[Endoperez]

Oh, and you might be interested in the DomIIIDevDiary. It has been in few FRAQ! Newsletters, although it has been quiet for some months now. Here are the ones that were written:

Prepare Thyself for Dominions III!

PRESS RELEASE -- This text is not created or endorsed by GameSpot.

Cary, NC, 18 October 2004 - Hardcore strategy gamers around the world should begin to stock up on massive amounts of caffeine and sugar laden food and beverages, for 2005 looks to be the Year of Insomnia. It is with great pleasure that upon this day Shrapnel Games and Illwinter Game Design would like to announce that work has begun on Dominions III, the direct sequel to the multi-award winning Dominions II: The Ascension Wars.

Dominions III will build on the foundation of greatness laid out in Dominions II, taking an already proven formula of addictive strategic gameplay and enhancing it in many ways. Some of these changes come directly from the input of the wonderful worldwide Dominions community, while others spring straight from the gaming genius minds of Illwinter. Here is but a taste of what to expect from Dominions III:

Several new nations, which in turn will increase the number of possible players to create some truly epic wars of ascension.
A brand new interface making it even easier to simply jump in and play.
A random map generator for endless game possibilities.
New battlefield backgrounds.
Many more exciting features!

Come now, you didn't really expect us to detail everything? Anticipation is a fantastic feeling, yes? As work progresses on Dominions III and the feature list becomes more solidified expect to see more features revealed, many of which will bring great joy to Dominions II players.

"Dominions III will be an excellent fusion of proven ideas and awesome new features, many taken directly from gamers whose passion for Dominions II is amazing," Tim Brooks, President and Founder of Shrapnel Games, commented. "This will be an evolutionary title that will give the faithful thousands upon thousands more hours of the unparalleled intense fantasy gaming they've come to enjoy with Dominions II."

While the current release date is "when it's done", gamers should expect to see Dominions III ascend in late 2005 if all goes well. Like Dominions II: The Ascension Wars, Dominions III will be available on a wide range of popular operating systems, including Windows, Macintosh, and Linux. Solaris will no longer be supported.

Keep watching www.shrapnelgames.com for more news on Dominions III, and for all your Dominions II: The Ascension Wars information please visit www.shrapnelgames.com/Illwinter/d2/1.htm

By Shrapnel Games






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Dominions III Developer Diary

For the Christmas season we're giving our interviewees a holiday break. Interviews will continue next year, as soon as everyone gets all the egg nog and turducken out of their systems (hopefully not in the most direct and violent way). Instead we're bringing you the start of something that we're particularly excited about at Frag! HQ, the Dominions III Developer Diary by Illwinter Game Design.

Periodically the kind folks at Illwinter will share their thoughts on the Dominions universe, game design, or other such wisdom as we count down to the release of Dominions III. We hope you enjoy this feature! And now, for your reading pleasure, Illwinter Game Design...

Developer Diary 01
------------------

Hmm, well, Hello!

There is to be a Dominions 3 developers diary, or so I hear. I have never written a diary and I have never seen a developers diary. So what should I write? Whatever comes into my mind I suppose.

My name is Kristoffer Osterman. I'm about 50% of the Illwinter crew. I am the master of the world (uttered in a booming voice). It is I who make the sprites and most of the unit descriptions in the game. I like to create worlds. I have done so since I was eleven years old and got my first RPG. So I am the master of the world. JK on the other hand is the watchmaker. He makes the laws of the world (he is the programmer). This makes division of labor easy. I make sprites, write descriptions, add new units and spells, and JK makes everything else work. Unless I find the inspiration to make a new monster it will not appear. So, I have a veto on the world, but JK has a veto on everything.

So, Dominions 3 is announced. The contract is signed etc. But what do we have in mind? What are we doing? What am I doing?

We began work on Dominions 3 late spring. We had some ideas that would take some efforts to incorporate in Dom2. Better start with something new. Or at least partly new.

During Origins we had some discussions with Shrapnel about were we wanted to go. They were all ears. We went home, took some well earned vacations and resumed work.

So what will Dom3 be like?

Hard to say at the moment. We rarely work after a plan. Changes are mostly done when we get a good idea or at rare occasions when something seems necessary.

The game basics will be the same. Nations, pretenders, battle orders, magic research etc. Those who have played dominions before will feel at home.

Dom2 was apparently not an easy game to get into, so we will have to work a bit on user friendlieness. This is scary. I'm friendly, but I don't know too much about Users.

Nations and themes:
Themes will be reworked and rebalanced. Many of the ideas from the forum has proven useful. Caelum now has it's three themes almost finished. Now I like the raptor theme, not just the idea. There are also some major changes in theme/nation setup. We are still experimenting here.

