Last week we’ve posted our first Concept Blog for Galaxy on Fire – Alliances. And those of you who’ve taken the time to read through it will have gotten quite a bit of first-hand information about the ancient artifacts, which you can use in the game to level up your command ships and respective fleets. And that’s where we continue today with the second concept blog for our red-hot mobile strategy MMO. This time, however, we’ll no longer talk about the artifacts themselves, but rather will we introduce you to the so-called citadels, which contain almost infinite amounts of the said artifacts underneath their high-tech shells. Designed by a highly advanced civilization and scattered all over the galaxy by the devastating shockwave of a cataclysmic cosmic event, the citadels could best be described as monumental structures that melted into the surficial areas of their host planets millions of years ago.[full]
A first idea sketch of the artifact mountains (also known as citadels) on the one hand and the mysterious treasures they contain on the other...
With the aid of their integrated auto-repair mechanisms and survival technologies, the citadels had not only been able to keep their key functions intact after crashing onto the concrete surfaces of the orbs in question, but they also managed to stay fully operational through the aeons. Therefore, these age-old retainers of an ancient civilization’s long-forgotten legacy are now being discovered and claimed by contemporary explorers and entrepreneurs, eager to take possession of the mysterious secrets and tremendous powers within their cores.
The final concept artwork which served as guideline for the actual 3D renderings of the citadels in our upcoming mobile multiplayer strategy game Galaxy on Fire - Alliances.
Despite their high-tech composition, the look of the citadels is rather inartifical and natural. We ultimately agreed on a “mountain”-like design, because it illustrates the complete merging of the advanced technology with the planet they crashed onto. Instead of remaining to be foreign objects, the citadels have deeply merged into their surroundings over the centuries – to the point where they’ve become an inseparable part of the planet they’ve once landed on. Consequently, they can also not be moved away from the crater site, but rather do the players have to take the whole planet into their possession, if they want to take hold of a citadel and harvest the valuable artifacts it contains. And considering the nice bonuses you’ll get from equipping your ships with red, blue and yellow artifacts, claiming dominion over as many citadels as possible might not be the worst of options.
Welcome to the very first Concept Blog for our upcoming mobile strategy MMO Galaxy on Fire – Alliances. Like a “light version” of the Developer Diaries, the Concept Blogs will focus on one particular asset or aspect of the game and introduce it to you in more detail. In addition, they’ll also feature some cool artworks, scribbles and graphics that (in most cases) have not been published anywhere else before. The first assets we’re going to talk about in more detail are the so-called artifacts, which are remnants of an ancient civilization that bear enormous powers. In GOF-A, they can be harvested from special planets and used to increase the stats of your command ships and their respective fleets. In total, there are three different kinds of artifacts, all of which have different qualities and grant different bonuses.[full] While the blue ones can be used to improve your ships’ defense, the yellow ones can be used to increase their speed and the red ones can be used to boost their fire power.
The 3D renderings of the ancient artifacts in Galaxy on Fire - Alliances have been designed on the basis of the concept artworks displayed above.
In regard to their visual appearance, the artifacts have been designed as rock fragments nerved by glowing energy fibers. Other attempts, which got discarded in the meantime, include crystal-, alien- and tech-like designs.
Despite its pretty cool look, the "alien/organic" design for the artifacts got discarded because the Alliances team felt that it would not fully incorporte the mineral-like nature of these items.
In the end, however, we went with the rock-like look for two reasons. On the one hand, that look shows right from the start that the artifacts are minerals that have to be unearthed from deep underneath the ground. And on the other hand, it also conveys that they contain some kinda mysterious energy within their cores. Therefore, after quite a bit of trial and error, we ultimately settled with a design fairly resembling scorching-hot chunks of volcanic rock…
Just like the "alien/organic" design, the "tech" design is another pretty nice attempt that didn't make it into the game...
The colors of the three different types of artifacts correlate with the special glow in which your command ship will be wrapped as soon as you equip with an artifact. Since a combination of two or three different types of artifacts on one and the same ship is not possible, one has to choose carefully which command ship to boost with which kind of artifact.
By equipping your command ship with red artifacts, you can increase its firepower quite a bit.
With the production of Galaxy on Fire – Alliances still being in full swing, the concepts and 3D renderings displayed above are not 100% final. However, there’s a good chance that the assets that end up in the final version of the game will only differ slightly (if at all) from the ones shown in this blog.
In the past couple of months, it’s become a little quiet here on the blog. But that’s (hopefully) going to change very soon. Why, you might ask. Well, because it’s Dev Diary time again! Yes, that’s right! We’re very happy to present you the first Developer Diary for our upcoming mobile sci-fi strategy MMO Galaxy on Fire – Alliances today and we’re eager to announce that from now on we’ll be posting an exclusive blog about the development and production of the most ambitious project that Fishlabs has ever tackled every single week until launch day! We’ll post a Developer Diary every first Thursday of the month and a so-called Concept Blog on all subsequent Thursdays! While we’re going to tackle a selected variety of bigger and more elemental issues in the Dev Diaries, we’ll introduce you to smaller assets such as structures, planets, characters and space crafts with the aid of the weekly Concept Blogs.[full] Sounds good? Of course, it does. So let’s not waste any more time and cut to the chase right away. Because I’m sure a lot of you would like to find out how the title Galaxy on Fire – Alliances came about.
The star map shows the individual territories of the alliances in GOF-A. Among others, you will also be able to highlight strategically important targets, such as planets containing citadels, for your allies.
