Bugs and the Fixes That Love Them

I just released MG 1.2. I feel pretty good about this release; hunted down every bug reported about 1.1.1 that I felt I could fix without massive rewriting. All that remains are minor things, generally linked into the display code.

I'm currently waffling back and forth between working on new stuff for MG 2.0, and working on other projects. I need to focus on one or the other, I think. At this point, I'm leaning toward other projects. I've had a fairly steady flow of ideas for MG 2.0 for quite some time, but many of them aren't mature yet, and other projects are a fine occupation while they ripen.

...once more, with feeling...

Just released 1.1.1; should correct a couple of nasty crash bugs in 1.1. Need to be more careful, need to test more. This kind of stuff is unacceptable.

MageGuild 1.1 out the door

And it is done, MG 1.1 has been turned loose. Got a flood of last minute bugs in, fixed them, and got it turned around.

Two New Tidbits

Two new bits of information to share...

The first, I've released the code for the display library that MG uses, after renaming it Phasma. If you're developing some sort of tile-based (be it ascii or bitmap) game in C#, it might be worth a look.

The second...The code that will become MageGuild 1.1 is caught up. All of the ugly little bugs  that were reported about 1.0 have been caught and squashed, and I've gotten in a little bit of tweaking for balance and so forth. Added a few new things as well. The question becomes...how long do I wait before chunking it out? I'd like to give people more time to play with 1.0 before I go throwing a new version at them. Partly because I don't want to push people to constantly download new versions of things, and partly because I want more time to let the bugs sift to the top.

This really brings up a bigger issue...in a stable game, how often does one release patches and fixes? More to the point, regardless of the general process, how often do I want to release patches and fixes?

MageGuild Out of Beta

MageGuild is out of beta. It's about all I can say, I'm currently too busy plastering the internet with announcements to add much to that. Check it out: http://glistenimages.com/Lukos/lukosMageGuild.htm.

Finally Here

I'm putting the finishing touches on what will be 1.0. I'm currently assembling a list of places to post the announcement about 1.0, the first non beta release. Nerves are setting in. But it will be finished, and it will be finished soon, and it will be released. And then...some other project. :)

The Last of the Bugs?

0.7.3 is out, now. So far, so good: no bug reports. I've got some balance and minor feature issues to iron out, and I think that (plus squishing any bugs that crop up) will constitute an 0.8 release. Depending on the reception for it, I'll probably just renumber 0.8 to 1.0 and make it the first non-beta release. That's if all is well with 0.8, of course.

My thoughts are increasingly turning to the next project; I've got enough ideas (both submitted ideas and ones I've come up with) to get to at least a 1.1, probably a 2.0. But I think I'd like to take a break from MG after 1.0 is released, work on something else for a while. The other roguelike that I've been toying around with is a potential to be that next project, but I'm still not sure.