The game results page has a few new filters available to narrow down games. Games can now be filtered by a player’s tribe, game result. hosting, and alliances.

These new options can be found on the left side bar by expanding the section under a player name. Options to filter by player names, number of players, map, date range, and rated games (those that get points) are also available in the section.

Facebook Optimizations

For all those that have been hoping to share their victories on Facebook, the site will now show better page previews for links shared for game results, maps, forum posts, news, users, etc.

Also, be sure to Like Populous Reincarnated on Facebook where you can get updates on new features and server issues.

Help out with Hosting

From time to time, people have expressed interest in donating to Populous Reincarnated in order to help out. In the past there was no way to do easily handle the money so it couldn’t be done, but now thanks to our webhost Dreamhost, anyone can Donate directly to hosting costs through PayPal.

The latest matchmaker has a major update to the map pack system with a complete rewrite of the back end and a new method of installation. Map packs are now installed into a separate directory leaving the original Populous files untouched. This should cut down on the permission and corruption issues people have seen that require a full reinstall of Populous to fix.

There is a little bit of setup required to copy the files that is done the first run of the matchmaker. If there is ever a problem with the game not starting or issues with levels, just type !restore to recopy the files.

Map Testing

Another new feature in the update is testing of maps not in a map pack. Often map creators found that it was difficult to try out their map in a multiplayer setting to work out balance and game play issues, so this should help with that.

To test a new map, first submit the map to the website. The uploaded maps will show up on the user submitted maps page. Only maps #266 and higher can be played in the matchmaker.

In the matchmaker, enable map testing on the Populous tab in Options (all testers must do this). There will then be a new "map pack" available labeled "* Test Map" at the top of the map pack list. Click that and pick the map to play on the list for install. Only the host needs to select the map.

Ok, there isn’t actually one for reading the news, but there are around a hundred other achievements that are now unlockable. Achievements are unlocked for performing certain actions or reaching milestones. For example, the achievement "Master Assassin" is given to a player who has killed 50+ shamans in a single game, and "Part of the Tribe" is given to players with 10+ ranked games (advanced from wildman).

Once unlocked in the matchmaker, the achievement will appear listed in your profile page with the medal (Bronze, Silver or Gold) for all the world to see. A description is shown by hovering over the title.

Some that require multiple games to unlock such as "Conquerer" will only include games from now on, but others that are accumulative stats will count all previous games in the new system.

Map of the Day

A new map of the day has been added that’s visible in the daily matchmaker message. Today’s map is Devil Worlds 2: Grass Worlds - Three Cats. Any wins on the map will receive double the traditional points for the game, and the player with the most wins will be announced Player of the Day (there’s even an achievement for your bragging rights).

As most regulars will have noticed by now, the website has received a complete redesign. A big thanks to Apnea for designing the new graphics. The new design separates the website into six main categories and provides useful stats to logged in users on the left sidebar.

New Backend

In upgrading the website, a big portion was to move from the 8 year old phpBB 2 forum to the recently released (and updated) phpBB 3 software. The entire site is now integrated with this software which should provide better consistency and better working pages. As there are a lot of pages on the site, some not commonly used, there may be some missing pages that were not converted. If you see any missing or broken pages, report them to IncaWarrior so I can get those fixed up.

More pages and features will be rolled out as they are completed and tested.

New Statistics

Aside from the basics on the left side bar, there are many more statistics available. User profiles will give many nifty tidbits of information such as the player’s favorite map, Nemesis, total time played, and more.

Every map now has a page with similar information specific to the map, as well as a new league based on games just played on the level. For those that missed it on the old site, there is an interactive preview of every level that shows the land and information on any monument found in the world.

The latest matchmaker version has a few bug fixes in it (best teams show up for Yellow and Green, longer messages allowed, AutoHut is nicer, PM colors) and some changes to the way hosting is detected so hopefully there will be less false positives and more hosts.

'The Beginning' mappack has also been updated to include the most commonly used restrictions, so everyone will need to update.

Earthquakes, Tornados, Wars:

A 5.8 earthquake in the capital, tornadoes ripping up trees and houses, and of course the on going war that's lasted over 1 year and 2 months that's so far claimed the lives of over 2,551,831 brave men. It's a very dangerous world out there, so I hope everyone will keep the survivors in their thoughts as they go about their day.

The world I'm talking about is of course Pressure Point, which has in the last couple months surpassed Face Off as the most played map for the first time since records have been kept!

Populous Matchmaker 1.6.5.2 comes with support for several languages that can be changed on the Options panel. Currently available are Dutch (by Synchro), French (by Kiyana), German (by Nefarius), Portuguese (by Snak), Romainian (by Kiyana), Spanish (by Apnea), Swedish (by MentiX), and others (translators can be found on the Staff Page). If your language is not on that list and you feel like translating to it, Contact us for instructions to do so.

Updated Skin Design - Iconic

Since images don't translate as well as text, most skins will still have English buttons. The new skin Iconic solves that issue by having only icons and no text on the buttons:

Updating 1.6.5.1:

For those of you that were helping test version 1.6.5.1 - please run the Matchmaker Installer as auto update is disabled in that version.