The naming of Galaxy on Fire – Alliances was by far not as easy as one might think. The only thing that was clear right from the start was the fact that the iconic “Galaxy on Fire” moniker should be used for our new game we well. After all, we’re very eager to expand the Galaxy on Fire IP and take it beyond the confinements of the sci-fi shooter genre. Consequently, we’ve gone through several meetings and countless discussions before we ultimately agreed on a title that – at least in our opinion – illustrates and underlines what the game is all about, namely a battle-driven multiplayer strategy game in a sci-fi setting. While the word “Galaxy” points out that the game takes place in futuristic scenery, the word “Fire” implies that there’s a whole lotta fighting going on in said outer space environment. And last but not least, the addendum “Alliances” makes it clear that you’ll have to team up with others and display a fine amount of strategic finesse if you want to dominate the servers of GOF-A (as our community has already nicknamed the game). After all, multiplayer gaming is where Galaxy on Fire – Alliances really shines and shows its strengths. Among others, the individual alliance members can not only send each other support troops and coordinate attacks, but they can also communicate directly with each other through the integrated mailing system and mark strategically important targets on the star map. Therefore, it was particularly important for us to highlight the crucial role of GOF-A’s manifold multiplayer features right from the start by incorporating them into the title of the game. All in all, we’ve put several dozen suggestions, such as “Colonies”, “Pioneers”, “Citadels”, “Dominion” or “Reign”, up for discussion. In the end we chose “Alliances”, because we felt that it best represented the nature of our game. And it has got a pretty nice ring to it as well, hasn’t it?
In GOF-A you will be able to observe the epic space battles from the bridge of your command ship. Here's an early concept of the bridge of a Terran battle cruiser.
Okay, guys. That’s it for today. I hope you enjoyed our first Developer Diary about the naming of our first multiplayer game. What do you think? Did we nail it with Galaxy on Fire – Alliances or would you have favored another title? And are you already curious about the upcoming Concept Blogs? In the next couple of weeks, we’re gonna give you some additional insight into the powerful artifacts of GOF-A as well as the ancient citadels that contain them. Stay tuned!
Earthlings, humans and other nut jobs, it’s me again, your old pal Mkkt Bkkt. And from the fact that I’ve hijacked the Fishlabs blog again to address you directly, you should already have derived that I’ve got some amazing news for you! And this time it’s better than ever! So let’s not waste any more time and cut to the chase right away: Galaxy on Fire 2 HD, the completely overhauled sci-fi epic that is specifically optimized for all A5- and A6-powered iOS devices, is currently available for download entirely free of charge! Yes, you’ve heard right! Fishlabs’ award-winning flag ship title, that is considered the undisputed reference for open space shooters on smartphones and tablets by fans and media alike, has just gone free for the first time ever since its initial launch on the App Store in October 2011. So if you’ve got an iPhone 4S, iPhone 5 or iPod touch 5G on the one hand or an iPad 2, iPad 3, iPad 4 or iPad mini on the other, then you’d better not waste any more time and download the “brilliant game” (Appasnap.com) with “with beautiful graphics and unique gameplay” (148Apps.com) right away.[full] The freebie offer is only valid for seven days from February 7th to February 14th. After that the app will be set back to “Paid” according to my reliable sources at the Fishlabs headquarters.
The Gator Custom is a true behemoth of a space ship... if you've got both add-ons unlocked, you'll be able to buy 'n fly more than 50 different vessels in Galaxy on Fire 2 HD for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch!
If you’ve already played SD version of Galaxy on Fire2 before, you will most likely not need any additional information in order to be convinced that you should get hold of the HD version as well. Even if you don’t own any of the supported devices yet, you might still want to download the game now to make sure that the app is registered to your iTunes account and can be restored as soon as you’ve upgraded to a newer iPhone, iPad or iPod touch.
If you're more of a trader than a fighter, you might want to buy a Rhino freight ship and gain millions of credits by exploiting the best trade routes in the galaxy...
And if for some reason you haven’t heard of Galaxy on Fire 2 so far, let me tell you that Fishlabs’s action-packed sci-fi epic is easily the most ambitious and engrossing open space shooter that the mobile platform has ever seen. With console-quality 3D graphics, rich sound design and full voice-acting as well as a unique mixture of story-driven, mission-bound and sandbox gameplay, the title will keep you hooked for hours and hours on end. Believe me, I tried it myself… putting Galaxy on Fire 2 down again is about a thousand times harder than overcoming a neuro-algae addiction!
The Vossk are a particularly belligerent alien race in Fishlabs' award-winning open space shooter GOF2 HD. The picture above shows the hangar of one of their space stations.
Speaking of which, I gotta go now because a Rhino full of the aforementioned hallucinogens is scheduled to arrive here any minute from now. And I gotta make sure the product is absolutely top-notch before a pay an eight-figure sum of credits for it. In the meantime, why don’t you hop over to the App Store and download Galaxy on Fire 2 HD via http://bit.ly/gof2hd (Free for a week only) and Galaxy on Fire 2 SD via http://bit.ly/gof2sd-EN (Free for good). And, as always, don’t forget to leave some feedback here in the comments and over on www.Facebook.com/GalaxyOnFire and tell the world what you think of the game!
