The OpenMW team is proud to announce the release of version 0.30.0! Grab it from our Downloads Page for all operating systems. This release includes ranged combat, and crime & punishment. OpenMW just got a whole lot shadier… Other new features include terrain threading, many fixes and improvements to save/load, and a laundry list of bug fixes.

Check out the release video by the pertinacious WeirdSexy:

Known Issues:

• Character generation can be skipped
• Some items can be stolen without raising an alarm
• Sound may be disabled on videos in Windows

Changelog:

• Implemented Ranged Combat
• Implemented Sneaking Skill icon
• Implemented Crime and Punishment
• Implemented correct trader gold handling
• Implemented AIFollow package on summoned creatures
• Implemented run stance in the AIFollow package
• Implemented all NPCs in the area attacking the player when the player attacks one
• Implemented terrain threading
• Implemented correct GUI save/load progress bars
• Implemented saving the weather state in save games
• Implemented class creation form remembering previous changes
• Implemented quicksave, quickload, and autosave
• Implemented deleting saves
• Implemented bribe gold being placed into the NPCs inventory
• Implemented saving quick key bindings
• Implemented NPCs returning to their default position after pursuing the player for a crime
• Implemented vertical axis navigation for flying and swimming creatures
• Implemented functionality for NPCs to evade each other when walking around
• Fixed extreme shaking that could occur during cell transitions while moving
• Fixed crash when a non-existent content file is added to openmw.cfg
• Fixed OpenMW allowing resting/using a bed while in combat
• Fixed crime punishment in the Census and Excise Office at the start of a new game
• Fixed evidence chests not re-locking after new evidence is put in them
• Fixed NPCs still attacking after punishment is served
• Fixed taking items from a corpse being considered a crime
• Fixed some creatures not being able to get close enough to attack
• Fixed dead creatures dying again each time the player enters the cell
• Fixed input manager state not being handled correctly when loading a save
• Fixed crash when trying to get LOS of disabled NPC
• Fixed incorrect inventory behavior before inventory is activated in a new game
• Fixed NPCs not equipping torches in dark interiors
• Fixed mouse wheel scrolling too fast in race selection
• Fixed doors being blocked by NPCs
• Fixed repair/charge indicators not updating
• Fixed scribs not defending themselves
• Fixed creatures life bar not always being empty when they are dead
• Fixed creature and hand to hand attacks not increasing armor skill
• Fixed undead and mechanical creatures bleeding red blood
• Fixed Tarhiel never falling
• Fixed script variables not being saved
• Fixed custom class names not being handled properly in save games
• Fixed NPCs stuttering when walking indoors
• Fixed menu appearing when trying to skip intro movie
• Fixed NPCs getting stuck when they run into each other
• Fixed health bar showing permanently when running BTB-Settings
• Fixed guard killing PC when Khajiit race is selected when running BTB-Character
• Fixed HUD weapon icon showing a fist after loading a save, when a weapon is equipped
• Fixed guild rank not showing in dialogue
• Fixed flash of blue when sneaking and opening a container or the inventory
• Fixed incorrect level-up class image when using a custom class
• Fixed mis-aligned buttons on quit menu
• Fixed an NPC stuck hovering in a jumping animation
• Fixed crash when loading the Big City esm file.
• Fixed mis-aligned dialogue topic list when scrolling
• Fixed certain faction memberships not storing in saved games
• Fixed pasting text always inserting at the end of a text box, instead of at the cursor
• Fixed conversation loop when asking about “specific place” in Vivec
• Fixed Caius not leaving at the start of the “Mehra Milo and the Lost Prophecies” quest
• Fixed map markers not being saved in save games
• Fixed “ring_keley” causing exception
• Fixed open dialogues not being closed when loading a game
• Fixed some collision geometry cleanup
• Fixed a special case script instruction for the Athyn Sarethi mission
• Fixed an improper handling of a special NIF format case that caused problems with the Pluginless Khajiit Head Pack
• OpenCS: Implemented region map context menu
• OpenCS: Implemented region map drag & drop
• OpenCS: Implemented scene subview drop
• OpenCS: Implemented preview subview
• OpenCS: Implemented OGRE integration
• OpenCS: Implemented Dialogue Sub-Views
• OpenCS: Implemented lighting modes
• OpenCS: Implemented different camera navigation modes
• OpenCS: Refactored user settings
• OpenCS: Fixed failure when dropping a region into the filter of a cell subview
• OpenCS: Fixed exception when loading files

Releasing 0.30.0 is taking more time than it should, but I think you should all know what kind of problems we ran into. For one, we needed to add a hotfix for OpenCS, but that’s just a small pixel in the bigger picture – OpenMW 0.30.0 is coming!

But let’s focus on some of our heroes, such as Scrawl. His heroic fights with OpenMW bugs is truly worthy of song. There are still so many of them, but Scrawl is fierce and unrelenting and squishes dozens of them, even now.