Currently three new nations are in the works, but it is likely that more will come. I have a year to go and I'm almost finished with these.

I like arms. Most Indian gods have several. Thus I like Indian gods. This month I have delved into Srimad Bhagavata Mahapurana, some other books, and Online resources to find more about Indian spirits and supernatural beings. Bandar Log, a new Indian inspired nation will have themes with additional mythological content and unique summons. Celestial apsaras and gandharvas as well as malign rakshasas and daityas will be available for the Bandar player.

There is also a couple of new gods. Some of eastern appearence others of mediterranean, northern or southern dito.

Some other stuff:
Morale system is remade. Perhaps we will be able to explain how it works now. Life drain altered, probably not for the Last time. Shields parry instead of adding to prot and def. Strikes in head dangerous. Keep your helmet on. Insanity instead of feeblemindness in the void gate. Nation specific researchable spells and summons.

Current unit count 1347. Thats 252 new ones. 17 new gods.

/Kristoffer Osterman

---

This month I have been working mostly on the battlefield graphics. Dominions 3d engine has got a well needed update. There has been significant speed improvements for modern 3d cards. Forests now consists of thousands of trees and bushes, so if Dominions III were a FPS you wouldn't be able to see the end of the forest because of all the trees. Also new is the grass that covers the ground and will blow if there is a storm going on.

Other than graphical stuff I have been beefing up some old spells that weren't as featureful as we wanted as well as implementing a few new ones. Since most simple spells were already created in Dominions II any new spells that are added now usually involves quite a bit of coding. I try to stay away from recycling spell effect, because it is way more interesting with a different effect than another name and 10 points more of damage.

/Johan Karlsson

Stay tuned for more developer diaries in the future. Same Shrapnel channel, same Shrapnel time!






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Dominions III Developer Diary

Developer Diary 02
------------------

Happy New Year!

Time flies. Another month, another year, another Frag!.

Christmas was good. Perhaps not for the development of Dominions, but for me, and
that is good for Dominions. The Last couple of days on the other hand has been a
productive time.

Yesterday I enjoyed a game of Dominions for the first time in several months. Lately
the game has been more or less unplayable. All nations and themes have been reworked
and placed in one of three eras. Until a few days ago it was not meaningful to play
games in the early or late era. The middle age is more or less the default themes and
has not changed that much. So when I started to play a game of the early Version of
Ermor I had a bLast.

I decided to try the small Faerun map. I have never played on it and must say that I
liked it a lot. With eleven opponents of which several are untested I was excited. I
reduced research cost and increased gold, res and supplies to 200%. I got a good start
and found that my legions did a great job against the independents of this early
era. Soon I was the most wealthy of the players, but I ran into Niefelheim, Jotunheim
in the early era. The AI had good taste. He made Bolvitner, a Niefel Jarl with heroic
toughness his prophet. When I first met him he had 135 HP. Next time 203. But Bolvitner
wasn't my main concern. It was his neifel skinshifters. They replace the woodsmen in this
early mythological era. They are not quite finished and I had all but forgotten about
them when they hit me. Skinshifters turn into wolfmen with additional HP when slain. So
do the niefel skinshifters. Skinshifters regenerate. The niefel skinshifters are
sacred. This particular skinshifter was blessed with berserker fury. My main army defeated
the niefel army, at a high cost. It did not defeat the skinshifter. It defeated my
remaining army including my Augur Elders and Pontifices. The problem with the skinshifters
was not that they were unbeatable, but that they only cost 70 GP. A slight oversight
that made my conquest of Niefelheim a real bother.

At the same time I was at war with T'ien Ch'i and Sauromatia.

Sauromatia? What?, you say. Before Christmas we begun a remaking of themes that will
make things easier. Both changing stuff and modding at a later date. Each theme is now
made as a separate nation. This makes it easy to add, remove and change nations. This also removes the need for a nation to exist in a given era. There was no Pythium before
the break from Ermor, but another nation lived near the marshes of Pythium. There are
hydras in Sauromatia, but the theurgs have not yet come. Witch kings, enaries and
oiorpata rule the steppes.

More of the recent stuff? National spells and summonings. Mictlan got a couple of new
blood summons. C'tis got a Devourer of Souls and a Sirrush. I was annoyed when I saw an
old archer and remade some early rezoomed sprites from Dom 1. It felt good. It felt
really good. Then I realized thet there are about one thousand sprites that needs a
remake and went back to Mictlan blood summons again.

Next step? Not sure. We just got some new fun ideas. Probably not very important for
game play, but great fun, especially for role players I believe. Take that you
grognards .

/Kristoffer