Devblog #13 - Hiring Workers
Ahoy Shipwrights! While your crew is rising in numbers, it’s time for us to give you an update regarding the time-saving system we’ve been working on lately. With your friends on board in co-op mode, all the hard work gets easier and things are done faster. That must mean that pl
Ahoy Shipwrights!
While your crew is rising in numbers, it’s time for us to give you an update regarding the time-saving system we’ve been working on lately. With your friends on board in co-op mode, all the hard work gets easier and things are done faster. That must mean that playing solo is no way to go… right? Arghhhh, ain’t no way! We’re not leaving no one! So, without further ado, welcome to the hiring system.
Original post
Workers Cabins
Next to your docks, you will find a few abandoned and ruined wooden houses. They are there for a reason, not just for mere disfigurement of the landscape. Your repair skills will come in handy as those houses can be renovated. Obviously, this will require not only your hard work but also some materials. Once you repair the cabin, a new feature will unlock.
Hiring Workers
Once you interact with a renovated cabin, you will be able to hire assistants to help you out with the job. They must be paid with money regularly, so always be mindful to save some in advance. You can assign them various kinds of tasks, especially those you aren’t so keen to do by yourself. Chopping wood gets tiring? Just get someone to do it! This kind of system does not leave solo players at a disadvantage. Also, later in the game, after being through the full ship-building process plenty of times, some minigames might start to bore you and feel more like an annoying repetitive nuisance. We don’t want it to happen, right? It’s also a solution that lies in between the “do-it-all-by-yourself” mindset and the approach of buying all the necessary things from townspeople or pirates. With the docks’ fast growth, more responsibilities fall on your shoulders. We want to help you out by providing a little bit of an automation opportunity. Choose a playstyle that will suit your liking! And also a big thanks to our community for they are the ones who suggested this feature first (Moros, noicemyman). We love to listen to your ideas and are excited to put them to good use. Feel free to share your thoughts on our discord server or right in the comments. See ya! The Devs
Shady deals with the local pirates may make people suspicious and they will trust you less, moving you closer to the infamy end of the spectrum. While there is no problem in sourcing things from them, constant dealings with them will make your clientele much more questionable as well. Pirates and privateers may become your main source of revenue.
Before you even think about assembling large ships in your shipyard, smaller vessels should be the centre of your attention. They will be key to the beginnings of your adventures.
Rafts are small and easy to manoeuvre in shallow and narrow bodies of water. Rafts will be useful in resource gathering and moving around before you build larger and more spacious boats and ships. Moving around swamps and rivers or the island will be much easier when you can hop onto this small vessel and paddle your way to resources.
Junks
Captains from all over the world will order new ships from you. This variety of clientele will allow you to learn techniques older than your family bloodline and use them to skyrocket it to glory by working on designs unheard of on your little island. Despite being ancient these traditional Chinese ships may become a crowning achievement of your shipyard. The wide range of uses as house and pleasure boats will be especially attractive to your rich clients who seek unique additions to their fleets.
These ships are sleek and often heavily decorated, which will help you unleash your artistic side.
Frigates
Not all your work will be used for pleasure and transporting goods. Warships such as frigates may just become your bread and butter, as larger fleets need many fast scouts. This is where your iron casting skills will shine, as you create cannons capable of pulverizing other ships. Their complex design will fill your hours, even after you prepare all the necessary materials. Their assembly is an art form on its own., but rest assured that once you’re done, your ships will put Napoleon’s fleet to shame!
Longships (Drakkar)
Specialised tactics require specialised builds. Drakkars are perfect for shallow waters with their shallow-draft hulls. These powerful ships could carry warriors without relying on the wind to more currents to carry them to their destination. Intricate carvings decorate the sides and front of this boat and it creates fear in crews of vessels who dare to oppose the might and speed of this ship. Your craft will be a part of some of the most terrifying tactics on the seven seas. So grab your tools and begin preparing materials and creating true sea monsters, which will wreak havoc.
We’re still looking for new ship types and ideas for gameplay mechanics. Each ship will have its unique customisation options making the experience of building them more fun. Let us know what would you like to see in the game. We’re waiting for your ideas in our Discord.
Watch our for the shady type though! You can deal with the pirates who decide to stop on your tiny island. They will be sitting in the local tavern, waiting for you to sell away items they found during their adventures. The value of the materials and items they offer you can differ depending on their rarity and quality. But be careful! The pirates may seem like a lovely adventurous bunch, but they are the slimiest cheaters out there. They may try to squeeze every piece of gold out of your pocket.
These trades may make the job of a shipwright much easier. You still be able to create the vast majority of the materials and resources on your own if you don’t want anyone’s help. For those of you who want to do everything on your own, you still can. It may be a bit more difficult but still possible.
Do you think you will use the help from the townsfolk and help them as well? Or maybe you will prefer to be lone wolves tinkering away in your shipyards?
Let us know in our Discord server or on social media!
The map itself is 3 kilometres long and 3 kilometres wide with varied elevations, from sea level to tall mountains, with canyons, tunnels, and hills in between. The island is split into two by a river that meanders and creates a large waterfall, which may or may not hide some secrets. The river also creates a canyon There are multiple biomes, which cover vast parts of the island, tall mountains with barely any trees descend down and turn into lush forests and wetlands full of wines moss. Some areas are more mysterious than others, with ruined huts, lost crates, beached ships and abandoned pirate stashes.
