Happy Friday. Time for another update on Samphi. Think this is going to be the shortest yet! You know I’m working on chests, but despite best efforts they’re taking much longer that I’d like. This short update will just explore why.
Last week I said …
So next week shouldn’t see a new build according to the schedule, they’re every 2 weeks, but it will! I’m so close to being done with chests that there’s no point in waiting 2 weeks, we’ll just get them out.
If only. Chests are proving to be a royal pain in the ass. Each time I solve one problem another crops up. The item system needs quite a large change to accommodate chests so unfortunately it won’t be this week as I’d hoped.
For example, what happens when a player has items in a chest them moves world. There’s no chest for them, so they can go to their inventory. What if their inventory is full though? No problem, we’ll leave them in the chests. That means data for items in chests need moving from the player to the world save file. That’s done.
Now what happens when an item is already in a chest and the user collects more of it? They’ll end up with two of the same item and Samphi isn’t currently built to accommodate that.
It’s things like these that I keep running into. Chests are coming, and they’re close, but we’re just not there yet.
Since they’re not available yet this gives a good opportunity for me to get some feedback on how I intend them to work. Here’s my current thinking:
Items placed in chests belong to the world, not the player
If you change world you won’t have the items. If a new character joins the existing world with a filled chest they can access those items.
This will work great and the last real hurdle is allowing multiple stacks of items. How does this sound? Is this how you’d expect them to behave?
I was recently made aware of a bug in the latest build, v0.1d, that crashed the game is custom textures were enabled. That’s been patched and that version is now in the stable branch.
Hopefully next week chests will actually see the light of day in v0.1e. That’s what I’ll be working on ‘till then. Sorry it’s taking so long, it’s a bit of a mess! It feels shitty to keep saying they’re coming soon and then never delivering, but issues keep cropping up out of nowhere. So I’ll leave it as hopefully!
Hope you all have a fantastic weekend!
As always you can show your support and keep up to date with development by following me here:
Early Access Update #11 – It’s all about sheep (Sheepgate)
Hi friends,
Another Friday, another update. Let’s get straight to the point, I’d hoped this update would bring chests but it’s going to have to wait another week I’m afraid. They’re 95% done, there’s just a few final things to tidy up. If I were to push them into this update however it would have been sloppy and need work next week anyway, so best to wait.
There’s still a couple of small changes to this update, and I’m nicknaming it sheepgate! You guessed it, they revolve around sheep.
So we recently added shears, and good news, they can now be used. No longer do you have to kill that poor innocent sheep to get its wool. With shears equip simply right click a sheep to shear it and the wool will grow back in a few minutes!
To accompany the game-changing shearing update, sheep have also received a small graphical update. They’re now much fluffier and have two possible colours. It’s like a whole new game!
Both of these changes are now live in build v0.1d, available now in the beta channel.
Since this update is short I figure I’ll give two small game hints. Why not!
Did you know you can shoot down beehives? When a beehive spawns fire at it with a bow and arrow. It will fall to the ground and can then be harvest for food!
Did you know sheep and pigs can be tethered? With rope equip on your hot bar right click and animal to tether it to you. It will then follow you around the level. This feature is very rough, and is intended to be used with fences so you can lead animals into a pen later down the line.
So next week shouldn’t see a new build according to the schedule, they’re every 2 weeks, but it will! I’m so close to being done with chests that there’s no point in waiting 2 weeks, we’ll just get them out. If there’s time we’ll also sneak in some other smaller updates and fixes before getting back to schedule.
So, bit of a slow two weeks I’m afraid. Haven’t got as much as I’d like done but that’s the way it goes sometimes. :)
Hope you all have a fantastic weekend and enjoy sheepgate!
As always you can show your support and keep up to date with development by following me here:
Hope you’ve all had a good week. Mine’s been a bit hectic and unfortunately not because of Samphi. A bit of background; I’m currently at University and am in my placement year. Instead of working at a company I took self-employment so I was able to work on Samphi for a year. The University aspect of my self-employment is now over so I’ve had a bunch of reports to write …
So not much game programming has been done this week, but there’s still a few things to talk about, so prepare your butts for a quick update.
For starters, v0.1c has been in the beta branch for a week now and nobody as reported that it’s blown up, so it’s now moved to the stable branch. Important note, the save file location has changed, so unless you want to start fresh here’s what you do to copy your save data over:
All you have to do is simply copy all data from AppData/Local/Samphi_Beta to AppDate/Local/Samphi.
