I’ve created a page that the team here will attempt to keep up to date with what’s happening as far as the Stargate Worlds Beta Program is concerned. Add the page to your bookmarks. Visit it early, visit it often!

If you’re interested in the progress of the Stargate Worlds Beta Program, stop by the “progress of the beta” page here on GateBuzz!

Sneak peak:

Key points along the way:

• 04-17-2008, 02:42 PM - Khatie

  We’ll be sending invitations to REGISTERED FORUM MEMBERS in the next couple of weeks. Once you register you’ll be put into a database and from that database we will be pulling in early beta testers VERY soon!!

• 04-22-2008, 01:24 PM - Khatie
  

  Friends and Family beta began in the past couple of weeks with the company employees testing as well as a handful of friends and family.

  We will be ramping up soon.

  IF YOU GET ASKED TO REGISTER and/or JOIN the friends and family testing, please keep your NDA agreement. We will take action on anyone who is dishonoring this. Thank you.

• 04-22-2008, 03:01 PM - Khatie
  

  We’re gonna link to the registration page soon. When that happens you’ll all sign up and from that database we’ll start selecting users a few at a time and ramp up over the next weeks to more and more.

  Be patient guys. Don’t want to break our baby game eh?

Even I am going to have that page bookmarked!

As promised in the podcast, here’s the raw information I found as I was investigating “FireSky”

1. “whois” command output for “FireSky.com”
2. “traceroute” command output for “FireSky.com”
3. The “Wayback Machine” archive of “FireSky.com“
4. Netcraft survey results for:
   • www.stargateworlds.com (link)
   • forums.stargateworlds.com (link)

note: the server software for “forums.stargateworlds.com” was upgraded from IIS v6.0 - I misread the survey when I did the research … apologies if it misrepresented anyone!

Episode 18 of GateBuzz: covering an exciting news item about the upcoming beta of Stargate Worlds (as mentioned by Khatie in the official forums) and my fascinating in depth investigation into the mysterious “FireSky” game publisher along with the unexpected gems of information I uncovered in the process.

 

 Gate Buzz Episode 18 [25:19m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (947)

The observant visitors will have noticed that my phone number has changed. I’ve moved over to a far more versatile voice-over-IP provider - the venerable Skype. Voicemail there has proven to have higher sound quality, and be orders of magnitude better for sound editing afterward … just judge from the audio in episode 17 of the podcast!

I’ll be re-recording the intro to the podcast for the next episode … something I have been meaning to do ever since I got the new mic and mixing desk! I’ve been thinking about the intro music too, but I’m not musician enough to go writing and performing something of my own there! I’ll settle for just talking and creating websites.

There’s a really cool website if you’re a Doctor Who fan. The theme for the TV show has evolved over the 30+ years that the TV show has been on the air while keeping the essential elements the same. This has spawned an entire website of people creating their own remixed and re-imaginings of the Doctor Who theme. The podcast (”Whomix Radio“) is really worth subscribing to. The thing it makes me wonder is this: where are all the remixes of the Stargate theme?

Anyhow, feel free to add me to your Skype contacts, and if you see me, drop me a message (or chat to me, I don’t bite!)

I recently had the opportunity to sit down and talk with Myrddin, to talk about the command that he founded over 2 years ago - The Ancients - that sadly I missed promoting back in episode 7 of this podcast. During the course of the interview we talked about not only the command but also about the official Stargate Worlds Wiki which he co-founded.

 

 Gate Buzz Episode 17 [22:24m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (594)

Ideallo.co.uk had a nice publicity piece for Stargate Worlds, highlighting the wisdom of basing the graphics engine on Unreal Engine 3.

Everything started with Roland Emmerich: the film Stargate from 1994 has since grown into a whole universe of stories: Television series and books are commercial successes. No surprise then that a computer game is now in development too. But Stargate Worlds is really giving effort and looking to be an ambitious MMORPG project. Thanks to the Unreal 3 Engine and multisided scenarios the graphics look absolutely stunning, like in most MMORPGs.