The good thing about totally unexpected happenings is that they occur both ways… sometimes they throw you back a little, but sometimes they also play into your hands. Not even two weeks ago, it looked as if the simultaneous launch of our new open space epic Galaxy on Fire 2 – Supernova in SD, HD and Full HD had to be postponed for quite a few days due to an unexpected rejection of the Full HD version on the one hand and a number of subsequent iPhone 5 optimizations of the HD version on the other hand. During that time, we still had a glimpse of hope that we could make a September release, but internally we were more expecting the new expansion pack to be launched sometime in October. Since we didn’t know a specific release date ourselves also and didn’t know if and when the re-submitted versions would get an approval from Apple, we purposely kept all information about the release as vague as possible and also didn’t announce the exact dates of new submissions of the Full HD and HD versions publically. After all, there has always still been the chance that we’d get rejected again for one reason or another and if that had happened, people would most likely be even more disappointed than they were after the new add-on’s first delay. [full]
However, as I said earlier, sometimes things turn out quite a bit different than expected and it seems as if not only our developers but also the Apple staff were pretty eager to get everything fixed as soon as possible and hence we got the approval for both the Full HD and HD version of GOF2 – Supernova in less than a week. When I left the office yesterday evening, we had still been waiting for feedback from Apple, but when I got back to work earlier today, I hadn’t even started my computer when our CEO Michi came to my work place and showed me Supernova on the iPhone 5 in all its glory! The game looks and performs absolutely amazing on the new hardware and both the handling and the presentation really benefit from the bigger screen and 1136 by 640 pixel resolution of Apple’s red-hot smartphone. For performance reasons, we’ve not integrated the refraction shaders and bloom shaders right from the start, but we’ve tweaked everything to the new resolution and also added the enhanced motion blur effect that most of you will most likely remember from Wednesday’s behind-the-scenes featurette. Since everything went down that well after all, there’s really just one thing that still needed to be done. And that is to flick the switch and make Supernova available for download!
The Teneta R.E.D. is one of the exclusive special ships in GOF2 - Supernova. Any idea what the acronym R.E.D. could stand for?
And guess what? That’s exactly what we just did! So after more than a year of hard work our biggest title of the year has been released at last and you guys are finally able to take on a new adventure and save the galaxy from an impending catastrophe once again. It might sound like a worn-out phrase at first when I now say that Supernova was definitely worth the wait because it marks by far the most epic and spectacular instalment of the GOF saga to date. However, I’m sure that every single GOF fan out there will agree with me as soon as he’s checked the new expansion out on his iPhone, iPad or iPod touch and dived a little deeper into its gripping storyline and conflagrant universe. If you’ve read our previous dev diaries with care, you’ll most likely have learned quite a lot about the new Supernova expansion and its numerous features by now. But even if you’ve read every blogspot twice, there will still be lots and lots of surprises that we left out on purpose because we didn’t want to spoil all the fun in advance. I’m surely not exaggerating when I say that Supernova’s gonna be really huge and that you guys will be able to spend many hours on end exploring its manifold new star systems and taking on a broad variety of new missions. To get an overview of the most spectacular new features of Supernova, you’re recommended to check out the brand-new feature trailer above! It’s good fun and gives you a good impression of what to expect when you decide to set course for Ginoya system and engage in an adventure unlike anything you’ve ever experienced before!
Earlier today, our lead web desinger Christian gave our new sci-fi epic GOF2 - Supernova a try on the red-hot iPhone 5.
Before I finally shut up and leave you alone for your first couple of Supernova playing sessions, I’d like to take the opportunity and say “Thank you!” to all our graphics artists, programmers, game designers and other colleagues assigned to the Supernova project, who’ve been helluva supportive to me right from the start and provided me with tons of interesting pieces of information and spectacular assets whenever a new developer diary was due. And, of course, I’d also like to say “Thank you!” to all of our fans, who took the time to read these blogspots and posted their feedback in the comments. The very first Supernova dev diary went live not even six months ago and still the Supernova dev diaries alone have already generated more than 65% of all comments ever posted on our blog! Not bad, eh? I really hope to see you guys around in the future as well… and so much is certain: Our next big title’s already in the making and hence it’s only a matter of time until the next bunch of dev diaries is about to be written!
The Na'srrk is the newest addition to the Vossk fleet in GOF2 - Supernova for iPhone, iPad, iPod touch and Mac.
Oh, and I almost forgot… just in case there are some guys among you who’ve stumbled upon this blog by happenstance and haven’t even played Galaxy on Fire 2 yet, you can download the game in HD at http://bit.ly/gof2hd (for iPhone 5, iPhone 4S, iPad 2 and the new iPad), in Full HD at http://bit.ly/gof2hd-mac (for Mac) and in SD at http://bit.ly/gof2sd-EN (for older iOS devices). Enjoy the flight, everybody!
Let’s face it, guys. If it wasn’t for Apple releasing the iPhone back in 2007 and opening the App Store back in 2008, Fishlabs would most likely no longer be around today. And to this day, iOS is by far the most important and successful market for us. We understand that many of you won’t be affected directly by the newly added iPhone 5 optimization of Galaxy on Fire 2 – Supernova and hence might be quite a bit disappointed by our decision to add a number of new features right away, rather than adding them afterwards in the course of another update. We also understand that those among you, who’ve not yet moved over to the HD version of GOF2, might not be too fond of our decision to stick to our plans of releasing all three versions of the new expansion pack simultaneously, despite the fact that only the Full HD and HD versions had to be re-submitted. Though all of these things don’t seem to be connected to one another, the matter turns out to be more complex than it might appear at first. If all had gone according to plan, we would have launched the add-on prior to the release of the iPhone 5 and then added the additional features with another update that would have gone live at the same day that Apple’s new smartphone hit the market.[full] But as so often in life, things turned out quite a bit different than expected and now we really need to do everything we can to make our title appear as appealing as possible on the new device right from the start. The better it looks and performs on the iPhone 5, the higher is the chance that we‘re going to get a lot of media coverage as well as an international feature upon release – and these things can indeed be crucial factors that decide whether a new title becomes a success or a failure.
The Gator Custom bursts through the Shima system with all guns blazing in Fishlabs' upcoming sci-fi epic GOF2 HD - Supernova.
