Reunion: New House Q&A is now available from Discovery forums! The article contains extensive information on the new House that will be available in Discovery 4.85: Reunion.
Quote:Q: Will there be a new House in Discovery 4.85? A: Yes. A French house, like many of you already guessed.
Q: What name will the new House bear? Will it be unlawful, similar to what Outcasts and Corsairs are, or more like lawful Houses? A: The name will be "Gallia", latin name for Gaul/France. Adjective is "Gallic", people who inhabit Gallia refer to themselves as "French" or "Gauls". Structure of the new House will resemble lawful Houses. It will have its own Police and Military, corporations, and unlawful factions.
Q: Why France and not any other country/countries? A: Many reasons. France has interesting historical and geographical background. Also, it's one of the most powerful European nations that were part of the Alliance. UK, Germany and Spain all had their own sleeper ships, with a large portion of Italians obviously present on the Spanish sleeper ship. So, France was the next logical choice.
Q: How many of the new House systems will be accessible in 4.85? What are the names of those systems? A: 5 systems will be ready for 4.85. Those systems form the Gallic Border Worlds, although more densely populated than the original Tau, Sigma and Omega systems. Names of systems will be: Languedoc, Dauphine, Burgundy, Champagne, Lorraine. Core systems of the new House will not be included into this release. Jump holes that connect Gallia to known systems are located in Languedoc and Lorraine.
Can we have it set down to fifty seconds instead? Sixty has this unpleasant habit of causing that bug where you see the menu screen for FL but without any options and you can still chat on the server in the system where you last F1ed...
Today, on June 14 2008, Discovery is celebrating its 3rd birthday. Three years is not a very long time compared to human life, but quite a lot for an independent gaming project that started out from (almost) nowhere. A forum with only a few members, and plans to create a Freelancer server with a small mod for it.
Since then, we've come a long way. Server has grown to become the largest Freelancer server available online. Board changed hosting, server changed ownership, new people came, while old ones left. We've exceeded the 128 player limit, and reached the record 197 players simultaneously online. The mod received a genre award at ModDB.com Mod of the Year-2006 contest, was downloaded hundreds thousands of times from various sites, and was even stolen by a rogue server and re-released under another name. Everyone within the community can tell many more interesting stories on what was going on... and I'll just reveal some celebration plans for this month.
First of all, you are welcome to participate in Discovery Screenshot Contest. Sure, there will be prizes - but it's not only about prizes! The best screenshots can be used to promote Discovery on various websites, including ModDB, and you can help to showcase the mod from the best point of view. Second, you all know about the recent Discovery 4.85: Reunion announcement. Very soon, I'll post Q&A article revealing much more details on what we are planning to do. And answer more questions that you may ask yourself.