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Wizard101
Developer Diaries

 

Producer's Letter - June 2011

 
 
 
 
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My dear Wizards,

It’s been busy at KingsIsle this spring! Besides the normal hustle and bustle of making sure the Gobblers don’t eat all the office supplies and the Piggles don’t fly away with all the spare network cables, we’ve been hard at work adding new content to the Spiral at a breakneck pace!

Most recently we added the new hotness of the Dragon’s Hoard booster packs to the Crown Shop. We are at heart, a collectible card game come to life, so we love the opportunity to offer more things like this. For the low price of 399 Crowns, you can open a card pack and find awesome treasures like the new Bone Dragon or Dragon Wing mounts, dragon pets, armor, housing items, and more. While not EVERY pack has the super rare loot, they all have at least 399 Crowns worth of cool stuff (plus the opportunity to get some MUCH more valuable items), so you win either way!

Of course, let’s not forget about that GIGANTIC Wintertusk update last month. We always want to know what you’re thinking, so we put up a Feedback Friday right after it went live. Here are some of our favorite comments:
  1. Tragamite says: “One thing huh? Man there is so much great about it but I guess I'll just go with the crown store update it's great and easy to find what I'm looking for now!”
  2. Tala171 says: “I love the new wand stitching! I've been wanting to do that for many months, so I'm very thankful to see that capability put into the game. Great job!”
  3. Random1self says: “Only one? Allowing health drain spells and nova to be enchanted with sun school damage boosts.”
  4. Cristopher62597 says: “My favorite part of the update is Wintertusk itself. Today I made it to Wintertusk (finally) & it was the first time in a while where I couldn’t put the game down. Wintertusk is very successful in my mind.”
  5. IvoryJade says: “For me, it's the wand stitching and the new pets. Also, the gear drops from WT are pretty impressive. I haven't gotten my new pet yet, but I'm sure I'm gonna have fun with it. Wait...there's a Flying Carpet Mount? No way!”
So between Wintertusk continuing the Grizzleheim story, the Waterworks making its appearance, new spells and pets to quest for (as well as hybrids to discover through hatching), you legendary folks should have quite a bit on your to do list! If you’re not quite there yet, don’t worry. Crab Alley reopened with a continuation to that dramatic tale (and yes, there is more poetry); there are also new level 35 spells; wand stitching; free-roaming mounts; Crown Shop sorting and searching updates; a new “hidden” option to get some privacy while playing; and much, much more.

Speaking of the Flying Carpet Mount discussed above... the one that was teased in the commercial but wasn’t immediately available with the update, it’s part of our newest GameStop card and available now! This bad boy comes with the Sultan’s Palace, which has the most spots to put housing items or plants of any house so far, and it includes a super special genie that will grant your every wish... as long as your wish is to get some free loot once a day. You can use your shiny new flute to lay the musical smackdown on some baddies, and enlist the help of your new snake-in-a-basket pet, of course (basket absolutely included!). Of course, all the usual goodies come with it – 5k Crowns or a month Membership, an additional housing elixir, and a minigame kiosk. Now, if you need me, I’ll be trying to get that treasure chest on the island in my palace...

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Unfortunately, there were a few minor hiccups with the Wintertusk update when it came to older video cards and computers. Internally, we called this “discoing”. While sometimes it’s fun to dance the disco with flashing colors and lights, it’s a bit distracting when you’re trying to adventure through the new worlds. We apologize for the inconvenience, and want to thank everyone that helped us out by reporting the errors, sending in screenshots and logs when requested. It helped us get to the root of the problem, find them all, and fix the issue. The Spiral is, as far as we know, now 100% disco-free!

Across the pond, you may have heard that Wizard101 has a UK version, supported by our partners at GameForge. Well, we have now broken ground and our esteemed Professors are now able to speak in a second language, as there is now a German version as well! What languages will we learn next? Stick around!

We’re definitely not done for the summer, either! Things are still heating up here with the nifty stuff we’re working on. I hope you are interested in faraway places, as we are currently planning expeditions to new, undiscovered lands to see if there is more life (and treasures) out there to discover. We also have some behind-the-scenes things to do to support those other languages we’re learning, and maybe we will find time for a few new toys for you Wizards to play with...

You’ll have to excuse me now, as I need to review some really amazing art that just came in for the… well, you’ll just have to stay tuned until later this year. Until next time, stay fiery!

See you in the Spiral,

Leah “Professor Falmea” Ruben
 
 
 
 
  • We’re rated E 10 and up for Crude Humor and Mild Fantasy Violence
  • We won the Massively Award for Best of the Decade

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