Digiverse

Digiverse is a massively multiplayer sandbox survival game released for PC, Playstation 5, and Xbox Series X/S. Developed by a small independent studio, Eta Realms, Digiverse quickly became a fam favorite for its massive open world, unique looter shooter system, and soft visual style. Set in a digital universe that spans a procedurally generated planet the size of earth. Digiverse offers players nearly endless opportunities to explore, craft, and fight in a world that is constantly growing and evolving.

Story
Since Digiverse was designed is a sandbox survival game, there is no specific storyline for the player to follow. The game was built without NPCs or dialogue, and instead uses an in-game task assignment system to build and reward players for performing tasks. Over the course of the game's life, players have developed their own stories centered around the game's numerous guilds, similar to the community of Eve Online. Some of the lore has been derived from hidden easter egg messages with in the game's 20 limited fast travel hubs.

Gameplay
Digiverse is a sandbox survival game with universal open PvP. Players explore the vast game world over 20 unique biomes, called "lands", to gather resources, craft weapons and tools, build permanent structure, and control territory to survive. The unique looter shooter system rewards players for collecting rare items from the environment. These game rare items are also required for level and tier advancement, forcing a player to choose between obtaining stronger equipment, or level progression. The game has a deep crafting system split among multiple professions, where player combine material during a variety of minigames, to create new items. With open PvP, players must be prepared to defend themselves against other player who may try to steal their resources from unprotected territory, or attack player conurbations.

Release Controversy
Despite its initial hype, Digiverse's release was met with mixed reception from players and critics alike. Many were disappointed by the game's lack of a narrative structure, and the limited amount of non-"main game loop" content available at launch. Some players also experienced technical issues, primarily on the console versions, which prevented them from fully enjoying the game as was intended.

Instead of abandoning the game, the community rallied together to catalogue and voice their concerns, providing feedback to the developers. Eta Realms small team responded by releasing several updates within the first month of release, that addressed many of the player concerns, and added vital new features to the game; the most impactful of them being the player task creation engine. With the introduction of this questing system, an dynamic dungeon instancing mechanic, and expanded depth of crafting minigames; perception of the game turned around quickly.

A few months after release, Digiverse began to attract a dedicated following of players joining after the holiday season. Reviews of the game showed players appreciated the game's open-ended gameplay, its sense of exploration, and unique loot upgrade, and character leveling system. This helped differentiate it from other MMOs on the market.

Today, Digiverse has a thriving community of players who continue to explore and populate the game world, contributing to its ongoing development. Eta Realms as been praised for their willingness to listen to player feedback, and reliably, and expediently, improve the game based on suggestions. Digiverse currently has over 100,000 average daily users. Eth Realms has said they are committed, due to release sales, to maintain the game for at least the next 20 years.

Release Strategy
Digiverse was developed mostly in secret by a small team of experienced developers at Eta Realms. The studio was founded by a group of veteran game developers who wanted to create a game that emphasized exploration and player agency, utilizing procedural generation in a novel way.

Despite its ambitious scope, the developers kept a low profile during a majority of the game's development, and only released a small preview trailer, which ultimately lead to it's poor reception on release. The studio's social media accounts were also space, with only occasional updates on the game's progress.

When it came time to release the game, Eta Realms decided to take a unique approach. Instead of announcing a release date far in advance, and allowing players to preorder the game. The studio quietly released released the game with only three weeks notice, during a suprise E3 press conference. During the conference, instead of a scripted demonstation of the game, the presenter took the risk of calling a random member of the audience to the stage to play the game live.

This surprised many players, and created a sense of excitement and mystery around the game. The release strategy paid off, as Digiverse quickly gained a dedicated following of players who apricated the game's unique features, despite it's rocky release state. The lack of hype marketing allowed the game to be judged on its own merits, rather than being judged against unrealistic expectations. However, it was seemed that on initial release, even those were not meet.

