Category: Ramen VR

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Kickstarter Funded MMO Zenith to Release a Pre-Alpha Very Soon

Last year indie dev team Ramen VR launched a highly successful Kickstarter to crowdfund an MMORPG called Zenith. Now the studio has announced that an early pre-alpha is on the way later this month for founders who backed the initial campaign.

Zenith

The pre-alpha will be made available eligible backers on 21st March 2020, supporting Oculus Rift/Rift S, to begin with. As development continues more headsets will be added to the roster, with Steam VR and Oculus Quest planned for later. All the funding tiers from $35 USD and above are included in this pre-alpha. As this is a very early build Ramen VR does stress that many of the core features are still missing but it does still offer the first fully playable loop of Zenith.

Lauren Frazier, co-founder of Ramen VR notes in the video below that account creation won’t feature (that’ll come later) so players will be given pre-created characters. Also, the servers will only run at the weekends, with the pre-Alpha held for at least a month, possibly longer. There will be three environments for players to explore, the main Zenith city itself, a dungeon/cave type location and a larger grassland area.

A cyberpunk style VR MMORPG inspired by anime and JRPG classics, Zenith is an ambitious project to create a living, breathing world which players can explore, go on adventures with others, fight enemies and craft items. Players will be able to pick and customise their character and class to suit their gameplay style, all with full-body avatars – no floating heads.

Zenith

The brainchild of Frazier and fellow co-founder Andy Tsen, who met during the Oculus Launch Pad program in 2017, they were only looking to raise $25,000 from the Kickstarter but went on to hit $280,075 from 3,415 backers instead. This allowed them to hit several stretch goals for even more content.

Ramen VR will be releasing further updates on Zenith over the course of March for those unable to access the pre-alpha. In the Kickstarter the team estimated a launch would take place in August 2020 so the pre-alpha should be a good indication of how things are progressing. VRFocus will continue its coverage of Zenith, reporting back with the latest updates.

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VR MMO Zenith Surpassese $200K In Kickstarter Funding, Over 800% Of Target Amount

Zenith is an upcoming VR MMORPG from the developers of Conjure Strike that features a distinct anime-style aesthetic and touts action-focused combat inspired by Beat Saber.

The Kickstarter still has about two weeks left to go but it’s already earned over $200,000 reaching more than 800% of its targeted $25,000 goal between over 2,300 backers. That’s a lot.

Watch The Kickstarter Trailer for Zenith:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGXs-R7gUXo

The original $25,000 goal was extremely low and I frankly had trouble believing an MMO even remotely like the one they were promising would be possible on that sort of budget — even if they have additional outside funding. But 10x that amount? Now you’ve got my attention.

Since Zenith surged through the original target in just four hours it has gone on to surpass six of its seven planned stretch goals, including: in-game familiars, a ‘Ramen Review livestream by the develoeprs’ player vendors for selling goods, player housing customization, transmogs for visual customizatoin, and a new playable race. The only stretch goal left at the $250,000 mark is a level editor.

Zenith is ambitiously targeting not only PC VR headsets like Rift, Vive, and Index, but PSVR and Oculus Quest as well and it will also be playable on non-VR PC setups. Plus, they’re planning for fully compatible cross-play between all devices and PC at once, similar to OrbusVR, VRChat, and Rec Room.

As exciting and epic as Zenith sounds, I will stress that this is a Kickstarter which means that not only is the game ever actually getting released guaranteed, but the core developers are relatively untested generally speaking since they’ve never shipped a game together of this scale and they’re a very small team. That being said, I’m pretty optimistic.

Currently the “Estimated Delivery” date is August 2020, but I’ve followed enough Kickstarters to know that probably actually means alpha by that date and maybe a full launch or wide Early Access release on PC by Spring 2021 if I had to guess.

Let us know what you think down in the comments below!

The post VR MMO Zenith Surpassese $200K In Kickstarter Funding, Over 800% Of Target Amount appeared first on UploadVR.

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VRMMO ‘Zenith’ Kickstarter Pushes Past $200,000 in Funding with 2 Weeks Left

Ramen VR, a new indie studio, launched a Kickstarter recently to help fund an ambitious new MMO called Zenith, a game currently being built for both VR and desktop users.

Update (September 11th, 2019): Zenith has officially topped over $200k, now boasting over $211,000. With 15 days left in the campaign, the studio has announced the completion of their latest stretch goal, which will introduce a new race to the game called ‘The Minkeo’. You can check out the latest updates to the Kickstarter here.

The original article announcing Zenith follows below:

Original Article (August 27th, 2019): At the time of this writing, the Kickstarter project has secured over $170,500, a far cry from the original $25,000 funding goal proposed when the project launched two weeks ago. There’s still 30 days left until the project comes to a close, with the next stretch goal coming at the $200,000 mark—the promise of more than one playable race at launch.

