Genre: Real Time Strategy (RTS), Simulator, Strategy, Indie
Summer Islands
June Update 2024 [v0.9.4] with engine upgrade and much more
Hello everyone,
The time has finally come. Thank you very much for your patience. In this update everything has been turned upside down again and due to the long time a lot could be changed.
The update was basically ready two weeks ago. Then came the Indie Game Fest and some things were adjusted again. To be honest: fortunately!!! There were still a few bugs and a few errors in thinking. But the Indie Game Fest was great fun. Looking over the shoulders of so many people as they celebrate the game and give feedback is really great. Thank you all for your feedback! Alright, enough of the past. Let's take a look at the hot s***.
The main feature in this update is the engine upgrade. I.e. 30-60fps until the late game. We were able to verify this in some long-term tests. Nevertheless, everyone has different hardware, which is why there will always be deviations. A lot of under-the-hood adjustments had to be made. There is still a BUG with PIXIJS which means that we have not yet fully switched to WebGPU. But the new upgrade of PIXIJS alone brings a lot of performance. In addition, we have made a few adjustments, e.g. moving vehicles (bicycles, cars, mopeds, airplanes, ships,...) now only move at 10fps. In my opinion, this is an adjustment that doesn't really catch the eye and makes the pixel character even more beautiful.
As already mentioned, in this update there are a few buses that drive along the streets as soon as tourists arrive at the port or airport.
I have noticed that some people have problems with road construction and terraforming. That's why I've made the fields look better in this update. When building roads, you can now build by holding down the mouse button and can build around corners.
When you build a new building, the bonus/penalty area is displayed immediately. Buildings with a foot icon must contain a road in this border so that tourists can get there on foot.
If you have built the building too far away, warnings will now appear. I.e. warnings if the building has no road connection or the building has no harbor or airport or a harbor has no connection to the Dark Water.
The money icon at the top now contains a small report on the last year with the profits and losses of the individual building types.
If you pause, build something and have to demolish it again, you get the building costs back. In other words, as long as no time has elapsed, you can demolish the buildings for free as if nothing had happened.
The costs for terraforming and the consultants have been reduced. The side missions have also been adjusted. In addition, there are always a few beginner missions (Build Harbor, Build Hotel) to steer you in the right direction.
Last but not least: I think many have only found their way to the store in a roundabout way. I wanted to change this. The store button has now been integrated right at the start on the left-hand side. Just in case.
The same applies to the menu to see the preferences of the buildings. If you click on a building, another button will take you directly to the preference menu.
In the preference menu you can select the right buildings or click on the building to build it directly.
There are a few more minor adjustments in the update. There will also be a few changes under the hood in the next update. Because, as already mentioned, the performance of WebGPU could not yet be switched on. There are also a few missing features like the Steam Workshop support and other wishes from you that I have noted down.
So look forward to the next update or to Gamescom 2024, where we will have our own booth.
Until then, thank you for your patience.
P.S. If you ❤️ Summer Islands, we would be very 🤩 about a 👍 Review.
ADDED: Engine Upgrade with WebGPU Support and a lot of adjustments under the hood to keep it running
ADDED: Buses on Street
ADDED: Warnings for problematic buildings
ADDED: Buildingsname in different language
ADDED: Money icon shows small report
ADDED:
Pause extended: Demolition and money back if no time has passed
IMPROVEMENTS
FIX: Better display of the letters ÄÖÜ
FIX: Links are opened with Steam overlay
CHANGED: Resolution Zoom with Render Engine
CHANGED: Reduced costs for terraforming
CHANGED: Reduced costs for consultants
CHANGED: Sidequest finetuning
CHANGED: Disaster number finetuning
CHANGED: Road construction with preview
CHANGED: Building preference menu with building button
CHANGED: Building click menu with Button to preferences
CHANGED: Victory menu custo
mized
Indie Game Fest 2024 & News about the coming Update v0.9.4
Hello everyone,
Once again, I can only inform you about an interim status and draw your attention to an upcoming event
From Friday 31.05.2024 14-21 o'clock and Saturday 01.06.2024 13-21 o'clock we are at the Indie Game Fest in Cologne with our own booth. https://indiegamefest.de/ Come by and play a round or just chat and get to know each other. I'm looking forward to seeing you again!!!!
All information about the Indie Game Fest and tickets can be found on the following page. We have also been sent the following code for a 20% discount on tickets for the festival: Game20. https://www.eventbrite.de/e/854790771207/?discount=Game20
I'm working hard on the new update. A few new architecture changes have been thrown out and others have been created. With every test cycle you get new insights that lead to changes. But what I can already announce in any case:
Buses are coming. Buses are intended as fillers for tourists at airports and ports. This means that as soon as tourists arrive in paradise, buses drive from the airport through the streets and roads. You cannot and should not build bus stops or create bus routes. If you haven't built a bicycle, moped or car rental service, the tourists will already arrive with buses at their vacation destination.
