To all who celebrates - 🎃🎃Happy Halloween 🎃🎃- to all others - Hello! 🤓
Again this year the community tips in with event specific stuff. I would loved to have done some Halloween content for the game, but I simply haven't had the time as all my game dev time goes into making multiplayer happen. https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1079260/view/3732980645401630422
So once again guanaco0403 saves the day with an updated version of his Halloween mod! Combine that with firework mods from Amnestey and you are in for a good time!
Release notes
--> BIG UPDATE <-- - Changed 90% of the models to low poly to match to the game style - Added A LOT of details (easter eggs, haunted things,...) - Added Scary Events (just move around the map and you will see, they are totaly random ) - Added interactions (can see some npc speak, player can trigger some little events,...) - Added animated NPC's (they are funny) - Added brand new smoke (A looot less laggy and better than before) - Fixed a lot of things **NOTE: this update only applies to the Town map, ranch isnt updated yet !!!**
You simply find the mod in the in-game workshop. To make it easier to find you can filter mods to only see Halloween mods or search for "Halloween".
With the mod installed you will now have some detailed spooky decorations when you go into the Town or Ranch map.
You can always disable the mod or unsubscribe if you want the scary decorations to go away again.
If you run into trouble with this mod or the game in general, remember you can always ask for help in the Community section here on Steam or in my Discord. Either I or someone else from the community (most likely Keltusar :P) will help you out.
Its been another month and time for an update from the developer - aka me :)
As mentioned previously in Developer News I'm working on changing some fundamental things in the game, related directly or indirectly to multiplayer. https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1079260/view/3660917344836649708
Disclaimer: Keep in mind that I am here talking about things I am working on at the moment. You won't have access to these until the next open beta + they might have changed before we get to that. Just want to make that clear, so you do not expect to see this in the game right now.
Server list
Originally it was my idea that Fireworks Mania in multiplayer would be a game you played only with friends and people you knew, why I started out with just having a JoinCode as you might remember from the public alpha. However, I got a lot of feedback from the community on this topic. Many players wanted to play with friends of cause, but also play with other random people from the community.
Therefore I have this month started adding a "Server list" into the game.
It's still very work-in-progress but it works and I must admit it adds a lot more to the game than I was expecting as it feels more "alive" now that you can see and join others (if they decided to play public of cause. Making private games will be possible too, just haven't implemented that as of writing).
Continue on UI overhaul
Not a lot to say other than the work continues on improving the UI. UI isn't what I'm best at, so its trial and error to find what feels right. I'll let the gifs below show the current state.
Alternative tool selection
Not all I'm doing is directly related to multiplayer, like the new "Toolbar/Tool selection" feature I implemented during a live stream previously this week. At the end of this live stream I show off some multiplayer gameplay too if you are interested.
Over the years I have gotten feedback that some would like to have a more "standard" way to switch the tools. With the number 1-5 on the keyboard, as it's done in many other games. While developing this on the live stream there were already feedback that people liked the possibility to use the numbers to switch, however, not all wanted more UI on the screen. It is not implemented yet, but later on I plan to make some more settings so you have more control over what UI elements you actually want on the screen. Like permanently hiding Toolstips, the new toolbar in the bottom etc. However, it will be a bit later.
Faster mod loading
A very common feedback I'm getting is that the game loads too slow. In general that's not really the case as if you play the standard game with no mods, the game loads very fast. However, players do have a point when it comes to having 200+ mods installed because that can be pretty slow with loading time of many minutes.
I think part of the reason players are "complaining" about the load times is because community mods is a official support and build-in feature that is super easy to use in Fireworks Mania - which is kind of a new'ish thing.
Not too many years back modding a game was something the community did without any help or support from the developers. The community thereby needed to "hack" their way to modding a game. This also mend that using mods in game were something that only more advanced players were doing and it was hard to get working, so when the game loaded slower due to the fact that it needed to load in a lot more stuff that is was part of the game, players understood why and were just happy when it finally worked.
In Fireworks Mania this is much simpler and easier to do. You go to the Workshop, subscribe to some stuff you find interesting and start a game. In general it just works, of cause as always with community generated stuff, not all works and I can't fix everything, but in general mods are of a very high quality in Fireworks Mania - because the mod creators are awesome :D
As a little example of their awesomeness, I can inform that the base game have around 70 pieces of fireworks. The modding community have added around 2000'ish! That's a ton of work from the modding community that the entire Fireworks Mania community benefits from - which is also why I'm trying all I can to make it as easy for both mod creators and players to create and use mods in the game.
The downside of this being so easy in Fireworks Mania is that players might forgot, or for good reason don't know, that they are adding extra external stuff to the game that needs to be downloaded, loaded into memory and progress by the game when it loads a map.
I'll see what I can do in the future to make this a bit more obvious.
Oh, and by the way, I cut the mod loading time in half in this new version of the game :)
Next public multiplayer beta announcement soon!
I hear you. Almost daily I see on the Discord, YouTube, DMs etc. you guys asking for when you can try out multiplayer. I'll be posting an announcement about that sometimes over the next weeks - so keep an eye here on Steam!
And by the way, please appreciate the screenshot at the top - it was almost impossible to get people to lineup for a photoshoot!
Its been another month and time for an update from the developer - aka me :)
As mentioned in the last months Developer News I'm working on changing some fundamental things in the game, related directly or indirectly to multiplayer. https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1079260/view/3660917344836649708
Disclaimer: Keep in mind that I am here talking about things I am working on at the moment. You won't have access to these until the next open beta + they might have changed before we get to that. Just want to make that clear, so you do not expect to see this in the game right now.
More build-in characters and improved animations
In the last Developer News I showed that I added some default characters in the game, with some questionable animations. However, I have added a bit more "build in" characters and improved the animations now.