Zenith is said to head into Early Access sometime in August 2020.

Although the fledgling studio hasn’t publicly shown much in the way of gameplay, the team, which is made up of developers who previously worked on VR multiplayer shooter Conjure Strike, has managed to attract a fair bit of attention in the venture capital space for their efforts, having now secured additional Y Combinator funding of a reported $134,400, according to Crunch Base.

This puts the team’s overall funds to over $300,000 currently, which admittedly pales in comparison to standard MMOs built for PC, which can span into the tens of millions in development dollars. Very few VR games have had the luxury of those sorts of funds, so it will be interesting to see what the team can do on the shoestring budget, or if they’ll be able to attract more VC cash along the way.

Billed as a cyberpunk-themed MMO put into VR, the team says they’ve been inspired by a number of works of fiction including games like Final Fantasy, Chrono Trigger, Nier: Automata, anime like Sword Art Online and Castle in the Sky, and books such as Snow Crash, Ready Player One, and Rainbow’s End.

“These worlds were integral parts of our lives but it always felt like we were seeing those worlds through a small window. We’re building Zenith because we want to you to experience living in these worlds,” Ramen VR says.

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To bring the game to life, the studio is collaborating with Improbable, the makers behind the cloud platform SpatialOS. This, the studio says, will make it “much easier to build an MMORPG,” and that it will allow them to build a world with “real physics, complex AI, and a landscape that evolves and is shaped by players and NPCs alike.”

Since the studio was founded earlier this year, Ramen VR says they’ve already built seven prototypes of the game, and have been running user playtests with their Discord community for over a month.

Zenith is targeting release on Oculus Rift, Oculus Quest, HTC Vive, Valve Index, PSVR and desktop PC. The studio maintains all versions of the game will include cross-play.

The post VRMMO ‘Zenith’ Kickstarter Pushes Past $200,000 in Funding with 2 Weeks Left appeared first on Road to VR.

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VR Kickstarter Zenith Popularity Continues to Grow, Hits 625% Funding Level and Counting

There has been a lot of Kickstarter success for virtual reality (VR) compatible projects in 2019 such as the FeelReal VR Mask, Woojer’s haptic vests, and Ramen VR’s current project Zenith. Today, the studio has announced that Zenith has achieved 625 percent of its funding target whilst revealing the seventh and final stretch goal.

Zenith

With the Kickstarter campaign Ramen VR looked to raise an initial $25,000 USD and easily achieved that within several hours. It’s been so successful that Zenith has managed to raise just over $167,000 with a month still to go. This has enabled the campaign to hit five of its seven stretch goals adding more features. Up until now, the final stretch goal was kept secret. If the campaign manages to hit $250,000, then a Zenith Level Editor will be unlocked, allowing the Zenith community to create and publish their own custom levels for the platform.

“We’re overwhelmed by the support our backers and community as we work together as co-creators to realize our shared vision for a cross-platform VR and PC living anime world,” said Andy Tsen, co-founder of Ramen VR in a statement. “Lauren and I, along with our small team of indie bandits look forward to continuing our development journey with everyone who has been so kind and supportive… to everyone, we say we will see you in Zenith soon!”

Zenith is a cyberpunk style VR MMORPG inspired by anime and JRPG classics. Designed as a dynamic living world with cross-play between VR headsets such as Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, Valve Index and PlayStation VR as well as PC in mind, the project will offer players the chance to fight, craft, and explore massive open locations. The team promises advanced AI ensuring monsters will dodge, hide, and hunt in lifelike ways, while players will gain abilities to pull earth shields out of the ground or suck creatures in with gravity wells.

Zenith KS Infographic“Thank you and wow, is all I can say,” adds Lauren Frazier, co-founder of Ramen VR. “We wanted to involve our community and share Zenith’s progress early on, so with the voracious reception we’ve seen from backers, we’re able to do so which we’re beyond thrilled and humbled.”

With such a grand project in mind, Ramen VR is looking at a summer 2020 launch for Zenith. Funding goals currently start from $29 for those interested. VRFocus will continue its coverage of Zenith as the Kickstarter continues, reporting back with the latest updates.

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Cyberpunk VR MMORPG Zenith Hits Kickstarter Goal in 4 Hours

At present there aren’t many MMORPG’s for virtual reality (VR) headsets, the most well known of the bunch being  OrbusVR: Reborn. That’s not going to last long, however, thanks to several titles on the horizon. NetEase’s Nostos is on its way while role-playing game (RPG) specialist inXile Entertainment seems to be adding a multiplayer aspect to its next VR experience. Adding to this troop is a cyberpunk VR MMORPG called Zenith, which recently launched (and funded) a Kickstarter crowd-funding campaign.