You can build roads around the corner: I think it's a feature that will make life a little easier for some people. You no longer need 2 clicks to build roads, no, you can now build around corners with just one click. This simplifies building and saves a lot of time.
Bonus/Malus area You experts probably already know the areas by heart. But there is now a guideline to show you how big the bonus/malus area around the buildings is. Please note that all tourists from your street network visit all buildings if they are in the street network. But the area around the building gives your building a certain bonus or malus. e.g. No tourist wants to go to a hotel right next to an airport or landfill.
Warnings There are also a few hints if a building has a problem
As you can see, there are some changes and improvements coming. I am improving and fixing bugs in all corners. My goal is to finish the new update in the next 2-3 weeks.
Until then, thank you for your patience.
P.S. If you ❤️ Summer Islands, we would be very 🤩 about a 👍 Review.
Time is passing far too quickly again. It's only just been Christmas and now I hope that everyone had a good Easter. I would like to bring you up to date with the latest news. What is currently being worked on, what else is happening, etc.
First of all, the most urgent NEWS:
Summer Islands is part of CAGGTUS 2024.
https://www.caggtus.de #GamesGround #Caggtus From April 5 to 7, 2024, we will be at Caggtus in Leipzig with our own booth in the Indie area to show everyone who wants to play Summer Islands. Come by and play a round or just chat and get to know each other. I'm looking forward to seeing you!!!!
The next update:
As you might have guessed, I've been working on the next update for a few weeks now. In terms of the timeline, the engine upgrade is coming in the next update (and of course a few other little things) The aim is to round off Summer Islands even further in all areas so that there are no major surprises on release. This means that with the latest update I'm trying to keep the FPS at 60 (maximum drops to 30 fps), the side missions need to be calibrated and the map editor needs to be adapted for Steam Workshop.
As you can see, there are a lot of things going on under the hood. There are also no more major features planned before the release (I hope this is not a surprise. The timeline has been mentioned here before).
To summarize: We are working on the next update. Your wishes and feedback are welcome at any time.
However, I would like to go into a little more detail about the current technical situation in this news post. In other words, for anyone who also deals with software architecture or wants to understand the IT behind the game in more detail.
The longer you develop games, the more you look at the structures in games. "How was this effect added?", "ah, this little movement already gives you the feeling for XY", "look, the waterfall also only contains 3 textures that move back and forth". Here you still have to be careful that you can still enjoy games. But you also understand that computer games only ever want to and can convey the atmosphere to the player with the smallest of means. Because every calculation in a game must be considered efficiently so as not to diminish the gameplay experience. "Is this fluid calculation for the water worth it or is a simplified calculation enough?", "How much atmosphere does this effect add to the FPS?". This constant back and forth has accompanied me a lot in recent years.
When programming, there are always two ways to solve complex problems: Solve the problem with computing power or memory capacity. So you can recalculate the position, angle etc. of an object in the game again and again or you can save the information about the object and call it up when required. If you solve a problem using the computing power, you have full flexibility. With the memory capacity you have more power for other calculations.
Since we have implemented Summer Islands in Javascript, many things are rewritten with the engine upgrade to the memory capacity. The different layers from the browser, JS, Executable to the actual calculation are not designed for high computing power. Nevertheless, a high degree of flexibility is always required at the start of development in order to implement changes quickly. This has always been an advantage for Summer Islands. Even if the latest version of the FrontEnd Engine brings a change from WebGL to WebGPU, this unfortunately does not result in a "Plug&Play" stable 140fps. The change is accompanied by many changes and this is noticeable in the creation of many textures. The focus is now more on reusing the textures that are already stored in the GPU cache. Therefore, all calculations and textures had to be temporarily stored in memory to a much greater extent.
It is well known that you should generally store everything in a cache. But that's always easier said than done. The textures in Summer Islands are all stored in the cache. But switching between textures and creating additional sprites (textures with additional properties) creates a lot of work, e.g. when 3000 bicycles are simply riding around in the landscape. Also the creation of the fields (water, beach, grass,..) are no longer recalculated with every change. We have added another controller that is responsible for texture management. The rendering can always take all the information it needs for display from this pot without being disturbed.
At the moment I have gotten good results in some long-term tests on my programming laptop (i7-8750H, 16GB Ram, GeForce GTX 1050 Ti Max-Q). So after 45 years of game time with 15 bots and a 300 map size with 10,000,000,000 starting money (for the bots), it ran at 45-55 fps. The hardest calculations are for the moving objects (bike, car, ship, airplane).
