#phoenix labs

[kayliebeanie]

Project Dragon was a game that was in development for 3 years only to be canceled weeks from its announcement and its entire art and development team laid off. The game (which would have been called 'Everhaven' upon release) was intended to be a multiplayer sandbox rpg taking inspiration from both Minecraft and The Legend of Zelda, with an art style similar to that of the Spyro Reignited Trilogy, which some of the team members also worked on along with Crash Bandicoot 4.

According to character design/illustrator Nicholas Kole "Our cancelled project of the last 3 years is officially, truly dead as of today (internal attempts to save it failed), and the embargo on the whole body of portfolio work has been lifted". This means that the only way the game has a chance of resuming development is by raising awareness and spreading the word of it's development. More info from Nicholas Kole and #BringBackProjectDragon Even if you're not interested in the game itself, you can find the concept art, animations, 3D models, music and all other completed pieces of work for the game being shared by the team at either of these links, and I think are worth checking out. Some mounts and NPCs

4 of the 5 playable starter races (5th being human of course)

Edit: the decision to cancel the game was made by Forte, a blockchain company that acquired Phoenix Labs last year, who later decided to cancel all other projects so that the studio could focus on Dauntless and Fae Farm, Phoenix Labs' other already established games, rather than take the risk with this new IP.

I advise against sending any sort of hate towards Forte or Phoenix Labs and instead recommend continuing to share love for Everhaven and what it could have been until they realize their mistake.

Also thanks for 10k notes.

[ursafelis]

There's a petition going on to save Everhaven / Project Dragon

If you can, please go sign ! This game truly deserves it !!

[everhavenworld]

On this day in 2024 (second Sunday in June), Everhaven would’ve been announced during the PC Gaming Show with Early Access release set for September… 😞

Cinematic cutscenes by Revenant

• Spread the word about Everhaven

• Sign the petition: https://www.change.org/p/bring-back-everhaven-project-dragon-phoenix-labs

• Send polite messages to Forte about wanting Everhaven sold: https://forte.io/contact-us/

• Send messages to other game companies, like Microsoft/Xbox, and ask them to try and save Everhaven from Forte

[alphamecha-mkii]

Project Falcon (Unreleased) - The Knife - Butcher ship class by Alejandro Burdisio

[heartspark]

Making Videos like this does not come naturally to me but I wanted to try 😭😅

[theseworldsareyours]

From Tide Pools by Phoenix Labs

[foundry-fabrications]

Hey folks! It took WAY too long to get this out, but it's finally done. Well, technically it isn't done, but I'll get to that in a bit. One weird thing that needs explanation at a time.

So, as one can tell, I didn't just make statblocks for the behemoths, write some lore, and call it a day. I've discovered that I really don't like making statblocks and dealing with all the nonsense that comes with it (CR is a joke, and I'm not laughing). So, in typical Foundry fashion, I tried doing something weird that requires more work and ultimately still required me to make statblocks anyway. Yeah, I'm not smart. 

So I made them templates instead. And while I was tempted to give up and just do the obvious thing since I was just going to end up with stats anyway, making them templates makes a certain amount of sense from a lore perspective and I genuinely think is an interesting idea worth pursuing. Quick lore tidbit, behemoths are likely the result of normal creatures becoming mutated by aether (it's not certain, but there are signs of this origin from what I've read), so a template makes logical sense. So, as long as I pick appropriate creatures for the template examples, the end result will get you pretty close to the behemoths in game. Sure, they're not perfect, but it would be easy to tweak them to better suit your game.

So the other behemoth in the room is there are only 3 behemoths here. I had intended on releasing them all at once. Turns out there's like 30+ behemoths AND 5 basically legendary behemoths. So, I'm splitting them up into their elemental categories, and the legendaries by themselves. I already have the Blaze behemoths written out, so those won't take nearly as long. As I complete each category, I'll update this post and make y'all aware of the additions. By the end, I'll have one document with all of them in it, a brew to rival Flesh & Bone. 

But for now, a quick break to work on something else my ADHD has compelled me to rework. Stay tuned for that. Anyway, stay safe, don't forget to love each other, and I'll see you next time.

Enjoy my work? Consider leaving me a Tip or supporting me on Patreon! Patrons gain access to high quality PDFs for all of my content, weekly updates, early access, and more!

[pendragongames]

Dauntless

This one isn't a new game for me. I started playing late in the closed beta and played HEAVILY during open beta.

The open beta days were peak. It had everything going for it that Monster Hunter did, but had a simplified gameplay loop and very satisfying interrupt mechanics. The community during open beta was also outstanding, both the players and devs. I streamed on Twitch at the time, usually around 10-15 viewers, sometimes more, and I had devs pop into my chat, watch me play, and ask for my opinions more than once. I've never seen that for any other game.

