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So, a while back, we sent off 33 questions over to Jagex HQ, in the hope that we can get some answers to some questions you were wondering. We've got them back, so I'll post them here!
The questions were answered by Mod Korpz, the Big Chief of FunOrb (as Mod Craddock put him).
So, here they are.. Enjoy!
1) How high in your priorities is bringing enough players back to the less popular games?
FunOrb central is designed to make sure that the multiplayer games always have players available to play in them. You can be in any other game on FunOrb Central and still be waiting for your favourite multiplayer game to start.
2) When can we expect to see a developers diary for FunOrb Central?
You should already have them by the time you read this.
3) Do you plan on expanding games which have always been entirely free-to-play (e.g. Bouncedown) with members expansions?
Yes, in certain cases. No all games lend themselves to expansions though.
4) Can we expect an enhancement of the resolution of fullscreen mode?
Yes but this is some way off in the future. Being able to select a screen resolution of your choice is a key development plan for the company generally. We already have this in RuneScape and we want to be able to offer the same facility in FunOrb. It’s a complex job for FunOrb though as its tied into some other graphical work we wish to do.
5) RuneScape does not get major F2P updates, but as FunOrb expands, free players seem to be getting their share of updates as well. Will this trend continue, or will there a slowdown of constant F2P improvement in the future?
This trend is set to continue at least for the foreseeable future. FunOrb is a free games site, that offers members some great upgrades. We want it to be seen as a fun place for people to come an simply play. If they want to invest more time then membership becomes worth it very, very quickly.
6) What do you think is Jagex's biggest success in FunOrb?
FunOrb itself. Three years ago it was three developers and myself laying the foundations for something, we weren’t even sure what we were planning. Now its a full blown, high quality gaming destination with 35 games live that has been up and running for over a year. Sometimes I forget just what an incredible achievement it is simply to have the service in place at all.
7) Are there any improvements coming to the FunOrb Forums?
Yes, we have a number of plans for the forums but these are global updates to all of Jagex’s forums. I can’t give you more details at this time I’m afraid.
8) What can you tell us about FunOrb Central, and how this global system will affect gameplay as opposed to how it works now?
Well it shouldn’t affect game play at all, other than to allow you to chat in single player games, and that the chat pane will no longer cover the game window. You should take a look at the developer diaries that Mod Artifice has put on the site. I expect they can explain matters far better than I can. They can be found here. http://www.funorb.co...norb_central_02
8) How do you feel when the first player gets a hidden or hard achievement?
Very good actually. I’m very pleased that there is such dedication in the player base. If anything I feel a little on the guilty side that some of the achievements are that hard.
9) You already confirmed that RuneScape members will be allowed to test the beta of MechScape. Will it be the same for FunOrb members?
Yes, anyone with Jagex Product membership will be involved in this, if it takes place. I’m not involved directly with MechScape so I can’t confirm that this definitely will happen though.
10) Do you think Funorb will be even more popular in the next years?
Absolutely. I know what games we have planned and it’s the games that will drive the services popularity.
11) Will the Jagex Store eventually carry FunOrb items? (caps, shirts, orb mouses even)
I think it already does. If not then it’s certainly coming soon
12) What's your favourite doughnut filling?
Actually I like Iced doughnuts out of preference. Other than that; custard. Custard makes ANYTHING better.
13) Why did you decide to make Dungeon assault 2 into a sequel instead of just updating the first one?
Because the first game is a good game in its own right and we do have plans for some minor updates to it. DA II will be a very different play experience, especially in the area of dungeon raiding.
14) Do you have any plans on making currently single player games such as Bouncedown into a multiplayer game?
Yes, Terra Phoenix is a big one for us and Bouncedown is certainly one of the game we are considering. There are potentially others as well but no firm plans are in place yet.
15) When the new rating system will come, will the current rating be transfered to the new ones or just start of at 1000? Also, will it affect achievements that depend on rating?
That has not actually been decided for certain at this time.
16) On a scale of 1 to 10, how awesome do you think you are?