Job done! You can delete the old folder now, just make sure your data is out of it first! If you don’t do this the game will still work fine, you’ll just not have any previous save data. Okay, on with the changes.
So the only real system I’ve worked on this week is a wiki for the Samphi website. Samphi already has a wiki at Gamepedia, but I’m a programmer and love tinkering. I want more control over how my wiki works so I’m building one!
The system is really fresh, but I’m developing it out in the open on the live site so you can check it out if you want and as it develops. If you head to www.samphi-game.com/wiki/{anything} then you’ll find a wiki page.
If you enter an item that doesn't exists (which is currently basically everything) it will simply show nothing. I think the only item currently ‘plugged in’ is the spade, and that only has an image. So remember, it’s my WIP build, but I figure why not just work on it live so people can watch!
Unfortunately, that’s kind of it for this week. Been really busy with these reports, but that’s all done and it’s back to business as usual starting tomorrow!
So, I have a few things in mind for the next build. First and foremost I want to get chests back in the game. They were in it right until launch when there was a major save bug, so it’s about time they make their return. I also want to plug in the new shears item and look at getting another crop in the game. To what extent that crop gets added depends on how easy the other jobs go, but I’d like to get some work on farming done!
That’s all for this short update. Sorry I don’t have anything more exciting to share! Hope you all have a great weekend and see you next week for builds v0.1d!
As always, you can show your support and keep up-to-date with development by following me here:
Early Access Update #9 – v0.1c, Smelting, and updated save location! (Important)
Hi, friends.
Friday is here again. This week seems to have gone so fast! The latest build of Samphi, v0.1c, has hit the beta branch and it sees the first introduction of mining and smithing along with a new item. These things were covered a bit on the last news post, so check that out to learn about the pickaxe and iron.
I’m going to start this update with a PSA. In one of the last builds, there was an issue with Steam not been able to find the executable. Here’s why that happened.
My game project for Samphi was previously titled ‘Samphi Beta’. When I exported it the .exe, it too was named ‘Samphi Beta.exe’, so before uploading to Steam I had to rename it ‘Samphi.exe’ each time … that time I forgot.
Doing this each update is obviously not ideal and I’d 100% forget again, so I renamed the game project to just ‘Samphi’ as it should be. Problem is, that’s now moved where the game runs from. All data is stored in AppData, and version v0.1c and up will use a new folder so you’ll need to move your data over.
This will only ever happen this once, then we’re good forever. All you have to do is simply copy all data from AppData/Local/Samphi_Beta to AppDate/Local/Samphi.
Job done! You can delete the old folder now, just make sure your data is out of it first! If you don’t do this the game will still work fine, you’ll just not have any previous save data. Okay, on with the changes.
In the last update, I showed the new pickaxe and iron ore that spawns in the ground. Well, now when equipped, the pickaxe you can see it on your character. You can also now mine the iron around the level. This will give you raw iron that needs to be smelted in the kiln.
That’s right, the kiln now does something! For those unaware, here’s the crafting recipe for the kiln.
This will be used to refine all ore, there’s more to come, and it’s really easy to use. Just like cooking, to use the kiln simply drag the icon of the ore over it. The longer you hold it there; the more iron ingots you’ll make.
As you guessed it, iron ingots are what you’ll craft with, and I’ve added an item to craft so you can use them straight away!
Shears can now be crafted in the following way:
They currently can’t be used, but they’ll soon allow you to get wool from a sheep without having to kill it!
There're a few smaller changes that are in v0.1c:
You now need to have the spade equip to dig rocks
Added a ‘Need spade to dig’ message if try with anything else
In update 7 I made a list of things that would be coming soon. Here’s what we’ve accomplished so far:
Adding Chests
Adding Iron
Adding Sheers
Adding Wolf
Adding new crop
There’s still a few of those to go, I’ve done a nice chunk of work on the wolf, so work moves right over to them! Expect them soon. :)
That’s all for this week. Another week another build. Hope you all have a great weekend and enjoy mining some iron!
As always you can show your support and keep up to date with development by following me here:
Early Access Update #8 – Introducing Mining & Precious Metals
Hey all,
Hope you’ve all had a good week! I’ve been pretty busy with IRL nonsense this week, so this update will be short, but I have some cool things to show!
