9Lives Arena Development update September 2020
2020 has proven to be quite the game changer for everyone and certainly has changed how we work at Touchhour. Since mid March our team decided to operate virtually with everyone working from home.
The first release under these conditions was 0.5 which was quite a big update and among many things, we introduced the Spirits.
It wasn’t long before the community discovered that Resurrected Spirits can give birth to the Immortals. To become an immortal you must hunt 9 Lives without dying.
Now closed alpha version 0.6 is going to launch in October and will be our biggest and last content update before we focus on scalability to enter into open alpha.
This update is so packed with features that we are absolutely thrilled for the launch.
1. The introduction of the Black Phantoms
We don’t want to give too many spoiler alerts here but there will be two ways to become a Black Phantom. Black Phantoms are unique in 3 ways:
- They have only one life
- They have their own leader board
- They are the Immortals worst nightmare as they do permanently kill any Immortal they beat in the Inferno Arena.
So watch out Immortals and bring your A game when you face a black Phantom ;)
2. Competitive Fishing
Fishing will be an entirely different game all on its own and feature five unique leader boards, legendary fish and a few surprises!
3. World announcements
World Record Fish catches will get global announcements for every player to see. This will also be utilized for big achievements like when a player opens the Beach Vault or a new Immortal is born or someone moves up to the Number 1 spot on a leader board… fun things like that.
4. The Beach Vault can now be opened
The mysterious vault everyone has been wondering about will now be able to open but how it opens is your duty to find out.
5. Bunch of Secret features for players to discover
6. The Beach received another face lift and so did the water
Atlantis is ready to host your next vacation! Oh, the Training Arena also received another polishing pass…
7. Treasure Hunting
This one is another big one and allows you to send your Ooogy onto treasure hunts… he can also level up his treasure hunting skills which are stored on the Ooogy — so a great treasure hunter can be sold on the marketplace… just like how each Ooogy levels up. In the near future we will set up a server for the meta data before open alpha launches so the details are accessible on the marketplace.
8. Ooogies can wear NFT based outfits
If you own Ooogy outfits, you can now dress your Ooogy up! :) We will also start releasing Ooogy outfits for all kinds of Occasions…
9. New in-game loot and resources
We have added a bunch of items with very cool unique features. These can be obtained from fighting in the Inferno Arena, from Treasure Hunting and Fishing!
10. Achievement boards
We have added two in-game achievement boards that unlock rewards…
11. The huge door on the beach can now be opened by the player
Or of course by your Ooogy :) whats behind it? I guess time will tell…
I probably forgot a few things but in general this update is MASSIVE and we can’t wait to play and test it with all of you!
12. Multiverse Forge Hammer integration
Ooogies will now make use of your mighty Multiverse Forge Hammer if held in the wallet connected to the game and give your active Ooogy a +3% Epic item crafting chance.
13. Belts are now usable in the game
We integrated a Belt Station where players can go and equip the Belts they have in their wallet. This is the first step of Belt integration which simply allows everyone to use their Belts unlimited in the game for now.
What comes after 0.6?
The focus will shift onto the technical side of things working mainly on the multiplayer backend to solidify game scalability to host thousands of players…
We will also be working on Ooogy to fix his path-finding and polish his behaviors etc… Once we achieve proper scalability which will take several months, we will move into “Open Alpha”. Once “Open Alpha” has proven to run stable and the scalability works as we expect it to, we will be ready to move onto Steam’s “Early Access Program” with a very polished open Beta of the game.
For Open Alpha we are also adding a new two story arena and something that makes Ooogies pale with envy… but more of that in the next development update… oh before I forget, also during open alpha we will add the Mage Two Handed Staff weapon art and possibly Archery…
Thanks to all our loyal fans who have supported the game from day one and for all you new fans, we look forward to seeing you in the ruins of Atlantis!