I’m afraid that’s impossible for me to say. I’m of the belief that what you think of yourself is not that relevant. It’s what other people think of you that really counts.
17) Are you planning to release an all-time high scores list for funorb games in the future?
Not at this time no. All-time highscores are open to cheating and usually end up being rather static. We’ve found that they usually end up being ignored within a few months.
18) Why was the increments for the orb points chosen to be 100-300, *400*, 500, 1000?
It fitted the difficulty ratios of the achievements we were working with at the time. There was a fair amount of “gut” feeling that was involved in the decision.
19) In, say, a year from now, what do you feel will be a typical time between the release of a) new games,
expansions?A very good question. What we are aiming for 1 major game release and 1 update every calendar month. The development team has only just reached full capacity so there is some training and learning to be done by a fair few of the developers. In a year’s time though, that’s where I want us to be.
20) As more achievements come into the game, will the limit on access for free players to the forums be lifted from the paltry 42 is is currently?
I think that this is unlikely. 42 was chosen as good value for this as the free player needs to play multiple games in order to get this number of achievements. That’s unlikely to change even with the Achievement update. The limit was set to ensure that anyone that wanted to post on the forums was relatively serious about FunOrb. Plus 42 is the answer of course.
21) Who originally came up with the idea for Funorb?
The original idea for a minigames (as they are called in comparison to RuneScape at least) site was Andrew Gower’s. The idea evolved during development substantially from the original concept. In truth, no one person apart from Andrew, really came up with “FunOrb” as such.
22) Do you currently have any plans for the expansion of ingame rewards?
I’m not sure what you mean by in game rewards?
24) On a progress-bar of 1-10, how far would you put Funorb as a whole?
Basically, has FunOrb got more to come in a few years compared to your expectations?
1. We have considerable plans for FunOrb over the next few years. These are based around games and technology to enable them, as well as other services that FunOrb will offer. We really are at the start of this journey, just about to reach the end of chapter 1.
25) Do you think it was wise to make the Main Page Log-in a Java applet?
(IE, why is mot everything taken care of by Java?)
All our games and front facing modules are programmed in Java. I think all the backend systems are as well. We pride ourselves on being able to program in Java better than anyone else in the world. It essentially means that our technology is relatively platform agnostic. It can work on any computer with access to the internet.
26) Will you work on bringing back another old game Andrew Gower worked on around 1999 called "Goldmine"?
No, we have no plans to do that at this stage.
27) Will there be more seemingly impossible achievements in the future, or are you trying to change the difficulty level on the achievements of new games away from these?
Sometimes seemingly impossible achievements are good. Think of the sense of achievement a player feels when they do actually make it. Some very, very hard achievements are there to give the expert players something that really does give them that sense of achievement. The trick is getting the mix right and currently, I think we do that.
28) How wide is the moat around Jagex castle?
That depends on how hard it’s been raining.
29) How often do you guys check the Suggestions forums/Hall of Heroes suggestions?
Weekly, at the very least. Often daily and sometimes constantly, if there is a particularly hot topic that we are interested in. We also get a summary report run for us each week.
30) Is setting your own key control combinations something that Jagex is thinking about?
Yes, it’s not often a major concern for us for though as most of the games have very simple control mechanisms.
31) When can we expect to see the FunOrb Gallery, and have you considered mixing the artwork with other player submissions?
Yes the gallery got put on the back burner a little as higher priorities became apparent. I’ll investigate as to where we are with it.
32) Why do we need to login to view Achievements Online and the Highscores?
Because if you don’t login, we don’t know who you are and thus we can’t show you your achievements or highscores.
33) Do you have any plants to change the range of Orb Points rewards for achievements, such as 2k Orb Points?
No plants, no plans even at this time. Although plants gives me a game idea.....:-)
So as you can see, a very nice response there
A big thanks to Mod Korpz for taking his time to answer these, thanks to Mod Craddock for passing these on, and thanks to you for creating these questions.
-banned-
