[show] Rise & Ruin trading card game

[Ray Beez]

Are you ready for a little R & R ?

Hey folks, am I glad to finally show this off.




Here is some "marketese" :wink: :

Rise & Ruin is an entirely new twist on the trading card game (TCG) genre. Players level up their own customized avatar while assembling decks from an ever-growing pool of powerful attack, defense, magic, and specialty cards. Thrilling, cinematic 3D battles take place directly in a web browser allowing for fast and accessible game play.






We've actually been in Open Beta for just over 2 months now, but some major bugs got worked out, so I feel better about showing it now.

The game is half Flash, half 3DVIA (formerly Virtools). The two plugins actually live on the page at the same time, but alternate focus using some Javscript and DIV trickery, and we got the two plugins "talking" to each other using Javascript as well. (I hope its not "cheating" that the above screen shots are of the 3D portion?)

All the non-3D interface screens, like card management, deck creation, skills page, Chat, etc are in Flash. ;-) The game is FREE to play as much as you want. You get a free account, custom avatar, a free newbie pack, and play as much as you want. So don't be afraid to sign up. (No, we won't sell your email address)

Since we are new, our chat/battle rooms are sometimes empty (darn school starting took away a bunch of our regulars!) Check out our event schedule for special events where you can meet people, battle them, participate in special challenges and win new cards and skill points:

Schedule of Events: http://riseandruin.com/events
Our Forums: http://riseandruin.com/community/forums
Known bugs and workarounds: http://riseandruin.com/forum/26

We sell in-game credits via a reputable secure service, which can be used to buy card packs (you get a free newbie pack with every account). Help support small indie game developers and help shape this game as it evolves. Already in our 2 months we have taken player feedback and bug reports and implemented several updates. Being a browser game, we have the luxury of continually updating and improving the experience.

I moderate the chat on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 7:30pm (EST) to 10m under the name "GM Spore". Please come say hello! Or check out Friday Night Fights event at 7:30pm (EST) on Friday!

~Ray

[ImprisonedPride]

Sounds like a really good thing you got going. Too bad I can't register. No matter what I try I get The name <name> has been denied access.

Things I tried:

ImprisonedPride - The name ImprisonedPride has been denied access.
ImprisonedPride62 - The name ImprisonedPride62 has been denied access.
lkajh4rlkjaglaklaerga - The name lkajh4rlkjaglaklaerga has been denied access.


At first I was typing it in on the login page by mistake and I got The name ImprisonedPride is a reserved username. but I didn't try the other two there.

[bluemagica]

hmmp, seems like firefox can't open the game, weird! IE is trying, but still loading is pretty slow......I will comment on gameplay, after I manage to play it, but if the starting is this buggy, it will surely affect your userbase!

[Ray Beez]

*sigh*
This is the challenge of launching a game service like this, and why it's still got the moniker of "Open Beta". NONE of us on the dev team (and we're talking 6 people + our friends) get the problem you mentioned ImprisonedPride. And Blue magica.. again, some problems that only happen to other people. :-(

@ImprisonedPride: I just created a new account with no problem: http://riseandruin.com/user/register
Is that the form you got the problem in? Did you check the 3 checkboxes? Did you do anything else? Any clues to help us figure it out? What OS? What browser?

@BlueMagica: I agree, unfortunately they are issues we either have pulled all our hair out trying to find the cause, or in the case of something like long-loading, what can we do?


Some helpful info:
It WORKS in Firefox 2 and 3.0. Don't be mistaken. It just usually requires a restart of the browser. Firefox 3.5 broke a couple things and may or may not work. In Vista with FireFox you may have to right-click the browser icon and choose "run as administrator".

It works in IE the best, and we've had reports it works in Safari and Chrome as well (but not for everybody). We think security settings and OS may be a factor but can't nail down the exact circumstances that cause problems.

OS matters. If you are using Windows 7, which is not even a final production OS, then don't be surprised when something doesn't work right. We've had mixed results from Win 7 users. XP is best and Vista seems fine, though, in Vista with FireFox 3+ you may have to right-click the browser icon and choose "run as administrator".

It even all works on Mac, until you get to battle someone. Then this hard to nail little bug prevents the battle from showing. :-(

Loading time: The server is located on the West Coast of Canada. The game client is roughly 4 mb, and then once in, there is 20 to 30 mb in game media that caches ONCE but does so in the background. If you explore the features and stop to chat before launching into battle, the loading might be done by then. We've had a lot of players from South America with 0.5 mpbs internet services who pop in and immediately challenge everybody in the room and then when the battle loading starts, they are barely 1% and it takes forever. We're not "slowband" friendly. (0.5 mbps?!?!)

The good news is, once cached the loading is as quick as it can be, and the game media does NOT get cleared when you clear your browser cache.

It's quite the challenge letting new players know all the little idiosyncracies. People don't read. THey just want to click a button and play. But what can we do.

Thanks for checking the game out. Friday Night Fights starts at 7:30pm EST.
~Ray

[ImprisonedPride]

@ImprisonedPride: I just created a new account with no problem: http://riseandruin.com/user/register
Is that the form you got the problem in? Did you check the 3 checkboxes? Did you do anything else? Any clues to help us figure it out? What OS? What browser?

Yes that's the form. Yes I checked the boxes. No I did nothing else. XP Home Edition SP2//FF v 3.0.14.