Greye also helped out with killing some of those bugs, but he was focusing more on our Windows release. Most of these bugs were related to file path encoding. It seems we just can’t get enough testing on the Windows version done. To tell you the truth, Windows gives us some problems since most of our developers work with Linux, so the code they write might not work as well as it should on other operating systems. Fortunately, this problem with the Windows version was easy to spot, so, as you might expect, another hotfix was soon pushed to solve this issue. In fact, it wasn’t fixing the problem that was the difficult part, as it was finding the person to write the fix in the first place… until a hero came to our rescue. Thank you, Cc9cii.

Seriously, we need more testers who will reports bugs. If you always wanted to help us, but you didn’t know how – there’s your answer. So everyone who wants to help, please raise your hands! *raise hands*

Sorry, I think I missed that! Anyway – she’s back. Our lovely AI. Guards can now fight with mobs, so if you are chased by a cliffracer, you can now find refuge in the city. Come and think of it, it’s kind of funny how guards will come to your rescue against a cliffracer, but aren’t interested in fighting people who break the law in broad daylight, such the assassins of dark brotherhood…

There are still many outstanding bugs, both big and small. From time to time we are even haunted by HUGE bugs – and there’s just no escaping those! Our friendly developers have added an incredible amount of features and with those come bugs that need to be fixed, so it does make sense that they’re in there.

As I keep saying week after week, OpenMW it’s almost ready and we haven’t even seen new bugs pop up when we try to fix one of them. Now that’s pure luck. At this point you can get a good idea of how far along we are by looking at the amount of problems we have solved. So, sure – maybe the news this week is not extremely exciting but we won’t release 1.0.0 if these bugs are in there… nor even just 0.30.0 if you don’t like to look into the not too distant future.

Speaking of which, 0.30.0 still isn’t ready, but we are very close. K1ll pushed a whole bunch of corrections to his repository that fix some issues with certain Linux installations and Scrawl just smashed all records with the amount of bugfixes he delivered. Other developers have also been working hard, of course. Last week was very active, but other than bug-fixes we don’t really have much to show for it. The only bit other bit of news is that two weeks ago Zini talked about improving support for loading the game files to the editor.

And that is all for now. Just be patient and wait for release 0.30.0 – we’re so close I can almost taste it!

As you’ve heard last week, OpenMW won the honour being the Linux Games Award’s Project of the Month. Considering that we got many more votes than the competition, one can safely assume that those other games are not widely known. That is a bit of a pity, because these Awards are an interesting way to give some games that otherwise don’t get enough promotion their due recognition.

Browsing through the games, I encountered a game called Tales of Maj’Eyal. It sucks you in like quicksand so that explains the delay. Well, that and the English translator for this newspost taking her sweet time as well. [[I just spent some nice time in Belgium, thank you. – Ed.]]

But let’s get back to the topic at hand. I was a bit under the weather, but once I got better I’ve started working on OpenCS. Now you can drag game cells onto the rendering widget, including exterior cells. Region records can now also be dragged onto the map to change the cell region.

Meanwhile, Zini has been working hard on loading documents in OpenCS. We’ll have more details soon.

Work in OpenMW itself is progressing nicely as well. Scrawl has introduced some important fixes to the game’s AI. For example, otherwise friendly NPCs will now also become aggressive when you attack them and miss. And that’s just one among many fixes.

We also cleaned our cache of unnecessary links to long-forgotten libraries that we no longer use. (Audiare? I don’t even when we dumped it).

Crime and punishment in OpenMW is become more and more like Morrowind. Monsters can’t function as witnesses to your crimes anymore, for example. In the future we might introduce flags for some creatures that decide whether or not they can function as witnesses, like the daedra guards in the mage’s mansion.

And finally, for this week’s dessert, we’re rapidly approaching OpenMW 0.30.0, and it includes a huge number of bug fixes. You’re gonna like it!

Except for Sir Herrbatka’s, who started off the spring with a flu. We also sympathise with those suffering from allergies, who are now walking around with red eyes and runny noses. But despite that we still love this season, and even with all this ruckus surrounding it, we promise that we’re not going to stop development. All our top coders are still working for hours on end. We’re a veritable beehive of activity, which shows in the work that has been done.

Let’s start with bugfixes: there are a lot of them. I would’ve liked to leave it at that, but then you might feel cheated, so I have to mention at least some of our accomplishments:

– You can now loot corpses without being considered a thief.
– The time it takes to drown is no longer hardcoded.
– You can no longer repair items, recharge enchanted items or create potions in the middle of a fight.
– Any many more fixes…

This update isn’t very feature rich, but you have probably gotten used to that by now. After all, OpenMW still has a lot of bugs that need to be fixed. But that doesn’t mean it’s completely devoid of features – there’s still some news for you:

– Depending on how dark it is, NPCs might use torches.
– When NPCs are done chasing something or someone, they will now return to their default position.
– NPCs can now fight along the vertical axis, so you can no longer chug a levitation potion and pummel those poor, defenceless NPCs into oblivion.

Another good news:

Project of the Month May 2014 – Winner

The third installment of the Project of the Month is over and the game project that could collected the most votes and thus the Project of the Month May 2014 is:

OpenMW

Get the results from http://www.linuxgameawards.org

The http://www.linuxgameawards.org/supporters  Linux Game Award supporters will promote OpenMW for one Month starting 1st May.

:)