Good to know!
The Shaman detail there was what sparked my Shaman question; the image shows him controlling an orb by hand, but I wasn’t sure if that was the main way they deal damage, nor how it actually plays/feels.
Unbelievably excited about seeing this new world unfold over the next 6 months. My mind is legitimately blown that you guys are going this ambitious, but it makes sense and has revitalized a ton of interest in the game for myself and others.
I wouldn’t be me without some questions though, so here we go!
Major: I know there are plans to focus on bugfixing and addressing specific systemic issues with the original game which I assume will carry over into the new world, but how much of a priority will it be to addressed bugs (of varying impact levels) as well as add oft-requested small quality of life adjustments? I believe there are some worries that given how long many frustrating bugs have been in the current game, that the new world will carry those over and add new ones from the rework, which will linger in perpetuity. I recognize and appreciate that it’s always a difficult balancing act between adding new content/systems and fixing/improving existing ones, but the ratio seemed to be a little off.
Minor: Do we get to keep our dram going to the new world?
Major: Will there be new overland zones, or will it exclusively recreations of existing overland zones?
Major: Highsteppe is being described as the last bastion for humanity, which implies all other towns and population centers are gone. Are our long-term hopes of visiting all of the fabled cities mentioned in lore in the current game lost? Parathime, Elephantine, the City of Lights, etc? Similarly, if the current world is doomed down to the small population of Highsteppe, does that mean we fail to “Defend the Realm” in current times, no matter what we do? Kinda bleak.
Major: Given it’s place in gaming and technological history as the first VRMMORPG, it seems unfortunate that version 1.0 of Orbus would be effectively lost forever. Are there plans to preserve this in some way?
Major: Given how much testing and iteration went into all of the content, systems, classes, of the current game (2 years worth?), even with a larger team and refined processes, wouldn’t there be concerns with getting everything (an entire world/quest/new-classes/etc) into a stable state in ~6 months, even if it was completely done and going into testing?
Moderate: Is there a lore premise regarding our existing characters transitioning into the reborn world? If so, do any NPCs come with us?
Moderate: Are there plans to incorporate any other existing, new, and upcoming VR tech into the reborn version of the game? Additional trackers, knuckles, eyetracking, etc etc etc.
Major: It sounds like beta for reborn will be separate from the live game and then eventually collapsed together. Is there an idea of when this may happen, or if it’s dependent on certain factors? Also, I assume all beta progress will be fully wiped in the transition in favor of bringing over live characters?
Major: Aside from waiting for the beta and playing our asses off in it, how can we help this be a successful transition?
As always, thank you for your time!
7 Likes
Draven asking all the good questions as always xD thanks 
I think this would include dram
2 Likes
I read that all the non end game stuff is scaling so you will be able to help low level friends without hurting their XP Gains. I assume these reworks have new Quest IDs which would mean they would not be completed by anyone when they are added into the game. Thus with scaling you should be able to go back and do them plus earn exp along the way
This could be totally wrong, but based on experience, marginal understanding of programming and data bases, and explanation from Devs. I feel pretty safe in this assumption.
fro mthe wording it sounds like the shaman can probably put totems around in a short range. Probably primarily melee with a few ranged abilities. (my guess based on the information and image)
That’s a fair question. I guess it really depends on the bug in question. A lot of the bugs (for example: FPS slowdowns in raids or the overworld) are just naturally going to be fixed by us being a lot more strict and custom with our art assets. Others like crashes will likely be fixed by the move to the upgraded engine (we are jumping ahead basically 2 years in terms of Unity editions – that alone will lead to a lot of bug fixes on their end). Still others like some of the bugs around certain fights obviously won’t matter anymore because the fights won’t even exist anymore as we’re re-doing new ones from scratch.
I think really the best answer I can give on this, is that there will be sufficient Beta testing time to catch most major bugs, and we are seeing OrbusVR: Reborn as the launch of the game out of Early Access, so obviously we are going to hold ourselves to a higher standard than we did before with that sort of thing. I won’t pretend the game will be bug-free (no game is), but I do think we’re going to have a much more solid foundation to build upon.
Yes. Also to note although I don’t think anyone has hit it yet, the cap on Dram is currently 2.5 million.
The overworld is going to look totally different. Like, you aren’t going to recognize any of it. This is not a fresh coat of paint, this is a total re-imagining. So while we might say “this is still the Highsteppe area”, it’s not like it’s going to look anything like the current Highsteppe both from an art standpoint and a layout standpoint.
We’ll touch on this more as the Defend the Realm event comes to fruition, but basically we are going to take into account how the community does in that event to affect the time-jump part of the story. But certainly from a “big picture” standpoint we’re already locking a lot in, as we have to do to move forward with development.
