The Xumi Post #6: From Dreams to Reality - The Testing Phase!
Go behind the scenes of BuildPort Xumia, from early station concepts and avatar art to VR building prototypes, multiplayer stress tests, and game updates.
Introduction
Hey there Builders! Today marks the start of a new series, From Dreams to Reality! We want to use this series to look back at how far BuildPort Xumia has come, and give you, the players, a chance to see the concepts that shaped our game.
Our first edition in this series will look at one of the most important parts of Xumia: the testing phase!
The First Concepts
From the beginning, we wanted a big social space, originally called the station! Below is a quick glimpse of it. It never made it into final production, but we just thought we'd mention it ;) We also do concepts for everything in the game. Be it art, environment, parts, spaceships, and everything in between!
Concept of the station vs in-engine test.
In the next blog post we'll delve further into the full process around parts, so stay tuned!
The Art
Every concept changes, and evolves as art assets are created.
Concept of the BuildPort ceiling vs version in the live game.
Concept of the new Halloween avatar (Skullivan) vs version in the live game.
Not everything we test ends up in the final product, but it's all learning towards what we want to build for you, the players.
The Prototyping and Stress Testing
From the concept, comes the art and environment and the gameplay. Our most unique feature is VR building, which went through various stages both mechanically and visually. Here's a quick example!
Early version of the BuildPort building vs live game versions.
The biggest part of the fun comes from building and breaking barriers, so players can have as much freedom as possible!
Here is one of our latest internal developments, building with 16,000 energy with multiple players!
This is just a small glimpse into what we're cooking up for the end of the year, but we can't detail that just yet!
Game Updates
This week we launched a patch build addressing the session issues that had been bugging us, and you, for a while. Now they'll be smoother than ever!
Additionally, the Halloween update is still going strong, so make sure to grab the time limited avatars before Thanksgiving comes around.
See you around, Builder!
What's Next
In future posts, we will look at other parts of Xumia's development, like different game modes, the flight system, and the game's artistic vision.
Thanks for building with us and for bringing your own ideas into Xumia. If there's a specific part of the game you'd like us to reflect back on, please let us know in our social media or in our Discord channel.
See you around, Builder!