Team name:
Team ETHERELL
Project name:
Legends of Etherell Antavia
Brief description:
Our  game pushes the elements of traditional massively multi-player role  playing games to their limits; offering over-the-top-action, an epic  story saga, and the ability make game altering choices. The game  features a real-time combat system where players strategically use magic  and weaponry, to advance through a uniquely designed open-world.  Through skill and prowess, the player is able to join factions, legions,  and empires in an epic quest to restore or destroy the lands of  Antavia. The game also features PvP zones and battlegrounds, where players are able to  battle other players for prestige, supremacy, and faction dominance.
Target aim:
Our  intended goal is to build a multi-platform title for retail and  download release. The project has a predicted release date of August  2013 based on our current business plan. However, we plan to release a  closed Alpha and Beta during the development cycle of the game, offer us  a wide range of feedback to help improve our overall design.
Compensation:
Our  current business plan features a very reasonable profit share contract  to insure that a percentage of each item sale will yield a payment to  each team member. We are currently in negotiations with 5 commercial  publishers that are all on standby for our playable online  demonstration. Based on the "possible" outcome of negotiation, our  company (SilverHelm Studios LLC.) plans to issue each member a monthly  salary requiring that new contracts be issued to reflect their updated  entitlements. I'm stressing the word "possible" because our company  recently suffered the lost of a publisher due to financial shortcoming  stemming from the riots in London and the companies Executive Director  being hospitalized indefinitely. As a result, many members of the team  became highly demoralized and a few have left. We aren't asking members  to work unrealistic hours as the product is unpaid at the moment.  However, we are still in serious negotiations with new publishers and  are required to work consistently towards our alpha demonstration. We  have recently finalized our new commission contracts that are awaiting  reviews from our attorneys, and the moment they are done, they will be  issued to each members guaranteeing their earnings. I can't stress how  enough that this is a very serious project, so should it be regarded as.  All details of development and internal/external design elements  are  protected by a confidentiality contract. I would be more than happy  to discuss these stipulations and more information about the 5  publishers that have received and responded to our press kits, with all  applicants prior to joining our team.
Technology:
Torque 3D
Nvidia Physx
Photoshop CS5
3D Max 2011
Maya 2011
Z-Brush
Blender
Maya 2011
Gimp
Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 (C++/C#)
Talent needed:
2 C++/ TorqueScript Programmers with Network Experience
-Programmers'  will utilize TorqueScript and make alterations to the Torque 3D source  code as required. Reasonable knowledge of networking to client  communication, C++ programming experience, and TorqueScript  knowledge/experience is also required.
2 3D Character Modelers
-Character  modelers' workflow will involve sculpting of characters and armor, then  retopologizing to meet the required standards of our art pipeline.  Next, artists will bake the normals from the high poly sculpt, applying  it to the low-poly model. Lastly, the artists will apply textures to the  model. Low-poly models are a requirement for the nature of game we are  developing (MMO), making sculpting an important requirement as we are relying  on normal maps to offer details that our low-poly models are unable to  show. See the images below for a visual presentation of final products.  Texturing, sculpting, and a reasonable knowledge of anatomy are  requirements.
2 3D Environment Modelers
-Environment modelers'  workflow will involve sculpting or standard modeling of hard surface  structures, props, weapons, and items, then retopologizing (if  sculpting) them to meet the required standards of our art pipeline.  Next, artists will bake the normals from the high poly sculpt (if  scuplting), applying it to the low-poly model. Lastly, the artists will  apply textures to the model. Low-poly models are a requirement for the  nature of game we are developing (MMO). With hardsurface objects, sculpting  isn't a requirement as with character and armor models, however some  method of normal map generation is required to maintain consistency  throughout the gaming environment. See the images below for a visual  presentation of final products. Texturing, and normal map generation are  requirements.
2 2D Concept Artists
-Concept artists' workflow  will involve creating painted or textured 2D renders for use in website  development, promotion, character and environment modeling, and UI  (user interface) elements. Artist will be required to export art in  various digital forms, making digital porting knowledge a requirement.  Artist should also have an understanding of digital art principles such  as applying alpha maps and transparency to specific formats to insure  that they operate as expecting within the game engine. Physical to  digital art conversion and digital art application knowledge are  required.
2 3D Animations
-Animators' workflow will involve  skeleton/bone/rig construction, skinning of meshes to  skeletons/bones/rigs, and animating of skeletons/bones/rigs to comply  with all animation requirements. Rigging knowledge and animation  experience is required. Currently all characters are natively rigged in 3DS Max 2012 (biped) and exported to fbx or dae formats for those animating without 3DS Max.
