Dev-Update for Atrius
 

Hey all, just wanted to fill you in on Atrius progress. I'll keep posting update in formation here, so stay tuned. Any crits are welcome, and if you have ideas, post them here. :)
-madj

Completed:
-Custom Graal characters
-Character gender support
-Clothing
-Variable Movement w/ strafe and running
-Drag and Drop inventory items / item stacking
-Complex item system with unique item possibilities
-4,000 level overworld
-360 degree vehicles, mouse steering

Current Objectives:
-Mining and planting jobs
-Unique guilds
-Realistic (events) bowling, paintball, etc.
-Five new towns
-Business Hierarchy - industry, distribution, player-owned shops

Boo for Era modern theme
Boo for Era gun theme
Boo for Era health display
Boo for Era chairs and floor tiles (lightly modified is still stolen.)

Ideas:
Ditch guns and health display.
Think of something original instead.

Don't mind Houdini. He happens to have everything against every server that "copies" Era.
However, I didn't even look at the screenshots or the server.
I'm just saying. :)

It's because there is only a limited number of 'classic' server spaces. Generally to get one on there, one comes off. And we don't want to flood it with era servers.

Yes, but that doesn't mean the server is crap.

Where did you get the graves in the first screen shot? I don't remember exactly who made them but we had those exact graphics on Graal X over a year ago.....

@Spark911
It's already flooded with classic style servers....I think Graal the Adventure is fine because well its normal classic original Graal...but look at UN...a server just like classic but well...not as fun.

Woot much I think thats me in the second screeney :) I know diablo is in the first....Anyway about the Era thing....Atrius puts Era to shame and you say the tiles are copyed...Using the same principal but is not copying and every server with guns is not a "gun" server.

Zim, you really did make my laugh with that post. Thank you :-)

Nice copyrighted sephiroth statue there too!!!!!!111

The issue with UN isn't that it's a classic copy, personally I think using the classic style is great. But UN isn't consistant, its medieval and then its modern!
how can you have a medieval theme and expect roleplay when you have cars? it's rediculous.
UN is a server that has no storyline and is made up of a whole lot of varying styles of playerhouses.

That's an awesome point until the fact that UN is not supposed to be a roleplay server is brought into play.

MMORPGs are not supposed to have a strong storyline. If you want a storyline go play a normal offline RPG. I play online games for the community and for multiplayer aspects, not to spend 15 hours following some halfassed storyline created by a 15 year old.

This isn't anything personal, just commenting on your comments to make light of theme.

Houdini-Classic = Boo for Zelda Theme
Jus' a little bit of irony there. We are shooting for a completely new feel, nothing like era. Wait until we are ready for review to say that we are like them. :) Not to mention nothing is modified, it came out of my MSpaint. Just because Bloo got to it first doesn't mean I wouldn't have done it when I got to Graal.

Inspiration-Once again, Zelda. I'll call him Sephraaloth and he can be the online version.

Oh and Smurf-Lance works with us, he uploaded them. If GX wants to complain, I'll make new ones.

Generally, playerworlds come up and die back down. Era has died three times over, and people won't let it die. Face it, its becoming cluttered and worn. I know that their are limited playerworlds, thats why we are making something that will attract not only a good portion of players from other servers, but new comers as well. As far as UN goes, sorry to the dev's of that server in advance, but I couldn't take that place. First time I logged on there, I didn't log on again. All I saw was a mess of activities that served no purpose to any kind of plot or consistent theme.

Are you trying to say that you can use copyrighted material because Graal is a Zelda-like theme?
In all fairness,they must be giving a LARGE amount of players what they want and enjoy, as a LARGE amount of the playerbase play there.

Personally, I cant stand all the gangster, shoot-em-up type PW's...It just isn't Graal...

oh, because we all know modern servers are all rip offs of era :rolleyes:

if you're going to put it that way, delteria, shaded legend, unholy nation, and such should be taken off because they're "rip offs" of classic.