After all, a new iOS device is always destined to turn the market upside down and hence it is particularly important for a company like Fishlabs to be ahead of the curve and support such devices from day one. And it’ll also become more and more important for us to pursue our cross-platform strategy and support all relevant models of the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch equally. Releasing the SD version of Supernova prior to the HD and Full HD version, as some of our fans suggested, wouldn’t make a lot of sense at all for us, because it would take away a lot of buzz and would make the title appear way smaller than it actually is, if we’d first present our biggest and most important release of the year in a version that’s not at all tailored to the specifications and capabilities of the hottest smartphones and tablets on the market. If we want Supernova to become a success and get the notification it deserves, we’ve gotta kick it off with a bang and show it to the world in all its glory… and that’s simply not gonna happen if we release the slightly dated SD version first and then put out the state-of-the-art HD version later on. This being said, we really hope that you understand our situation and are still looking forward to the release of Supernova, which will hopefully not be that far away anymore.
To ensure a perfect sci-fi gaming experience on the iPhone 5, all elements of the touch screen navigation have been re-adjusted for the 4" Retina Display of Apple's new smartphone bestseller.
Of course, we’re still gonna stick to the release of our bi-weekly developer diaries, despite the fact that we’ve already run through all of the topics we originally wanted to discuss. So today we’ll introduce some of the new iPhone 5 features to you, such as the full support of the native 1136 by 640 pixel resolution of the new Apple smartphone’s 4” Retina Display. As you can see above, the game will look pretty neat on the iPhone 5’s bigger screen and all control elements have been re-adjusted in order to ensure a perfect gaming experience.
The new motion blur effect makes the boost look even cooler than before in GOF2 HD. It will not only be available on the iPhone 5 but also on the iPhone 4S, iPad 2 and new iPad.
We’ve also added a new motion blur effect, which will give you a way better feeling of the enormous speed that your ships reaches while its boost is activated. To make sure that this effect can be enjoyed on all devices from the iPhone 4S upwards, we decided to use a so-called radial blur, which is less resource-consuming than a full motion blur effect. In order to create the effect in question, we first have to render the current scenery to a texture and then sample that texture several times around a given centre point in the middle of the image. By making the effect stronger and more prominent towards the image boarders, we’re then able to make it look as if our space craft was passing by asteroids, meteors and cosmic vapours at lightning speed.
The new refraction shaders will make the gamma shield look way cooler in GOF2 HD. Unfortunately, the static screenshots don't really do 'em justice.
Furthermore, we’ve also integrated two additional shaders from the Full HD version of Galaxy on Fire 2 into the HD version, namely refraction shaders and bloom shaders. The former have been created in a similar way as the cloaking device and the gamma shield (see dev diary #8, for example) and can be spotted at several occasions, such as the burning space stations in the Supernova system or absorption animation of the plasma collectors. And the latter are so-called post effect shaders, which are rendered onto the complete scenery on the screen and cause the light areas to shine even stronger than before. Whether or not those two will really end up in the game has not been decided yet, because we won’t be able to test Supernova on an iPhone 5 before its official release on Friday, September 21st. If the game will still perform fine with these additional effects integrated, we’ll keep them in and have them activated right from the start. But if they cause significant frame rate drops, we’ll have to take them out again in order to ensure the best-possible gaming experience. So let’s wait and see if the iPhone 5 will live up to our expectations.
The Groza MK II slams its predecessor in every aspect. However, to get hold of this highly sought-after vessel, you gotta shell out a nice sum of credits.
Here we go, everybody. Thanks for your time and patience. We hope you enjoyed the read and understand our situation a little better now. We’ve got our fingers crossed that this will indeed be the last dev diary before the release of Supernova, but given the recent course of events, we don’t wanna make any false promises or raise false expectations, so please don’t be mad at us if we’ve still got to come up with one more topic two weeks from now.
As many of you will already know, the launch of the upcoming Supernova add-on will be accompanied by the release of a free update, which will contain a number of pretty cool features for all Galaxy on Fire 2 players – no matter whether they’re going to purchase the new expansion pack or not. So despite the fact that the novelties brought forth by the soon-to-be-released update are strictly speaking not part of the Supernova expansion per se, we’ve decided to put them in the centre of the attention of this week’s developer diary anyway. I mean, it still makes sense, doesn’t it? Cause on the one hand they’re rather closely connected to Supernova anyway and on the other hand they also cover a number of issue that you’ve repeatedly asked us about, such as the new actions you can perform at the Kaamo Club, for example. Oh, and just for the record, all three versions of Supernova (SD, HD and Full HD) have been submitted to the App Store in the meantime and are currently waiting to be reviewed by Apple. Fingers crossed it won’t take too long anymore before Supernova goes live and you can finally take on a new adventure on your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch![full]
Soon you'll be able to meet all kinds of shady characters and whacky folks in the space longue of the infamous Kaamo Club!
And since the latter seem to be of particular interest for quite a lot of GOF2 fans, who’ve hoped for quite some time that there’d be a little more action in the deserted space lounge of their very own space station, we’re happy to let you know that the establishment in question will indeed be a lot more frequented in the future! Among others you’ll henceforth meet a group of very skilled engineers there, who will pimp your ship by improving its handling, cargo space and armour or even adding an additional equipment slot – if you’re willing to shell out the right amount of credits for such an in-demand service. After all, giving some extra-power to a high-tech space ship requires quite a lot of expertise and the few people, who are able to pull it off, will surely not waste their talents by working on your space craft for a starvation wage.
The Berger CrossXT looks rather pale in comparision to its successor. With four primary weapons and enhanced stats, the Berger Cross Special will soon be one of the most powerful ships in the GOF2 universe.
