Wow! It is already May! I hope everyone is having a good year so far! Apologies for having such a long period between announcements. I have intended to post something for over two months but am only now managing to force myself to do so. In this post I want to give an update on Crea and as well as details on why this current Crea update is still in development.
Crea Development
Just to get it out there: yes, the Crea 1.6 update is still being worked on. I am still figuring out exactly what it will have and when it will be released. I will tease that a big new feature has been completed for it which will delight those who like to build. There are many other things I would love to do in 1.6 so I ask for your patience for a bit longer. It is also worth noting that I am once again the sole developer on Crea. The artist, Jonatan, did great work for Crea but after wetting his appetite for indie gamedev he wanted to work on his own projects for awhile. I hope to work with him again in the future!
Development Delays
So why is this update taking so long? Well, to be honest, it is because I have hardly worked on it. I started last year working as hard as I could go and kept at it for a solid 7 months working incredibly hard. Kelley (former Crea artist and wife) and I decided to travel to Stockholm for 6 weeks (August-September) with our daughter. Here is a picture of us taking a day trip to Skansen, an open-air museum.
Afterwards we decided to move back to California and once there I found myself in a not so great place. In the past I have kept up the facade that everything is great even when they're not. I decided to stop that and instead share the struggles in hopes that it may help others and maybe in the future it will help me too.
After the 5+ years of working on Crea I was extremely burned out. I had suffered from minor burnout during development but nothing close to this. My desire to do any game development entirely dissipated. With my productivity gone I felt aimless and empty which resulted in me becoming depressed. Occasionally, I would struggle in an attempt to be productive but my motivation was at an all time low and my attempts where fruitless. I retreated into an old MMO with my brothers which lasted until the end of February when my brothers' grew bored of the game. At that point I was forced out of my routine and fortunately I discovered my motivation was renewed and productivity slowly returned. This is certainly not the best way to handle this situation but I think talking about it is a good step in the right direction.
Since the end of February I have been very busy with Crea and several side projects. For awhile I was juggling them and then I decided to finish these side projects first. That way they can be completed finally and I would be able to focus 100% on Crea once more. Another week or two and I should be back on Crea fulltime.
Hexachain
One of these projects is Hexachain, a mobile zen puzzle game about connecting hexes together and then destroying the hex chain. I started this project a few years ago with a friend and we have really wanted to finish it. It is now in beta testing and if you are interested you can sign up with the link associated to your device OS:
Another project I have been working on for awhile now is becoming a homeowner. We decided to buy a new construction home which we have been working on getting since coming back from Sweden. It is finally nearing completion and we should be moved in by the end of May. Here is a sneak peak at the future home of Siege Games!
Loves
Thank you everyone for your amazing support and patience. The last half year has been tough for me but things are looking up and I'm exited for the second half of this year!
Update v1.6 News
Hello, I hope everyone is doing well! I wanted to give everyone an update on the progress for the next big update (1.6). While it is developing nicely; it still needs awhile longer in the oven to fully bake. So what is planned for the 1.6 update?
Currently in beta, I am bringing much better unicode support to Crea and making it vastly easier to translate with the Localizer tool. This will hopefully lead to more languages added to Crea soon!
The main course for the update is enhanced dungeons. "Lackluster" and "anticlimactic" would be good words to describe the current dungeon system.
The dungeon modifiers and objectives will be balanced and expanded upon. Other aspects such as treasure will be rebalanced and most importantly bosses will be added to the end of dungeons.
Thank you for your continued support! Happy holidays!
Patch, Pricing and Progress
Hello everyone! I just wanted to give a quick update on a few things.
1.5.5 Patch
I just released a small patch that fixes a few issues around using mods.
Resolved issue with activating a mod for an existing world without first selecting it which resulted in putting the world content information into a bad state that causes it to crash on load
Fixed issue with some mods using old craft categories
Attempt to resolve Xbox One controllers misbehaving
Pricing Availability
Several countries had their pricing updated by Steam and this caused Crea to become unavailable int hose countries. I have submitted new prices and am awaiting Steam's approval. I unfortunately do not know when this will happen but keep checking back. Steam updated the pricing!
Update Progress
The next update is in progress and while I'll hold off on exact details I will tease that friend's of the dungeoneer will be pleased! I am hoping to get this update out before Christmas.