Darlene, if thats not enough to use it, then I'll just call it my electronic copy, because I have the model in real life. I don't care if people on graal don't like modern. I joined graal for Era, and then it went to crap. If the people that play graal come for classic, then I'll find and attract my own target market which is modern-lovers.

Gerami, thank you... thats the best point on this post, and one that I've been trying to stress since the start of Atrius.

Let me also say that guns will be somewhat discouraged in Atrius. We don't want to be viewed as a "gun server". I'll explain our base for PK somewhat so you can get an idea of what will happen, IF people want to PK (but there will be much more to do than that). There is a clip system set up, but not implemented right now, so that when a player wants to use guns, they have to manually load their clips. When you are in the middle of a fight and you are out of clips to load into your gun, you are in trouble if you're a bad melee fighter. So, melee is more of an issue than guns. But, no worries about PK... there will be plenty of quests to cooperate against AI too. Furthermore we are hoping on a good portion of concentration towards item collection, housing, and our realism events.

I didn't think it was that hard for someone to grasp the concept of copywrighted material.

want 2 c my version era??!!

You've got to be kidding me.

Wow, can we drop the copyright thing? I'm a business management major, please don't assume that my knowledge of such is inferior to anyone on this game. My point is not that Sephiroth is copyrighted, it is that people would be hypocrites to point out that I have a graphic on my server that resembles a character from an RPG. 1. I made it from MSPaint. 2. You are playing a game that is referred to as Zelda Online. 3. Theres plenty of RPG characters that look the same and come out of different companies. 4. Are you telling me you never downloaded an mp3?
Thanks, goodbye.

Bah, I hate when the margins get screwed up :\ .

Ok you got me... you know all due to the fact your a business major.

Ok that's all well and good, but that's mine.

I don't have a server with obvious duplicates of characters, all of that other stuff, like music, is not relevant.

The name Zelda Online was changed due to copyright issues. If you're a business major, I hope it is not in business law, because you know nothing about it.

Okay, wow. So I read someone elses published work, and then copy it by typing in MS Word, so the copyright on the work becomes invalid?

Or a game that was called that about 8 years ago, but was changed to to copyright issues.
You've already admitted it is him. Invalid.


No, but I did not then take that MP3 and use it in a body of published work without permission.

And exactly how does someone else doing something wrong justify you doing it?

Once again, the first word that comes to mind is wow. I said don't assume that my knowledge is inferior, I didn't say it was superior. Looking up Waltz, you commented on the ability to grasp the concept of a copyright, or in your words 'copywrite', not the fact that Sephi has a copyright. I'm pretty sure people reproduce characters all the time online and otherwise. I can think of numberous heads and bodies on graal itself that copy those things directly. Could something be held against it? Possibly. Do I care? Not really, its my artwork, just like everyone else does their own reproductions.

Edit: I stress the fact that I don't really care. If you don't like reproductions, attack your precious graal instead. You guys really need to look back and see what your saying. You just said the name was changed from Zelda Online to Graal. Wow, direct copyright infringement... I make a small work of art based on something I own, call him Sephraaloth to spite you, and you still don't see my point. And yes, I have a very good understanding of Business Law, Inspiration.

No one assumed it was inferior, you proved it to be.

Do they then use them in bodies of work that produce monetary gain for them?

And these wrongs justify yours how?

Awesome. Keep it off graal.


Then are you getting everything about it wrong on purpose, for fun?

If you have played Graal long enough, you'd know that Stefan at a point was forced to change many things due to Nintendo getting on him about copyrights. Graal now for the most part bares a slight, but extremely loose, resemblance to Zelda.

Your character is sephiroth. He is not some guy with a long sword and long hair. You've made no notable changes to the design.

No one cares if you care if you're breaking rules or not. It's not okay to do something simply because you don't care if you do it.