2 Writers/Script Writer:
-Writers'/script  writers' workflows involve gathering information from current  documents/stories regarding Legends of Etherell and using it to derive  unique stories, dialogues, and descriptive creations for provinces,  towns, villages, characters, items, structures, and all other things  that make up the realm of Etherell. Knowledge of story structure, proper  English grammar knowledge, and knowledge of developing realistic  dialogue are requirements.
Team structure:Management
Project Manager (Joanna Wycoff)
Public Relations Officer (Chad Dulac)
Design
Lead Designer (Aaron Victoria)
Creative Director (Chad Dulac)
Lead Level Designer (Philip "Vality" Arnold)
Art
Art Director (Chad Dulac)
Environment Modeler (Mark Ward)
Environment Modeler(Chris Pyne)
Lead Character Modeler (William Barry)
Character Artist (Rahul Salazar)
Writing
Lead Writer (Corey Beasom)
Assistant Writer (James Kennedy)
Writer/Script Director (Po-wil Guzman)
Programming
Programming Director (Michael Reino)
Programming (Jacob Ruta)
Programmer (Aaron Victoria)
Audio
Composer (Matias Castro Canciano)
Composer (Jamie Williams)
Sound Effect Engineer (Aaron Victoria)
Female Voice Actress (Laura Fedora)
Female Voice Actress (Jenny Krompel)
Female Voice Actress (Rhina Chan)
Male Voice Actor (Teddy Bostik)
Male Voice Actor (Heath Jenkins)
Male Voice Actor (Isaak Wells)
Analysis
Lead Tester (Kareem Brooks)
QA Engineer (Jeremy Ford)
Tester (James Morose)
Progress:
Our  alpha build is 45% complete at the moment with our MMO framework nearly  complete; a few optimization parameter implementations and more server  testing is required before true completion can be suggested. Moreover,  the game is fully online and operable with server access available.  The programming division has been running tests for the last few weeks  and have the database registration and server-based playability  complete. Tests have ran smoothly, with movement and combat working  precisely as they should across the server platform (5 players logged  simultaneously). We are currently incorporating UI elements, including  the equipment window, dropped item window, hotkey bar, and player vitals  block, into the player's viewspace. In addition to that, we are in the  process integrating our character models into the game to replace our  placeholder/test models. The construction of the entire map of Antavia  has been finalized, and exists as an enormous heightmap divide into  megaterrain blocks to be used for our open-world streaming system. We  also have a conversation system that has been implemented that offers  players the option to click to select player responses during  conversations and plays back .ogg files from our voice actors content  directory. Our next goal is to implement the dynamic camera positions  during conversations. Our combat system is complete, although it is currently undergoing an overhaul to meet the new requirements of the new real-time combat system in our updated design  documents. However, hotkeys respond accordingly with the addition of  button presses to activate hotkeys still requiring code.
Websites:
(Official) 
http://www.legends-of-etherell.com
(Facebook) 
http://www.facebook....123016314429688Contacts:
Aaron Victoria
aaronvictoria@legends-of-etherell.comPrevious Work by Team:
Our  project manager has worked as project manager on a list of federal  government projects for the U.S. Army and the U.S. Air Force. I have  programmed and held the role of project manager for a few half-life mods  such as The Black Mesa Project and Project Piranha o2. Our lead writer  has written many scripts for local acts and commercial plays, as well as  a personal novel inspired by the game's story. Our creative director  has more that 20 years of experience creating and developing medieval  campaigns for Dungeons & Dragons and has hosted many dungeon  mastering events. Our Art Director has worked as a commercial comic book  artist, and has many publications in Dungeons & Dragons rule  books/magazines. Two of our testers have professionally tested for  commercial projects/game companies internally, one tested alpha builds  of City of Heroes for Cryptic Studios, the other worked as a tester for  Gearbox Software.
Additional Info:
The story take  place across a vast landscape where players may journey and venture as  they please. The emphasis of gameplay is mainly to give players the  ability to pick up a control or keyboard, and immediately be able to get  into the action. The leveling system is very traditional, but each  class has 3 skill trees to help the player fine tune their personalized  playing style. Players can embark on the main quest which is designed to  have over 12 possible endings, or they can create a party and adventure  into the massive open world. Each town, city, village, empire, and  kingdom will feature unique helpers, companions, enemies, and  townspeople. Each of them with there own lives, and destinies that the  player can alter. A large amount of these characters will offer  side-quest or prestige missions to build your rank. Many expansions are  planned as well, making the depth of the story ever-growing. While the  player is playing the game, large amounts of data are secretly being  saved. This data will play a huge role in shaping the world in the  fourth coming expansions as well as the planned sequel.
Images:
Please visit our official site or our facebook for more pictures and information.