Localizing Crea
From the very beginning I planned for Crea to support multiple languages. My hopes were that the community would help localize Crea and I have not been let down. There are numerous attempts to translate it including Russian, French, Japanese and Chinese to name a few. However, as Crea continued to grow these existing localizations struggled to keep up as it is extremely difficult to know what text had been added, removed, or changed. This is finally changing!
Localization Tool
I have been working on better localization support since the last update and am ready to share what I've come up with. I have created a tool inside Crea called "Localizer" which allows you to filter, edit and preview localization entries. It will also version your entry and let you know when it is outdated making it easy to keep your localization up to date.
While editing there is a live preview which reflects what it will look like in-game including the styling and line length.
Localizing Crea
My hope is to bring official localizations to Crea with the community's help. If you would like to help contribute then you should reply to this forum post letting everyone know so that we can work together. I am considering putting together an official github repository of the localizations for everyone to view and make push requests to (submissions).
I have released an update to the beta branch which has the Localizer. I have not done much testing on the game outside of the Localizer. I have also updated the creating localizations documentation so be sure to check that out on getting started.
Housewarming Update (v1.5) Now Available!
Greetings adventurers! It has been awhile since we spoke last and I'm excited to bring good news - Housewarming (v1.5) is now available!
In Housewarming the focus has been on improving building and adding an incentive to construct a base. You will also find many new home items and several new monsters to fend off.
NPC Housing
After learning how resourceful adventurers are the NPCs immediately started making requests. Now they want their own room and will even request items to furnish it. Upon completing these requests they will give you various bonuses through their services such as a discount. Get to building!
Building Upgrades
With the focus on building this update I wanted to make the experience easier and more enjoyable. A placement grid has been added so you can easily see how things line up while building. Speaking of lining things up, item placement will now snap to the grid (this can be turned off in the settings). Grass is also automatically replaced when attempting to build on it.
More Item and Monsters
Tons of new building related items have been added such as fences, scaffolding and stone furniture. Build away but be wary for there are new creatures lurking about. Most of these will be familiar as they are variations of existing monsters but be careful for their attacks do vary. Oh and be watchful for monsters sense have been heightened and will gravitate towards players now.
More!
Several other changes and bug fixes have been made as well. You can view the 1.5 changelog here.
Moving Forward
To squelch any concerns, I will be continuing Crea development for the forseeable furture. I will be attempting to balance working on Crea as well as this new secret project I started with Jonatan. During this time updates will be a little slower than before but please still look forward to them. Thank you for your continued support!
Update and Sweden
Greetings Adventurers! Time has flown by since the last announcement and I wanted to update everyone on what is going on.
First off, the NPC update has sadly been delayed due to real life taking over. Unfortunately it is going to be another two months before I will be able to release it. Sorry! I will try to get a smaller patch out in the meantime to fix any major issues. Apologies for not being around for the few weeks to reply. I'm going to try to be better at balancing that.
Over the last few weeks I have been busy selling many of my possessions, packing up my apartment, and moving everything into storage 600 miles south of Portland in Northern California. This is all with Kelley's help and baby Kaelie... not so much help. Since arriving in California we've been visiting family and friends this last week and now we are off on a big adventure - to Sweden!
For those keen readers you may remember that the talented Crea artist, Jonatan, is in Sweden. I am going to visit him and we will be starting a new project! That's right, after five and a half years working on Crea I am finally going to be working on something else. We are going to be working on a prototype at first and go from there. My plan is to focus on this new project while in Sweden and once I get back to the States in 6 weeks get back to working on Crea part time. We are excited to be starting something new and I believe that once I return to Crea it will be with a restored vigor.
Again, sorry for the tease on announcing the next update and then delaying it for so long. I hope everyone is still looking forward to it when it does finally land.
Thank you everyone for your continued support!
NPC Housing Progress
Hello everyone! First off I want to say thank you for everyone's support the last few weeks. Many people stopped by my livestream to tell me how much they have been enjoying Crea and lots of great reviews. It really means a lot to us!
I wanted to give everyone a quick update on the NPC housing and the next update for Crea. Good progress has been made on the housing with full room detection including which items are in the room. The big remaining task is getting the NPC to get the various bonuses from the items they request.
