Exhibited Press - Comments

Hey guys

Long time no see, hmm?

I just want to take a moment to write out a very big apology to you all, and to explain my absence, and hopefully leave you all at the end of it feeling happy and excited.

*takes a breath*

At the very end of last year, my husband and I unfortunately lost a child and it was really an awful time indeed. Without going too much into it, I'm sure all of you can understand that I simply wasn't able to code or manage much of anything at that time. A couple of months from then, I began to reassess a lot of things in my life and Exhibited was one of the first things I took a look at.

Exhibited, as it stands, has been running since 2008 (with the prologue to it from 2006), with me as the sole owner and coder in that whole time. It is my passion, and I came to view many of you guys as friends and family. One thing I always marvelled at was how wonderful our little community was, how it could be both so tight-knit and welcoming at the same time, and just how generous everyone was with one another. (Not to mention, we are all a group of awesome dinosaur nerds, and that makes us cooler than everyone else!) But the game itself, though something I adore, cannot fully progress into what I imagine without a heck of a lot of changes.

Anyone that's been a member of Exhibited longer than a year will know that I often recode and "refresh" the coding, and usually tighten up features, improve them, and coincide that with a new layout or two. Not all of the changes are completely well received which is understandable (we are all different), but to get EX on par with other games out there and fully "modernized" would require so many changes that it simply wouldn't be fair to players on EX because the game that they have come to know would become virtually unrecognizable.

So I decided that after 7 years, EX deserved a sequel, and that is what I have been working on for the past few months.

I have teamed up with my long term friends and coworkers: artist Xylax (who took over doing all markings, some species, and items here at Exhibited at some point late 2011); and, as of two weeks ago - programmer Rykos, who has been our on-hand "go to" guy for emergencies and server issues since 2010. He has also designed the majority of Exhibited's layouts.

Together, and with all mods' input, we have been working on something pretty incredible and I really think all of you guys will love it. I will retain the majority of Exhibited's features so that EX II will be familiar, and keep the ideas and game mechanics that already work so well. But alongside those I am introducing lots of shiny new features that wouldn't fit too well in EX without feeling out of place, as well as making notes of much-longed for features that people have campaigned for on EX for years.

This is basically another chapter, and I invite all of you guys to be a part of it. EX II is not ready for me to show you guys yet, but I would like to keep polling you guys and asking for feedback on various features, so that we can tailor the game to what you want too.

But what does this mean for Exhibited? Is it just going to close?
No. I won't close EX, not so long as there are people - even if it's just a handful, as now - actively playing it. Exhibited will remain open for as long as possible.

However:

I will at some point turn off registrations to Exhibited. The reason for this is that EX II will offer rewards and priority access for Exhibited members, and I wouldn't want people to signup on EX just to get some rewards on EX II - I want the rewards to be special, and to show previous achievements and successes you guys attained through playing Exhibited.

Scales, also, will be transferrable to EX II. It will be entirely optional if you wish to join EX II in the first place or not, but also if you wish to transfer some of your Exhibited data - but scales will be included. Any scales you have on EX can be traded into EX II, and to make things a bit sweeter, any scales you purchase from the date of this news post will be transferrable, even if you spend them first in Exhibited.

So where does this leave us?

You'll notice that our wonderful moderators are still here, and have kindly stepped up to continue doing some running of Exhibited while I work on EX II. Bob and Herbal will be able to request smaller updates for Exhibited and I will code them in, as well as supply them with lots of prizes for fun chat events and competitions. Exhibited is still running, still working, and any bugs I hope to pick out as and when they arise, with the mods' assistance. Exhibited will continue to run and nothing will change (except for maybe a few updates!), and I will continue to update you all about EX II and ask for your feedback and thoughts on features as they arise.


To give a brief rundown of some features that will be present in EX II:
* ALL dinosaur species getting the center stage - not just carnivores, or raptors. You'll be able to have enclosures full of triceratops, iguanodon, stegosaurus etc. For fun, we'll also include other prehistoric animals, such as Smilodon and terrorbirds. If it's prehistoric, it's relevant!!
* A streamlined, rebuilt and super speedy framework
* Better battle mechanics, more realism, less tedium
* More focus on excavation, digging up fossils and discovering
* A research department based around genetics, with a genetics handbook that will let you unlock different colors and genes as you discover them through breeding
* Multiple moving crates
* A vastly improved overlay system
* More farming aspects - raise cattle for cheaper meat for your carnivores, or grow fields of prehistoric plants for your herbivores
* Personalities, relationships, friendships - dinosaurs will interact with each other and potentially form friendships and mated pair bonds

Those are just a tip of the iceberg, but I hope they are exciting enough on their own to make you feel very, very good about EX II.

I'd also like to finish up here by giving my formal apology though for my silence. I wasn't sure on the right time to tell you all, or how well it would be received, but I hope that now is the right time. In order to extend my gratitude to the handful of you who are still playing, please find ten scales in your account if you login (and your account number is 28715 or lower, to prevent mass signups for scales ;D), even just once, between now and seven days from this news post. (Please note, these will not be transferrable to EX II if you spend them!)

Thank you, and I love you all. :)