Ep 5: 2013?

[Sir Perceval of Daventry]

Can you guys say at the very least if you feel Ep 5 will come out at some point during this year?

I ask because we're basically at the end of the first quarter of the year with no real word.

[snabbott]

I don't know, but I would say it's at least possible. It's really hard to predict that sort of thing so early in development, though. Somebody else might have a better idea - I haven't been very involved yet.

[gem_sky]

So early in development?  What?  If you go back to the thread "Episode 5: 2012?" which I started back in February 2012, several staff replies indicated a hope for a 2012 release.  I'm confused how that would have been possible, if development hasn't even really started in March 2013.  I understand Cognition and Moebius and other projects are taking over:  they make money.  Would it be possible to encourage an Episode 5 release by charging us for it?  I've been a huge fan of you guys for years.  I loved that you were underdogs, that you were independent, and that there was nothing driving you other than your passion and your fans.  This seems to be changing...?

[wilco64256]

More like "early in assembly." It's a much trickier beast to tackle than Episode 1-4 were as those were mostly put together in the engine when Episode 1 was released, it was just fixing up and finishing them off that took place. 2-4 were all probably 70-80% complete as each prior episode went out. Episode 5 is a bit different as the entire thing is being assembled from scratch in a new engine. We do have a huge amount of that work done, we're currently putting the game logic together and finishing some R&D to make sure characters move from place to place and interact with their environments properly. I can't really give an exact date of when the game will go to public release, but we really are pushing to try and get it wrapped up later this year.

[snabbott]

Would it be possible to encourage an Episode 5 release by charging us for it?

No, this is strictly forbidden, as KQ is the property of Activision - we are working under a license from them.

I loved that you were underdogs, that you were independent, and that there was nothing driving you other than your passion and your fans.  This seems to be changing...?

Not really - it's just the way real life works. People have to make money in order to live. A lot of the people who were working on TSL (for free) are working on the commercial projects. They're still involved with TSL, but as before, it's in their "spare" time. There are also some people working on just TSL, but as Weldon said, it's a huge project. All of the assets had to be recreated for Unity. Trust me, though, the passion is not gone. TSL had to be put on the back burner for a while, but work on it is ramping up.

[gem_sky]

Thank you.  I am satisfied with both answers    Just don't forget about us or episode 5!

[wilco64256]

Rest assured, it isn't being forgotten or abandoned. Mainly we want to make sure we finish TSL properly, and not just rush it out the door to get it out of the way or anything.

[daventry]

I thought you guys arent allowed to Profit TSL, now it seems the Episodes are being sold in a Store.

[GrahamRocks!]

Um, they're still there for free.

[stika]

I thought you guys arent allowed to Profit TSL, now it seems the Episodes are being sold in a Store.

The games are indeed in the store, but they're still free. We simply placed them on the store for the sake of convenience, so that we can have all games in the same page

[Lambonius]

It's still unclear to me WHY the conversion to Unity was necessary.  When it was decided before, it really just seemed like it was being done "because we can!"  And not because the game itself really required it.  Seems like a big fat waste of time and effort to redo everything like that.

[KatieHal]

Just about everything in Episode 5 is new anyways--we're no longer in the Green Isles. So all the scenes would have to be newly made and set up in the engine either way. And Unity is MUCH more user-friendly than Torque was, so since we were already making the switch, it made sense to go with the better engine. Making builds take much less time, too. Plus we can easily make a Mac port for Episode 5, whereas doing so for Eps 1-4 was obviously much more difficult and time-consuming (as evidence by the fact we still don't have them).

[snabbott]

Not to mention the amount of time we had to spend trying to fix crashes and memory / handle / user object leaks!

[wilco64256]

Yeah the version of Torque we used for Episodes 1-4 of TSL was getting very outdated, and we had modified so much of the core engine code that we couldn't even really get normal support for it any more (not that it even was being properly supported in general) and we figured since we were developing better tools for game assembly directly in Unity it just made sense to do Episode 5 in the newer engine. Our tools make it a lot easier for those who aren't familiar with directly coding to still setup a majority of the game's logic and cinematics.

[Lambonius]

Those all sound like perfectly valid reasons.  Fair enough. 

[Jussara Gonzo]

Good, but I hope I can play it soon! I'm anxious! 

[stika]

we all are!

Welcome to the forums, Jussara

[Jussara Gonzo]

we all are!

Welcome to the forums, Jussara

Thanks! 

[KatieHal]

Welcome! Love the avatar

[Jussara Gonzo]

Welcome! Love the avatar

Thanks!

It's my little cute cat!, Jurandir!