Greetings everyone! The Twitch VOD of John showcasing character creation and the Town Square has been uploaded to the Identity YouTube!

Good Eve gents and gals, I want to bring to light a common issue i have seen in games that are offering content for real life currency. Its good to have, but one thing i noticed is that, it could lead to people actually not playing the game to its full potential. Lets be honest here. If i paid for a luxury apartment and not actually grind for one, i would look like a scrub. Its like putting cheat codes in GTA and getting free money / apartments / guns etc. You get my point. I think the paid cosmetics is a bit to early to advertise. I would have liked to see a different way to fund development costs. However, i am a bit understanding of the business move. I think people will get bored if the top looking apartments were bought with real money and not earned in game from hard labor. My goal obviously here is to make a lot of money. I want to experience that feeling of reward when you buy an expensive apartment. Are these apartments going to give an edge in comparison to people having regular apartments? Hopefully @Beach_Ball could answer this. Now, mind you that i understand the funding that this will bring. However, i am not convinced that its effective. Sorry, our opinions are different on the matters. You see, i want the pure enjoyment of finally being able to walk in that smooth upscale apartment after a long grind. Please, don't forget the feeling when you spent the last 3 weeks of your life grinding for an apartment. Finally you get that dopamine rush to your brain of rewarding accomplishment as you walk in it for the first time. Bravo! Anyone remember such nostalgic feeling that we experienced in games like GTA V, WoW , etc ???? I Do. I hope i still can feel such rewarding feeling. *Drops $400 on the game.... I feel like a scrub. What are your thoughts?

Crowdfunding, Kick Starter, Early Access, Backer, Founder, Etc. Have a certain expectation level that comes with them if you so chose to engage in the process. Many negative Nancy's here seem to ignore that fact, or simply make up their own expectation level when they themselves feel that progression is slow or communication is lax from the developers and studio. If you so chose to engage in said process, you should really follow the the studio and developer announcements early on, as I did and many of you did. Once you feel comfortable with the proposed product and feel reasonably satisfied with what the vision of the end result is, then and only then should you be reaching in your pocket. For some that's the first day for others that is three years down the road. I followed the prospect of Identity for almost three years before I reached into my pocket or even made forum account for that matter. Either way, if you don't go into this with the attitude and mindset that you just threw your money on red number 7 on the roulette table, then you have set yourself up for disappointment. The fact is, these projects are a gamble and if you chose to partake, You own it, it's all on you.

No, pledged apartments will have different unique layouts from non-pledged apartments. The layouts won't be "better" or larger than their ingame counterparts, they will just be different.

I think it would really interesting to add economic functionality to the game, Where the government has objectives to achieve like, Economic growth, low unemployment, stable prices, balanced budgets, low state debt etc. These kind of achievements will make elected people more accountable and can work well for building a political environment on the island. The Governor and any elected representatives could have the power/ability to do things such as; Setting Budgets By calculating the government revenue, they can then change spending on current policies or create new policies. An example could be a spending scheme for unemployment benefits, where the governor can propose changes to the spending. This would make political campaigns more interesting I think. Taxes Taxes could be introduced or removed by political figures, i.e. Income tax, Corporation tax, Property Tax etc. where the governor can propose changes to these levels and introduce new ones in order to maybe balance the budget. Interest rates By maybe having a central bank on the island, where a committee votes every few weeks to change the islands interest rate can make a more dynamic economy as it will change how much money people will save or spend in their bank accounts, making people potentially better off or worse, making in-game loans more expensive or cheaper... just change things up. Housing Projects Following the idea of budgeting, I think if the governor can allocate money for new housing projects or for expanding the town square etc. I think it would work for people looking to buy new houses or flats. These are just a few ideas that I had, wondering what people think or whether you have any additional ideas to this one! Thanks

I understand what you mean, however if the people vote them in they will be able to vote them out again, if they raise taxes to high levels. I do think tho that there should be a maximum tax threshold that the government can do... like maybe 80%? Plus I think economic crisis would make the server extremely entertaining and interesting.