Originally I was wanting to get this update out last week but that did not happen for various reasons. One of those reasons being that I unfortunately have to move by the end of the month. Towards the end of the month and after I'm going to be quite busy. The plan is to release the 1.5 update a little before that happens which is not far off. Because of this the NPC update will just be rolled into the 1.5 update.
Along with the 1.5 update I'm going to do my best to address the reported issues. Thank you everyone for your patience and support!
Housing, Leveling and Customizations
Since "The Enchanted" 1.4 update was released I have been hard at work fixing issues and incorporating feedback. Thanks to this feedback there are some huge changes coming into Crea!
Enchanting Enchantments
Enchantments were introduced in 1.4 and players quickly took to hoarding them. Players needed something to do with this plethora of enchantments on hand. Now you can enchant enchantments!
When enchanting an enchantment you can replace individual attributes on an enchantment with a random attribute from another enchantment. This isn't free though. It consumes the latter enchantment and costs some of your hard earned Auri.
Level Progression
The monster levels in the world regions have been static but we're experimenting with changing that. A new world option "monster levels" can now be set to "progression". This lowers the levels on the surface of the world some and when you defeat a boss the lower level regions increase.
This change helps keep the world relevant and more engaging as you progress. It also allows us to make that change with lowering the initial levels. I am leaving the "static" option as the default for now and am looking to hear your feedback. If it is good then I hope to make "progression" be the new default. Note that existing worlds are unaffected as they are already "static".
Bonus! You can now increase a region's level by releasing contained chaos in it. Take care!
Character Customizations
Customizing your character before starting off on your huge adventure together is undeniably important. The more options the better! Now you can customize your characters face and there are new shirt and pants options. This is just the first pass on expanding character customizations so definitely let us know what you'd like to see!
Housing
Building in Crea has always been done by the player's own volition. That is about to change! This week I will be working on adding in some incentives to build a base. The first and simpler one is that monsters will be a bit more aggressive in general and even more so at night.
The second and honestly more exciting change is that NPC will begin to request having their own rooms. Give them their own space and then they'll start asking for some stuff to fill it. As you fullfill the NPC requests you'll start getting bonuses from them. Such as the merchant may request a Auri Register and once fullfilled prices may be cheaper or new items made available. We are just beginning to work on this so if you have any suggestions then definitely make them known either below in the comments, on the discord server or on my devstreams.
Changes Since 1.4
Enchanting enchantments is now possible
New head and clothing character customizations
World levels progression introduced
Improved water monster movement logic
Map markers now face the direction the item is facing
Prevent the player from changing gear while active doing something
Added "Auto Toolbar" option to automatically switch the active toolbar when changing mode and weapon loadouts
Greatly reduced "Hulk" health
Made Slam and Sky Sword skills not usable in water
Better interactions with Lorumite Column
Level 3 remna now drop from level 40+ monsters (was 50+)
Warden armor is now based off of max stamina
Support spells such as healing now target allies even if your cursor is not exactly on top of them
More clay and soot in worlds now
Added Sano Idol with healing bonuses
Show which Aer the player is channeling as a status effect
Made enchanting a bit cheaper
Resolved issue with being able to use another weapon while a bow is drawn
Resolved many multiplayer issues caused by having more than two clients connected
Resolved issue where craft UI would get into a weird state if interacting with a crafting station while the craft UI is open
Resolved issue with enchantments not being synced to client properly
Resolved several issues with enchanter NPC in multiplayer
Resolved issue with water and lava not rendering on the client properly
Resolved issue with monsters teleporting to the end of a grappler
Resolved issue with Firestorm, Sandstorm and Snowstorm not working properly
Resolved issue with an expanded inventory getting into a bad state when interacting with an item notification
Resolved issue with bosses being invisible on multiplayer
Resolved issue with other players being invisible in multiplayer
Resolved issue with renaming chests and Way Crystals in multiplayer
Resolved issue with water not rendering properly in multiplayer
Resolved issue with shield facing the wrong way in multiplayer while on backhand
Resolved crash in multiplayer when joining a game where a character has a storm effect active
Resolved crash in multiplayer while trying to show monster info
Resolved issue with popup notifications not showing in multiplayer
Resolved issue causing chaos craft tutorial to show up repeatedly in multiplayer
Resolved issue with Weapons and Tools power not saving properly
Resolved issue with lower level Beam spell not chaining
Resolved issue with combo keyboard bindings not saving properly
Resolved performance issue with foliage system gradually causing extreme lag
Fixed pagoda shingles from slowly moving from original position
Resolved issue with Impeen Wand not charging correctly
Resolved a few issues with Silvan Anomaly
Resolved issue with bad loot dropping from apex monster causing a constant fountain of items to pour out of its remains
Resolved issue that allowed bosses to be fought repeatedly without leaving the realm
Fix issue with purify anomaly spawning monsters
No longer able to grab bosses and paragons with a grappler
Focus now works with elemental weapons
Do not show "Flip Item" help text for already placed items
Focus controller input only when the Start button is pressed
Fixed ResistStatusEffectAttribute on tooltips
Fixed Corium Shield icon
Fixed Precision Striker graphics
Crea Community
Hello! With "The Enchanted" just released now is a great time to try to join and help build Crea's community.
