The official logo for FusionFall Retro.
FusionFall Retro (abbreviated as Retro or FFR) was an unofficial revival of the Cartoon Network MMORPG FusionFall, which was crafted and supported over the span of four years by a team of devoted fans. The game was a modified version of the original game, with new custom content added later in its life. FusionFall Retro was under the FusionFall Universe banner, which also contained FusionFall Legacy.
History
Conception
After the FusionFall Legacy live-event, the Legacy dev team were contacted by a group of people who specialized in bringing back old MMO games. These individuals were Joshsora, Kevman95, and Womayhem. They had taken an interest in FusionFall Legacy, and were concerned over how the team wanted to create a single-player version of the game first before converting it into a multiplayer game, as that would've caused problems in the future which would've resulted in much more work than was needed to achieve their goal.
Using their skills in constructing a multiplayer framework, they developed a multiplayer client which contained the original FusionFall gameworld. After witnessing their skills in action, the Legacy team partnered with them, and dubbed their client 'FusionFall Retro', which they decided to replace the Legacy demo with, since Retro's alpha state would've been playable at the same time as the Legacy demo would.
Development
In late December 2016, FusionFall Retro was officially announced to the public.
There was originally planned to be a three-day closed beta, tested by forum users who got randomly chosen to receive the special key. With the need to overhaul the game client, delaying Retro by several months, the team opted to initially publish the first four levels of the Future. However, it did not contain trading, groups, buddies, races, etc. at the time.
Official Release
A demo of the game that included the tutorial was released in the days following August 1, 2017, after database issues hampered the originally intended date.
On August 5, 2018, the Future (Sneak Peek) Area was released, along with Missions, Nanos, online play, and chat.
On September 27, 2018, the Past Area was released, making the entire original game playable.
Events and New Content
Not long after the release of the Past, the Retro dev team discovered out how to add brand new content into the game. With this discovery came many new seasonal events and permanent content updates, with entire expansion sized updates being planned in the future.
Development Hiatus
On April 6, 2020, the director of FusionFall Retro, Devan Baker, announced that due to "key members of the team no longer being able to provide the necessary resources", the game would not be receiving any more content updates for the foreseeable future. He also announced his, Dogon's, and Womayhem's departure from FusionFall Universe.
This halted development of the Time Squad Part 2 Update, and the Retro Expansion Update. This announcement caused an uproar in the community, and caused multiple users to leave the community. Retro Gamemaster Przzy clarified that FusionFall Universe was searching for new members to join the Retro team so they could be trained on how to develop the game, so the project could come out of hiatus.
DMCA Takedown
On April 16, 2020, FFU, whose Twitter account had been changed to ‘The Universe Team’, announced that Cartoon Network had filed a DMCA takedown request, which the team agreed to, leading to FusionFall Retro being shut down and FusionFall Legacy being cancelled as it was also confirmed that the team's fan projects, social media, and web services would no longer be hosted in any capacity. Numerous details about what FFU planned to include in Retro have since been shared by the organizations members.
Differences from FusionFall
FusionFall Retro used a modified electron client, built upon on the January 2010 build of the game (Before Birthday Bash).
- The Future was used as the beginning area instead of The Academy.
- Level 1 monsters dropped C.R.A.T.E.s containing attire from Character Creation as well as unused outfits.
- Only the original 36 Nanos were available.[note 1]
- NanoCom Efficiency was not present.
- Rudy, Tootie, Cootie and Judy were not present.
- Many new missions, NPC's, Items, etc. were added over time.
- The mission Time to Go is not present due to technical difficulties with the mission.
- FusionFall Adventures were not present.
- No FreshTV shows appeared, at the company's legal request.
- FusionFall Retro was not browser-based like the original game. Instead, it shared a client-based downloadable launcher with FusionFall Legacy.
- A report player feature was added so players could report users who were breaking the code of conduct.
- New emotes were added that allowed the player to sit and lay down.
- New and unused music was added.
- No Code Nanos were present.
- During the Halloween events the fusion matter meters glow effect would be orange instead of green.
Trivia
- One of the possible barker texts NPC's in the game could say was "If Sumo Slammers Online ever shuts sown, I hope the fans can bring it back."
- The New Year, New Nanos Update wasn't the final update for the game. Another smaller and backend update, which changed minor things such as Dee Dee's hair, and also resolved mechanical issues, was released unannounced.
See also
Notes
External Links
- FusionFall Retro Website (Archived)