The same is also valid for the ship dealers, who’ll hide in the dark corners of the Kaamo Club’s space lounge and offer you enhanced versions of some of the most popular vessels in the universe. Since these particularly strong models, such as the Teneta R.E.D. or the Phantom XT, are rare prototypes which haven’t gone into production yet, you can only purchase them from said dealers and nowhere else in the galaxy. Besides new paint jobs and slightly modified bodies, these special ships do also contain better stats as well as more weapon and equipment slots than the customary models they are based on.
Many of you will most like already know the Gryphon from the original Galaxy on Fire 3D, which initially got released on the App Store back in 2009.
Another new ship, which the ship dealers don’t have a monopoly on and which you’ll hence be able to purchase all across the galaxy, is the Gryphon. A re-made version of one of the most popular ships of the Vossk Wars, the new Gryphon is a classy vessel with a nice retro charm, which stands out due to its perfect blending of elegant design and respectable fighting power.
Let's see how many kills you'll be able to score in the new "Supernova Challenge". If you've got iOS6 installed, you can even challenge your friends right after you've scored a new record.
The second-to-last update feature which we’d like to discuss in the course of our current dev diary is the so-called Supernova Challenge. Based loosely on the shoot ‘em up version of GOF 2 – Supernova, which we had already shown to our fans earlier this year at GDC and Gamescom 2012 in Cologne, the Supernova Challenge could best be described as an action-packed arcade version of Galaxy on Fire 2. You enter the orbit with a pre-equipped Blue Fyre vessel and have you’ve got two-and-a-half minutes in order to score as many kills as possible. But take care! Since you’re also going to get extra-points and combo-multipliers for attacks that have been carried out particularly well, you’d better display some good combat skills and an effective attack strategy or else you won’t make it into the Game Center highscore lists. If you’ve got iOS 6 installed on your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch, you’ll even be able to challenge your friends right away and dare them to beat your latest record! Let’s see if you guys have what it takes to make it to the top of the global leader boards!
The achievement hunters among you will have to display quite a lot of skill in order to win all of the nine new gold medals.
To round the whole thing off, the upcoming update will also grant you access of new weapons as well as enable you to fulfil an exclusive selection of new achievements. Do you have an idea what you’ll have to do in order to score the “Grave Riser” or “Ore Athlete” medal, for example?
With all modifications (indicated by the crosses behind the altered stats), the Gator Custom is even more powerful than before!
That’s it! We hope you enjoyed this little wrap-up of the most important features of the free GOF2 update. If all goes as planned, this will have been the final dev diary before the long-awaited release of our new sci-fi epic Galaxy on Fire 2 – Supernova on the App Store! As always, please post your feedback in the comments and tell us what you think about all the stuff you’ll so be able to do at the Kaamo Club! And while you’re at it, feel free to “like” our official Facebook fan page for the GOF saga over at www.Facebook.com/GalaxyOnFire as well.
What the heck is happening here!? Another dev diary coming out of the blue? Has Khador found a way to manipulate the space-time continuum or has some Midorian spy hacked into our servers and released next week’s blogspot seven days in advance? Not at all. The reason for us not sticking to our two weeks schedule and cramping another dev diary in between is simply that our audio director Gero did a helluva good and quick job at cutting our video footage from GDC and Gamescom. Much earlier than expected he came up with a really cool montage that gives a pretty good impression of what it’s been like to visit GDC and Gamescom on behalf of Fishlabs Entertainment. And since we don’t wanna keep that kick-ass video of our trip to Cologne rotting on our hard disks for a whole week, we’ve decided that it would be best to upload it right away and make it the centerpiece of our 14th dev diary for the upcoming Supernova adventure! So here it is in all its beauty![full]
As most of you will have noticed, we’ve been to Cologne from August 13th to 19th in order to showcase Galaxy on Fire 2 Full HD for Windows PC and Galaxy on Fire 2 – Supernova for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch at the GDC 2012 and Gamesom 2012. We had a fantastic time at both events and it was particularly great to meet quite a lot of hardcore GOF2 fans at our little stand in the consumer area. Many of you showed us your save games on your own devices and we were quite impressed when we saw what a huge fleet and seemingly infinite collection of goods and commodities you had already gathered at the Kaamo Club. But the best of all was simply that everyone – from absolute GOF novices who’ve seen the game for the very first time to experienced GOF veterans who’ve already completed the title on “extreme” – was very fond of Supernova and enjoyed the new graphics, assets and features quite a lot. After all, that’s the most crucial point when you’re creating a game. No matter how much time and work you put into a game, you can never know if they fans will like it until they’ve actually laid hands on it and played it themselves.
Tobi (Online Editor), Kai (Marketing Director), Michi (CEO) and Marc (Senior Marketing Manager) infront of one of our Supernova boulevard banners.
This being said, we’d like to say “Thank You!” to everybody who stopped by at our booths in the business and consumer areas as well as everybody who’s already eagerly awaiting the release of Supernova. We hope you enjoy our little video and who knows, maybe you’ll even be able to spot yourself or your friends on there. Take care and don’t forget to pop in on our blog next Wednesday when developer diary #14 is about to be released!
In the past four months we’ve shed light on almost every aspect of our upcoming sci-fi epic Galaxy on Fire 2 – Supernova for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. Among others, we’ve filled you in on the soon-to-be-released add-on’s extensive storyline, introduced the new characters and spaceships to you and giving you exclusive sneak peeks of a broad variety of power-ups and weapons systems. And we also took a closer look on a whole lot of other assets and features, such as sound recording, logo design and new gameplay modes. If you’ve read our bi-weekly dev diaries carefully, you’ll most likely know almost as much about the Supernova expansion as we do! But nevertheless there might still be quite a few things that you’d like to get additional information about. So instead of picking the topic for today’s dev diary ourselves, we decided to give you the chance to ask us all Supernova-related questions you might come up with. Thanks a lot for your comments and emails, everybody! Here we go![full]
The gamma shield is only one of the handy new gadgets that Khador invented in Galaxy on Fire 2 - Supernova for iPhone and iPad.
