Spiritlands
New Tall Story Studios website!
First I am glad to here that I have had no bug reports since the last big update! This means from tomorrow work can begin on water & power buildings- making use of the new settlements basis!
I am here though to announce the new Tall Story Studios website!
https://www.tallstorystudios.com/ IS LIVE!
Included is a blog for developers tips/experiences, and a forum if you want to sign up and share screenshots, ideas, or find help!
Update #7- Settlements
The level of variety this update can form adds a tonne of gameplay. Create port towns, hamlets, skycraper cities and little towns, each with their own population, production, and resources.
Each settlement shares attack power but not soldiers, and explorers who now cost nothing to exist and are actually settlement-less, providing for themselves as they scavange for you!
Power, Faith, Explorers, Research, Exp (for chests that can be opened over any settlement), special items are shared.
What is not shared: Resources, workers, resource rates, all soldiers.
Creating a settlement is easy, upgrade a campfire, enter if you want to transfer X amount of resources from your Capital, name it, and click to form it's own independant space!
Tip: Build away from colonies and other settlements so you can upgrade.
UPDATE LIST:
- When fully zoomed out you, you can see information and areas for all your settlements, as well as the colonies.
- When looking at a settlement, all other tiles will be slightly opace, the same for colonies and the wilderness.
- You can click on wilderness resources but it will be given to the capital.
- Your first settlement is your Capital- the place that funds new settlements. It has a flag of your chosen colour flying above it and starts as an old level 2 Town Hall.
- There is now an advisor! She will help guide you with information about mechanics and when something doesn't go to plan. Currently she pops up only in regards to settlements- for the next update she will pop up quite a bit for first time interactions/events.
- You can only build in settlement space now, except campfires for exploring, and tile decors and placing nature.
- The circled number on the profile panel is now the number of settlements you have.
- Right clicking town halls now brings up a menu where you can rename settlements- some of it has coming soon features.
- Explorers cost no food (remove the population cost) and are removed from any settlement you assign them. They can be assigned in one place and released into another- if you want to.
- The name of the settlement that you are looking at is now shown in the profile panel. Looking at a settlement changes all panels info to that settlement's.
- Red food and housing warnings can appear above settlements in an emergency state.
- Death countdowns are removed- you will have 10 seconds for every death now.
- Settlements can be destroyed via their town halls but wipe all traces of themselves, all buildings turn to dead grass or ocean tiles.
- Path bonuses only affect the settlement they are in.
- Opening chests over a settlement gives that settlement the goods. Dont open in wilderness.
- People now cost 0.3 food rate compared to 0.5- this marks a coming change in requirements and too many farmers needed was slowing build progress.
- Increased special item chance for resource production buildings of 1/4.
Patched:
- When clicking save or load- the settings boxes now hide.
- Fixed not showing save flags when profile menu is closed.
WHATS TO COME!
I foresee the rest of this week as being myself responding and working on any issues you all have.
The next update will at least include some particle effect changes, additional settlement restrictions that force you to take out enemies, and more advisor help. If it is a larger update (a typically 2 week one) it will also include power and water buildings and settlement requirements.
The order of currently planned updates after that will be:
- Happiness
- Research & Missions
- Scenarios
Then the final release!
I am super happy with how this game is going and I hope you all are too. If not feel free to chat to me in the forums! If you love the game be sure to let Steam and your friends know.
Thanks!
Kenthria- @ Tall Story Studios
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tallstorystudios/
-: https://www.facebook.com/kenthria/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TallStory_S
Progress Report
I haven't posted in over 2 weeks so this is a short message to say- i'm still here working super hard on more content!
The next update which is Settlements, is a massive addition to current gameplay. It involves going through tens of thousands of lines of code and changing everything from collective values (e.g. one food store for all the map), to values that are specific to settlement locations.
The ground-work is down. Settlements are being shown, and the work so far is working really well and feels very nice. I am hoping the update will be out next weekend. I won't lie, there may be bugs for the first week after release- but I will thoroughly test it before putting it out to you all. The week after will be adding power and water requirements as I now possess the new 11 buildings (including happiness) that will be eaked out this month.
Ultimately I hope to see Spiritlands completed by the end of the month. Please share the game with your friends- it helps support my work so I can work faster. The game as is won't be changing, only GROWING, so don't wait!
Thank you,
Tall Story Studios.
Update #6- 'Little' Things
As ever please report any issues in as much detail as possible- including screenshots if you can! Thank you.
[B]Changes:[/B]
[X] New building menu backgrounds for enemy camps, colonies and ruins!
[X] Rename yourself and your lands in-game by clicking your name in the profile panel- move panel to set.
[X] Added an alternate map mode that shows symbols and not beautiful tiles- a strategy view. Ends on new mid-seasons.
