An actually useful and useable dungeon generator. The one that's available now is literally a command line thing that gives you the option to either A- generate levels in a highly inefficient manner or B- press a key to automatically generate a freakin minotaur's lair complete with a distinct lack of rhyme or reason in it's design.

I wasn't aware that there was a dungeon generator, but I disagree that there should be one at all. It sounds like if all servers or "worlds" used this, they would be too similar as opposed to starting from scratch and carefully crafting it themselves.

GraalOnline Playerworlds supported for mobile!
(I know they're working on it)

Let me clarify. Graal Kingdoms used it, a long time ago. It was used to make large levels, such as the old underground dungeons and the castles for each kingdom. The castles were... ok I guess. They were generated with special parameters and were further edited afterwards to clean them up and add more complex things to them that the dungeon generator couldn't do, such as bakeries and blacksmithing areas.

The underground dungeon, on the other hand, was an absolute mess. It was generated with no parameters, it was a literal maze with no purpose.

Adding parameters and seeds and all that just is far too difficult and there wasn't any sort of interface. It just ran in a command prompt and you press a key, which makes it generate a level with what ever various text files, images and tilesets you gave it.

So, if it were improved to actually be user friendly and not a nightmare of a proprietary program that Unixmad designed so he didn't have to work too hard with creative stuff and could focus on programming, it could be used to create very large levels in a short period of time, which could then be tweaked and refined to perfection.

DISCLAIMER: I'm not hating on the game in any way, I played the everloving crap out of it. But tough love must be given.

I think the problem now, with new players/returning old players is the confusion over the fragmentation, and the business model as a whole. I tried to get back into GraalOnline only to be told I only had so many hours available (What is this, AOL?). Well, I get on servers only to find them ghost towns. Then I find there is a "facebook" version, and an iOS version. These don't seem to be the same. What? They seem to be using the F2P model, bustling with players! So many players that the client lags from all the sprites! The Windows client is not using this model. What is this PC port then?? The dying remains of the old servers? Servers I'm expected to pay for, if I may add?

In case I'm not 100% clear on my last paragraph the branding is absolutely confusing - Graal should be Graal. Graal Era makes enough sense, but you have "Graal", "GraalOnline" and "Graal Classic", and I have no idea if they're the same thing, or different! I check the windows Graal EXE and I'm asked for a password - I don't even remember setting one, and most of my recent progress was in the facebook version - which is nowhere connected to the EXE version. (This isn't obvious, by the way.) I type in "the code" in the server list like I'm supposed to for classic, and... I log on and only one person is connected along with me, and he's AFK. I'm having... not fun.

Knowing that I was supposed to type in that keyword in the server box is not common knowledge. It's nowhere in any sticky, or FAQ, None that I could find. I had to message an admin to get this information. Not good! I don't even know if I'm supposed to be sharing that information, given how hard it was to even get it in the first place!

Looking at the "official" graalonline forums, I see entire subforums that haven't been posted in in 4 years. buried in those forums are answers I couldn't find from google. Some posters are wondering where the admins are. This looks SO BAD for someone casually browsing material for the game they saw their friends play on Facebook. If we need these souls on the PC servers, as it is, it's not clicking.

I was so confused over the organization of this game that I was at a point of giving up completely. This must be addressed. As it is, it's a confusing mess with no easy way to navigate through any of it. Of course these are "noob" issues, but if an oldbie coming back from ages past is having trouble navigating through this, just imagine how a true newbie feels.

To make things worse: After hours of googling, I found this: http://i.imgur.com/txIn9mN.png


What is this? is THIS the graal I remember? with missing images? Was dust blown off these pages before the server sent them to me? And to top it off:

"Without Gold membership, you can only play 5 hours per month."

With ZERO players? uh-uh.

Here are my suggestions to fix this mess:

One: F2P the whole blasted thing. People will buy items in game for VIP island loot. Those lazy bones will buy gralats(gelats?) with real money. The WoW subscription model worked back in the day, but it's a disaster compared to the way games are expected to operate today. And before you ask: Yes, I do Android dev for F2P games, these suckers will pay out the nose - so will PC players. Especially since I can give as much as I want to the development and upkeep of the servers by my purchases. It may have felt unethical back in the day to "tempt" players to pay for items, but now that it's common, just go for it! Those that have to till the soil for gelats can still do what they do, and those who pay can get an easy ride. Their choice.

Two: Clean up the website. Get rid of the outdated information. This isn't a crazy request, it's just what's expected on a bare minimum.

Three: If Staff is that stretched thin for the PC port, make the PC port work with the Facebook port servers. If the rumors I read about broken editing tools are true, we have a much bigger problem, don't we?

Four: Don't expect Facebook players to pay for "gold" membership with a ration of 5 hours per month if they don't. They will flee without a second thought and go to peggle or something. I've seen it happen in other mobile games with my own eyes.

Five: Keep in contact with players and keep them engaged. I'm seeing that on the facebook port, which is good, but the PC port is crickets. seeing official news posts from 2012 on the main page also looks bad, it's 2017 now.

Of course, this is some old geezer's opinion. :)

This is the best advice I've seen in ages. Thank you for this. I agree with everything you've said, and Alpho, I hope you see this post.

I'm happy he's here to give these ideas. It's important that we work together to come up with new things. We are a community of creators.

