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Hello GDUnlimited community: I am excited to announce that Island Forge is now Free-to-Play - See the announcement in the original post of this topic!

I've been lurking around for a while, and this looks really nice! Thanks for your excellent work!

Hurray, today Island Forge @ Kickstarter reached its base goal! But it doesn't stop there - this is where many projects really take off. I appreciate everyone who has contributed and commented so far. Let's use these final couple of days to spread the word, and see how far we can take this! Find Island Forge on Facebook, Twitter, IndieDB, MMORPG.com, and Steam Greenlight!

Kickstarter Update: New Lifetime Membership reward!

Another big announcement: Island Forge @ Kickstarter! See me talk about the game, myself, and the future of Island Forge. Island Forge is all about community participation, so please help me spread the word via Facebook, Twitter, your own blogs, news sites, and other forums. As always, your input is most welcome, and I appreciate your interest in Island Forge!

Today I am extremely excited to announce that Island Forge is no longer in Beta! (read the full announcement here) Like Island Forge on Facebook and follow on Twitter to help us spread the exciting news!

Thanks for your reply, Jon! I appreciate your comments - they are very encouraging. Here's the latest: Island Forge: Now with Coinage!

Island Forge is now listed on mmorpg.com's massive Game List. We're excited to have so many new players signing up. In the latest beta, I've added a global roster feature, which allows you to see everyone who's in the world and direct chat with anyone (plus several other enhancements). Many beta updates are prompted by player suggestions - your input is most welcome! For quick updates, be sure to follow at: Facebook and Twitter

Hello again - wanted to mention a few exiting updates. The site ( http://islandforge.com ) has been streamlined There's a new introductory video (see the home page) You can now (optionally) help us out by subscribing during beta! Thanks for your interest.

I released Island Forge Beta v0.9.8.4 today, with several enhancements, some bug fixes, and one gameplay/rule change. Just wanted to let folks here know. As always, your feedback is most welcome.

Jon Bon, I am most greatful for your efforts! I really appreciate the support of (potential) players. The most important thing to understand (which you covered) is that there is no business relationship or expectation of compensation. You certainly have my personal gratitude! BTW, sorry to be a few days in responding to your post - apparently I'm not getting email notifications of new posts. I'll make sure I have that turned on, and check back here regularly. I'm very excited about the RMXP game development community!

Can anyone here recommend other forums with users who might enjoy games based on player-created content? I'm still hoping to find more players interested in creating islands and stories. Thanks for any recommendations!

I appreciate your interest, and look forward to hearing what you have to say. Thanks!

I can tell we're on the same wavelength, kellessdee, and it's rare to find someone more opinionated than myself. My hat's off to your superior contempt. In all seriousness, I'm very glad I was taught C, then C++, as foundational languages. (Actually, first I taught myself Applesoft BASIC on an Apple ][ c+ then GQ Basic on a Tandy/SL2... but I'd best stop there before I further date myself.) Fundamentally, C and C++ are still very important languages. That said, if it were up to me (which I hope it will be), I'll hapilly program everything in Java, especially if OpenJDK can get its head out of the sand and make the platform more transparent to end users. Uh, oh, now I'm on a rant. How much lead time did Java Applets have on Flash, and Sun just never made applets at all presentable to end users. I still can't stand Java Applets... and don't get me started on Java Web Start... [/rant] Thanks for listening. Until later.

Thanks for the quick feedback. I wrote the code and have no external dependencies aside from Java 6. I don't mind admitting that it's really too big of a project for one person, but I'm glad to be at the point I am now. I hope to find enough players (soon) to really get it off the ground. The game is MMO, but there is a strong solo and storytelling angle. Expeditions outside of town (where you fight creatures, clear the fog, and potentially follow quests) are instances that you can take solo and no one will be there to bother you. You can even choose No Peril mode so there aren't any pesky creatures. Then again, if you want combat and action, you can choose Minion, Master, or Lord peril, and the more players you put into an expedition party, the more creatures there will be. There's a lot of info on the site, but I'm very open and eager to discuss the gameplay, features, technology, etc, in as much detail as you like!

