Project News - About the DevLog

Happy New Year!

I'd like to take this opportunity, on the occasion of the New Year, to talk a little about the DevLog itself and how we intend to use it going forward.

The short version is that we intend for DevLog posts to be a regular thing, occurring at least once/month and usually toward the beginning of each. At a minimum we want to use it to keep you all informed, at least in a general sense, about the things going on with the project. As time goes on and progress begins to accumulate, I would personally expect the posts to become more frequent and hopefully more interesting.

As for the kinds of information we'll be giving, it could be anything, though we'll try to keep it primarily about status or aspects of the project in a fairly top-level way. In some cases we may focus on one particular aspect, analyze it and lay out our decisions, designs and intentions for it. The DevLog will sometimes be a checklist of things completed, sometimes a list of things in progress and sometimes a discussions of things that are planned.

Occasionally, we may set forth goals and ideas that we have. These goals may or may not come to fruition. These ideas may or may not make it into the final product, whether in their original or some altered form. I want to be clear moving forward that until we officially add something to a feature list, it should not be considered “gospel”; at this point a lot of things are subject to change. A lot of things will change. Due to the factors I have described in my previous two entries, there is a necessity for change or at least for a change in scale and/or scope. Our goals may remain lofty in the long run, but our realities may mean a few more intermediate steps along the way. Like I said before: bear with us!

I also want to set forth a policy of openness. I want people to feel like they can ask questions about the project. Clearly, we can't always give complete answers, and some questions we may defer or not answer at all, but we will at least respond. For example, at this stage in the process, we won't answer “When will it be done?” but at some point we will. Questions related to DevLog posts can either be given as comments to the post itself or posted in the general MMO project forums, as may be appropriate.

Lastly, no matter what we call this project, what we're really talking about here is the long-term future for Layonara. This DevLog is going to serve as a window into the process. As with the project itself, the goals and scope of the DevLog may change over time, but this at least is the current intent. Layonara's future is for the whole community, and this blog will serve to help keep the communication open between us. We hope that the new year brings many great things for us to share with you, that our progress moving forward continues to build up on what we've rekindled here. I hope everyone has a happy, healthy and successful 2014, by whatever metrics you use to measure such things.