This would work, as long as the taxes weren't chosen by the governor. I believe the allocation and division of funds are necessary for a realistic political environment, but I believe taxes should be set by the game. For example, if a Communist party takes power in a server and decides to place a 100% tax rate on businesses, what would happen? To my knowledge, players are not allowed to transfer character information (wealth/career/etc) from server to server, so tax-choosing would lead to an economic crisis.

With the political aspects of the game not yet fully thought of, these are definitely great ideas!

Best one I found so far is Arma 3 Role Play https://arma3roleplay.org/forums/index.php?/topic/2-community-start-up-manual/ easy to join and growing community

You are right. It is our choice to invest, but why do you think that means we can't be annoyed when our expectations aren't met? You have every right to cancel dinner plans with your wife, that doesn't mean she cannot be annoyed at you for it. This is what you need to get into your head, no one is saying Asylum have committed any crimes. No one is saying that Asylum HAVE to listen to us. We chose to invest in a project, and if we aren't happy with the way that project is going, we can be annoyed at that. You are ignorant to blatant facts, which is that the developers of this game have failed on many levels, and while we understood this could happen coming in, that doesn't mean we have to just bend over and take it. We can voice that we are incredibly frustrated. The developers agree with me! Here is a quote directly from beachball to me in private messages. Look, I am not getting into another debate here. I'm not attacking the developers, I am not personally attacking you, I am just tired of the people who think that because we were aware of the risks coming in and chose to back anyway, that automatically means we cannot be annoyed when expectations aren't met.

More likely my money went into someones crack pipe.

I'm not being negative, I'm being realist. Even the die hard fans have said that until this game is completely DONE (not just the running around simulator which is Town Square) is going to take a couple of years and will come around in 2020-2021. This is the problem with you, you just label everyone that aren't blindly happy and hyped as being negative and shit when I'm just stating facts.

Don't worry about it, it won't show in your library for 5 more years. (or maybe 3-4 years if we're lucky)

This is normal sir, the game is not out yet, but will be "very soon"!

We're getting close! You can now connect your Steam account to your Identity game account and obtain your Identity game Steam key. This key will add Identity to your library so that when Identity is released, you can download it and start playing immediately without having to do anything else. To get your key, login on the main site (NOT THESE FORUMS) at www.IdentityRPG.com. You can then go to the Account tab of your profile where you'll see an option to link your Steam account. You must have BETA ACCESS on your account to claim a key! ATTENTION! You can only attach one steam account to one game account, and it's permanent. Be sure you're logged into your game account which has the items you've purchased before attaching a Steam account! While you won't get Identity in your game library just yet, you will very soon. Handing out the keys like this allows us to reduce load on our servers. We currently have 20,000 keys in the system and we'll be adding more.