[X] Added ability to mute atmospheric and clicking sounds.
[X] Added a ui title banner for the item overlaps like forest- road, walls.
[X] Removed thick special items border.
[X] Placing walls on walls etc replaces them.
[X] Added a tile UI button to buildings on right-click for mirroring the tile- removed keyboard command.
[X] Put weather and moving clouds and birds below clouds layer.
[X] Added a settings option for day/night cycle- 3 options = Off, Seasonal, Real World (matches computer time)-- Don't change your system time as it breaks NWJS applications.
[X] Event pop-up to show when camp in range of attacking and when you've built enough to be attacked (15).
[X] Added a hide all ui toggle- keyboard (P)
[X] Esc on name select now brings you back to main menu and on map making returns you to main menu.
[X] Access markets via the green popup buttons now.
[X] Added popup random trade events- where someone will give you for example- 10 Iron for 200 food -- based on the amount of resources the player has.
[X] Added the ability to move fishing boats anywhere for gold- great for moving boats to newly discovered special tiles.
[X] Markets now depend on colonies completely. No trades until you find colonies and have a good relationship with them- the friendlier you are, the more you can trade with them.
[X] Cheaper colony costs for their buildings.
[I]Taken at 5pm[/I]
[B]Patch:[/B]
[X] When right clicking resource buildings, if worker count is maxed out, it now should not display the plus button as green.
[X] When clicking some upgrade building reqs out- some titles didn't say upgrade after building type.
[X] Upgrading buildings was destroying ALL smallmenubackgrounds (including tile req pullouts)
[X] Stone path cost was saying 40- costs 50
[X] Pressing left fishery icon when you dont have enough pops it back to the right one (should go back to port)- fixed.
[X] Achievements wrongly given at the start fixed:
- We know these lands - Search through every ruin
- A Hero's Conquest - Destroy every camp
- Taking a peak - Have 10 campfires
[X] Improved map editor tile counts- shows when e.g. sand count = 0
[X] Added left-click hold painting (if it works)
[X] Smaller mouse edge sections.
[X] Camera not on town hall on game start
[X] Changed resources food icon to wheat or 'generic food icon'-
[X] Cant place walls on topleft or bottomright of tiles.
[X] Heal tile building health and remove attached building health text on building destroyed- done.
[X] Fixed cant remove workers from buildings
[X] Tileicon selection animation not undoing
[X] Building tile rates corrected for farms/fisheries.
I know there are likely some more issues- Spiritlands has 21000 events (cause/effect pieces of code)- so some risk conflicting with tiny chances. If something seems odd just post it in the forums and I'll get back to you quickly about it!
The next update will be settlements- so it will involve taking what is in the game now, 'restricting' building space into town hall areas and creating settlements!
Read more here: https://www.reddit.com/r/Spiritlands/comments/6fl1f0/the_future_is_bright_and_full_of_growth_dev_qa/?utm_content=title&utm_medium=hot&utm_source=reddit&utm_name=Spiritlands
Spiritlands sub-reddit
In it you can read in detail the big update coming in just a few weeks that will continue for a couple of weeks onwards!
https://www.reddit.com/r/Spiritlands/comments/6fl1f0/the_future_is_bright_and_full_of_growth_dev_qa/
There will be an update in the coming days- a restart may not be needed for this. The update will finalise the marketplace placing more needs on the colonies as they will supply all trades.
Plus more!
Thanks @KiruArken for your map screenshots!
Update #5: Our Friends and Enemies
There are 4 colonies- Port Keepers, Woodland, Hill People, and Mining- All colonies have a relationship with you. They trade your food, wood, stone and coal with you.
When you find a colony, their whole space will be revealed to you- in this area you cannot collect resources or build. But you can interact with each colony in 2 very different ways:
- Making them an ally- e.g. By trading wood, you will fund the port keepers, who will build up their area. More ports, and more developed ports as their requirements grow. Making them your friend or ally increases your production of in this case- food. When they produce more- you get a cut! (more details will be added to the guide shortly).
- Making them an enemy- Colonies will not harm you unless you harm them! You can anger them by attacking their beafy town centre, or their resource buildings. Attacking and especially destroying what they own will anger them, causing them to refuse trading their goods with you. Making them an enemy will result in them attacking you, a lot like the camps. You can make an unfriendly colony friendly again, but you must give them time and resources- so think wisely!
Colonies provide another place for your resources to go, a place for those excess stores of stone- but trading goods to them only works once you have discovered their colony.
[U]What else has been done?[/U]
[X] Explored ruins animations are added!
[X] Spaced out the early farm sounds (annoying cuckoo) and quietened.
[X] Music quietened.
[X] Update brief info area added in main menu- this is for just the most important info.
Patch/Fixed:
[X] Some display text improvements.