Crafting
Digiverse features an extensive crafting system, with 12 different crafting skills to master. Players use these skills to create a wide range of items; from weapons and armor; to tools, decor, structures, and decorations. Each skill has its own set of recipes and materials required to create items.

To craft an item, players must be the necessary materials and access to the appropriate crafting station. For example to create wooded flooring, the player needs access to a log and a carpentry station. The station is then supplied with tools of varied quality. Each of the 12 crafting skills has 4 tools which need to be present at the station to begin crafting. Once the materials, tools, and crafting station are available, the player can begin the crafting process.

Crafting in Digiverse involved a series of minigames that require skill and precision to complete. Each crafting skill has its own unique minigame that players must master to create the highest quality items. These minigames involve actions such as hammering, sawing, and shaping materials with precision timing and accuracy.

As players advance in their crafting skills, they can create more complex and powerful items, and the minigames become easier to complete. Some items require rare and hard-to-find materials that can only be obtained through exploration and combat. The crafting system rewards players for their prowess by allowing them to create more powerful and rare equipment and tools.

Crafting is an essential part of Digiverse's gameplay, and player who master the crafting system have a significant advantage over those who do not. An economy has developed within Digiverse between trusting players with the skill to play the minigames and craft items, and players looking for the high quality equipment from the resulting crafts.

Blacksmithing
The player traces patterns over a metal ingot using the mouse based and rates the player based on accuracy and timing. For example, a sword blade requires precise movements to shape the tip and edges correctly.

Carpentry
The carpentry minigame involves players sawing or planing back and forth quickly. The player has to avoid hitting knots and voids in the wood which causes tools to stick or slow. As well as inspecting which side of a piece of wood to process, as heart side and bark side differ.

Coppersmithing
This minigame involves the player using a hammer to shape processed copper by clicking on hotspots that appear on the screen. The player is able to anticipate the next hotspot and click at the right time, based on waves that travel across part being processed, to create the desired shape.

Farming
Players tend to crops and fields using the mouse and keyboard to perform different actions such as planting seeds, watering plants, and harvesting crops. Rhythmic well timed motions speed the rate at which crops are harvested, which differs based on which crops is harvested, and various environmental conditions.

Fishing
Fishing had players use the mouse and keyboard to control the position, direction, and force of a rod to reed in fish. The player needs to time their movements and directions to avoid losing the fish or breaking the line. Which requires the line to be restrung, replaced, or recrafted.

Glassblowing
The glassblowing minigame involves players shaping a blob of molten class, by blowing into a virtual glassblowing pipe. The game rates based on hold duration, release timing, and an alarm which resets when the player rolls their mouse wheel.

Horticulture
In the horticulture game, players care for plants by pruning, fertilizing and mixing soil, and spraying for pests. This minigame presents different real time challenges such as infestation of insects, and recognizing disease. Failure to inspect, and prune crops correctly can cause them damage.

Husbandry
For this skill, players care for and breed animals. They perform different actions such as feeding, grooming, healthcare maintenance, and mating. Each animal has to be sourced the correct tool, and caretaken in a specific way. At any time an animal can react and interfere with any process.

Leatherworking
During leatherworking, the player shapes a leather hide by clicking and dragging across lines that appear on screen. The player is expected to keep on the paths displayed to process the material correctly.

Masonry
Players shape stone by choosing which part to remove on the screen. Cracks in stone are procedurally placed. Based on the tools used and force applied to strikes, specific items, shapes, and yields are produced.

Mining
Mining has players use a pickaxe to extract ore by striking at ores or stones. The accurate locations to strike are dependent on where the ore intersects with the faced rock. Players then need to haul wheelbarrows and carts over land, while maintaining their balance.

Pottery
Using a pottery wheel, players shape a lump of clay by moving their mouse into the pottery wall, different levels of force accessible by keyboard. The player has to push at the right time, force, and for in correct direction to match a known recipe. Based on the accuracy, a quality is determined which determined the chance at which the firing process can fail.