Hello,
we’re happy’re happy to release VCMI 0.8. During last three months we’ve prepared several important features:

• support for hot-seat mode. It’s still somewhat preliminary but should be functional.
• victory and loss conditions. It’s finally possible to win or lose game (though counting points and Hall of Fame are not implemented yet). This feature, together with hot-seat, makes VCMI 0.8 first playable (to some degree) build.
• compound artifacts can be assembled and disassembled.
• Kingdom Overview window has been implemented. It has several variants, adjusted to different game resolutions.
• Grail and related functionalities: Obelisks, Puzzle Map, Digging, Constructing the ultimate building.

There are also minor features (as usual: “more everything”).
We have also done a lot of bugfixes - about 70 issues have been resolved. Please check the changelog below and bugtracker for the list.

Check items implementation status for the full information about which map objects, town structures, skills, spells, artifacts, creature abilities and victory conditions are supported.

Download link: forum.vcmi.eu/dload.php?action=download&id=16 (3.8MB, ZIP Archive)

If you downloaded the package before this message (02 Mar, 21:26 CET), please redownload it and overwrite all files. A few critical bugs were found and resolved. Sorry for trouble.

Installation:
Extract the package into your main Heroes folder.
WoG 3.58f is required. We strongly recommend using English version.
If your game is in another language, you can extract this package into Data/ subfolder - that will make your H3 installation English.
If you have older version of VCMI, you have to overwrite it.

Save format has been changed, savegames from previous versions won’t work with 0.8.

VCMI supports 800x600, 1024x600, 1024x768, 1280x960, 1280x1024, 1440x900, 1600x1200, 1336x768 (new!) and 1680x1080 (new!) screen resolutions. To use custom resolution, type (before starting the actual game!) in the console “resolution” and pick appropriate one. Alternatively, you can change default resolution by the editing config/settings.txt file.

Acknowledgements:
Many thanks for all testers and developers who contributed to this build.

For the general information about our project look here. Our project isn’t really playable now, but it gives you an idea of progress we have made so far. We’re hoping that you’ll like it.

Since VCMI 0.74 we have deployed separate bugtracker. Please report bugs using this form. Check this page for list of known bugs and details.

We hope you’ll help us develop the project - details are available here. VCMI is an open source project licensed on GNU GPL 2.0 or higher. Our SVN repository with all the sources is available here.
You can look for help in building and developing VCMI sources in the development board.

CHANGELOG
0.75 -> 0.8 (Mar 01 2010)
GENERAL:

• Victory and loss conditions are supported. It’s now possible to win or lose the game.
• Implemented assembling and disassembling of combination artifacts.
• Kingdom Overview screen is now available.
• Implemented Grail (puzzle map, digging, constructing ultimate building)
• Replaced TTF fonts with original ones.

ADVENTURE MAP:

• Implemented rivers animations (thx to GrayFace).

BATTLES:

• Fire Shield spell (and creature ability) supported
• affecting morale/luck and casting spell after attack creature abilities supported

HERO:

• Implementation of Scholar secondary skill

TOWN:

• New left-bottom info panel functionalities.

TOWNS:

• new town structures supported:

• Ballista Yard
• Blood Obelisk
• Brimstone Clouds
• Dwarven Treasury
• Fountain of Fortune
• Glyphs of Fear
• Mystic Pond
• Thieves Guild
• Special Grail functionalities for Dungeon, Stronghold and Fortress

OBJECTS:
New objects supported:

• Border gate
• Den of Thieves
• Lighthouse
• Obelisk
• Quest Guard
• Seer hut

A lot of of various bugfixes and improvements:
bugs.vcmi.eu/changelog_page.php?version_id=14

Full changelog is available here.

VCMI Team

Woohoo! Hotseat!
You guys are awesome.

Shouldn’t combined artifacts will now be marked as implemented in 0.8?

great job!!

ps. i would like to make a donation, is that possible?

download link doesnt work ?

See here for info about donations: [forum.vcmi.eu/t/donations/207/1) (currently we don’t accept donating money)

Yes, it doesn’t. There is a serious bug in battles in that version (I’ve already fixed it but Tow must rebuild the source and upload the new package).

On the positive side, I just managed to complete an 8-player test map in HotSeat mode (controlling 2 players): I first defeated the 6 computer players, then had the 2 I was controlling fight each other. So it’s good to know the two new functionalities implemented: HotSeat & Victory Conditions (at least the “Deafeat all enemies”) work pretty well and don’t conflict each other.

The bug mentioned above however seems to impact the battles at Creature Banks, so it can be pretty annoying in enjoying a standard map. Unfortunately Tow won’t be available to rebuild the package until later this evening, so we thank everyone for their patience until then.

Package has been replaced. I did also a few trivial fixes for grail issues - hope they’ll work.
I’m sorry for the delay - recompiling the package was really the first thing I did after returning home. Blame my university.

Thank you for your patience!

[size=67]That whole “making releases” thing will kill me someday…[/size]

For me it’s crashing at map start (I’m trying to start the VCMI_Tests map attached to Mantis #392 report).

I’ll try to figure out why, otherwise I’ll just report with the .dmp file in Mantis (as I seem to have reached my attachment limit over here).

[size=134]EDIT:[/size] No worries, it was a one-time crash (at my first attempt to test the new version). I can’t reproduce it though. I’ll create a report on Mantis nevertheless. Sorry for the false alarm.

I just (finally!) extracted 0.8 package and the bug is still here. Game freezes just after I do first move in battle :? The same is true after rebuilding the whole with latest revisions.

BTW, how about updating sourceforge files?

Which bug are you talking about?

I’ve uploaded VCMI 0.8 to sourceforge.

You mean it’s not the bug with former 0.8 release? Then I should report it.

The critical battle bugs are indeed fixed (they were easily reproducible before, while now it’s not possible anymore). So you must have a different bug.