[X] Removing health text and insta-heal tiles on building on them
[X] Initial flag setting not placing the same mini-flag in profile panel - fixed.
[X] All worker text being set to the special item value.
[X] Exploration icons now disappear again on exploration complete.
[X] Resource expanding button created on start of new map.
[X] Tile collision boundaries for ruins and others fixed.
[X] Various combat related fixed including:
[X] Buildings not autorepairing fixed.
[X] Attack calculations.
[X] Sound settings are now be muted on sound slider at the bottom.
[X] Re-creating a map now works properly without ending game session.
[X] Settings do not load when reopening the Game. (all of them seem unaffected by changes in an earlier game session)
[X] Showing initial build requirements in click-out UI works now.
[X] Menu for shrine upgrades were showing market- sorted.
[X] On pop = 0 coal rateno longer changes (as houses still exist)
There is a big chance if you reported an issue it is now fixed!
The plan for the coming week is not to add any big features but work on the existing game. Some smaller features will be added and i'll be looking out for any forum posts about issues that need a fix- so next weekend should see some new smaller things- and hopefully no restart requirement!
Should include:
[ ] New building menu background for your own
[ ] - for enemy camps
[ ] - for colonies
[ ] Add a way to rename yourself and your lands mid-game.
[ ] Add an alternate map mode that shows symbols and not beautiful tiles- symbol on profile panel.
[ ] Add a tonne of new sound settings.
[ ] Reduce UI sizes on more panels.
[ ] Placing walls on walls should replace them, etc.
[ ] Add a tile UI button to everything for mirroring the tile - You can press 'R' currently!
[ ] Add a settings option for day/night cycle- 3 options = Off, Seasonal, Real World (matches computer time)
[ ] Event pop-up to show when camp in range of attacking, when camps attack paid off time ends, and when youve built enough to be attacked.
[ ] Add a hide all ui toggle- keyboard- great for screenshots!
Thanks to Arken for this great screenshot of their developing lands!
Thank you all for the support and patience- I can see many of you are putting in many hours which is fantastic! I'm sure as updates continue to come out, the more time spent in one map will grow considerably!
P.S I need your help- in the last update i proposed that each townhall created (level 2+) would start a new settlement with its own resource collection, that connects to each other. Does that sound like a pointless chore to create new settlements, or a fun way to increase what there is to do?
One month in, what's next?
I have crushed many bugs, edited many costs, made clicking a far less required part of the game, added new original music, added a tonne of environmental sounds, added micro-management controls, improved the UI panels, built on the mission system, added achievements and a whole day/night system.
The game has grown a lot thanks to your vital help, and I still hope to see more ideas, and hope the youtube community can also help again!
[U]What's next?[/U]
I have a load of big announcements!
- Update 5 will feature colonies. Helping with mid-late game, 4 naturally generated colonies will be in your world, - building on ocean, forest, hills and mountains for the main 4 resource types. Once discovered, when you trade the right resource AWAY at a market, they will receive it and use it to build more e.g. mines or upgrading ones they already possess. Helping colonies helps you, as it affects market values of what they process and eventually helps your production rates. That or you can attack them- but risk strong retaliation!
- Update 6 is a big change to core gameplay. As you know, expansions are created by placing campfires, or by upgrading them into Town Halls. I want to advance this part of the game.
When upgrading a camp into a town hall, it will form a new settlement. Your new settlement will have it's own resources and resource collection, however you will get buffs from other settlements based on their own production.
There will be finer points to this but be sure to leave suggestions.
Future updates include:
- Complete overhaul of the mission system. Rather than a path, it will be different icons showing all the different missions and you can complete them in any order, but showing a recommended path for beginners.
- Big research change- from the current panel, to a research tree with multiple paths you can follow for exploration, resource collection and combat.
- Pre-made scenarios for you to choose from, putting you in starting situations such as wastelands, desert-lands etc.
- Combat improvements.
Here is to a great April!
Poster + Patch
Firstly if you are a super-fan or you just love posters, we have a design for you!
Download it from here:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/e8gv1dtyzr22c0y/Spiritlands%20frame.jpg?dl=0
Patch:
- No special items can now ever go below 0. If they do let me know and i'll tell them off.
- Payments of Iron should now also be correct.
New feature!
Every 5 minutes a tip will appear in the events- things such as how to assign soldiers mid-battle, what special tiles are for, and how to avoid combat!
You can toggle it off and on with 'H' for HELP!
The Atmospheric Update
The focus of this update is soaking in the atmosphere of your world- with some visual changes and a tonne of audio improvements! Myself and our composer Mr Brian Fairbanks are very excited to make this live!
So what's new/changed?
