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Eternal Silence Interview for Independent Production Guide posted by NoX on Feb 16, 2010, 08:27 am
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Breaking News:
Dan got interviewed for a Independent Production Guide on the IGDA wiki. For those of you who don't know, IGDA is a society for game developers.
Eternal Silence has been around for quite a long time for a mod. How have the game and your role evolved over time? How have you kept momentum up?
"Eternal Silence has been in development for almost 6 years now. I played an active part in development for the first 5 years. Since last year, a community-driven effort has taken over development of the mod and has been pushing it forward ever since. I have moved on to develop a new project (an unannounced XNA title). I used to spend nearly 20 hours a week on Eternal Silence. Now I am mostly on the sidelines, but I do chime in now and then. It's very rewarding to see a project become totally autonomous, driven by the community that plays it. I am still amazed by what they have been able to achieve and I encourage them to continue."
"We keep our momentum going by releasing often. Eternal Silence releases a new patch every couple of months with new maps and bug fixes. This keeps the community active and keeps everyone motivated as developers. The Steam platform has been incredibly helpful here, since it allows us to push new fixes to the entire community all at once without any kind of publicity required. When the original development team felt it was time to move on (after all, 5 years is quite a long time to be working on a single title), the community stepped up and took over."
Great words from the Leader!
Read the entire interview here.
In other news, we're still hard at work on new content! Stay tuned, stay happy and stay awesome!
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Patch and news posted by NoX on Feb 2, 2010, 09:33 am
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Voting is over and the first winners have been announced. Congratulations to Out of Hell, Overgrowth, Naruto and A Reckless Disregard for Gravity! The Mod of the Year is still to be announced, so keep those fingers crossed! Regardless of the outcome, we would like to thank everyone who voted for us. Your support and dedication for this mod is amazing!
As a direct result of said support and dedication, we're ready with a new patch. It's not the big one - not yet - but it will fix some of the flaws in game and adds a whole new CP map, for your first person pleasure! The flamethrower will be slightly reduced in range, the tankbuster is boosted versus ships and the hackboxes and hand models are sexier than ever!
The new map is made by our very own Sbrown. It's Control Point - with a twist. Though it starts out linear, the last two subsystems unlock simultaneously. The impact on the gameplay is unquestionable - you'd better rethink your strategies. As a side note, this was the only map the testers wanted to play during the beta tests. 'Nuff said? Here are some pictures:
   
Some of you mappers out there will also squeal with glee at the new inputs that's been added. They bring a whole wad of customizability to the game and we got a lot more of that planned! So go and create some awesome custom scenarios - YOU are in control!
For those who want to make videos, a slight command change: cl_nodraw is no longer a cheat variable! In laymans that means you can get rid of the cockpit without having to enable cheats in the game! Needless to say, this will open for some incredibly awesome screenshots and movies!
The complete changelog is:
Added inputs to capital ships, corvettes, and space_dummytarget - Damage, SetTarget, ClearTarget
Added entity - space_dummytarget
Changed Tankbuster damage, does 1.5x normal damage vs ships
Changed Flamethrower range, it is 25% less
Changed cl_drawhud to no longer be a cheat var
Gunship now resupplies all weapons a player is carrying, not just the currently held weapon
Added cp_relay
Fixed client-side glitch that falsely reports flag/bomb return timer value
Sexy new hackbox and player viewmodel
We're not resting on our laurels, however. Ed, Thaldarin and NoX is working intensively on new maps. Ed is fixing up Rex' old map Vertigo, NoX is improving ctf_olympus and working on a hardcore map and Thaldarins project is top secret!
Konstantin is still hard at work with coding the AI and headprogrammingczar is working hard on some of the new features. We've got a few artists now and they're working hard with coming up with concepts for some new capships.
We've also gotten hold of a new sound tech - Spindoctor. We'll be putting him to work soon enough. Welcome aboard 
We are still trying to fill the empty spots on our roster, however. We're looking for talentented people of the following qualifications:
2d artist:
We have quite a lot of tasks for 2d artists and noone to take them on yet. If you've got experience with doing textures, skinning or HUD work, send us an e-mail ASAP!
3d artists(modellers):
The concepts are taking shape, the animator and sound tech is standing by - we just need modellers! You need to be able to make and compile your own models from scratch, based off a concept drawing. You'll be making various props, ships and even a new weapon.
If you want to apply for one of these positions, head on over to http://www.eternal-silence.net/join.php for more info.
That's all, folks!
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Mod of the Year awards 2009 - Commence Voting posted by NoX on Jan 7, 2010, 02:47 pm
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Eternal Silence made the nomination phase and is now among the top 100 mods on www.moddb.com. Now the actual voting begins. We think Eternal Silence IS the mod of the year and I'll give a few arguments as to why you should put one of your three votes on us:
- Epic space battles in the mind-boggling vastness of space.
- Frantic fights for control of the enemies' capital ship
- Nukes flung out en masse. What other mod does that?
- A perfect blend of First Person Shooter and Space Flight Simulator.
- An extensive and immerse storyline stretching over millennia!
You can vote for us by clicking the MOTY icon below, going to the Half-Life 2 tab and clicking the 'VOTE' sign for Eternal Silence.
VOTE FOR US AGAIN!
Development is picking up pace again and I'll here unveil some of what we've currently got going:
Termi/Michael Z is working on some visual updates to the game, like adding shiny buttons to the laptop. Check it out! Notice the new UTF hand look too:
In our coding section, the keyboards are red-hot from fast and furious typing! Juzz is implementing some new toys for the mappers and making some balance tweaks to the gameplay.
K^2 is working on A.I. for the upcoming releases. We all know his inventions will inevitably doom the human race to robot enslavement, but until then, we'll have some kick-ass ES bots to take our aggressions out on.
Marc, our veteran Sound Technician, is modifying the raw audio material for the upcoming tutorial. Yes that's right, we've already recorded the dialogue!
And finally, Orange and Surround has been working on some concepts for the new HUD additions and models. We'll be waving them all over the place when they're ready!
Finally, I'd like to underline that we're still looking for new talent. More specifically, we're in need of:
- Beta Testers(6 spots remaining)
- 2D Artists
- Modelers
For more info, see this thread: http://www.eternal-silence.net/forums/index.php/topic,5622.0.html
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Mod of the Year awards 2009 - Nomination posted by NoX on Dec 22, 2009, 05:47 pm
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It's that time of the year again. It's time to look back and recap the year that's nearing an end. The 2009 Mod Awards are starting up their nominations and we would like YOUR vote.
2009 has been a year of much turbulence, for us. The rate of development has declined, slowed to a complete stop, been revived and is continuing to increase. New staff members have joined our team whilst the ES veterans have moved on in their lives (sometimes as far as Indonesia).
While 2009 hasn't been a year of development at breakneck speed, it is important to remember that 2009 was the year that Eternal Silence went live on steam, bringing thousands of fresh recruits into the struggle between the Neo-Galactic Militia and the United Terran forces. Being distributed through steam is a major achievement and reward for 9 years of solid effort.
Many people have put an incredible amount of work into bringing you this game. If you've ever experienced the hectic, epic struggles for space superiority or the frantic rush to capture the shields, please nominate Eternal Silence for the mod awards.
We feel that Eternal Silence IS the mod of the year and that the veteran staff deserves this pat on the shoulder to send them off.
VOTE FOR US!
Regardless of the outcome, we'll keep on working on this epic game we all love. The Eternal Silence staff wishes you all a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year!
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