It's great that we now have the "test" server and we are able to see some of the stuff that's being worked on, but since we now have the "test" server, should we expect to not see any actual "public" updates any time soon? And that all we'll get is beta updates to the test server? It would be nice, if the hive ai is working or is in final stages, were added to the "public" server, even if we can't get the leviathan in as well.

Also, how is the mission generater coming, I thought that it was farther along then the leviathan? Can we test some of it's functions on the "test" server now as well? Or, if finished enough, actually get it added to the "public" server?

Umm. The mission editor isn't for US. It's for the devs. It's possible that we might get some subset of it at some point, but we're not going to get it.

even the guides?, then I TOTALLY misunderstood what all the fuss was about, I though we were going to be able to generate mission concepts as well. Oh well =(

But as far as the hive ai goes, can we get a public update of any of that concept?

I think their close enough to perfecting the Levy, that they'll just release it with the Hive.

me thinks.

We fully intend to get the Hive out to the main server *really* soon. We only opened the test server because we felt bad about telling you it would come out "this week" two weeks in a row. The last few days we've been working on making the rule system (upon which the hive is built) synchronize with our database, so that it will keep it's state when we need to restart the server, and I'm pretty sure that's completely working as of tonight. The Leviathan will probably be slightly different (better) when we put it on the production server, but it won't "wiggle" yet, as that involves writing an in-game, inverse-kinematics system and an exporter for 3dsMax. In the short term, we'll be working on low level tactics so that things like leading bots away from the leviathan don't work. (This will also make trader's escorts work properly.)
A *lot* of what we've been doing in creating the hive isn't visible in its currently rather simple behavior. Rather, it is a new method of creating such behaviors so that we can do more in less time. I don't want to over-promise and under-deliver, of course, but you can expect a lot more visible progress in the near future than you've seen in the last few months.
And, by the way, the mission editor is *already* available to the guides and they can *already* make missions with it. The missions can be saved, but not currently deployed. There is still some work to be done on turning the missions into actual code, but that will also be coming *Soon*!

Does this mean the guides will be writing storyline missions?

I like all the guides we have and I trust them, but what about continuity? What about consistent themes?