Zenith

Zenith is the brainchild of indie studio Ramen VR, inspired by anime and JRPG classics. Powered by SpatialOS, a platform designed around the creation of large and dynamic open worlds, the team aim to make Zenith a dynamic living world with cross-play between VR headsets such as Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, Valve Index and PlayStation VR as well as PC. Players will be able to fight, craft, and explore this fantastical world, forging alliances and friendships in guilds and parties as they go.

The initial funding goal was fairly low, set at $25,000 USD. This was easily achieved within four hours and now the campaign sits at just under $50,000 (at time of writing). This success has already seen a couple of funding goals hit, with plenty of time to aim for the rest.

“Zenith is our passion project, as we want to share the dream of a living anime world that players can experience on VR and PC without limitations,” said Lauren Frazier, co-founder of Ramen VR in a statement. “We invite RPG fans to join us on our journey and imagine their lives as legendary anime heroes!”

Zenith

With over a month still to go until the campaign ends, interested backers can pledge $29 (£24 GBP) to support the project, with that tier gaining them a digital copy of Zenith when it arrives. Going a little further up, for $35 (£29) backers will get early access to the closed alpha. Currently, Ramen VR expects to launch Zenith in August 2020.

“We view our backers and our community as co-creators with us,” said Andy Tsen, co-founder of Ramen VR. “We believe the more support we raise from Kickstarter backers who believe in the game, the more we’ll be able to realize the vision we all share.”

VRFocus will continue its coverage of Zenith as the Kickstarter progresses, reporting back with the latest updates.

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Cyberpunk VR MMO Zenith Launches And Passes Kickstarter In No Time

People sure do want a VR MMO; Zenith found success on Kickstarter in no time.

We’ve been following this cyberpunk MMO, developed by Ramen VR, for the past few months. Yesterday, it launched its Kickstarter with a modest $25,000 goal. At the time of writing it’s more than doubled that with $54,525 pledged from 453 backers. The campaign has another 44 days to do, so expect the total go be far higher than that by the end.

The team is making some lofty promises for the game. CEO Andy Tsen says it will eventually support ‘millions’ of players.

“We fundamentally believe that the more money we can raise from people that will actually play the game, the more we can stay true to the artistic vision,” he says in the campaign video. The clip also shows much more footage from the game, which boasts a vibrant anime art style. It’s come some way in the past two months, but it remains to be seen how the Beat Saber-inspired combat will shape up.

Interested in taking part? A $29 pledge will get you day-one access to Zenith, expected in August 2020. A limited $35 tier, meanwhile, will net you access to closed alpha testing. Tiers go all the way up to an eye-watering $9,999, which offers a day building the game at the studio and a chance to appear in the game as an avatar among other things.

With the main goal down, the developer is moving onto stretch goals. In fact, it’s already passed targets for adding familiars and player vendor stalls to the game. Next up is a $100,000 tier for player housing.

Zenith is aiming to launch on Oculus Rift and SteamVR compatible headsets. A PSVR version is in the works too. The game will also feature a non-VR version.

The post Cyberpunk VR MMO Zenith Launches And Passes Kickstarter In No Time appeared first on UploadVR.

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New Anime-Style VR MMO ‘Zenith’ Will Feature Beat Saber-Style Combat

New Anime-Style VR MMO ‘Zenith’ Will Feature Beat Saber-Style Combat

Zenith is a brand-new upcoming VR MMO from two developers that co-founded Ramen VR after working on the Overwatch-like VR shooter, Conjure Strike, together. Reportedly, the game will feature a bold anime art style and looks like a mixture of a futuristic/sci-fi cities and post-apocalyptic environments judging from the concept art above and embedded below:

We first learned about the game from a feature on Forbes, revealing it in an interview with the Ramen VR co-founders. Zenith sounds incredibly ambitious, to put it lightly. OrbusVR is the only real VR MMO on the market right now and while it does an admirable job transplanting the traditional MMO concept to a VR perspective, it’s far from emulating the likes of Sword Art Online. It sounds like Zenith is planned to be somewhere in the middle, moving the needle a little further.

One interesting note is that, supposedly, they’re planning to use rhythm-based and gesture-based moves for melee combat, which they’ve specifically cited as taking inspiration from Beat Saber. How that will work in an MMO setup exactly is unknown.

Nostos is another upcoming game that comes to mind, although it won’t be an MMO but is instead just an RPG with online functionality. It certainly sports a similar anime-infused art style.

There is not currently a set date for Zenith. However, the team intends to release the game on Rift, Vive, Index, PSVR, and Quest. Let us know what you think in the comments down below!

Disclosure: Charles Singletary, the Forbes contributor that revealed Zenith, is also an occasional contributor at UploadVR and sent us the story as a tip.

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