Chronicles of Elyria developer Soulbound Studios is finally back with its Inside Chronicles of Elyria video series, this time showing off Alpha gameplay of the upcoming Kingdoms of Elyria. The alpha, which was supposed to start by the end of May but was delayed due to issues, will see players dive into the kingdom sim for the first time since SBS announced it earlier this year.
KoE is a stand-alone kingdom management sim, which developer Soulbound Studios states will influence and directly effect the development of the larger MMO, Chronicles of Elyria. The video, which is the longest yet by Jeromy Waslh, dives into the gameplay as well as some information about the alpha and testing period moving forward.
The video itself states that the alpha is "right around the corner," with player alpha-backers seeing invites to the "mid-milestone client" of Kingdoms of Elyria within "a week or two." Walsh estimates the milestone 2 build represents about 25% of the way towards the conclusion of KoE's development.
The video itself, as we mentioned, is long. Forty minutes of gameplay is shown off, allowing viewers to see KoE in action before those invites come out.
However, it's not been smooth sailing in CoE land, with the current ongoing lawsuit against Soulbound Studios after the closure of the development house last year saw many backers demanding refunds of their hard-earned money. The lawsuit announced a milestone of its own this week, statng on the official Discord that the Complaint against SBS and Xsolla, Soulbounds payment processor, was filed as of February 2nd, 2021 in District Court. The mods state that the Complaint has been challenged by defense counsel (the lawyers representing Walsh and the studio) and now the lawsuit is awaiting a judge's ruling before moving forward.
If you're interested in checking out the Complaint itself, the documents themselves have been posted in the official Discord, from both the initial Complaint filing to the defense's motions to dismiss the charges. Additionally, it seems Jeromy Walsh took to a private Discord to answer some questions from the DSS community in CoE, namely about the state of the MMO and how they plan to rebuild the community following last year's announcements of closures and reopenings.
When asked if Walsh had a plan to reopen the Discord, he responded that they have a "rough plan."
"And it starts right here," Walsh continued in the Discord. "We want to make sure that the CoE community is a welcoming place and is community-moderated. Led by the same people helping to rebuild it. So, I'm going to be reaching out to the various CoE communities and seeing which of them want to be listed in the KoE launcher to help with recruitment and rebuilding. Then, as communities start to develop again, I'm going to reach out to those same community leaders and see if they want to rotate through as a moderator on the official CoE community Discord and Forums."
The screenshots of the conversation, including discussion about re-opening a Discord community, have been posted to the Lawsuit Discord.
Thanks Dirt_asylum for the tip