TwistTECK: What do the new characters look like? And will there be any new tools and gadgets designed by the Deep Science team?
Fishlabs: In Supernova there’ll be a whole lot of new characters, such as the muddle-headed Professor Moonsprocket, his Bobolan psychiatrist Brillo Lampeter, the dutiful Captain Squand or the stark-and-stiff Commander Trunt. In terms of art style and appearance, they’ll pretty much look like the older GOF characters you’re already familiar with.
Khador and the rest of Deep Science team do of course play an important role in the new add-on as well. Though they haven’t designed a new ship in the time after the Valkyrie add-on, they’ve at least come up with a number of pretty cool and extremely handy gadgets and power-ups, one of which is the gamma shield you see in the screenshot above. There are also some other cool inventions, but I’m not gonna reveal ‘em yet, because they play a crucial role in the storyline and hence it would be best if you’d discover them yourselves as soon as GOF2 – Supernova is out.
At Gamescom 2012 in Cologne, the GOF fans were already able to play a special "shoot 'em up" version of Supernova on the Mac.
Cheesenium: When will the Mac and PC’s Full HD version of Galaxy on Fire 2 get the Valkyrie and Supernova expansions?
Fishlabs: Supernova for the Mac will be released on the same day as the SD version for older iOS devices and the HD version for iPhone 4S, iPad 2 and the new iPad. The title is scheduled to be released in September, but a concrete release date has not yet been set.
At this point of time, we unfortunately can’t say too much about the PC versions of Valkyrie and Supernova, because we first have to see how the main game will perform on that platform. But if the title becomes a success and sells a reasonable amount of copies, the PC gamers will most likely not have to wait too long before they can lay their hands on the add-ons as well.
The majestic Blue Fyre seen through the plasma ring of the Mimung Blaster -- one of the most powerful new weapons in the upcoming Supernova expansion.
Dale: I would love to have some frontal pictures of the new ships especially the Blue Fyre and Gryphon.
Fishlabs: Some of the new ships, like the Bloodstar and the Amboss, have already been shown in all their beauty in our previous dev diaries. Among others, you’ll find a kick-ass action shot of the Amboss in #9, a cool screen cap of the Gryphon in #8 and a lot of spectacular footage of the Bloodstar in #7. As for the Blue Fyre, well, I’d suggest you’d just take a look at the screenshot above…
Do you have what it takes to save the Mido-Sector from the ravishing fires of a dying star?
Ilikepie: How did you come up with the idea of a supernova to be in the storyline? I know you wanted to explain the Midorians a little better, which I think is a good idea, but then you somehow find a way to add in a supernova, which is amazingly AWESOME!
Fishlabs: When we started working on the new add-on, we knew right away that we had to come up with a hazard that was bigger and more threatening than anything the players had to face before. After all, most players had already spend quite a few hours with the main game and the first expansion prior to their engagement with Supernova and hence they’d most likely burst into the new add-on with a pretty strong ship and tons of cash at their disposal. Right from the start, a devastating supernova seemed to be exactly what we were looking for, because what could be more drastic and destructive than a dying star that’s about to annihilate the whole Midorian sector!?
But also in terms of character development, a catastrophe of epic proportions came in quite handy for us, because we wanted our protagonist Keith T. Maxwell to undergo a certain kind of change of heart in the new expansion pack. In Supernova he’s no longer just a gun for hire who offers his services to the highest bidder, but rather has he evolved to become a true hero who takes part in the risky evacuation missions by his own conviction and not because someone’ written him a big paycheck.
And last but not least there’s yet another reason why we put the supernova into the centre of the attention of the new expansion pack, namely that it caters for quite a lot of new gameplay features and situations — such as lethal gamma rays which make it impossible for the player to roam an orbit forever or evacuation mission in which the player has to save refugees from the area of conflict.
If you want to save the galaxy from its impending doom by the hands of devious fiends on the one hand and the destructive forces of nature on the other, you gotta equip some kick-ass weapons and keep your finger on the trigger.
Well guys, here we go. I hope you had some fun with our twelfth developer diary for GOF2 – Supernova. Unfortunately, we were by far not able to answer all questions in the course of this blog, but don’t worry. If your question hasn’t been answered yet, just write it down in the comments and we’ll surely get back at you right away!
If you’ve read the previous developer diaries for our soon-to-be-released outer space adventure GOF2 – Supernova for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch carefully, you’ll most likely already know that the next instalment of our award-winning sci-fi saga will please your expectant eyes with tons of spectacular new graphics, visuals and special effects. But that’s of course not all! To make sure that Supernova will be a real feast for all your senses, we’ve also added a whole new soundtrack, lots of new sound effects and complete voice-overs in English and – for the first time ever – also in German! So, once the game is out and you’ll be playing it for the first time, we’d really recommend you to take put on your earphones and take some time to listen to all the kick-ass tunes, themes and sounds that found their way into the upcoming Supernova expansion![full]
Supernova’s soundtrack has been written and recorded partly by Periscope Studios and partly by ourselves. And believe me, coming up with a selection of tracks that totally reflected what we had in mind wasn’t exactly an easy task. Take the main theme, for example. On the one hand, we wanted to set the raging fires and ravaging gamma rays of the supernova to music by adding a lot of dissonant sounds and off-key notes. But on the other hand we also wanted the music to be kind of catchy and not too annoying and weird. After all, the players will have to spend quite a bit of time in the gamma-poisoned trouble area and hence the music they’re going to hear during their ventures to the supernova system shouldn’t get on their nerves after a minute or two. While the first couple of attempts weren’t exactly pleasing, we ultimately got hold of a song that’s epic and oppressive in equal shares and hence sounds exactly as we had imagined it.
