The team behind the post-apocalyptic MMO Fallen Earth posted this week an official release detailing the "feature complete" status and the vision forward, in addition to several in-game screeshots comparing the graphic upgrades done so far.

Fallen Earth is Feature Complete!

Fallen Earth™, the post apocalyptic MMOG in development using the Icarus Studios Tools Suite platform has reached the Alpha milestone and is now "feature complete."

Over the past six months, the Fallen Earth team has implemented new production processes which have allowed for improved product quality and a streamlined development schedule. Colin Dwan, who was promoted from Lead Engineer to Project Manager, said, "Fallen Earth has great technology and tons of content, but we needed to put a stake in the ground about all the features that were absolutely necessary to ship with. Now that we've finalized that long list, we've been able to spend all of our time making those features really fun."

The Fallen Earth Art Department focused on an in-depth upgrading of the game's overall appearance, improving textures, animations, and enriching the overall "look" of the game. Human models have been completely revamped, and newly added creatures include giant genetically engineered super soldiers and vicious killer fungi. Volumetric fog has been added and many towns have been completely rebuilt to take advantage of new building models and ecosystem options.

The Fallen Earth team has created a variety of new vehicle models from muscle cars to motorcycles to ATVs. They have also enhanced the vehicle combat system using the same basis as player-based combat so players will be able to attack from their vehicles, be it with pistols from a motorcycle or dual-mounted machine guns from a muscle car.

The core functionality players expect from an MMO, such as raids, clans, auction house, and a mail system, are now up and running in Fallen Earth. Players can combine their efforts in raids of up to four groups or thirty-two players, allowing them to tackle larger threats and compete more effectively in PvP activities. Clans allow players to form large social groups with a number of different ranks, each with its own configurable name and permission list. The auction house system allows players to sell goods to each other with ease, and to search the auction house for items needed for a specific recipe. The mail system enables players to easily stay in contact and trade goods among themselves through the vigilant efforts the Franklin's Riders, the postal service within Fallen Earth.

Going Forward

While we continue to work towards our next milestone, content complete, we're going to begin our Alpha testing process in earnest over the next few weeks. We have a means for selecting our testers already in place, but we will bring in more outsider testers as we progress through the testing process.

Over the next few weeks we'll be rolling out regular updates on Fallen Earth's progress in addition to the ongoing Question of the Week posts on our forums. These updates will concentrate more on new systems and visuals within Fallen Earth, such as showing off some of our new creature models or the updated vehicle system. These updates will be appearing on a weekly basis on our web page at www.fallenearth.com.

Fallen Earth is also stepping up our advertising presence and will be working with a number of game sites to get the word out on our game. As we move past feature complete toward content complete, and toward release we want to start letting folks outside our existing fan base know about Fallen Earth. In the coming months this advertising campaign will increase in scope as we get closer and closer to release.

We will also be introducing other, more...covert ways for fans to interact with Fallen Earth. Keep an eye on our forums, and really the internet in general, for hints. The future is coming sooner than you think.

Check our galleries for the new screenshots!