Great Work! Cant wait to do bug hunting on it 😀

This is just so AWESOME!

My thoughts when we get the bugs worked out is that the game will run a quarter to as much as twice as fast as it is now.

As it is now my game runs like LIGHTNING even with all of the additional content. Naysayers who have never even tried the game erroneously make baseless comments that the game will run laggy with all the additional content. My game has never run better. I can’t get the damned thing to crash and it has been more satisfying to play than ever before.

My continued thanks to JEFFREY THE GREAT!

MK

Stéphane,

No you don’t have the 64bit version yet because Jeffrey and I are still testing it out. Very soon though I am sure.

The basic difference is that WAY more memory will be immediately accessible by the game. This means faster game play, no lag, and no texture degradation. This is a big deal. Just Jeffrey’s conversion to DX9 native from DX8 is a big deal, because high resolution textures are now rendered. If you look at how the game looked in DX8 or how New Horizons looks, the textures are only capable of a limited degree of detail. So all of the detailed ship skins I have done really pop out now and you can see amazing detail.

Example: https://www.flickr.com/photos/49225014@N05/34648936744/in/dateposted-public/

This kind of detail just is not available in the other Storm offerings. However, at some points in game play memory spikes can occur causing lag. Jeffrey also made three fixes to take care of this. He made the game large address aware expanding how much virtual memory is utilized at a given moment. He also implemented something in the code to cause texture degradation to occur occasionally when massive amounts of memory are required to avoid lag. You might notice when looting chests or corpses aboard ships that the items suddenly look slightly fuzzy or less crystal clear and then a moment later focus into clarity. This is what that degradation code does so that you don’t lose game performance speed. Last he implemented an auto save capability that occurs every 20 to 30 minutes that you usually won’t notice at all – its purpose is to clear out the memory buffer so that your game play is still completely fluid.

However, once 64 bit is implemented, you probably will never see texture degradation again and your game will run even better because virtual memory spikes will never occur. This is why we are so excited about this and why it is SUCH A BIG DEAL!!! Our game already looks and plays better than ever and better than any STORM game ever has – and its just going to get better still!

MK

I dunno if you are aware of this but theres a new DLC currently in russian for TEHO
English version is coming later this month!
There Are No Clean Getaways.

This massive expansion offers you an opportunity to live a life of real pirate – full of crimes, riches, lust, betrayal and adventures! Make yourself a name, meet the most wanted criminals of the Caribbean, become rich beyond measure and try to survive the just wraith of the people!
Features:

A thrilling pirate story in 10 quests;
Plunder of cities and villages;
New unique weapon – a Norse axe;
New unique weapon ship – the Torero, a polacre;
New locations to discover;
Your very own base;
A special Indian posion to turn more odds in your favor.

Now what I find most intriguing is the very own base thing. Maybe we can incorporate that whole quest / parts of the game into this one 😀

Sorry, I have to go on a short trip and will be back by Thursday. I have been working on new stories and announcements for a site update/refresh since May but they are not all finished yet. I am about 98 or 99 percent done so I would say to watch for a complete site refresh with new stuff by Friday or Saturday at the latest.

We have incredible new announcements coming – just major stuff to talk about that is really very exciting.

Among those new items are DLCs that will be separate from the base download. With commercial licensing underway with two separate downloads (one which is the free public domain RESOURCE content download) and others which will be BUCCANEERS REEF owned and licensed content and source/executable code which will NOT be free. Contributing members (including testers) will receive keys for free downloads and TEAM MEMBERS (Me, Orazio, Jeffrey, and possibly others who I will not name now that may be coming on board) will share the royalties from the sales of the downloads. Once we have these complete – we may even transition from ITCH.IO to STEAM.

I don’t want to say too much yet so I will just tease you a little…

Our DLCs in development will offer many of the things Blackmark/TEHO is offering – but imagine historical scenarios instead.

Imagine on your GUI having the option of START NEW GAME —- OR —– PLAY HISTORICAL SCENARIO

Imagine then getting to play your choice of say 5 or 10 historical vignettes for instance:

Scenario 1) Gentlemen Stede Bonnet grabs his BALLS. You have joined Blackbeard but must ensure that the crew of your REVENGE does not depose you as captain and join Blackbeard aboard his Queen Anne’s Revenge while Blackbeard simply takes control of your ship and adds it to his fleet. YOU MUST CHALLENGE HIM AND CHANGE HISTORY.

Scenario 2) BLACKBEARD”S FINAL BATTLE: You are Edward Teach stuck on your sloop the ADVENTURE in Ocracoke Inlet. Lieutenant Maynard has found you and is attempting to put an end to your piratical antics. He has entered the bay with the crew complements of the HMS PEARL and HMS LYME aboard the commandeered merchant sloops JANE and RANGER. You must change history and win this fateful battle.

Scenario 3) BART ROBERTS final battle. Imagine you are the infamous BARTHOLOMEW ROBERTS aboard your famous English 4th Rate Pirate Flagship the ROYAL FORTUNE. The Royal Navy 3rd rater HMS SWALLOW has found you and intends to destroy you. Perhaps if you don’t get killed by a cannonball you can change history and continue your illustrious career.

Scenario 4) Battle Under the Scorpion. (Bayo de Alacranes) It is the year 1684 and you are the trusted Spanish Pirate Hunter Andres Pez del Malaranga – You have been searching for infamous pirate warlord Laurens DeGraaf for months. He must be punished for his raids – especially the sack of Veracruz. You have found him on the Scorpion Reefs repairing his fleet and dividing the loot. You have a fleet of Spanish War Galleons and Zabras to finally put an end to him. Don’t let him escape! – and even more importantly don’t let him get the better of you with his fleet of Dutch pinnaces and his flagship the captured Spanish War Galleon Neptuno (San Francisco).

…. and there are MANY more.

You will have your choice of playing either side and if you win the battle you will see the following: “CONGRATULATIONS YOU HAVE WON THE BATTLE OF XXXXXX – Would you like to continue the game with this character and captured ships in freeplay mode?”

So you could then begin your game at say level 15 or 20 already and have all of the captured ships from the battle with no sailing penalties and those items owned and gained etc. This will be especially nice for those people who always wanted to get into this game but had limited gaming time to spend dozens of hours building up a character and eventually gaining the higher end ships.

Would you pay for a DLC with 5 or 10 of these famous battles? Jeffrey and I are betting that many will. If it’s resource content that is not owned by us and is public domain now, that part of it will already be downloaded into your ERAS game. You will be paying for the new content owned by us.

So now you will not only get all kinds of new locations we are putting into the game, you will get new historic battle packages as DLCs as well. Jeffrey and I believe that this may be the key to finally getting some popularity here and getting our efforts noticed and more contributors. Its funny that we have to make people pay for it to actually get noticed and get dialogue going. That’s kind of sad to me but I think both true and necessary.

More to come….

MK

Great news, the historical events are a good idea, i like the idea to have an influence on history and change the fate
I also really like the idea of having my own base to develop

I also like the idea of having a base, possibly upgradable and that has some purpose. For example, in addition to storing things, we could recruit new sailors based on the reputation we have, leave there a ship, build facilities (and hire people) to produce certain goods, and so on.
Maybe the base will be acquired after completing an apposite quest, that should be created.
Of course this requires some planning and work, both on the code and the 3D models (I can do the latter), so for now it can just be an idea for one of those DLCs MK was talking about, if people really want a base like this.