The Fantastic Pixel Castle team shared the “Big Progress Episode” of their podcast diving into their progress on their MMORPG currently known as Ghost. Greg Street and Scott Johnson are joined by others to discuss their progress this year and even answer a number of community questions after releasing more new info last week.
The episode is about an hour long, and listening to it is informative, but the video version, which you can watch below, offers some visual detail that enhances the development talk. Since they’re showing pre-alpha footage, the conversation even touches on setting player expectations in this early part of MMO development. This comes after impressions of pre-alpha footage looking more like a lobby based game or looter shooter than an MMORPG, in addition to the use of placeholder assets.
They do show some of what they have already built, and are still optimistic about progress, although as Greg Street notes, they know they're going to hit some obstacles eventually, so they can be optimistic and know that times where they need to pivot or start over on something will happen.
The message is clear, as they’ve been taking us all into development much earlier than most teams would: we are seeing lobbies, but give it time, as they have to build out a lot of things.
Their goals are to make spaces you’ll want to return to. Fantastic Pixel Castle is working more on their signature Blue Zones to continue iterating and testing those to get those right, refining the core systems there before expanding into the full expansive experience.
Related:
Interview: Chatting With FPC's Greg Street About Ghost MMO Testing, Blue Zones, And 2025
FPC is pushing ahead, adding elements of fantasy and sci-fi, and they're working to solidify the game's ultimate identity in this early stage, so we'll have to wait to see more of how that plays out, but they're not leaving systems or elements off the table. Things like pets, magical weapons, and even how they might approach progression are included in the discussion. They do say they're looking to include both vertical and horizontal progression to enhance the experience and support various play styles. It's a good look into their direction and transparent about unanswered questions and work still to be done, along with community input.
The full conversation includes that they have a 10-year story plan emphasizing character-driven experiences. There’s also talk of community systems, the importance of guilds, even touching on competitive loot to enhance social experiences, and more. so no, they're not creating a lobby-based game, they want to create a world that feels more connected and includes elements of environmental storytelling like in games like Elden Ring.
As we head into 2025, we’ll see what the next string of tests and Ghost development updates reveal about how some of these questions shook out.
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