elemental-war-of-magic posts

With this humorous "screenshot" above (at least we hope it's supposed to be a joke) Stardock has now announced that the first beta test of their upcoming fantasy RPG Elemental: War of Magic has now begun. If you still want to get in on the first phase of the beta, simply pre-order the full game from Stardock sometime before the end of September. After that, you can still pre-order the game but you will have to wait until Stardock begins the second phase of beta testing.

As Stardock CEO Brad Wardell mentions in another post about Elemental on the Impulse web site. " . . . beta 1 will NOT be fun in any way. We are not kidding about this. Our objective with this first build is to get the parameters on which the game runs, how well it runs." The beta will also use the game's cloth map as its basis rather than the more detailed 3D graphical engine.

Developer/publisher Stardock's next major game is Elemental: War of Magic, their fantasy-themed title that combines RPG with the turn-based strategy game that you might expect in a Civilization game. At PAX 2009 this weekend. One of the big things Stardock CEO Brad Wardell mentioned at one of his presentations is that they are designing Elemental to run on close to any PC you can think of. "When the game comes out you will be able to play it on a netbook," he said at one point, "And I don't mean a good netbook. I mean a crappy netbook."

Wardell was trying to be a little funny with those remarks but in truth the game's design lends itself to running on a PC with low system requirements. One of the reasons is that you can switch from a full 3D map to a flat 2D overhead map and still play the game. Another reason is the game's illustrative art style that doesn't have to rely on high polygon counts for its characters and environments.

Check out more from the game after the jump:

No doubt attempting to assuage our ravenous anticipation for Elemental: War of Magic, Stardock has released a new batch of screens for the public to peruse. They show off more of the cel-shaded strategy goodness that Elemental will undoubtedly have, as well as some of the interface and environment. It also creates a link between the map-like view seen here and the ground view seen here, which definitely indicates that Stardock is committed to the massive zoom principle seen in previews and Sins of a Solar Empire.

Stardock's next internally developed game is Elemental: War of Magic. As with most of Stardock's games, folks who pre-order Elemental will be able to participate in the game's beta tests. Today Stardock head man Brad Wardell posted up word on the game's web site that a few folks are getting to play the game even before the beta begins.

Wardell states, "We've picked a tiny handful of the pre-order group to become alpha testers based on how many other betas they've participated in, forum karma, and a number of other criteria." if you have pre-ordered the game already and didn't get picked to try out the alpha test, don't worry, The first beta phase will begin sometime around the Penny Arcade Expo which takes place on Labor Day weekend. Wardell states, "Be forewarned, we plan to close the beta shortly after PAX and it will remain closed for some months." So if you want in to the beta you need to pay for the game in the next few weeks.

As always, the development process and features of Stardock's Elemental is being laid bare. In a personal blog post, CEO Brad Wardell discussed more about the game, including some elements (pun unintended) that are of great interest to those looking forward to the fantasy 4X game. The February 15th, 2010 release date simply can't come fast enough for us!

Some of the things discussed include what channelers are and how custom-made content is being integrated into the game. Channelers are very interesting, as they act as a mix between hardcore wizard and a settler from other games. Able to imbue both units and the landscape with magic, they are a vital resource to your growing empire. As well as this discussion on channelers (which takes up almost half the blog post!), there's the issue of mod creation, which appears to be using a system similar to GalCiv 2. Finally, The old economy discussion was briefly revisited, with the answer boiling down to "we'll see how testers like it."

Stardock is a game developer with titles like Galactic Civilizations II and the upcoming Elemental, a publisher of third party titles like Sins of a Solar Empire and Demigod and a digital distributor of games via their Impulse service. Now the company is on a hiring spree and our sister site Joystiq has posted word that in so doing the company is giving hints about their upcoming projects.

Speaking to Stardock CEO Brad Wardell, they found out they are hiring experienced game developers to work on a "turn based fantasy strategy game" along with a "real-time space strategy game" and a "turn-based space strategy game". They are also looking for people to work on a "party-based, single player, role playing game" and a "real-time land-based strategy game". Of course you will need to relocate to Stardock's offices in Michigan but if that appeals to you email jobs@stardock.com for more info.

With all of the networking issues in Demigod now corrected, its publisher Stardock can now put more emphasis on their next major game release, the internally developed fantasy strategy-RPG Elemental: War of Magic. This week, Stardock head Brad Wardell posted up some new screenshots from the game on it's official web site and we have added those shots to our gallery. It's been a while since we have seen new shots with Wardell saying, "We've been hesitant to show too many screenshots until the shadowing is in."

Beta testing for the game should begin "in around 60 days" according to Wardell so expect it to start around the end or August or early September. As usual with Stardock's games, anyone can enter the beta by simply pre-ordering the game now.

It seems that Brad Wardell is dedicated to the transparency that has earned him a name amongst gamers as an honest and thought-provoking CEO. Having recently explained just how Demigod fell on its face and what they were doing to improve it, he moved seamlessly into discussing different economic models for the new 4X/RPG game Elemental being released by Stardock. It's a fascinating read, especially since it involves asking the community for ideas! It's rare that developers are this active with their intended audience, which makes the ability to change how the game plays in drastic ways with suggestions all the sweeter.

For those interested in making their voices heard, you can visit the official forums to put your two cents into the discussion! Elemental: War Of Magic is scheduled for a February 2010 release date, with a beta planned for any time now.

[Via Rock, Paper, Shotgun]

Last week's Game Developers Conference was a big one for Stardock as it revealed its plans for their DRM solution Goo. But they were also demoing their upcoming titles. One of them was Elemental: War of Magic, a fantasy strategy game that Stardock announced a few months ago.

Unknown to most people at the time, Stardock decided to take a camera and film a screen showing off some very early gameplay footage of Elemental from GDC. That footage was posted by Stardock on YouTube and features narration from its CEO Brad Wardell. You won't have long to check out the game for yourself. Stardock is already taking pre-orders for Elemental and people who pony up the cash will get access to the game's beta test that begins later this spring. Elemental is due for release in the first quarter of 2010.

While so many game developers and publishers are feeling budget crunches and cutting staff members, PC game publisher Stardock is actually expanding, thanks in part to tax breaks given by its home state of Michigan. The Mlive.com web site reports today that the developer of Galactic Civilizations II and publisher of Sins of a Solar Empire plans to expand its Plymouth, Michigan base with 55 new employees.

The expansion was due in part to the granting of tax breaks by the Michigan Economic Growth Authority and was actually mentioned by the state's governor, Jennifer Granholm, in her State of the State address this week. Ironically, Granholm signed a bill a few years ago that would have restricted the sales of certain games from minors in the state (that law, like all other such legislation, was thrown out in the court system as being unconstitutional).

Big Download got a chance to chat with briefly on the phone with Stardock's CEO Brad Wardell about the new deal today which will allow the company to build a second game development team. Currently Stardock has one game development team working on the fantasy strategy game Elemental: War of Magic. Yet another team is working on Stardock's non-gaming software projects. This new expansion will be to make an all new game title which Wardell told us will be a fantasy based "old school party system" RPG. Elemental: War of Magic will be completed in 2010 and then that team will move onto working on Society, a long-in-development MMO title.

Wardell said the tax breaks, which total about $900,000 over five years, will allow Stardock to update things like their Internet connection at their location. While their Impulse game download service uses servers around the world, Stardock's own Internet connection at its office uses Comcast for its ISP to upload files like new games for the service to all those servers. Wardell said the tax breaks will allow them to upgrade their ISP to a faster connection so they can upload more games to Impulse (Wardell told us they have about 100 games waiting to upload to Impulse at the moment).