Greetings, folks! I have several exciting updates to share today.
Firstly, i'm excited AF to announce that the original soundtrack for DR4X is set to release in a few weeks. You can wishlist it now at the following link: I've also begun work on implementing achievements into the game as well. While you might spot two hidden achievements, please note that they're still a work in progress and not yet attainable. I'm diligently working on getting captivating artwork for them.
Finally, take advantage of the ongoing Steam Summer Sale and get your copy of DR4X at a 50% discount! But if you bought during a nonsale time! Thanks for that too!
Please help spread the word and if you can please drop a review! Those actually do help a lot with the steam algorithm.
Gameplay and UI
-I've added "The Dark Realms Codex", which is currently accessible only through the main menu. Once we have an icon ready, it will also be available in-game for quick references about game mechanics such as advantage and disadvantage.
-I'm committed to enhancing your experience by continually adding new articles to the Codex that explain various game mechanics, and lore hints, hopefully reducing potential frustrations.
-Units identified as "Infantry" for hard counter bonuses now have a health bar icon similar to those for archers, cavalry, etc.
-The "crime" particle effect has been optimized for better performance.
-In an ongoing effort to improve game performance, i've made several new optimizations. Notably, i've reduced the frequency of getcomponent calls, leading to a significant FPS increase, from 40-50 to 50-60 on medium maps. Bear in mind, DR4X is a work in progress; further optimizations are coming. --Optimization is a challenging task, and I still have a long way to go before DR4X can be labeled as a "optimized" game.
-I've added links to my socials in the main menu.
-You can now also find my Discord server link in the main menu for easy access.
-I've also added a direct link to my Steam developer page in the main menu.
Bug Fixes
-The game no longer attempts to animate/shake deceased units.
-Resolved an issue where wildlife was mistakenly able to train mushroom tanks from Uncjw instead of upgrading from them.
-Addressed a kinda major oversight involving the Debauchery and Lawlessness scenario, where the crypt was erroneously required for a conventional victory.
Balancing
-?
YouTube Spotlight!
Play it and i'll probably post the video here next changelog!
Wishlist the DR4X Original Soundtrack!
The DR4X soundtrack is now available to wishlist! Please do that if ya can! Click the image above or this link! DR4X Original Soundtrack
Wishlist the DR4X Official Soundtrack!
The DR4X soundtrack is now available to wishlist! Please do that if ya can! Click the image above or this link! DR4X Official Soundtrack
DR4X Art Stream
Art ARt ART https://www.twitch.tv/natch_evil
Optimizations. DR4X Changelog #73 06/09/2023
Hey there, folks! Got a bit of an unusual timing for a changelog, you ask? Well, the thing is, I'm all set to visit my folks in Arkansas for the next week or so, and believe it or not, I'm the kind who likes to vacation without my computer. So, here I am, making sure I give you an update before I hit the road and unplug for a week!
Now, you might have picked up on something a tad different with the game lately. Feels a smidgen less clunky, right? Or in some rare cases, a tiny bit more clunky. The root of this? I rolled up my sleeves and completely rewrote the unit movement/attack/selection/cell state code to make it a whole lot more optimized - we're talking high-speed, turbocharged level here.
Sure, this revamp has brought a few minor new hiccups along for the ride - like tiles occasionally playing hard to get when they're supposed to be movable to. But on the bright side, it's ironed out several pesky bugs and made the game way faster and smoother to play now. So, I'd say it's a win overall!
None of these chnages are really "screenshottable" so nothing new in the header image of this changelog. I'm still on my tycoon ark lmao
Gameplay and UI
-Optimized all the cell grid states (when building units, when moving units,when attacking, etc)
-You can now press enter to confirm when you rename units instead of having to click "okay" with your mouse.
-Optimized enemy unit advantage/disadvantage highlight code (Without breaking things!)
-New icon for tycoon buildings
-Added a pleasing little shake animation when something is attacked that scales based on damage done
-The material i use to render units and buildings is now gpu instanced which saves like 5-6 fps in some cases
-Packed all tiles into one sprite packer (was an attempt at optimization but I may actually need to make it one giant texture and rewrite my hex cell terrain shader)
-Tweaked my asynchronous scene loading code, those should all be a tad faster now
-Added icons in more spots (places I missed last update)
Things im not sure if were in last update.
-Added gambling halls to debauchery mission
-Updated gambling hall description
Bug Fixes
-Fixed continue anyway breaking when game ends on an enemies turn.
-Fixed continue anyway "goal" text, not being set.
-Fixed bug where swapping units via the button wasn't working
-Fix bug where game weirdly slow when units selected regardles of anything
-Fixed bug where you weren't able to attack tiles that had your unit on it, but also an enemy building (only really happened with the pqv grr)
Balancing
-Nothing to report here (I did want to add some more tycoon functionality stuff but ran out of time)
YouTube Spotlight!