This work does not have any monetary gain for me in anyway, in fact, I pay for it. If graal admins don't like the graphics, they can take it down... but make sure they take down everything that resembles any other game in the process. Oh, and read my edit above. Someone please lock this topic, its completely off the point and doesn't need to continue since people have to pick out details that are over-ironic and don't need to be argued about.

Edit: I'm not posting about that again, this will be my last comment about it. In response to your next post: I am quite aware of the technical side of things, I said I don't care. Leave it up to the globals to decide, but if they are going to make that decision, make sure they delete every sephiroth, crono trigger, etc etc body/head uploaded on any of the servers. Especially the public servers. Oh, and... you know... it was never ok for people to have the same hair style or wear the same clothes in this world, right? (sarcasm) Technically, that appearance may not be covered in their copyright, which in all reality my "model" does not have any facial details and you cannot make out anything besides the clothes/hair.

Good thing you don't actually own the server, or that might matter. Cyberjoueurs owns all content on Graal Online, including that sephiroth doll when you upload it. They make a profit, and since your sephiroth doll can be considered a peice of their game when it's uploaded, it then becomes an element of profit.

It's a good thing you are in business school, or I might not have to teach you this.

Oh wait...

Sigh, I see another PW scrapped, because the "owner" could care less about the law...what a shame

Ah, Darlene... if thats your attitude then have every single server scrapped with a head that resembles something from another game. I'm not trying to be crappy, I'm just saying that graal is full of content that resembles numerous games. Honestly, I know the conduct, but graal iteself follows that conduct very loose. If they wanted me to take it down because they were afraid of legalities, I would gladly comply. However, I wouldn't be afraid to assume that n-pulse has a body or head that was designed after another game uploaded on it, at least at one point or another. The fad for a while here was halo. Everyone was uploading halo heads/bodies/models on any server. Like I said, I know the technical side, I'm only following the loose trend of abiding by it. For the sake of Atrius's reputation, and that this is the most irrelevant issue to ever come about because it doesn't have any effect on Atrius gameplay, I'll remove the graphic myself. But, next time you see a graphic on a server that reminds you of another game, think of me. :)

inspiration; i don't mean entirely RP and classed like some servers have attempted, my point was mostly due to the inconsistancies of UN.
UN is attractive to players because players play it, and the reason the original players play they no longer know but they keep playing because players play it.
Thus, UN gets taken down for a few weeks and then brought back and people would play other servers and realise the difference in quality.
UN really is a third grade server. Even this Atrius rubbish looks better.

Either you don't know what 'hypocrite' means or you're making some unfounded assumptions about your critics. Of course, you are not allowed to argue against this, because I am an English major.

So? The only thing that matters here is the published media. The tools used to create it are entirely irrelevant.

Well, that's not its name. Graal resembles Zelda, but it has been altered to a point where the two games are legally distinct.

True enough. But this is about magnitudes, and it's extremely rare for two characters in separate games to show such a degree of similarity. To support your point, you have to show that the figure is sufficiently different from Sephiroth to obviate legal complications.

Piracy isn't even similar to unlicensed use of intellectual property.

Regardless, nobody's saying that your actions are morally wrong or whatever. They're merely saying that you're breaking the rules, and that accusation is not dependent on what they do in their spare time.

thats actually a pretty cool level o_o

lol Gerami, I was gonna say the same thing. If era looked like that I might actually play. Heres us testing our streetlights out:
:)

looks like you oughta changing the emoticons or remove them completely, doesn't suit the server.

Bef your oppnion and alot of other oppinions are so biased it makes no sense to even take it into account. Im not saying that becuse you diffrer in my way of thinking im saying it becuse alot of Era staff are gona hate anything that goes agesnt Era so why bother to try and persuade them. :\

Well, I would say your partially correct, I believe that it started out or obtained more people in the first place, Causing more people to come. After the average person downloads a game such as graal, They would tend to go to the server with more people. Thats why there happen to be many trials on UN, and after they would upgrade, considering UN was the server they played, most likley they would continue to play there. Although it's just an opinion.