Then they chose to launch on Epic for full release. I get why they did it. Epic was heavily incentivising for smaller devs to launch exclusively with them to pull in new users. It was a good financial decision for them. But it killed the game. A huge part of the player base refused to deal with Epic (including me), which is what triggered the game's death spiral imo.

I stopped following it for a while, but from what I've gathered, the studio was sold to a techbro parent company that forced them to essentially burn the game to the ground and start over. Mixed opinions on if this was a last-ditch effort to save the game or a deliberate assassination... either way it was objectively a bad decision.

I saw it was released on Steam and decided to give it a go. EVERYTHING that I'd spent dozens or hundreds of hours farming (armor, weapons, cells, everything) was GONE. WTF. I still had the raw materials I had, and I still had all of the cosmetics that I'd earned or bought, but all of my endgame gear was obliterated, and I had to start over the game from scratch. To boot, they fundamentally changed the upgrade system AND how behemoths could be interrupted (my favorite part). It was miserable for the first dozen hours or so.

I cannot understand how this seemed like a good decision (granted, I have no idea what the state of the game was like when that decision was made).

Now, the game in its current state. Once I got past the frustration of "I am being beaten up by a lesser embermane when I used to nuke rezakiri from orbit", it is still an enjoyable game. The new weapon and armor system sucks, and I'm also not a fan of the slayer progression system (which I do remember being implemented either shortly before or shortly after I quit, so that's not a new feature), but its still fun to interrupt the behemoths. (They took my war pike cannon, whyyyyy did they take the war pike cannon??? It doesn't make it any harder to interrupt, it's just not as cool)

In the wake of these awful changes, the game is being sunset next month. I'm trying to get as many achievements as I can before that happens, because as unfortunate as what happened to it is, it's still one of my favorite games historically, and the open beta days were really important to me as a baby PC gamer and young adult. It would be nice to have that 100% trophy to remember it by, even if its tied to the new version and not the one I loved. We'll see how that goes! I don't expect to 100%, since I work full time and am about to have a baby, but I'll do my best.

[gebo4482]

Project ONI (Unrealeased) -- Character Art Style by Hicham Habchi

[ice-crystal-9]

Time to play @faefarm

[vanquishedvaliant]

I'm not at all surprised to see that Dauntless is shutting down after its apocalyptically unpopular overhaul, but I am super sad about it.

For whatever complaints there were to be made about it, Dauntless was a great game for a number of years and served to get a number of people I know onto the joy of Monster Hunter style games, and without it many of them just never would have had access to or tried them out.

It's just another game studio tragedy of layoffs and buyouts with expendable properties being pushed to earn quick cash while burning down all the talented developers who worked on the property with love for years, and it's never fun to see that.

The fact that a crypto cartel just up and bought the company and tore it to shreds while siphoning every last penny they could out of the few players left is just... despicable.

Yet after all the hours I put into it, all the fun with friends, the building of skills and accumulation of experience, I'm still just sad to see it go.

Goodbye, Dauntless. I'll remember you.

[kayliebeanie]

Extended version of the character creation video seen in my other post, featuring more outfit and color combinations, different body shape options, the perennial pony mount, and a closer look at the Wyvarr and Purran races! (Dragon and cat folk!)

Video was shared by Airborne Studios, who were responsible for many of the 3D models used in the project. You've also likely seen their work in games such as Astroneer, Ori and the Blind Forest, Overwatch, Wolfenstein 2, Fortnite, Crash Bandicoot 4, Spyro Reignited, and several more well known franchises!

[haaaaaaaaaaaave-you-met-ted]

Project Unicorn - Red Dersert Environment Concept Art by Sylvain Sarrailh

[everhavenworld]

May 16, 2024 - 1 year has passed since Forte cancelled Everhaven and fired the dev team at Phoenix Labs.

Efforts to save Everhaven were intentionally stopped by Forte, who now sit on the IP.

In October 2024, a PR spokesman of Forte mentioned that they are currently not looking for "new partners or funding on paused projects”:

But recently the company has been blocking anyone who mentions to them about selling Everhaven instead of sitting on it.

Spread the word above Everhaven, sign the petition, reach out to any potential company, like Xbox or other game company, about Everhaven who may be willing to offer to buy the game from Forte.

#BringBackProjectDragon!

[luvsavos]

my sleep paralysis demon is real and it's called sahvyt

[the-big-stink]

Phoenix labs let me date zido you COWARDS