As you can see, improvements are being made in all areas for this update. So it will probably take a while yet. Vacation is not planned until June. So I'll try to keep you up to date over the next few weeks. But if you still find bugs, have ideas or wishes, feel free to contact me at any time. Even with the release, this does not mean that features will not be added.
P.S. If you ❤️ Summer Islands, we would be very 🤩 about a 👍 Review.
February Update 2024 [v0.9.3] with building plan stores and more
Hello everyone,
ATTENTION: v0.9.3 is not yet Steamdeck compatible. Steam has forwarded the problem to the Proton team. Until then, another version can be selected via Properties>Betas.
Here are the new features:
The biggest change to the game in this update is the unlocking of building plans. So we thought we'd make some real money with Summer Islands and integrate an in-game store with microtransactions, cryptocurrency and awesome NFTs!!! JOKE!!!
But the main component in Summer Islands is money, so it's not a bad idea to be able to unlock the buildings with money. This means that the new buildings are no longer unlocked randomly during the course of the game, but can be bought one after the other. A few buildings are already unlocked at the beginning. The others are sorted per category according to purchase price. A store has therefore been integrated in which you can buy building plans and then build the buildings.
This changes the gameplay somewhat. However, this gives each player the opportunity to implement their own most efficient construction plan.
In addition, minor details have been added and bugs corrected. Preparations have also been made for the currently planned next update (engine upgrade).
P.S. If you ❤️ Summer Islands, we would be very 🤩 about a 👍 Review.
FIX: Road direction of the bots was displayed incorrectly
FIX: Chart tourist all data has displayed only last months
FIX: Pause mode also pauses the tooltip in the finance menu
FIX: Environmental & social costs were not deducted correctly
FIX: Fixed costs were calculated too high
FIX: Plants have grown over pollution
CHANGED: Research tree menu and correlation menu merged
CHANGED: Random building activation switched off
CHANGED: Plant growth greatly slowed down
CHANGED: Upgrade PIXIJS v7.2.0 to v7.4.0
Capitalism and Economy Fest
Let's celebrate capitalism and spend even more money :D
December Update 2023 [v0.9.2] with plant growth and more
Hello everyone,
Here are the new features:
In the next updates, the flora will be integrated a little more into the game. For example, ships should no longer be able to reach the harbor if there are large mangroves in the way. Or surfers can't find water if everything is full of trees.
A few more effects/infos have been added about the changes to the key figures at the top of the screen. I.e. if you build something, you will see a red number drop down or if you have received more reputation at the end of the month or a new star.
In addition, the multiplayer menus have been slightly adapted to the standard.
P.S. If you ❤️ Summer Islands, we would be very 🤩 about a 👍 Review.
ADDED: Star animation when changing the victory stars
ADDED: Numbers at the top center receive an animation when they change
IMPROVEMENTS:
FIX: Building menu selection of buildings
CHANGED: Reduced costs for terraforming on land
CHANGED: Option menu audio settings revised
CHANGED: Multiplayer connection menu revised
Blog post: 2023 summary and outlook for 2024
Hello everyone,
I hope you had a relaxing Christmas and that you, your family and your friends are doing well under the circumstances. As the year draws to a close, I wanted to take a look back and forward with this post. Before that, I wanted to motivate you to leave some feedback. Everyone can create a Steam review, write their wishes in the forum or write me directly about their wishes or problems Support@SummerIslands.de The more feedback, the better. That's what Early Access depends on and I'm happy to implement your wishes and improvements. I have to admit that I always look at the percentage of positive/negative user feedback. My goal is always to stay above 75% positive :D
The following update was made for 2023:
03.2023 [v0.8.5] with Gamepad Support
04.2023 [v0.8.6] with reputation through quality & environment
05.2023 [v0.8.7] with volcano, pollution and more
07.2023 [v0.8.8] with Awards, Currencies and more
08.2023 [v0.8.9] with nature, more nature and fixes
09.2023 [v0.9.0] with special buildings and more
11.2023 [v0.9.1] with more sabotage
12.2023 [v0.9.2] with plant growth and more (coming next Weekend)
I have to say that the gamepad support was quite lengthy and you have to try out a number of options to find the best playing experience. Last but not least, Summer Islands was also verified for the Steam deck. The map editor is still missing, but that will come. With the other updates over the year, the gameplay was changed in many corners with small steps. Especially the reputation, the special buildings or the additional natural disasters have a strong impact on the gameplay. Between you and me, I was most looking forward to the special buildings. In the end, however, the WOU effect was a little less than I expected. To summarize, it can be said that all areas have once again been improved and worked on.