Other lands are certainly places we’d like to go in the future. One of the main reasons we are focusing on “falling back to Highsteppe” outside of narrative reasons is that it gives us a much greater chance to focus on making that the “social hub” of the game. That sort of happens anyway already, but one of the common complaints we have heard from folks is that as you get to higher levels, the population gets so spread out you stop running into people in those far off towns and they’re basically deserted (even, to some degree, Guild City). We’d basically rather have one capital city that we can really focus on and include a lot of stuff in like mini games and make it someplace super great to be your “start and end point” for a day of adventuring, than to try and support 5 different cities/towns no one will really spend much time in.
But I think to address your underlying point, there is still a ton of new and interesting stuff to see in the world. One of the main things we have done this time around is actually design “points of interest” into the world from the beginning. So it’s not just “oh here’s a bunch of flat landscape and a few trees” like the current game, it’s more like “Oh meet me over by that altar on top of this area” or “meet me by the giant tree over here” – even if they aren’t cities or towns, they will still be places worth visiting for sure.
Well, we use git so we have a complete history of everything from that standpoint. If you mean, will we keep a 1.0 version of the game servers up and running even once Reborn comes out, unfortunately we don’t have the resources to do that. As I have mentioned before, though, my intent is to bring back a lot of the original stuff as we can as “retro nostalgia events” and the like.
Well, we’re building from a much more solid foundation than we were before. As an example, let’s say before it took 2 months just to get basic questing in and working. We don’t have to do that again. We’re not re-inventing how zones themselves work, just the art assets in them. Etc. I think maybe the way to think of it is that even though a lot of stuff is changing and improving, from a foundation/server/client standpoint, really like 75% of the game is staying the same.
More on that to come.
We are experimenting with some things, but no hard promises yet.
Most likely Beta testing will start as a totally fresh instance with nothing from the live server, with frequent wipes. Eventually we will also do a test where we copy things over just like they would be if Reborn launched “today” (where you can play on your current character from the live game), but that will be later on. Yes all progress will be wiped from Beta to live just as it was before.
The Beta tests will be happening on weekends every few weeks like they did for OrbusVR originally, the Beta server will not be up 24/7 until very late in the testing process.
Just play the beta, give feedback when/where appropriate, and help us spread the word to anyone who is still sitting on the fence about playing the game that it is getting a big overhaul and they should check it out again soon 
7 Likes
I don’t have a solid answer for this yet because it is all still under heavy development. But the basic idea is you can sort of throw down totems in a short range around you. Some are meant to just sit there and do their thing (e.g. a slowing totem that “pulses” in a short AoE range around where you threw it down), while others are intended to be put by your side so you can grab for example a fire ball that appears at the top of the totem every few seconds and throw it at your enemies. So it’s sort of a “throw down totems and sling spells” class idea.
I’m over half way there~ is there a reason for this cap though? Also will there be an easier way to trade to our second characters in the future as it currently relies on other people
I believe I hit that cap before and didn’t realize it. Is there a reason for this cap?
Part of it is just for technical reasons. We had to pick some value, and it seemed like a high enough value that it would be reasonable. Based on the current economy, I think it represents a pretty substantial amount of resources, we may increase it at some point in the future though.
I love how you guys are adding the “Taken” from Destiny to the game 
/s
jokes aside, this makes me really excited for what’s to come. It makes me upset when I see bad reviews for the game on reddit, when I can see how dedicated and passionate you guys are about creating a fun and engaging experience. Will be looking forward to the expansion!
You gave a brief overview of Shaman, what about bard? We move orbs around on a staff to create jingles? or is it more of a horizontal pattern? I’d like my imagination to have an accurate baseline to go off!
Cant wait for it! When will the Beta begin?
Is there still a plan for an in-game Q&A about it?
Going to be Friday. 20
See, I thought it was Thursday as well (saw before the edit). Where did you see the update to Friday?
Insider information lol. My husband is doing the interview. It was supposed to be earlier but hes been called to work overtime 
1 Like
The interview is with Rejinx, last I heard it was Thursday, so you better have him PM me and get it arranged haha.
EDIT: I just re-reviewed my PM with him and I stand corrected, for some reason I thought the 17th was a Thursday. So yeah it will be Friday the 17th. We’ll announce a time soon but I think it should be around 7 or 8 PM Central.
3 Likes
Q4 2018 (which would be October at the earliest).
We will be attending Oculus Connect 5 and bringing an early build of Reborn to that to show off, in case anyone happens to be in the San Jose, CA area, as well.
2 Likes
Well shoot, might have to bring the Guild by your booth haha!
1 Like