Echo's some of my thoughts that I have previously expressed in places such as here:

http://forums.graalonline.com/forums...46#post1739346

But then I was recently told that it was not considered worth renovating/re-marketing the current website/client while PC Graal is in its current state, and that it would be preferable to deal with this after the new client :shrug:.

for the loginserver on pc, have it list all servers (unless the owner wants it hidden and staff only) and have a configuration option for the server to show up in a work in progress category.

When you minimize the client, maximizing it should work properly instead of turning the window black

disable opengl from options.

Bump.

I'd really like to see a server make use of player shops.

A managing company with a CEO who actually gave a **** about the quality of their game would be an excellent start

Wow that's being a bit greedy don't you think?

Zone has done that. So has era

classic too. (state shop)

Ol west too. (Player contest submissions)

how about we just get rid of all da bad admens and den we replace dim withda good admens


But that'd never happen, were just gonna be stuck with Uni doing nothing beneficial to the game and only making the admins add things that get Uni money.

But hey, even if Uni just disapears, who would even be in charge? Cuz idk

Alpho4toonslabmaster

just fix the GUI on mobile. cuz it's ****, other than that, everything's good. oh and maybe lower prices lol , yes i understand the server hosting thing and you guys need more $$ since it's FTP

at this point i wouldn't even be surprised if it turned out that unix had retired years ago and that the game is running purely on unpaid volunteers (lats, gfx, gp, etc.)

It has always been running purely on unpaid volunteers, since when has unix ever done anything anyways?

Unix Madrid is a meme

Because people like the game even if they don't like the owner.

cuz without us the severs woukd probably be dead. hosting servers is not ****ing free when the **** people will understand that.

A Graal Adventure with dungeons and levels! (delteria) :(

Yawn.

alpho where are u

What future

Seeking support from Graal Administration be like...
 

so when can i expect development for everything except cosmetics and holidays to cease, or has it already ceased

I'm still here. Sorry for not following up on this thread. I've been busy working on a new tool.

I'm working on a development suite. Dusty had a lot of good ideas in the quote below regarding it.
Progress on the Level Editing portion of the suite can be found here:
http://www.graalians.com/forums/show...181#post776181

Working on a new server project which will have this for sure, it'll be a big part of our economy. Server hiring thread will be posted in the near future, most likely when I have a working version of the Level Editor ready to go.

I'm going to try and include this in the Level Editor I'm working on. Maybe some other types of generators too. I still have to research the algorithms for how it all works though. Good idea.

In the works;)

That's my hope, that people will start developing again. I also hope that the development suite will attract new developers as well.

ALL RISE!



but in all seriousness thanks for the update! Can't wait for the stuff planned. hopefully I don't die of boredom in the meantime:giggle:

The animals must be hats

All I want is for every server to fix their bugs, every server has their own number of issues that seem to never get fixed, some worse than others, but a polished Graal is the best Graal. Also would love if Zone would actually get somewhere near the progress of the other servers, Ol West is years ahead of Zone and Zone has been out for much much longer.

UPDATE:There is no future.

yet we cling onto that list bit of hope like the graalians we all are

"the future of graalonline"
posts a screenshot of some words
everyone pretends like this guy is some savant
everyone is shocked when he disappears

good **** fam

toppest of keks to you my good man

I appreciate all of your ideas. These were strictly just for me and giving me ideas on what I could makenext for the community and on GraalOnline. I hope some of you other developers can pick from this thread and create some excellent new content.

Did any of you expect anything but an anti-climax?

Has management for the server you were working on shifted to somebody else, or has development stopped altogether? I was really looking forward to seeing what you were making.

He said he completed everything he was assigned to doing on graal, idk who will fill in role now gone though.

Hardly rumours, also it's Nico's game theres also another one era like(but that'll possibly be well off release)Also you'll likely get censored out for saying anything of the sort here - Even in gaming section that says you can gets censored. Hi Colin. Funny how it isn't censored the otherway round. @Game in comment I wouldn't be too excited for it as everything is very basic tool wise there although the graphic quality etc will be good..can't comment gamewise but surmise it'll be very similar.

@thread this is just going to become one of them places we all go back to and bump in the hope that graal gets better. lol.

iClassic is its all-time lowest state is better than the game you're talking about by tenfold. That game is absolutely horrible in every way imaginable. People don't play it not because it's "censored," but because it's unplayable.

Never said they didn't play because censored? ..Also said it's very basic dev wise etc. Do you read? @quoted bit, still stands whether the game is better than others or not, sucks that we ain't getting updates on anything new that was announced to be in the making.

*bump*
Any news on Worlds Ios or Graal3D? @hape.. still in production/anything actually happening soon?+ Why was worlds thread closed?

I still believe that they are dropping support for what are currently called PlayerWorlds, and will eventually be referring to the current mobile servers as PlayerWorlds for the final part of the cover up. They'll be able to say "See we told you we'll have PlayerWorlds on mobile" when it will actually be a re-branding of mobile Graal and a culling of PC Graal.

If I am wrong, then why is current PC Graal still being treated as if it doesn't exist? Why is there no designated support staff for it? Why is someone who was recently jailed for domestic abuse still listed as the PWA Chief? Why is the website still using the winter theme and displaying out of date information from 10 years ago? Why are people offering to help the platform being either ignored or banned? This doesn't look like a platform that they plan on promoting any time soon.

No **** they dropped support for client graal years ago, when will you learn that they don't care about anybody who plays via client graal

You're preaching to the choir.