What's Left To Do in 2021?

It's been a long time since I've updated the release. It's been exactly 9 months since Public Beta 2 released and I have to say that I'm truly sorry about that! However, the last 9-10 months have not been for naught. The game's gotten better and closer to a beta release candidate.

As you know, I work on this project in my free time  when I'm not helping film & edit for Florida Van Man. When I originally started this project, the goal was to make my programming skills better and show that I have what it takes to work for a serious company. Of course, it's still a hobby project so I've taken my time and taken many liberties with this.

As of today, multiplayer works over the network and locally. There is a very basic AI, nothing even remotely ready to play the campaign with. The campaign map has been created and the framework is in place to easily re-create the campaign and even modded campaigns. I am adding the capability to support modded campaigns, though it may still be some time before they are fully supported. 

As we speak, I have a crawler bot downloading card art images for all 500+ monsters in the game. However, card effects and fusions will still need to be manually linked to data. At least cards with their default stats are usable/playable. 

Pretty much everything is there in terms of framework. Almost everything will be there in terms of data. After that, it'll be about testing and documenting what still needs to be done. 

The honest truth is that this could've been in testing phase a few months ago. I have been very worried about netplay being *too* buggy and have been spending significant time making sure that what I have currently added works. The netplay conversion process has been stressful, and in some ways I'm still recovering from it. 

What will it take to get a playable beta?

1. Campaign map with map points must be viewable. It won't be able due to lack of AI.

2. Netplay must work.

3. Local multiplayer must work.

4. "Custom duel" must exist in some capacity. 

5. Multiple saves will be present.

6. You will be able to edit decks

7. There will be starter decks that will be automatically assigned until the campaign dialogue/cutscenes are enabled. 

8. There must be a Discord where I can offer support/discussion for what's coming next in this project. 

So I'll be getting to work...