The “Make” e-zine blog reported finding aluminum molds in a scrapyard. Case in point, the stuff I found this week in a bin of what’s called ‘New Aluminum’ in the scrap metal trade. They looked like 12″x12″ pieces of 3/8″ aluminum plate until I flipped one over to reveal… The StarGate. In absolutely jawdropping detail. Really. Take a moment to scope these detail images and fantasize about what you could make if you had a cnc mill with this kind of resolution. Un-freakin’-believable… and there was a pair of ‘em! Both sides of a mold made specifically to crank out weensy little StarGates about 9″ across. Personally, I’d always thought Richard Dean Anderson was taller than that, but whatever… These things had come into the yard in a load of stuff from one of the movie industry prop shops…they’d seen some use (there were a few stray bits of resin visible), but were nearly new. I’ve done a fair bit of casting and mold-making over the years, but I experienced a complete WTF moment when I realized that this particular mold had no sprues.

I’ve a friend who’s picked up a few things while dumpster diving, and is a total wizard when it comes to garage sales (I mean, a total wiz!) but I could never have imagined anyone scoring movie/tv props like these!

Talking of sweet images, the recent WarCry Preview of Stargate Worlds (forum members got an exclusive look at the hi-res images linked in the article) showed off some nice details.

The article has some nice quotes:

Which leads into the second major differentiator for Stargate Worlds, and it’s all in the title. Unlike the last three sci-fi/rpg/shooter games [Hellgate: London, Tabula Rasa, Mass Effect], they have a major intellectual property behind them: Stargate.

They’re very aware of their own IP and have gone to great lengths to weave the style of the show into all facets of gameplay. Nowhere is this more evident than in their approach to classes and, as a result, basic gameplay.

“Frankly, we have the best writing staff in the game industry and we understand how to tell stories in the interactive space,” boasted Klug. He cited the team’s experience from Earth & Beyond, Ultima Online and other past projects as examples of their strength.

I play The Matrix Online for the ongoing story, and the chance to participate in the story. A quote that claims “the best writing staff in the game industry” sends shivers through me as it hits my “hot button” for gaming. Why else would my favourite XBox games be

• “Knights of the Old Republic” (I and II)
• Jade Empire
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer (original, and Chaos Bleeds)

Yeah, I like story.

The WarCry article finished off saying an encouraging

They did say Stargate Worlds remains on schedule for a Fall 2008 release, but did not get into public testing timelines. The target date should put it up against some stiff competition in the form of EA Mythic’s Warhammer Online and potentially Blizzard’s Wrath of the Lich King expansion to World of Warcraft. Nonetheless, Cheyenne doesn’t seem too worried. “All you can really do is make the best game you can,” Klug said.

I cant wait! Roll on Q4!!

Episode 16 covers the exciting interviews given by Demetrius Comes (to Ten Ton Hammer) and Joe Ybarra (to Gamasutra) and the release of Dev Q+A number seven.

 

 Gate Buzz Episode 16 [13:55m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (690)

What’s so cool about this pie chart anyhow?

Over ¹/₂ of people (51%) who listen to the podcast do so right here on the website.

4% of the listeners are using a Zune player to listen to the podcast. I am glad that I listened to the feedback from people and added the Subscribe in Zune button on the site. It’s nice to see a new feature actually being used.

Apple might have 70% of the overall market-share for portable MP3 players, but according to the stats, around 90% of the people who grab the podcast to listen on their own machine, do so with iTunes.

The other 1% of listeners use either WinAmp, iPodder and Apple TV to download and listen to the podcast, proving that it’s not just the well-known pod-catcher applications that are being used.

I couldn’t help but comment on the release of the Stargate DVD “The Ark of Truth”, it’s just too good!

The interview that Gateworld.net posted with Christopher Judge, and the recent “Religion in Stargate” discussion thread in the official SGW forums are covered along with cherry-picking the most interesting questions and answers from the first 16 pages of the “Ask the Creative Director” thread in the forums.

Lastly, the episode looks at some of the recent feedback that I’ve received … well done to Loki (of the Australian Stargate Unit) and sgtbenc for correctly guessing the “Easter Egg” that was encoded into recent episodes of the show.

 

 Gate Buzz Episode 15 [18:15m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (702)