I’ve added a new item, the pickaxe! This will be used to mine precious metals that will be found deeper underground than rocks. I want to be clear though, Samphi is not about spelunking huge caves. There will be metals to find, but they will be rare. They will be a precious resource and not so readily available.
Anyway, here’s the pickaxe and how you make it:
Since we now have a pickaxe we need something to mine. Enter Iron. As you dig below a certain level and new blocks come into view there’s a certain change that it will be an iron block. That’s currently 1/50 but that can be changed as we need to if it needs balancing.
It will only spawn below the normal dirt level, so iron will never be in a fresh spawn. You will always have to dig down and find it. For now, it’s using a sprite very similar to the rock sprite, but we’ll update that later. Here’s what the block looks like:
I originally drew a really shiny block, but actually raw iron appears to have this rusty-red color, so that’s what we went with. This will be used on a furnace to create nice shiny iron.
In other news, v0.1b has been live in the beta channel for a week now, so I’ve moved it to stable. If there are any bugs let me know, but none have been reported. :)
That’s it for now. Short update, will be working on chests I think next! They need to be back in!
Hope you all have a fantastic weekend! :) Ciao.
As always you can show your support and keep up to date with development by following me here:
Early Access Update #7 – Beta introduction, new item system, and more worlds
Hi friends,
It’s Friday and time for another Early access update! Let’s start with an overview of what’s changed in this update, and then I’ll go into more detail on some of the bigger changes for those that want it!
Let me preface the following by saying that this update has gone to the beta channel. The last update I just pushed live and it had a bug. For this one It’s gone to the beta channel and will go to the standard channel in a week or so if no bugs are found.
To access the beta channel, right click Samphi in your library >> Properties >> BETAS, and select the only beta channel there is. That will get you v0.1bu (u for untested). At any point, you can opt out of this and go back to the stable channel and build.
All codes should give access to this beta, but if anyone has any problems just let me know.
Right, on with the changelog:
Re-coded items. They are now somewhat open to modding later down the line. (Explanation to follow)
Items can now be snapped to/from the crafting bin by holding shift and left clicking.
Updated world select screen. It was like this a long time ago and I recently found a screenshot and wanted to go back to it!
Opened up the other worlds so you can now have 5 worlds
Fixed issue where the player was underneath the door
Fixed issue where you couldn't place backing walls behind doors
Changed sprites in custom_textures folder back to normal
Okay, so let me explain what’s happened with the items a little bit. In an earlier update, I changed the name of an item and the game really didn’t like it. I looked at the item code and it wasn’t a quick fix, so I re-coded it. It needed doing. Be it now or later, that code needed updating so I just went for it.
One of the changes to gameplay is that you can now snap items to/from the crafting bin by clicking an item while holding [Shift]. So [CTRL] and hovering over an item will show a description, and [Shift] and click will snap it to/from the crafting bin.
While I’m here, what I think I’m also going to do it separate item information from the game into a config file. This way item name, descriptions, and images can be modified. It’s not a huge job, so that should come pretty soon.
Samphi always had 5 world slots, but 4 were turned off. Well, they’re now on! You can have 5 separate worlds now, with 3 individual characters and they aren’t tied together. You can place any character in any world and mix and match.
Again, while I was here I made a slight cosmetic update. A long time ago Samphi’s world creation used to look like this:
I always liked this and don’t really know why it changed. I found this old screenshot and decided to go back. The world sprites, like all sprites in the game, are not final, but I love having little worlds there. Do you prefer the worlds or the text?
If you haven’t seen already I released a guide covering the creation and use of custom_textures. If you haven’t read it, definitely go take a look and start modifying Samphi!
Since this update hasn’t seen much added to gameplay, next update will be entirely focused on that. Here’s what I think I’ll be working on:
Adding Chests
Adding Iron
Adding Sheers
Adding Wolf
Adding new crop
Those are the things I want to get working on next, so let me know what you think.
Hope you’ve all had a great week and have an even better weekend ahead! It’ll be solid dev for me, get some fresh content added! :)
As always you can show your support and keep up to date with development by following me here:
Early Access Update #6 – Release Schedule Update and Crafting Guide
It’s been a week since we last spoke. What have I been up to I hear you ask? …. Email.