Thanks for the Support!
Before I get into the juicy details I first wanted to say thank you to all of the recent kind words and encouragement - it means a great deal to us! I also want to thank those who have taken the time to post reviews. I read every single one and not only do I (usually) get great feedback from them but it also helps us and Crea out more than you would think.
Join the Community
We would love to have more players involved in any and every way possible. Here are a few!
In order for the community to grow we need to help new players. This includes replying to questions on the forums and discord. An even better way is to expand the Official Wiki.
There is much to do on the wiki and we need all the help we can get. If you have dozens of hours or just started your first play through you can help contribute. The goal with the wiki is to provide answers to whatever questions players may have. How do you get refined items? How do you unlock the first boss? How can I move water?
If you want to help out but not sure how to contribute to the wiki then feel free to join the discord channel and ask for help. Myself or many other awesome community members would happily help you!
Thank you to anyone that does help out in any way!
Enjoying Crea?
If you're enjoying Crea then I hope you consider joining the community and sticking around.
"The Enchanted" (v1.4) Update Released
The Enchanted
I'm excited to announce that the latest update for Crea, The Enchanted (v1.4), is now out! With this update comes equipment enchantments, equipment redesign, huge combat changes, new content, visual enhancements, and much more!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AM73HgcKKoU
Enchantments
Enchant equipment while crafting or later through the new Enchanter NPC to customize your equipment however you like. Enchantments are scattered throughout Crea and offer a wide range of attributes allowing for countless possibilities.
Equipment Redesign
There were many changes made to equipment to better support enchanting. Equipment no longer requires upgrading and accessories are no longer split up into many levels. Earlier gear level requirements were lowered, high level bows scaled back and many more changes.
Honing Combat
Attack combos are now immediately available to characters as well as being able to move with shields and bows. Even more impactful is that monsters are now staggered briefly when hit making attack combos even more important. Blocking attacks with a shields consumes much less stamina and you can even regenerate stamina while holding a shield up. Additionally all skills cast times, cooldowns, and stamina usage have been significantly reduced to help make combat a bit more engaging.
OMG! Content
A brand new biome was added, the mangrove, which is named after the amazing trees you'll find there. An entire family of slimes have also moved into Crea and can be found throughout it. The number of shields have nearly been doubled giving many more options and higher level shields. There are also some new higher level treasure chests to loot not to mention their expanded inventory space!
Visual Enhancements
A new graphics setting, "Beautiful", was added which brings bloom and illumination to Crea making certain items pop. This feature is a bit intensive so if you're running into performance issues definitely try the "Fast" option.
We've also spent some time making visual improvements to many other things such as water splashes and bouncing loot.
Much More
We are always taking player feedback and this update is packed with it. We have once more reworked the toolbar giving players even more power in a simpler design.
Speaking of power, new characters are now able to ledge grab from the get go and place ground blocks on top of backwall blocks. More prominent notifications are displayed when unlocking bosses and the effects for defeating the bosses for the first time.
This list goes on and on and you can check it out along with all of the other changes and bug fixes we made in the full 1.4 changelog.
Moving Forward
I will continue to focus on fixing issues for v1.4 meanwhile Jonatan has already begun work on the next update (v1.5). In it you can look forward to better character customizations, dungeon improvements and whatever else we get our hands on.
