ADOM R68 released as a Steam Beta!

As promised yesterday we released ADOM R68 (version 2.2.2, yeah!) a couple of minutes ago as a Steam Beta version. ADOM R68 has become a surprisingly intricate release. Originally we intended to fix just a few more bugs but by now we have implemented more than 50 changes in the release (bug fixes and new features).

See the changelog for details. The most important changes include:

• Performance has been greatly improved, especially on levels with many monsters. There is another batch of performance improvements coming up related to the graphical UI but these were too complex to include them in R68.
• The character generation process has been greatly improved: The back button now works correctly, some selection features (e.g. star signs) now are error-free, character generation does not hang anymore on Linux systems (a stupid curses library incompatibility with some curses versions), game customization features once more work correctly, the character creation process configuration is stored in more situations and more.
• Challenge mode once again works correctly.
• Several PC combinations have been enhanced (e.g. ratlings now have a wider range of charisma, farmers and bards start with a whistle, etc.)
• Several achievements finally work correctly (Lithium Man, Titanium Man).
• Some encounters have been made more challenging (e.g. boss monsters and doppelgangers), vile spirits have been weakened somewhat in order to enhance the fun of fighting them.
• There are more random vaults in the game.
• Magic missile once more has a nice graphic.
• A nasty crash with shifting dungeons has been fixed.
• And so much more. See the changelog for all details.

Naturally we are quite excited due to the big number of changes and hope that we didn't ruin anything  in the process of changing all this. Let us know.

In order to play ADOM R68 please use the following instructions:

• Go to your Steam games library.
• Right-click on the ADOM entry.
• Click on "Properties".
• Select the "Betas" tab.
• Select "Beta - public beta test" in the dropdown box.
• Close the dialog.
• Play.

(If you already tried ADOM R67 the update should download automatically - save files are compatible!)

If you bought prerelease access please be a little patient - as soon as we get the confirmation that no major showstoppers have been introduced we also will release R68 to the prerelease testers. Why the change in sequence? In order to be fast it seemed to be wiser with this release (which mostly contains bug fixes and very minor features) to go with the thousands of Steam players first (instead of with the hundreds of prerelease testers who are much more experienced and less sensitive to minor bugs). With the next feature release this again will be reversed as the ton of content that is under preparation will require all the experience of the prerelease testers to test it to its limits before we even would dare to confront the newer Steam audience with the next content release ;-) Thanks for your understanding!