Since the pitchblack Stealth Fighters will be Keith T. Maxwell's most dangerous enemies in the upcoming space action shooter GOF2 - Supernova for iOS and Mac OS, they're also going to have their own music in the game.
Another tune that plays an important role in the game is the theme song of the Stealth Fighters. We really liked the idea of these shadowy phantom menaces having their own “battle music” in Supernova, just like the Voids had theirs in Galaxy on Fire 2. And here, Periscope hit the nail on the head right away and came up with a great piece that makes the out-of-nowhere appearances of these heavily armed stealth vessels all the more frightening and menacing. If you’d like to check it out already, feel free to watch the official trailer on YouTube and let us know what you think. Besides the Supernova theme and the Stealth Fighter theme, the new add-on will also contain a special theme for the Most Wanted Criminals as well as a new Deep Science theme and a couple of other cool tracks.
Here's where our audio editor works his magic and creates the music, sound effects and trailers for our titles, such as the upcoming outer space adventure Supernova.
Next to the new soundtrack, we also designed a number of sound effects for the numerous new weapons systems and pieces of equipment. Especially the sound of the plasma collector turned out to be quite funny. We don’t wanna tell you too much about it, but we hope that it will put a smile on your face the first time you’re gonna use that novel device. And last but not least, there’s the new voice recordings. For Supernova, we hired more than a dozen voice actors who did an absolutely stellar job impersonating the game’s characters, such as the nutty Professor Moonsprocket or the dutiful Captain Squand in both English and German. Yeah, that’s right. In Supernova, there’s gonna be German voice-overs as well!
Fishlabs Entertainment's soon-to-be-released sci-fi epic Galaxy on Fire 2 - Supernova for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch will contain full voice acting in English and German!
OK, everybody. We’ve already reached the end of our 11th developer diary. Number twelve will be out in two weeks and this time you’ll be the ones who decide the topics! Please send us your questions about Supernova to community@fishlabs.net and we’ll pick a selection of ‘em and ask our graphics artists, game designers and programmers to give you some first-hand information on whatever questions you might have! So keep your emails coming!
Last week we’ve posted our first Concept Blog for Galaxy on Fire – Alliances. And those of you who’ve taken the time to read through it will have gotten quite a bit of first-hand information about the ancient artifacts, which you can use in the game to level up your command ships and respective fleets. And that’s where we continue today with the second concept blog for our red-hot mobile strategy MMO. This time, however, we’ll no longer talk about the artifacts themselves, but rather will we introduce you to the so-called citadels, which contain almost infinite amounts of the said artifacts underneath their high-tech shells. Designed by a highly advanced civilization and scattered all over the galaxy by the devastating shockwave of a cataclysmic cosmic event, the citadels could best be described as monumental structures that melted into the surficial areas of their host planets millions of years ago.[full]
Welcome to the very first Concept Blog for our upcoming mobile strategy MMO Galaxy on Fire – Alliances. Like a “light version” of the Developer Diaries, the Concept Blogs will focus on one particular asset or aspect of the game and introduce it to you in more detail. In addition, they’ll also feature some cool artworks, scribbles and graphics that (in most cases) have not been published anywhere else before. The first assets we’re going to talk about in more detail are the so-called artifacts, which are remnants of an ancient civilization that bear enormous powers. In GOF-A, they can be harvested from special planets and used to increase the stats of your command ships and their respective fleets. In total, there are three different kinds of artifacts, all of which have different qualities and grant different bonuses.[full] While the blue ones can be used to improve your ships’ defense, the yellow ones can be used to increase their speed and the red ones can be used to boost their fire power.
In the past couple of months, it’s become a little quiet here on the blog. But that’s (hopefully) going to change very soon. Why, you might ask. Well, because it’s Dev Diary time again! Yes, that’s right! We’re very happy to present you the first Developer Diary for our upcoming mobile sci-fi strategy MMO Galaxy on Fire – Alliances today and we’re eager to announce that from now on we’ll be posting an exclusive blog about the development and production of the most ambitious project that Fishlabs has ever tackled every single week until launch day! We’ll post a Developer Diary every first Thursday of the month and a so-called Concept Blog on all subsequent Thursdays! While we’re going to tackle a selected variety of bigger and more elemental issues in the Dev Diaries, we’ll introduce you to smaller assets such as structures, planets, characters and space crafts with the aid of the weekly Concept Blogs.[full] Sounds good? Of course, it does. So let’s not waste any more time and cut to the chase right away. Because I’m sure a lot of you would like to find out how the title Galaxy on Fire – Alliances came about.
Earthlings, humans and other nut jobs, it’s me again, your old pal Mkkt Bkkt. And from the fact that I’ve hijacked the Fishlabs blog again to address you directly, you should already have derived that I’ve got some amazing news for you! And this time it’s better than ever! So let’s not waste any more time and cut to the chase right away: Galaxy on Fire 2 HD, the completely overhauled sci-fi epic that is specifically optimized for all A5- and A6-powered iOS devices, is currently available for download entirely free of charge! Yes, you’ve heard right! Fishlabs’ award-winning flag ship title, that is considered the undisputed reference for open space shooters on smartphones and tablets by fans and media alike, has just gone free for the first time ever since its initial launch on the App Store in October 2011. So if you’ve got an iPhone 4S, iPhone 5 or iPod touch 5G on the one hand or an iPad 2, iPad 3, iPad 4 or iPad mini on the other, then you’d better not waste any more time and download the “brilliant game” (Appasnap.com) with “with beautiful graphics and unique gameplay” (148Apps.com) right away.[full] The freebie offer is only valid for seven days from February 7th to February 14th. After that the app will be set back to “Paid” according to my reliable sources at the Fishlabs headquarters.
