There are lots of things to do this weekend, so I am only writing a brief intermission to focus on adding to the game instead.
Despite my lack of time, things are generally progressing quite smoothly. I am expecting that I will (finally) release the tutorial at the end of next week, which will also come with a longer post then.
Until next week!
Weekly Update 147 - Backend Work, Part 2
Hi everyone,
Reworking some of the backend has continued last week, and I’ve made some good progress.
As I’ve continued going through things that can be merged and improved, one of the things that actually stood out quite a bit were the most recent changes I made to the tutorial: Where the old tutorial was based entirely on the quest system (which is still not in use anywhere but for the tutorial), I took a lot of liberties with the improvement of the tutorial, creating little hacks to achieve all of the unique little things I wanted to do in the tutorial - which had of course also contributed to the problems I encountered.
In an attempt to reduce the bugs introduced in the tutorial, I now decided to upgrade those little hacks into more standardised quest steps, which are more flexible than any of the previous ones. In addition to the quest steps, I also added a new, more flexible loot item - which allows me to create new loot that has unique effects when found (rather than simply having inventory contents). I have no doubt that this will also come in handy for the research in 0.9 (e.g. finding research documents in a chest), and for 0.10 (being able to e.g. start a quest by finding some loot).
Again, this wasn’t strictly needed to be done ahead of releasing the tutorial or 0.8, but I feel that both will benefit from the more robust setup I have created.
Until next week!
Weekly Update 146 - Backend Work
Hi everyone,
In order to finish the tutorial, I have not just been hunting bugs, but also been doing a lot of restructuring of things at the backend - so today I’ll take a minute to talk about that.
One of the things I noticed as I was hunting for the bugs mentioned last week was that there were many things that had gotten a bit messy - which made finding bugs a lot harder than it could have been - and certainly isn't a good basis to add more functionality to. In some cases, this was a really straightforward mess: As we had improved on some art, for example, I sometimes kept the old assets - leading to multiple files in the same folder, most of which weren’t actually in the game any longer.
Some of it was less straightforward: Some old code was used in multiple files and I had long improved on it - but forgotten to update it in one of them. Some functionality (even a very recent one for the tutorial) was created to just fulfil a quick task, but I am planning on re-using it in the long run and should really rewrite it to be easily usable in different contexts.
Overall, there has been a lot of reworking and cleaning up of things like that over the past week, and we got started on redoing some of the larger mess as well (especially textures and wind-effects for the various plants). This wasn’t strictly necessary to do before the tutorial or even finishing 0.8, but considering it will help me to fix whatever remaining bugs I have not found (and any that may come up in the next weeks), I like to think it is time well spent.
Until next week!
Weekly Update 145 - The Usual Bugs
Hi everyone,
As I was finalising the tutorial last week, I realised that there were a whole range of things that didn’t work even though they should have - let’s call them the usual unpredictable bugs. As a result, the majority of the week was spent trying to figure them out (and I am down to only one now).
So: what are these “usual unpredictable bugs” I am talking about? How can something be both “usual”, and “unpredictable” at the same time? Let me give you an example: When I created the pathfinding graph for the new island (so the villagers would know where they could go and where they couldn’t), pathfinding on Pirate’s Peak simply stopped working. There was no clear reason for this. Both graphs were stored in different, well labelled files that shouldn’t have interacted with each other - and yet, creating the graph for one island seemed to override the other. After a lot of unsuccessful research online and many tests in the game itself, I tried simply deleting the files and recreating them from scratch. Same names for the files, same locations, and supposedly same content - it suddenly started working.
It is still unclear what happened or why deleting the files fixes it, but the more complex a project becomes, the more of these issues it will run into. So while each of the bugs itself is completely unexpected (and usually not traceable to a “real” problem with setup or coding, but rather a result of compounding issues), these bugs have become very expected whenever I make major changes to the project overall.
In addition to the pathfinding bug, I also ran into an issue with the quest system simply not running one of the tasks (until I added a debug line to the code), and most recently, the GPU Instancer system we are using is working correctly on Pirates Peak, but not running at all on Opal Reef (something I am still trying to figure out).
These are of course frustrating problems. Fixing them is not optional, and yet when I manage to, after many hours of investigating and trial and error, I am right back to where I started. At least I tell myself that I will be able to fix things more easily if something along those lines should come up again - but I fear the bugs will get ever more creative as well.
Until next week!
Weekly Update 144 - Form or Function
Hi everyone,
The tutorial is mostly done, but as I was setting things up, I realised that I have been continuously making decisions recently that might be interesting to talk about: Whether to prioritise aesthetics or functionality.
Being a programmer and not an artist, I of course tend to prioritise functionality. I love adding new mechanics and systems to the game, and when I started making the game, that was my main task. Over time, things changed in terms of responsibilities and feedback, and I took over most of the art as well - which has slowed things down quite a bit. However, I have to admit that I also recognise how important the art is. Especially from a first person perspective, immersion and enjoyment of the game are very influenced not only by what you can do, but also how it looks.