I couldn't agree with you more.
-----------------------------------
All this might be a bit too late within the post, but I thought I'd throw some input in.
^^

Gman got the cool item buying box up today!

::edit:: opps here it is.

Houdini.. you can seriously just shut the hell up. It doesn't take skill to start a server with a system for hitting already made, default ganis, and default GFX. I'm sorry if you think that classic is better than custom GFX, Ganis, Scripts and all in between. Original? You mean original as in UN, Delt. and Atlantis? Because I couldn't spot a difference for the life of me in those.

I guess to some people, fighting with "s, s, s, s, s, s, s" is more fun than custom systems consisting of max weapon capacity, weight, strength, speed, clothes endurance along with many weapons made from scratch.

Edit:
Bef, each emoticon will be replaced with ganis. Here are some ideas we have so far:

NPC Code:

---

A = Apple (Take out apple and eat it)

B =

C =

D = Dance 

E =

F = 

G =

H = 

I =

J = 

K =

L = Love (Random hearts float around head)

M = Muscle (Flex)

N = No (Shake head no)

O =

P = Point (Points in the direction you are facing)

Q =

R =

S =

T = Time (Looks at watch)

U = Thumbs up

V = Thumbs down

W = Wave (Waves hands)

X = 

Y = Yes (Shake head yes)

Z =

---

If you have any other ideas, post them.

Unbe-****ing-lievable. Darlene, I really don't know what the hell is wrong with you, but you need to pull your god damned head out of your ass. You trash talk Atrius because it is a server with guns by saying "i haet dem al shewt em uhp shersvers". Then you go to trying to say how unlawfull the owner of Atrius is. You're no more than a "racist" on the grounds of playerworld anatomy.

And to everyone who said that Sephiroth is a violation of copyright, think of the definition of copyright.

The legal right granted to an author, composer, playwright, publisher, or distributor to exclusive publication, production, sale, or distribution of a literary, musical, dramatic, or artistic work.

In other words, taking the credit for something made by another. Madj isn't taking credit for ****. He "drew" a replica of a character from a video game and put it in his room because maybe he likes that game series. It is no different than buying the damn thing in real life and getting sued for copyright infringement. The two do NOT add up.

Another note..
Avoid the swear filter? I believe saying "****" is helping the spam filter. Add it up.

...Are you trying to get banned? She said nothing of the sort. You're just trying to pick a fight.
Uploading copyrighted materials to Graal servers is against the rules. It's against the Terms of Use that you agree to when you make a server. It's against the EULA you agree to when you install Graal. I don't see how it can't be unlawful.
And "racist on the grounds of a playerworld anatomy?" What, so she's not allowed to dislike Era-esque servers? She's supposed to be penalized for having an opinion? You can't ask for critisism and then only accept ones you like.
He drew a replica from a model he bought personal rights to, and is now placing that drawing into the public domain, without written permission from its owners.
It's actually really different. When you buy a CD, you're paying the publishers and artist(s) for personal use of what is theirs according to copyright.
Choosing to take a company's intellectual property, and making a direct copy (granted, modifying it slightly to suit the environment it's placed in) and placing it into a public domain, while not being granted written permission to modify and use such property in that manner in the first place, IS against the law.

You want to avoid the hassle? Get rid of the thing. It's aesthetic, and serves no practical purpose. All it's doing is causing controversy. Ask yourself, is it really worth it?

How about someone just friggin emails Square-Enix and asks them if he can have like a 16x32 pixel replica of one of there characters...I really don't think they would care but **** how bout we ask?

Uh. That definition doesn't mention credit. It's about publication, production, sale and distribution.

Anyway, your server is unoriginal. You're using a tired, overused theme and you don't appear to be innovating in the slightest. Guilds, shops, mining and planting? Utterly generic.