Hi all! I’m the developer of Harling, a fantasy MMORPG I’ve been building on my own. It runs natively on Linux: the launcher comes as a .deb for Ubuntu and Debian and as an AppImage for every other distro, and once installed it keeps the game updated by itself.
The world is Orand, a continent of 58 regions (these tests will focus on just one of them) where four ancient Labyrinths are starting to give way. There are six classes (Knight, Mage, Archer, Barbarian, Monk, Assassin), group dungeons and voice chat with the players around you.
Harling is in an early stage of development and still in testing, so not everything works well yet: expect bugs, balance that needs adjusting, graphics to improve and more. I’m looking for testers who enjoy playing and telling me what works and what doesn’t. Spots are limited and invites go out in small waves. The server is in Europe, so the ping is best from here.
Sign up here: https://playharling.com/#partecipa
I’ll be in the comments for any question, Linux ones especially. Thanks for reading!
Edit (Oct 12): in-game screenshots, only cropped to hide the HUD.
Update (Oct 16): a first gameplay video is up: https://youtu.be/DPfqgG2HInQ
Passing off AI-generated images as concept art is certainly a choice.
Solo dev running an MMORPG? Does this use science based dragon breeding?
Domain registered 2 weeks ago. Hm.
Well… Yeah? Doesn’t say anything about how long this has been in development for, could’ve just waited until they were ready before buying a domain.
Lemmy user, 1h ago. Hm.
Username is for the project, so again, just waited until they were ready.
Fam why you excusing them. Let them answer.
Hi Pomal, I bought the domain when I started putting things online, and the realm went up at the same time. The Lemmy account was made for this project. The game itself had been in development for about 4 months before any of that (it started as an experiment and grew day by day). Any other mysteries I can clear up? 😄
What degree of LLM use are you kicking for development and design decisions?
I use it a lot for writing code, creating shaders and textures, and getting inspiration for the settings. But all generated content gets analysed and rebuilt over and over until it’s something I consider acceptable for where the game is right now (just to give an idea of what the process looks like). Game design decisions are mine: AI can help refine the mechanics, but I decide what kind of game it should be, and of course I “borrow” mechanics from the games I love :)
To what extent was AI used to make this game?
What do you mean? I don’t think a human was involved at all
As I mentioned in my comment above, AI was used throughout development, both for writing code and as support for the art direction. I’m not an artist :) and the “concept art” shared on the website is the base used to develop some of the places in the game. Today it’s standard practice to use AI extensively at every level of software development, from solo devs to large studios. It still doesn’t make a game on its own (not yet at least XD): there have been months of design, manual adjustments, testing and fixing behind this one, and that’s exactly the part where I’m looking for help.
Hi all, dev here. First, sorry for the silence yesterday: I posted and then wasn’t around, and on a brand new account that looks exactly as bad as you say. Most of the criticism here is fair, so here are straight answers.
Who I am and what this post is for. I’m GianLuca, an independent developer from Italy, not a studio. Harling has been in development for several months and will need many more. I wasn’t looking for players yet: I was looking for people who’d enjoy helping with testing and development at a very early stage. I should have said that more clearly.
AI. Yes. AI has been used throughout the process, both to support the art direction and to write the code. I should have said it up front, and calling AI images “concept art” on the site was a poor choice.
Real screenshots. Six in-game screenshots, only cropped to hide the HUD: https://cecchigl.itch.io/harling
Privacy, terms, contact. You’re right, they’re missing, and I’m adding them to the site. Until then the contact is info@playharling.com, and if you made an account and want it gone, write there and I’ll delete it with its data.
What the launcher connects to. game.playharling.com (game files and updates) and realm.playharling.com (login and game server). Voice chat uses Cloudflare’s STUN server. Nothing else.
Money. It’s free, there’s nothing to buy, and no crypto or NFT of any kind.
If you’d rather wait until the legal pages are up and there’s more to see, that’s completely reasonable. Thanks to those who actually tried it and reported what they found.
I honestly prefer dog shit art over AI slop because it’s actually art that someone took the time to create, not some amalgamation of theft.
Slay the Spire is an excellent example of having shit concept art, after a certain point you can toggle it on over the final polished art. It’s amazing, I love it, and I wish more games would do that.