Custom characters via mods
If the build-in characters isn't enough, I have also added the possibility for mod creators to create custom characters.
UI Overhaul
As you might have seen in my latest live streams I am working on a totally new UI for the game. As the game evolved with features the UI also need to follow along.
Until now I have been able to tweak the current UI to work "ok" with the previous additions to the game. However, with multiplayer there is a need for many more UI components, views etc.
It might change 1000 times before you get to try it, but this is how it looks right now.
That is some of the things I am working on currently.
Its been another month and time for an update from the developer - aka me :)
This past month I have started one various very big changes to the game. The main focus is of cause still to add multiplayer - however there are a bunch related things that I'm currently working on.
Keep in mind that I am here talking about things I am working on at the moment. You won't have access to these until the next open beta + they might have changed before we get to that. Just want to make that clear, so you do not expect to see this in the game right now.
Upgrade to Unity 2022 LTS
For players this might be a bit of a boring thing, however, for the game long term, its a big deal. From my experience in previous projects, I know it's very important to try and keep up with Unity versions as much as possible. If you first get too far behind, it can be a nightmare to get back up to speed, resulting in the game never getting to latest Unity version.
So why is it important to be on the latest version of Unity?
Unity keeps developing their game engine. This means both features, stability and performance. So by staying up to get the game get a lot of stuff for free and it gives various possibilities to do new thing via new features in Unity.
So will you as a player feel this upgrade right a way...maybe or maybe not. I haven't done any measurements, but it "feels" a bit faster in terms of load times.
However, what you will feel is a "side-effect" up this upgrade, as I had to change the "Player controller".
New Player Controller
The Player Controller in the game, is essential the logic that determines how the player character behaves and move around when you press a button or move the mouse. The one I am currently using in the game (as of August 2023) is the same old Unity "Standard" one that I have been using from day one of the game.
As you know, it have worked fairly well and done a good job so far. However, there have all along been some major downside with it, essentially that it was very hard to customize and make changes to.
For instance, this is the reason there are currently no "Crouch" function in the game, no fly-mode etc. Its not that it wasn't possible, but it was unnecessarily complicated to get it to work, so I noted to myself to replace sometime in the future.
The time is now - because upgrading to Unity 2022 LTS broke the old Player Controller. Well, I could maybe have gotten it to work, but as it was one the todo to replace anyway, I decided that now was the time.
It's how to explain, but the player "feels" a bit different to control now, for the better if you ask me, but there might be a bit of getting use to the new feeling.
When that said, this new Player Controller makes it a lot easier for me to add various new features, like Crouching, 3rd person (we get to that next), players being affected by explosions so you are actually pushed back or into the air, if the explosion is powerful enough, multiplayer footsteps etc.
This is for sure something you will feel - so you can look forward to that in the future.
Animated player characters
(YouTube link to above short video) One of the extra challenges of adding multiplayer, is that you can now see each other. As you might know, so far I have added some fancy glasses and hats to the default white "bean". That has been working fine so far, but in the long run the bean might be a bit too boring.
Therefore, I have now started looking into adding more real characters with animations etc. Also as part of the new Player Controller, I am working on adding 3rd person perspective, as I will now have to have animated characters anyway, so you might as well be able to play like that. Not 100% sure if it's something that I will keep, depends on if it ends up good enough, but my tests so far is going really great.
None of the above is done, it is all work in progress and not always working as expected as you can see...
This Developer News comes a bit late this month, as its summer and vacation time. Hope you have had/are having, a nice relaxing vacation :)
July was a really interesting month as we had the first public alpha testing of multiplayer! https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1079260/view/3671043467012058494
Such a huge milestone! A lot of you participated and thank you for that.
I did a fun little livestream that ended up with me playing with around 20+ of the viewers in a game. I didn't except that to be possible at this point. To be fair, it wasn't without issues but hey, it wouldn't have been an alpha if all was working.
So what happens now?
Now the public alpha is closed and I'm going a bit more silent again, to try and focus on further improve the game, both with bug fixes, but even more with big changes and features.
### Added - Added "Unsub from all mods", "Activate all mods" and "Deactivate all mods" buttons to the Collection tab on the Workshop. A very requested feature for easier mod management.
Let me start out by saying thank you to all that participated in the alpha testing - I learned a lot during these 10 days!
Public Multiplayer Alpha Test is coming to an end. Yes, I'm sure a lot of you will find it sad and annoying - but its actually for me to be able to make the game better :)
Even though the alpha test went really well and the game, basically works, there is still a long way to go.
That is why the alpha is now closing, so I can focus on further develop the game to make it as awesome as possible. :)
If you missed it, I had a live stream this week, where I played multiplayer with the viewers. We got to a much larger player count on the server than I actually thought was possible.
Check it out - the playing starts around 42 min. in.
Thank you for participating and thank all of you for supporting my little silly game here :)
### Added - Added "Unsub all", "Activate All" and "Deactivate All" buttons to the Mod Browser, so it's easier to do these tasks
### Changed - Clients are now automatically subscribed to all the mods from the host they join. This speed up things a lot as it doesn't have to redownload every time and rejoining the host within the same game session is much much faster now
### Fixed - Fixed issue where there were a lot "Deferred messages" in the console and some items could not be spawned for some players
### Added - Copy function on the joincode in the menu, so you just click it and have it in your clipboard. Easier to share this way - Added new "fm-host-log_player_spawn" for hosts to enable to see in the console who spawns what to easier identify spammers
### Changed - Now trimming the joincode that players put in, so avoid issues where a space is either in front or behind the joincode
### Fixed - Fixed issue where all fireworks in game was ignited right when a late joining client joined. Should reduce low fps right when joining
