End of Year Update & 2023 Roadmap

It’s been a crazy 2022 and things have changed quickly and often all year. Our team has been mostly heads down through all the tumult continuing to build Forgotten Runiverse – putting out a short demo experience for NFT.NYC and sharing our progress with all of you. As we look toward the new year, we are excited to share where we’re at so far, and where we’ll be going with you all in 2023.

The Closed Alpha

Our team just put the finishing touches on our Alpha build! This build is a representative sample of the gameplay that we hope will capture the interest and excitement of new players in the first few hours of play. The main use of this Alpha is to allow us to put our design options into practice and begin gaining feedback on the user experience and design choices we’ve made. We’ll take that feedback and iterate to improve the moment-to-moment feel of gameplay from exploration and combat to character upgrading and crafting. 

This phase of development can still see major changes occur to the game’s systems, and acts as a greenlight for many design decisions. We’ll be needing some external feedback and would love to bring in some of you in the coming months to test the game and provide feedback. You can sign up to be an Alpha or Beta tester here: SIGN UP LINK

Core Loops in the Alpha Build

The build consists of a small part of the world and is a testing ground for us to get a feel for the look of the game, the pacing, the controls, and all of the elements of game play. In fact it’s the first time we’re testing all of the game’s systems out in a live build. We’re hoping the build will validate the design choices we’ve made and help us make any tweaks necessary.

Character Creation

This is a pretty basic element to most games, but it’s important for it to feel right as it is the first interaction most players will have. Our team is working to balance options and customization with simplicity to get you into the game quickly with a character that feels right for you while also giving NFT owners the ability to easily jump in with their unique Wizard.

World Exploration

Most games start with a small tutorial or intro quest to help familiarize the player with the world and Forgotten Runiverse isn’t terribly different in that regard. After landing in the world through the rift, we introduce you to Alberto the Mage, an NPC who acts as an early guide to the world and will teach the player basic mechanics of this massive open world before setting you free to explore the wilderness and cities as you begin your adventure through the Mountains, the Desert, and the Fey.

Combat

The Closed Alpha introduces a variety of enemies to fight – from basic enemies to Elite enemies. This is the first introduction to combat and allows Alberto to teach the player about the flow of combat, how to use abilities intelligently, and how to manage their ATP Bar and combat initiative. Successful combat encounters will deliver the rewards necessary to engage in other elements of the progression systems – namely character XP and crafting materials.

Crafting and Progression

This Alpha build allows access to early aspects of the crafting loop and progression, but isn’t intended to touch on the deeper values and long-term crafting engagement loop. This means that the building blocks of the system are in place – gathering materials from the world and enemy encounters, finding recipes and inscribing them to the Forge, combining materials and recipes at the Forge and Mage Workshop to create items, and equipping those items are all possible. The deeper engagement of the ultimate variety of materials and items, leveling up the Forge, finding rare resources and recipes, breaking down items for new crafting materials, and minting to the blockchain are all not yet available.  

Building Management

The basic elements of plot management in the game are also something we’re testing with the Alpha build. Players can create and interact with housing, Forges, and Mage Workshops in the world. This basic element is the first brush with the deep mechanics and customization that land ownership will bring to the game. 

In the full game, Plots will be an integral part of the player experience. They’ll be the main locations to gather materials, as well as the host of upgradable buildings that players will use to reach late game character specializations, join and manage guilds, and craft powerful items and cosmetics to make the experience truly their own. 

Our Roadmap for 2023

After the Closed Alpha our team will be shifting gears to focus on the Beta version of the game. This will allow us to let in much larger groups of players and to test long-term game systems like the economy. We’re planning to release the Forgotten Runiverse Whitepaper in the lead up to Beta to share more details on gameplay features, the economy, and how Forgotten Runiverse will be making use of L1 and L2 solutions to give you true ownership of the things you create and ensure that the players who add the most value to the game see the most value returned back to them. 

We also have plans to launch a Mint focused on enabling an early entry point into the Forgotten Runiverse and to give the community as a whole the opportunity to become involved in Forgotten Runiverse. We’ll have more details to share early in the new year, but we think it’s going to be a pretty exciting moment to be a part of! 

The Public Land Sale is still an important tentpole of our plans since it will give many of you the opportunity to mint your place in the Runiverse and open up the opportunity for true ownership of the game’s content. We hope the Whitepaper we’ll be publishing in the new year helps to answer many of the questions about Land and how it will function, and are excited to finally allow you the opportunity to own some of it for yourself soon!

We’re excited about the future ahead of us, and want to take a moment to thank the builders and communities that have helped us get through this year, and we know will have our back heading into all the excitement and learning that we know will come in 2023. The Magic Machine team and Forgotten Runes community have been instrumental in building a vast and wonderful world and fiction for us to plumb for Forgotten Runiverse, and our early land investors like Dialectic and Seven Seven Six have given us the runway to weather the storms of 2022 and come out on the other side stronger and even more poised to give all of you what we hope will be an amazing experience and opportunity to connect. We’re in this together and as long as we stay that way, we’re all gonna make it. See you next year!