Hi kellessdee. Glad to have a nice programming language discussion. I started my professional life with C++, but took up Java because I felt it was a more modern language with cleaner features. I'm a big fan of strong typing. That said, I have full respect for those that still use C++. Even C and Objective C projects can be perfectly well designed, it just takes a lot of care from the developer to do it right. I'll certainly have to take a look at D. I've had my head burried in my code for a while now, and haven't had time to sample the new languages. Scala sounds interesting, too, with a lot of hard-core computer sciency features. My biggest problem with Java is the end-user experience. I've always said that Java is a language created by developers, for developers. Sun/Oracle/OpenJDK really need to make the platform transparent to end users. I've taken a lot of steps to make my game deployment as painless as possible. I provide a Windows exe and MacOS dmg, which is really just a small launcher that fetches the rest of the game libs/content. Mac seems to take care of its own JVM, but the Windows exe has to warn the user if they don't have Java. (I have tried Java WebStart, but encountered too many failure cases.) Anyway, thanks for the welcome. I'm happy to have discussions on all topics from gameplay, technical, and even the business of games.

Thanks for all the welcomes everyone! I've been prowling around, and I think this is just the place for me. Jon Bon, thanks for your comments. I'm not an artist, and I'm using mostly licensed content (and some stuff I've painstakenly tried to draw myself). Someday it would be exciting to colaborate with a pixel artist for future projects. At this point, the game is in open beta, and I'm excited to have players in the world. I'd really appreciate any feedback from folks here, since I can see you're all on the same wavelength as me. That said, Island Forge is a bit different, and I've tried to create a unique game design inspired by the old-school, but with a whole new approach. Anyway, you can find more about that on my announcement post: http://www.rmxpunlimited.net/forums/topic/8388-island-forge-indie-mmorpg-player-created-content/ Looking forward to participating in your community!

Announcement: Island Forge is now Free-to-Play with Membership and Upgrade options! This update is prompted by community input and the success of my recent Kickstarter project. Thank you for your interest in Island Forge. As always, community input is most welcome! I love old-school RPGs, and I've created a brand-new MMORPG in the old-school style that is all about player-created content. I'm really impressed by the creativity I see here at RMXPunlimited, and I hope the community will enjoy my game. Island Forge: A World of Player-Created Content. Create Islands with Stories for Others to Explore. The Brand-New Old-School MMORPG. The setting of the game is a classic RPG fantasy world, but made up entirely of islands created by players. The Island Builder allows players to design islands as well as place NPCs (actors). Actors can be given simple linear dialog, multiple-choice responses, or complex task-based logic. You can define quest tasks for players to accomplish, and the actor conversation engine can respond to (and control) the progress of your tasks. Publish your islands to the world for others to explore. The game engine (client, server, networking, everything) is built from scratch (by me) in the Java Programming Language.

Hey Vinderex, I know exactly where you're coming from. I also studied C/C++ in school, and basically had to learn Java in my own time. In my opinion, C/C++ are arcane; you spend way too much mental effort just trying to create stable code, rather than focusing on good design and the actual application. Java has its issues, as well, but I'd encourage everyone to learn Java. Thank you. You probably didn't intend the pun, but once I link my game, you'll find that my company name is Potential Games.

Greetings, I found RMXPunlimited searching for communities of RPG gamers who enjoy constructing their own worlds/stories. I'm the sole developer of an MMORPG that is all about player-created content (which I'll link in the appropriate forum). I love the old-school RPG style. I still feel the draw to replay Dragon Warrior or FF1 now and then. I've wanted to create an MMORPG since before RPGs were MMO. Today, I love the idea of player-created content. My technical background is in computer science and software engineering (specifically Java client-server application development). Consequently, I've developed my own MMO game engine (gui, client, networking, server). From what I've seen so far, I think my interests will fit in well with this community, and I hope folks here will be open to providing feedback about my project (I'm very open to community input). I look forward to being a member of RMXPunlimited (not to mention GDunlimited when the time comes).