Ramping up It's been busy as usual here at the Asylum office! For the past few weeks, we've had our testers running through all of the systems in the Town Square and a whole lot of progress has been made toward release. They've done an awesome job in finding the remaining bugs, and our team's been doing an equally awesome job in squashing them. As you likely noticed when following the Dev Tracker on our website, we're down to the testing stages on one remaining task. We've been working on this one for a while as there were a couple significant bugs encountered. These bugs were deep in the engine and were show-stoppers. Fortunately, we've recently defeated them and put them behind us. We're now knocking out the remaining minor issues being found by our testers and things are looking great. With the new website online (more on this below) we're soon going to be handing out Steam keys for those with access to the Town Square. This doesn't mean you can play just yet, but we're getting close enough that we're going to be bringing you on board in preperation. If you're wondering how it's going to work, it's really pretty simple. Once we launch this feature shortly, you're going to be able to log into your game account on our website. You'll then see the option to link your existing Steam account. Once you've linked your account, you'll be given a key which, when entered into the Steam client, will add Identity's Town Square to your game library. You won't need to log in to play, as we know who you are based on your Steam account. I'd recommend following us on social media (Twitter and Facebook especially) to watch for this coming announcement. Gangs and Warfare We're changing the Identity Insider format! Instead of larger insiders once in a long while, we're going to be sending out more frequent updates. We're talking a few each month! These Insider updates will paint a detailed picture of Identity's full gameplay experiences. To kick this off, we posted the following update on our new website just yesterday: Identity Drug Cartel Concepts (click image for more) You've made stacks of cash pushing drugs and the odd robbery, but when push comes to shove, you'll find strength in numbers. A gang is a group of ruffians with the goal of obtaining power and infamy through the domination of those around them. Gangs are often at war with one another as they compete for limited resources, whether it's turf, drugs or blood. There's no shortage of criminal activity in the world outside of gangs, but true power belongs to the syndicates and cartels with the strength and fortitude to rule over their rivals. Comradery Identity is all about working together with your friends, and gangs are the social structure geared towards crime. You can belong to only one gang at any time, so choose where your loyalty lies. Your gang has a full rank structure and the leaders can control access levels for each member based on that rank. As your gang grows, it can also unlock additional perks for all members. The gang leadership can designate any home owned in the world as the HQ, giving access to all members of the gang. Hang out with your gangmates and stockpile weapons, drugs and anything else you can get your hands on. Your HQ, like your personal homes, can also be used for respawning on death. This makes it an important rally point when *#!% hits the fan! Cartels Cartels are conflict areas which are controlled by one gang at any time, providing the owners with control over trade and traffiking of their related substance throughout all the land. To the victor goes the spoils. The cartel zone is a functional HQ for the current owners. Turf Identity Turf Neighborhood Concept Take control of city neighborhoods with gang turf zones. While cartels control substances across the world of Identity, the gangs who dominate a neighborhood have direct influence over criminal organizations in that area, such as drug dealers. Lookouts in the area will spot rival gangs in the streets of your turf and text message members of your gang in the area. Controlling gangs get access to a safe house in the area, tightening their hold. Warfare Dominate gangs who cross your path and prove your strength. Declare war on your rivals and hunt them down. Gang members who are at war are completely vulnerable to one another through the stress system, and so you need to be on the lookout at all times. Prey on your enemies until they submit to your demands. When declaring war on another gang, the other gang must accept the spoils set by the agressor. The spoils can include cash, turf, real-estate and more. When one side has had enough and ends the war, they forfeit those spoils to the stronger gang. In Identity, most items people carry can be taken if they're killed. What's theirs, is yours. War is hell. New website is finally here! The Identity website has had an overhaul to prepare for the Town Square release and Steam integrations. The new website brings all kinds of cool new features, mostly for the game account systems and the Identity shop! We're also going to be filling up the About page with all sorts of new information from the Insider releases. Now that the website has a true and proper shop, you can now get your hands on cool new items without having to buy entire packages. The shop now has all kinds of exclusive items, including apartment pets! You'll be able to get your hands on friendly critters for your home in-game as well, although those featured on the shop are only available there. Some of these items are only available for a limited time. Some of the new items include: Custom T-Shirt Graphic - Upload an image which can be placed on T-Shirts you create in-game! Each image can be used on 10 shirts. Vanity License Plate - Show your style with a custom license plate, visible on your in-game vehicle. Vanity Phone Number - Want a number that's easy to remember? Get a vanity phone number for yourself or your business. More Apartment Floorplans - Floor plans which haven't been available since Kickstarter, including the enormous Penthouse. Huge Clothing Packages - Clothing packages including clothes with dozens of original brands. Pets! Cats, dogs and more - Pets currently available include sphynx and tabby cats as well as pugs, maltese and the shiba inu (doge?). Another important note: when the new payment options (aside from PayPal) go live, we'll shortly after be removing all of the old packages. We will at this time never again be selling cash, so there's not much time remaining to get starter cash before Identity goes live. This is not something we plan to sell again in the future, but all who have it in their account will be able to claim that cash once on each server. Visit the New Identity Site Now! The Twitch Clips If you've been following Identity's development closely, you probably already know that developers stream their work live on the Identity Twitch channel every Tuesday and Thursday. We also use that time to answer almost every question that gets asked about Identity's development and gameplay. Now that we've been doing this a while, we've answered a lot of questions. Our awesome community manager, BeachBall, has taken the time to compile a massive list of questions linked to clips where they're answered by a developer. Get comfy and head over to the Twitch Clips Directory forum thread. If you haven't found this already, be prepared to spend a good bit of time listening to all sorts of awesome information. This is the best place to get to know the fine details Identity! -- John VanderZwet

It'll be at least 8 years for the negative nancies among you, and a few months for the rest of us.