Play it and i'll probably post the video here next changelog!
Tycoon. DR4X Changelog #72 05/29/2023
Hey guys, I have a new release here with a bunch of new updates and improvements to the game. Thank you all for your continued support, and I hope you enjoy playing this new version.
The plumbing saga continues btw, not sure if you saw my blog post down at my website. But heres a link. The plumbing saga.
Well I have an update on that. Things actually went sorta well for once!
Insurance hasn't given me any issues, and I had the sewage cleaned by a company called servpro. They took care of everything and now im just waiting on being given the go ahead to pay the insurance company. Than servpro will send a guy down to give me an estimate for repairing all the stuff they had to take apart during cleaning (after they put the sink and toilet back in) (they had to completely strip my downstairs bathroom, pulled the toilet, sink, counter etc, because of water damage and the laminated flooring so now its like I only have one bathroom lol but they will be able to put it back together and insurance will be sending me a check for estimated repair costs. than I can choose to have it repaired or to just leave that bathroom unfinished until i renovate it sometime this year.. Though there were some things I had to take care of, for example putting the dryer vent back up in the laundry room was literally painful. Also, i had to pull the carpet in the closets adjacnet to the laundry troom and i just dowsed the floor in those (the carpet there was just inserted in it wasnt attached and the bottom is just tile) in lysol and wiped those down and dried the carpets (as they were still wet from the cleaning and i wanted to prevent mold growth in those little alcoves) and put them back in, so now after all that is done the cleaning etc, I can actually sleep downstairs again!
Of course this has been hell to deal with. But I did also manage to get some game dev done!
I worked on adding some layers of complexity to the economy management of the game (the first of many mechanical additions I want to add to make turns a bit more engaging, but I didn't get a chance to allow you to have a real impact on that underlying simulation side. I guess its nice to see numbers go up though!) as well as several bug fixes and QOL changes. I also worked on the tech system a bit to add a new kind of tech that is now dinguished from global research items and "normal" research items.
This changelog will include the stuff from the last "devlog" post I made on the 9th since i didnt bother clearing those out of my trello.
Gameplay and UI
-I've introduced new classification for technologies: Global, Local, and Basic. They are also color coded in game in their tooltip. --'Global' techs alreeady existed and function universally, meaning once researched, their effects apply to your entire faction irrespective of where the tech was researched. The 'Inquisition' tech serves as an example. These are now purple in their tooltip.
--'Basic' techs are those that, once researched in a specific building, have their effects propagate to the parent city and all buildings linked to that city. An example of this is the 'Fire Arrows' tech, which, when researched at the blacksmith, grants fire damage to all rangers originating from the city where the blacksmith is located. The newly added 'Barracks' tech, which enhances all units constructed in the associated city, also falls under this category. (This used to be the "default") (This is also why you can only research bastian boost x amount of times per city) These are cyan, as they always have been
--The new one is I've introduced 'Local' techs, which are akin to 'Basic' techs but with a more focused scope. Their effects only apply to the specific building where the tech was researched, without propagating to the parent city or any other linked buildings. And you can research them the given number of times without worrying about how many times its been researched in that city. This is all explained in the tooltip. These are orange.
-Subtle UI tweaks with the unit info screen's flag list
-Added particle effect when a cell is revealed that is like low poly clouds coming apart --Makes exploration a tad more satisfying
-Added black market unit portrait
-Gave spiderrs new Unit portrait -Cleaned up the code in general (went from like 25 compiler warnings to 3)
-Converted shared code between my unity projects into a dll, for speed and cleanliness reasons
-Made it more clear how tech works by rewording the tech tooltiop info, distinguishing them by color, and allowing you to "show more" using ctrl
-Added ability to put uints into sentry mode as described on the 9th and assigned it a hotkey
-Updated most of the techs in the game to use icons for represneting resources and combat stats instead of text, which makes things less long winded
-[NODEOSERROR]
-[NODEOSERROR]
--[NODEOSERROR] --Leads
--[NODEOSERROR] --Talk to
- Introduced the new "Business" flag, enhancing gameplay mechanics for Inns, Gambling Halls, and similar establishments by unlocking a dedicated UI panel, this is the earlier mentioned Tycoon system.
-- Implemented the concept of clientele in businesses for enhanced gold generation opportunities.
-- Businesses now operate within a framework of minimum and maximum customer counts, resource profit multipliers, and customer satisfaction levels. Weekly profit is determined by the customer count and their satisfaction level; the more customers you have, and the happier they are and the greater the multiplier, the greater the additional income generated for that turn. There are natural fluctuations in customer satisfaction, with plans to add connected buildings and upgrades to manipulate these simulation parameters. For instance, increasing max customers at your inn by adding more rooms.