Overall, this has led to me being often split between different things when developing the game. New functionality like the herb gardens and the healing mechanic necessarily needs an adequate art counterpart, and instead of simply developing the mechanic in a couple of days, I have to add development of the art to my timeline as well. In the case of the quest, creating the island for Opal Reef took time - but going through the tasks of the quest also made me realise that I would much prefer to have already upgraded the 4 starter buildings (port, warehouse, market, and house). With the old art still in place, it partially breaks immersion to be playing through the tutorial - and I have been torn between improving the art and moving on to the next mechanic for the past week.
Overall, I tend to still prioritise functionality. Both because I feel more comfortable on that side, and because I think the game still lacks functionality in a variety of ways that are more important than the art. However, I want to communicate that I am not oblivious to where the art is lacking. Once the tutorial is fully finished and uploaded this week, I will move on to the pioneer wagon, which I believe is one of the most important mechanics still lacking for 0.8 (mind you that I will need to create additional buildings and animations to make that work as well). I will keep you updated.
Until next week!
Weekly Update 143 - Intermission
Hi everyone,
Everything is going smoothly with the tutorial, so I should be able to finish the update by the end of the week.
I have said a lot about the tutorial already, however, so I won’t bore you by repeating the details. Once the tutorial is finished, I will work on the pioneer wagon, so more on that in the next post.
Until next week!
Weekly Update 142 - Overhauled Opal Reef
Hi everyone,
As mentioned last week, I wanted to write this update once I finished the overhaul of Opal Reef, so I am only getting it out now.
The “world” of Opal Reef has now been finished, and while I initially thought I would use this post to show you the various parts of it, I think it may be more interesting to explore it while doing the tutorial (maybe I am too optimistic). At this point, I still need to edit the existing tutorial quest to include the new lessons, which should take me into next week. Once all of this is done, I will upload a new version of the game including the healing mechanic and the tutorial.
I am looking forward to hearing all of your feedback once it’s out.
Until next week!
Weekly Update 141 - Intermission
Hi everyone,
I have limited access to wifi this week, so I will only write a quick update.
Overall, I have been continuing to work on updating Opal Reef (you can see some finished and unfinished parts in today’s image). I will be fairly busy until the end of the week, but will try to finish Opal Reef over the next weekend. Depending on how close I will be at the time, I may push back the weekly post by a day or two and show the finished result, rather than mention that I am working on it yet again.
Until next week!
Weekly Update 140 - Building the New Tutorial
Hi everyone,
I have been working on the tutorial island for most of last week but have not managed to finish it yet. However, I will take this opportunity to tell you a little more about what I am planning for the new tutorial.
In weekly update 125, I spoke about our plans to have the tutorial be a longer format (between 1 and 2 hours), and have this essentially be an opportunity to really introduce players to each part of the game and how they interact with each other. This means, however, that we also need some “meat” to the tutorial in the form of a narrative that players can (and want to) follow. As a result, I had already stated in 125 that we needed to adjust the old tutorial island to accommodate the new format, and that John would try to work on that.
John has unfortunately been pulled in a different direction again and hasn’t managed to work on the island too much, so I have taken over as of last week, and have made pretty good progress. I would estimate that the island should be finished next week or the week after, and that an initial draft of the tutorial should follow a few days later. In addition to introducing the basic mechanics of the game and the new functions of 0.8, I also realised that there are a ton of mechanics in the game that I never actually mentioned or that would be reasonable for a player to find by themselves (I realise that undocumented features are officially bugs, so I guess there are a decent number of intentional bugs in the game).
For example, approaching a pirate from behind while sneaking allows for a silent takedown with the sword, which I had added after some frustration that spotting a pirate early and sneaking into position without him seeing you brought absolutely no benefits. However, I don’t think I ever communicated this through the posts or otherwise, so I think it is about time.
The first draft of the tutorial will not yet include the pioneer wagon, which I am still planning to create before an official 0.8 release, but I have already created an area to expand into as a part of the tutorial, and adding this “mission” once the mechanic exists should be relatively straightforward. In any case, I should be able to give an image preview of the overhauled Opal Reef by next week, so you can look forward to that for then.
Until next week!
Weekly Update 139 - The Healer’s Hut
Hi everyone,
I was travelling over the weekend, so my apologies for getting this post out late. I will also keep this reasonably short as a result - and explain things a bit more in depth next week.
Despite the travelling I was able to create a decent first draft for both the healer’s hut and the medicinal herb field (in today’s picture). The healer’s hut doesn’t have a lot of details to it yet (I am thinking of adding jars, mortar/pestle and dried herbs for a medicinal feel), but the general layout is there, and I think it should be fairly recognisable from its model.
With the healer's hut done, there are only 3 “big” items left on my agenda for 0.8 (together with a lot of polishing): Adjusting the tutorial for the new mechanics (and general UI/UX improvements for them), the pioneer wagon, and adding towers/watchposts for the units that don’t have them yet. This week, I will try to focus on the tutorial, so I will talk about that next.