The good thing about totally unexpected happenings is that they occur both ways… sometimes they throw you back a little, but sometimes they also play into your hands. Not even two weeks ago, it looked as if the simultaneous launch of our new open space epic Galaxy on Fire 2 – Supernova in SD, HD and Full HD had to be postponed for quite a few days due to an unexpected rejection of the Full HD version on the one hand and a number of subsequent iPhone 5 optimizations of the HD version on the other hand. During that time, we still had a glimpse of hope that we could make a September release, but internally we were more expecting the new expansion pack to be launched sometime in October. Since we didn’t know a specific release date ourselves also and didn’t know if and when the re-submitted versions would get an approval from Apple, we purposely kept all information about the release as vague as possible and also didn’t announce the exact dates of new submissions of the Full HD and HD versions publically. After all, there has always still been the chance that we’d get rejected again for one reason or another and if that had happened, people would most likely be even more disappointed than they were after the new add-on’s first delay. [full]
Let’s face it, guys. If it wasn’t for Apple releasing the iPhone back in 2007 and opening the App Store back in 2008, Fishlabs would most likely no longer be around today. And to this day, iOS is by far the most important and successful market for us. We understand that many of you won’t be affected directly by the newly added iPhone 5 optimization of Galaxy on Fire 2 – Supernova and hence might be quite a bit disappointed by our decision to add a number of new features right away, rather than adding them afterwards in the course of another update. We also understand that those among you, who’ve not yet moved over to the HD version of GOF2, might not be too fond of our decision to stick to our plans of releasing all three versions of the new expansion pack simultaneously, despite the fact that only the Full HD and HD versions had to be re-submitted. Though all of these things don’t seem to be connected to one another, the matter turns out to be more complex than it might appear at first. If all had gone according to plan, we would have launched the add-on prior to the release of the iPhone 5 and then added the additional features with another update that would have gone live at the same day that Apple’s new smartphone hit the market.[full] But as so often in life, things turned out quite a bit different than expected and now we really need to do everything we can to make our title appear as appealing as possible on the new device right from the start. The better it looks and performs on the iPhone 5, the higher is the chance that we‘re going to get a lot of media coverage as well as an international feature upon release – and these things can indeed be crucial factors that decide whether a new title becomes a success or a failure.
As many of you will already know, the launch of the upcoming Supernova add-on will be accompanied by the release of a free update, which will contain a number of pretty cool features for all Galaxy on Fire 2 players – no matter whether they’re going to purchase the new expansion pack or not. So despite the fact that the novelties brought forth by the soon-to-be-released update are strictly speaking not part of the Supernova expansion per se, we’ve decided to put them in the centre of the attention of this week’s developer diary anyway. I mean, it still makes sense, doesn’t it? Cause on the one hand they’re rather closely connected to Supernova anyway and on the other hand they also cover a number of issue that you’ve repeatedly asked us about, such as the new actions you can perform at the Kaamo Club, for example. Oh, and just for the record, all three versions of Supernova (SD, HD and Full HD) have been submitted to the App Store in the meantime and are currently waiting to be reviewed by Apple. Fingers crossed it won’t take too long anymore before Supernova goes live and you can finally take on a new adventure on your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch![full]
What the heck is happening here!? Another dev diary coming out of the blue? Has Khador found a way to manipulate the space-time continuum or has some Midorian spy hacked into our servers and released next week’s blogspot seven days in advance? Not at all. The reason for us not sticking to our two weeks schedule and cramping another dev diary in between is simply that our audio director Gero did a helluva good and quick job at cutting our video footage from GDC and Gamescom. Much earlier than expected he came up with a really cool montage that gives a pretty good impression of what it’s been like to visit GDC and Gamescom on behalf of Fishlabs Entertainment. And since we don’t wanna keep that kick-ass video of our trip to Cologne rotting on our hard disks for a whole week, we’ve decided that it would be best to upload it right away and make it the centerpiece of our 14th dev diary for the upcoming Supernova adventure! So here it is in all its beauty![full]
In the past four months we’ve shed light on almost every aspect of our upcoming sci-fi epic Galaxy on Fire 2 – Supernova for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. Among others, we’ve filled you in on the soon-to-be-released add-on’s extensive storyline, introduced the new characters and spaceships to you and giving you exclusive sneak peeks of a broad variety of power-ups and weapons systems. And we also took a closer look on a whole lot of other assets and features, such as sound recording, logo design and new gameplay modes. If you’ve read our bi-weekly dev diaries carefully, you’ll most likely know almost as much about the Supernova expansion as we do! But nevertheless there might still be quite a few things that you’d like to get additional information about. So instead of picking the topic for today’s dev diary ourselves, we decided to give you the chance to ask us all Supernova-related questions you might come up with. Thanks a lot for your comments and emails, everybody! Here we go![full]
If you’ve read the previous developer diaries for our soon-to-be-released outer space adventure GOF2 – Supernova for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch carefully, you’ll most likely already know that the next instalment of our award-winning sci-fi saga will please your expectant eyes with tons of spectacular new graphics, visuals and special effects. But that’s of course not all! To make sure that Supernova will be a real feast for all your senses, we’ve also added a whole new soundtrack, lots of new sound effects and complete voice-overs in English and – for the first time ever – also in German! So, once the game is out and you’ll be playing it for the first time, we’d really recommend you to take put on your earphones and take some time to listen to all the kick-ass tunes, themes and sounds that found their way into the upcoming Supernova expansion![full]