--With the new UI, you can now actively monitor your business performance in real time as you progress to the next turn. (Just hit next turn with the UI up, and you will see the changes in real time)
--Performances from performance troupes at your Inn or Gambling Hall give your customer satisfaction a boost
--Customer satisfaction will gradually drift towards an 'average' level if you do not work to increase it.
In upcoming updates, it will be your task to strategize ways to enhance satisfaction levels, such as launching limited-time sales or investing in improvements like additional rooms at your Inn or building connected liquor aging cave buildings for your inn for increased profit. To cater to diverse gameplay preferences, an AI management option may also be introduced for those who prefer a less micro-intensive approach. So the AI can manage the business for you!
----Important note, I will be adding a campaign mission all about managing an inn as a way to encourage myself to add more mechanics to this system, i felt kinda weird advertising "Manage your own gambling hall" when you didnt have such minute control over it , but now there is a whole system for that.
-Global Tech descriptions are now in royal purple
-Made it so holding control will display more info on techs and hid their long descriptions until you hit control
-Did some other changes to reduce the longwidnedness of various flags, text pop ups and so on --The UI shoudl just feel a lot cleaner now in general!
Bug Fixes
-Fixed music not playing after "continue anyway" clciked
-Fixed bug where upgrading loses city link
-Fixed several bugs related to techs
Balancing
-Gave Bandits on Debauchery and Lawlessness gambling halls
YouTube Spotlight!
None this time.
Im sorry about the inconsistantness of my updates lately, I hope you udnerstand this is due to the aforementioend plumbing issues.
DR4X Art Stream
Join us or perish https://www.twitch.tv/natch_evil
Map Generation Hotfix (+Some More Stuff)
It seems that I accidentally introduced a bug affecting non-Pangea maps when I implemented the new Pangea maps feature that made them entirely snowy mountains. This issue has now been resolved.
Additionally, I've introduced a Sentry Mode Toggle for units, allowing you to exclude them permanently from the next unit rotation until you unsentry them, reducing micromanagement. (Esp useful for Pqv grr players)
I've also improved the clarity of tech functionality during research by making it clarify that all the techs can only be researched x amount of times in the settlement rather than per building, I have also enhanced the readability of tech research by replacing resource names with their respective icons.
Sorry about that lmao.
This week has been a rough one. The basement floor of my huse flooded due to a mainline backup in my laundry room. This only just got fixed yesterday. it was messed up for a whole week.
DR4X Art Stream
We be streamin art. https://www.twitch.tv/natch_evil
Empowering Your Towers. DR4X Changelog #71 04/30/2023
Hey guys, I have a new release here with a bunch of new updates and improvements to the game. Thank you all for your continued support, and I hope you enjoy playing this new version.
One of the neatest things I've added is Tower Improvements, which use the Technology system to allow you to add specialized "rooms" to towers that do various things, making towers into Swiss Army knives that can generate resources, create extra powerful guards, and so on.
Gameplay and UI
-Added the ability to toggle a "Pangea" option in the skirmish menu, which makes the generator create a single continent surrounded by water COE style
-Added a new world setting option: Pipeland which is styled more like a cartoon than a standard fantasy setting with some unique enemies that only used to very rarely spawn before and with a unique variant of the hill tile.
-Added a Barracks improvement to all towers -Added Hidden Passage improvement to Bandit towers -Added Smugglers Den improvement to all Bandit towers -Added Prospector's Quarters improvement to all Kingdom towers -Added Heralds Quarters improvement to all Kingdom towers -Added Bastion Boost improvement to all towers -Added Lookout Perch improvement to all towers -Added Cultist's Conclave improvement to all Cultist towers -Added Cultist's Sanctum improvement to all Cultist towers --Added more improvements i forgot the names of too.
-Added a "Continue Playing" button when you win that allows you to continue playing (Based on a steam forum suggestion)
Some options menu updates based on a suggestion from the discord. -Added an option to disable the phosphor (film grain) effect in the options menu -Added an option to disable the TV effect in the options menu
-Added new alcohols to alcohol generator.
Bug Fixes
-The Z coordinates of tiles are now slightly randomized in skirmishes to prevent z-fighting, this has been a bug that has existed from the start, and now its finally fixed. -Fixed an issue with buildible vairnts of towers in certain situations -Fixed an issue with tower upgrading -Fixed an issue with AI pathing (they still do some weird things sometimes but hey)
Balancing
-Hell Apes are now slightly weaker
YouTube Spotlight!
None this time.
Lastly, be prepared to see some... interesting references in Pipeland. I recently watched the new Mario movie and it was great, and let's just say it left an impression on me. But, jokes aside, I hope you enjoy the tower improvements and would love to hear your feedback!