So. Much. Email. I grossly underestimated how long it takes to deal with support emails and that kind of stuff. It’s cooling down now we’re 2 weeks into release, but it’s taken up quite a bit of time this week and that’s dug into how much time the game itself has received.
I have been working on stuff, though, so let’s get to it.
In an earlier update, I announced that along with these weekly updates I would publish my latest stable build. Well, as I’ve found out this week, it’s sometimes going to take more than a week to create a stable build! Let’s talk about namegate.
In last Fridays update, I made a small change to the names of two items. Turns out this made the game collapse and on looking at the code surrounding items it needs a LOT of work: essentially a complete re-write.
Now this isn’t a problem, it actually opens up custom items, and I have my plan and I’m well underway writing it, but it means that there is no stable build to publish this week. This will almost certainly happen again later down the line, so I’m going to move the game builds to fortnightly.
These updates will still come weekly, so you’ll always know what’s been worked on, but the actual game updates will come mostly every two weeks. Now I’m saying mostly so I cover my back in case anything like this happens again, but every two weeks should be enough to ensure there’s always a stable build with changes ready to publish.
My first guide for Samphi, crafting, is now live. It’s the first draft, so may have some rough edges and need some content refinements, but it’s live.
The next one I’m going to create is on custom textures I think as that should open up some fun screenshots and stuff as people show off their creations. Looking forward to that!
So this week I’ll be continuing with the big item update. To make the items flexible, as in I can easily change names, the system that looks after them needs some serious work. While I’m here I’m going to expose item information to a simple text file, so if you want to change the names of items and their descriptions you can do so easily.
This is a big job and will take up a lot of the dev time this week, so I’ll also try sneak in some smaller updates and get another guide out. It’s been a slow start for updates, but that’s the way it goes. :) I had no idea the item code would need so much work but we’ll get this out the way then move forward. :)
Thanks for reading and I hope you all have a fantastic weekend! Ciao friends.
As always you can show your support and keep up to date with development by following me here:
Early Access Update #5 – Update, Trading cards, and Multiplayer
Hey, all! It’s Friday, in some places in the world still, so it’s time for the weekly update. Things have been so busy this week with the launch that there isn’t a whole bunch to tell, to be honest, but let’s get to it.
As I mentioned in a previous post, each Friday I’ll upload my stable build to Steam regardless of how much has changed. Well, we’re starting with one of the lightest updates I think we’ll ever have! Again, this is because it’s launch week so things will pick up quickly.
Here're the two minor changes I’ve made:
Edit: These changes caused a crash that I'm now aware of. I've rolled the build back and will re-update ASAP. The game really didn't like me changing the names of items!
Changed name of ‘Bench’ to ‘Crafting Bench’
Changed name of ‘Backing’ to ‘Wall Backing’
Since so little has changed I haven’t incremented the build number. This is just a silent update to fix two small things. More substantial updates will be here next week once I stop answering email! :)
I turned trading cards on! They should have been turned on from the start, but I somehow overlooked the final step to publish them. They’re set to drop every hour of play, so get playing and collecting!
I want to drop my thoughts on multiplayer while we’re here. There were a number of reasons why multiplayer wasn’t included at launch, with the two main ones been:
Press feedback showed more in-game instruction was needed
Multiplayer client would be untested
So the first point is remedied for now. If you hold [CTRL] while hovered over an item you receive a full description of it and how to use it. I also created the game guide etc. So that leaves the issue of testing, and I’m wondering on which of these two options is best:
Release the multiplayer version to all and state that it’s unstable and untested
Release the multiplayer version to the games beta branch
So, which one of these would you guys prefer to see? Release it to all and know it will fall over at some point, or push it to a beta branch.
The multiplayer client is mostly complete, so it will either come in the next update or the one after that!
That’s all for this week. Release and answering emails has taken a whole bunch of time, as is web stuff etc. so development will get somewhat back to normal next week and the updates will be a lot bigger. :)
Thanks for reading and I hope you all have a fantastic weekend! Ciao friends.
As always you can show your support and keep up to date with development by following me here:
Early Access Update #4 – First Patch, Update Schedule, Sub-Forums and Guides
Phew. Launch weekend is over. It’s been crazy, especially since Desura has finally sunk. Great timing there lads! Well, since launch I’ve put a few things in place so we’ll go over them in this final update before we move to a fixed schedule.