[B]Big changes:[/B]
[X] New unique music- a track that extends across all 4 seasons adding a rich, beautiful backdrop throughout your playing experience! The music also becomes louder as you zoom out.
[X] Over 60 atmospheric, environmental sounds! (video link below). Each natural tile has a distinctive sound, along with every building and many of their upgrade levels. Now you can truely get lost into a very diverse world as sounds mix based on what you are viewing- and your buildings change the sound of your lands. What will yours sound like?
[X] A day/night cycle! For now, pressing 'U' will toggle it on and off but by default it is enabled. All buildings and decor tiles create a small light source, and every season end slowly pulls your lands into darkness (video link below)!
[X] Improved special tile appearances! For built on and natural tiles, there are now new appearances, some with animations! See your lands fill with sheep, deer, fish and more!
Lesser changes:
[X] Slightly more health for enemy camps.
[X] New fog of war appearance! To cater for the new night-time, the fog of war is now clouds!
[X] New randomising button added to the flag creator!
[X] New loading sequence for new worlds! This is designed so that it better covers the old pause and wait with the hourglass, and gives a nice stepping block for future things to load in on start.
Patch changes:
[X] You can now edit the storage refining up to 100%.
[X] Excess resources now burn based on how many are in excess.
[X] Your defence score should never be below 1 now.
[X] Enemy camps no longer count into your area defence scores.
[X] The resource panel remembers being compressed when reopening.
[X] Removed the lag when buildings are repairing.
[X] Holding left-click down over resource tiles gives special items now.
[X] Lots of improvements to combat (for now).
[X] Removed adding/removing soldiers via the worker panel not affecting your attack power.
[X] Fixed some buildings not changing animation on seasonal change.
[U]Videos[/U]
Day-Night cycle:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1h-nfIQITWo
Sounds demo:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LoIgyao-5O8
[H1]What's to come?[/H1]
The next update is more secrative and will be announced in a few days after some experimenting- it will feature combat changes and will add a big addition to your gameplay! There will be more buildings to come in a future research big update- including lighthouse, smeltry and tavern!
Have any ideas to share?!
Post them on this thread and I will get back to you asap:
http://steamcommunity.com/app/618270/discussions/2/1327844097125521948/
Help shape the game!
Thanks as ever to bug reporters and idea sharers, and to all the players!
The High Achievers Update
All the changes made in this week's update!
Update 3 brings a host of changes to the game- from achievements, to market changes! This is a particularly good update for those who like more control or guidance to the gameplay! The list doesnt cover various graphical working done too.
The meat:
[X] Achievements are added! If you have any that don't complete when they should, be sure to let me know. Some of you will find achievements complete when you jump back into the game.
[X] Added a button to compress resource panel that only shows the amount of each resource and the storage values.
[X] Market levels change- all levels you can trade for all items- however level dictates how long open the market is. level 1 = 1/3 season. 2= 2/3 and 3=entire season.
[X] Left clicking resources button next to storage allows you to adjust what happens with excess storage- fades the text etc and overlays textboxes. - Getting a tonne of food and nothing to do with it? Click the manage button on the resources menu.
[X] The main colour you choose in your flag is the colour all buildings have- flags, rooves and more- including new details!
[X] Added the ability to place fishing dock unautomatically.
The lesser changes:
[X] More hover tool-tips in the panels, as well as benefits explanations for the paths and walls and the area defence checker.
[X] Worker types are displayed now when hovering over their number of workers.
[X] Temporary better combat balance- greatly improve camp health and slightly attack power.
[X] More interactivity with tile UI buttons.
[X] 1/6 increase in special item chance.
[X] Stopped the freaking out storage full event notification.
[X] Double special items gained from special tiles.
[X] Increased click speed for 'idle' clicking.
As usual- all the patched out things! If you have any issues please report them in the forum!
Patch:
[X] Fixed opened chests not giving text indicated items.
[X] Destroying multiple camps at the same time with faith no longer causes issues with placing tile decor there.
[X] Mission panel now appears where last was on forced opening on mission completing.
[X] Fixed iron market level 3- skins/iron requirements were switched.
[X] Removed useless market active button and resized it's menu.
[X] Defence barracks requirements menu being on the wrong side of it's upgrade button is fixed.
[X] Quarry menu wood amount realigned over the menu.
[X] Iron value now updates more regularly.
[X] Music volume shouldn't now force volume on when muted every season 3rd.
[X] Attack score can no longer go into the negative!
I'm looking to add a big music/sound system for the next update.
Thanks to BCrocX who emailed me this excellent screenshot of their port!
You can do the same at kriverwood@tallstorystudios.com or through the Steam Overlay!
Have any ideas to share?!
Post them on this thread and I will get back to you asap:
http://steamcommunity.com/app/618270/discussions/2/1327844097125521948/
Help shape the game!