Unfortunately, the next year 2024 will not be such an adventure. We are planning to come out of early access in the next updates => Release v1.0.0 in Q2 2024 This should hopefully not be a major surprise for you. We once published a timeline for this on 01.04.2023. Here is another update:
With the latest updates I'm trying to "round off" everything a bit more, i.e. fine-tuning the parameters, fixing bugs, adding more tooltips, adjusting textures, etc. There is also a major engine update pending, which should make Summer Islands run much more smoothly. So there is still a lot to do. In particular, the idea of a research tree has stuck in order to unlock buildings earlier. This feature will be available as a separate update. But a lot is probably under the hood. I'm also trying to focus a little more on marketing in order to have a good start for the release of Summer Islands. ;)
Last but not least, I would like to say a BIG THANK YOU to you and your support for Summer Islands. You are the heroes and a happy new year 2024 to each of you.
P.S. If you ❤️ Summer Islands, we would be very 🤩 about a 👍 Review.
In this update, we look at the new sabotage functions. There are now a total of 6 sabotages with very different effects.
It starts with cockroaches. A little something to reduce the condition of a building. With Defame, you can slightly worsen the reputation of your opponent. The respective building also takes some damage. You can use the construction time on your opponent's construction sites and on your own. It extends the construction time or shortens it for you. The stink bomb makes an area uninhabitable for approx. 200 days. This means that all buildings in an area with a radius of approx. 8 fields will perform very poorly. Even your own. The Shit Storm makes all of a player's buildings look bad. For a period of about 200 days, his reputation will slowly and steadily decline. As you know, reputation is an integral part of why your tourists come to you. Finally, you can also have one of your opponent's buildings demolished. As if by magic, it will then disappear from the surface. Nobody knows who triggered the fire alarm.
The chances of success of a sabotage are always different. They depend on the saboteur you have hired and the opposing security force. Unfortunately, every successful sabotage always reflects on you, which reduces your reputation.
The following should be mentioned in small print: It is important to emphasize that intentionally destroying reputation in Summer Islands and acts of sabotage are generally not recommended. Such actions can negatively impact the game experience for others and compromise the integrity of the game. As game developers, we encourage fair play and respectful behavior.
MouseOver Buildings
For a better understanding of the game, we have added some more information to the MouseOver Buildings. At the top right or directly as text, you can now see whether there is a problem with the building or which things are currently affecting the building
P.S. If you ❤️ Summer Islands, we would be very 🤩 about a 👍 Review.
ADDED: Icon and Text in the MouseOver menu if a building is not connected to the road network
ADDED: Icon in the MouseOver menu when a building is affected by a stink bomb or shitstorm
IMPROVEMENTS
FIX: Disappearing building: Islands Car
FIX: Mouse click on buildings next to special buildings
CHANGED: Gamepad Init delayed while loading
CHANGED: Finetuning Sabotage Effects
October 2023 update [v0.9.0] with special buildings and more
Hello everyone,
Here are the new features:
Special buildings
There are special buildings scattered across the map. These buildings attract more tourists. This means that every building within a certain radius of these buildings receives a boost. Every tourist wants to be near such buildings.
Area demolition
The demolition function has been expanded. An area can now be demolished. This can be filtered to demolish only buildings or only streets. It is also easier to clean up natural disasters such as pollution.
Filters and multi-selection in the building manager
In the building manager, you can use a filter on the right-hand side to display only those buildings that meet the individual filters. You can also select several buildings and edit them uniformly.
P.S. If you ❤️ Summer Islands, we would be very 🤩 about a 👍 Review.
ADDED: Special buildings with boost for surrounding buildings
ADDED: Demolition function extended for area selection
ADDED: Demolition function extended with filter for only street or building
ADDED: Building manager extended with filter
ADDED: Building manager with multiple selection
IMPROVEMENTS:
FIX: road costs were displayed 10.000 and deducted 20.000
FIX: Cameraposition on minimap
CHANGED: Resolution adjustment if screen has other Resolution
CHANGED: Finetuning the popularity funtion
CHANGED: Camera movement slows down the closer you zoom in
Delayed October 2023 update [v0.9.0] with special buildings and more
Hello everyone,
You probably realize it yourselves: Something is not quite right with the updates. Last update: September 2nd (more than 2 months ago)!!!
So I wanted to give you a quick update: The latest update v0.9.0 is almost ready.
But there are still a few adjustments to be made, bugs to be fixed and tests to be run.
BUT unfortunately the "worst case" for an indie developer has occurred: Total failure.
After the last update, we went on a short vacation road trip. Then came a few business trips for my day job and just when you have roughly thought about a battle plan for the update, Corona comes over you. Yes, Corona has knocked me out.
It's the first time I've had corona and luckily I've had a "milder" reaction. So I've been down with the flu for a week now. Now that things are starting to pick up again, I wanted to let you know.
I hope to be able to publish the update next weekend (knock on wood).
Until then, here are a few impressions:
P.S. If you ❤️ Summer Islands, we would be very 🤩 about a 👍 Review.