Quick note, if anyone has any issues regarding Desura and keys etc. just drop me an email at support@greenygames.com and we’ll sort it straight away.
There were a number of bugs present at launch, sorry about that, but the good news is they are fixed. I don’t know how long it takes my uploads to reach Steam clients as an update, but it’s uploaded and the following issues are fixed:
Fixed bug with game crashing when using the fishing rod.
Fixed bug with icons when overfilling craft bin.
Fixed crash that sometimes occurred when moving items.
Moved build number from 1.0 to 0.1ea.
I want Samphi to receive regular updates, and I think Friday would be a good day for them. Each week I’ll push my last stable build to Steam. Some weeks the updates will be thin, and others substantial, but they will be regular.
With each update, I’ll also release one of these updates detailing just what the build brings and any other related news. This will start this Friday!
There’s a good number of discussions on the community hub now so I’ve created a few sub-forums so we can stay better organized. Currently, we have the following categories:
General Discussions
Suggestions
Bug Reports
Trading
New categories will be added as needed but these will see us through for a while.
On a related note, I’d like to run something past you on how to handle bug threads. Once bugs are fixed I want some way of indicating that on the discussion post. The best way seems to be to lock the thread and I’ll add one final message stating that the issue is fixed, and the build number of the version that included the fix.
What do you think of this? At first glance, it looks like a good way to distinguish between active bugs and those that have been solved, but I understand that some might not want locking out of their threads. Let me know what you think of this.
The final thing I’d like to talk about is guides. I’m putting one together for crafting, and have a few more that I’d like to create such as:
How to create custom textures
Sharing your levels
Farming
Skilling
I’m making sure these guides are the best they can be, creating lots of informative graphics etc. so they may take a while to come but know I;m working on them! If there’s anything else you’d like a guide on let me know. :)
That’s all I have for this update. I’ve patched most of the initial bugs, done some tidying to the discussions and am working on complimentary game material.
See you all on Friday for the next update!
As always you can show your support and keep up to date with development by following me here:
Early Access Update #4 – First Patch, Update Schedule, Sub-Forums and Guides
Phew. Launch weekend is over. It’s been crazy, especially since Desura has finally sunk. Great timing there lads! Well, since launch I’ve put a few things in place so we’ll go over them in this final update before we move to a fixed schedule.
Quick note, if anyone has any issues regarding Desura and keys etc. just drop me an email at support@greenygames.com and we’ll sort it straight away.
There were a number of bugs present at launch, sorry about that, but the good news is they are fixed. I don’t know how long it takes my uploads to reach Steam clients as an update, but it’s uploaded and the following issues are fixed:
Fixed bug with game crashing when using the fishing rod.
Fixed bug with icons when overfilling craft bin.
Fixed crash that sometimes occurred when moving items.
Moved build number from 1.0 to 0.1ea.
I want Samphi to receive regular updates, and I think Friday would be a good day for them. Each week I’ll push my last stable build to Steam. Some weeks the updates will be thin, and others substantial, but they will be regular.
With each update, I’ll also release one of these updates detailing just what the build brings and any other related news. This will start this Friday!
There’s a good number of discussions on the community hub now so I’ve created a few sub-forums so we can stay better organized. Currently, we have the following categories:
General Discussions
Suggestions
Bug Reports
Trading
New categories will be added as needed but these will see us through for a while.
On a related note, I’d like to run something past you on how to handle bug threads. Once bugs are fixed I want some way of indicating that on the discussion post. The best way seems to be to lock the thread and I’ll add one final message stating that the issue is fixed, and the build number of the version that included the fix.
What do you think of this? At first glance, it looks like a good way to distinguish between active bugs and those that have been solved, but I understand that some might not want locking out of their threads. Let me know what you think of this.
The final thing I’d like to talk about is guides. I’m putting one together for crafting, and have a few more that I’d like to create such as:
How to create custom textures
Sharing your levels
Farming
Skilling
I’m making sure these guides are the best they can be, creating lots of informative graphics etc. so they may take a while to come but know I;m working on them! If there’s anything else you’d like a guide on let me know. :)
That’s all I have for this update. I’ve patched most of the initial bugs, done some tidying to the discussions and am working on complimentary game material.
See you all on Friday for the next update!
As always you can show your support and keep up to date with development by following me here:
