing adding the ability for players to change their look in game. This is something we are currently investigating but it won’t be part of the October publish. Right now this is not scheduled, but I will update you on this as we move forward.
High Resolution Textures
The high resolution textures are not ready yet, however we still intend to get these in the game. After further investigating the status of this, we need to do some more engineering work and they need a full QA pass. The QA pass is very important (and a bit time-consuming) to ensure the new textures do not cause crashes with certain graphics cards. I don’t have an ETA for this yet, but it is still on our “to do” list.
Today’s Maintenance
So far everything is moving along smoothly. The Ops team tells me we are on schedule. I’ll update you more as I get more information.
Hiring
We’re currently in the process of hiring an engineer (programmer), a designer, and a QA person for Asheron’s Call in order to fill out the team. You should see the job descriptions on the Turbine site in the coming days. We’re also interviewing some internal candidates for these positions as well. More on that as the hiring process progresses.
October Update
The October update is still looking good. We’re about code complete and then we’ll swing into full QA mode. We have an article planned for later this week to give you a quick look at some of the update.
Live Events
Some more good news. After getting a lot of positive feedback about the events, we have decided to continue these for the foreseeable future. So we’ll be doing both game content updates AND live events from now on!
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-Jonathan "Calandryll" Hanna
Director of Community Relations
Turbine, Inc.