Depending on where you wander, you will be able to find different types of materials. Biomes have native varieties of trees, which can be later on processed into three differently coloured kinds of wood. The location also influences the weather. The higher up the more likely you are to encounter rain or clouds, while wild beaches will scorch you with the sun.
Part of this vast terrain will be yours to use. On this part of the map, you’ll be able to build not only your docks but also additional buildings such as a smithing station and storage. This area is customisable and will develop alongside your business. The docks will grow larger so they can fit larger more prestigious ships
Every room will have a capacity of up to 4 players and they all will have access to in-game text chat. To maintain safety and keep the rooms vaguely civilized, the host will have moderation tools. This will allow them to moderate the chat and kick out the less pleasant individuals.
Progress made on a project in co-op mode will be saved separately for each player, so everyone can continue working in a single player. At this point, the saves will diverge, so if the same group wants to meet again, they will have to choose which version of the save they would like to continue.
We want to avoid unpleasant connection issues during the launch and later down the road. We are already looking into servers, which will scale depending on the traffic. Queues and stuttering gameplay are on our to-visit list, so even though the game is in the early stages of production, we are already searching for the best possible solutions. This includes most likely investing in localized servers, which can maintain stable and low ping for the players from the other side of the globe.
Our shipwrights have to remember that the co-op mode is absolutely a voluntary thing. We encourage it, but at the same time, we want to make sure that the solo experience is equally fun for those who decide to build their vessels on their own.
Let us know whether you will play in the single-player exclusively or invite your friends to join you in shipwright adventures.
We started working on a vast system of caves and caverns. Wild and difficult to traverse, they will try to protect secrets hidden within. Exploring them will be yet another source of new crafting recipes and decorative items. You will be able to find lost ships stuck in caves for years, holding secrets to new and more profitable boat parts.
Forgotten pirate treasures will be hidden in nooks and crannies of caverns. Protected by the remains of the crew, they wait to be discovered.
On the technical side of things, the devs are already looking at systems that will allow us to create vast tunnels without destroying people’s GPUs and CPUs. Strategies similar to the ones used to render grass and land will be crucial in making the underground can run faster and smoother. Behind the scenes, the caves will be cut into smaller, more manageable pieces and seamless transitions between them will be implemented. We want to make sure that spelunking is fun even on slightly older devices.
These caves and exploration will be an important part of expanding your company. The risk of leaving your shipyard unattended for a moment will be rewarded with rare and valuable items. They will give you the advantage you need to climb the online leaderboards.
Don't forget to check out our social media. Let us know on Discord, what treasures you would like to find underground!
New Trailer
Today we released a new trailer for the game. You will be able to feel the sweat and tears necessary to all aspects of a ship. This trailer will also give you a better idea of how minigames will work.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kcBcfJRnf8
New Steam Page
Our steam page changes too! The new description of the game with more details about the game’s mechanics and features. We'll still talk about some of them in upcoming devblogs, but you can find the main set of features on 
With a new description come new screenshots. Some of them you may have seen on our social media. Some are completely new.
Playtests Registration
On top of all these changes, the request access button is now live! You can sign up for playtests. We will keep you up to date when the playtests begin!
The main goals of the project: open world, a huge number of objects the players can interact with and the best possible graphics were the base for the creation of all necessary tools explained below. This was a tricky task but after some thinking, the best solution seemed to be a mixture of simple and more complex systems.
A separate test map was created to see how the engine will handle all the assets and textures. We filled it to the brims with buildings, trees, and most importantly huge amounts of grass.
Then the map was cut into smaller pieces, which we can load depending on where the player is. This allows us to show the highest quality textures and VFX in the surrounding area. We load the lower quality textures behind the horizon and the player, which helps us keep the immersion without worrying too much about the performance.
Even though the grass was at some point the trickiest part to get just right, finally getting the system to work reliably makes rendering trees and even whole pieces of land much easier.
The game will also be equipped with a separate controller responsible for animating and rendering the grass directly through the GPU. This will increase the calculating power available and relieve the CPU. A system like this allows us to keep stable 60fps on maximum settings when using a GTX 960 graphics card. (the light green part of the graph represents the editor)
A traditional LOD system, which will switch models into less demanding variations depending on how close to them the player is, supports all these systems. The models are almost identical visually while being much easier to handle for the engine. With the number of objects on the map going into thousands, LODs are a must.
The last implemented system allows the game to save and load the status of singular trees. It will differentiate between ones that have fallen and ones still standing. This system will ensure that up to 800 objects at once with no hiccups or frame drops.
The backend part of the process may not be the spectacularly looking or the most interesting for all the players, but we wanted to shine the spotlight on the hard work of our programmer. You can show them some love by hopping onto our community discord and saying hi or sharing this devblog on your social media.
The limited amount of items you can carry on you. The additional slots will open as you progress through the game. You can buy more space with all the cash this player clearly does not have. You can sort through items by categories or just drop them randomly for that extra bit of chaos.
Tool Wheel.
The quickest way to access your tools. You decide which items to take with you on that specific occasion. This way, in the heat of the moment, when you see the perfect tree, you don’t have to look for a saw in the depths of your inventory. Additional information will help you with using your tools.
The Stockroom.
All your tools and materials will be stored in the stockroom. Similarly to the inventory, you can access different categories separately. Organising your items is optional, but keep in mind you may play with others. You can buy additional storage space as you collect materials and eventually grow out of this stockroom’s capacity.
Ship selection screen.
Here you can access all ships available to you, along with brief descriptions and their stats. As you progress through the game, new ships will unlock and they will become more magnificent and complex. Each ship’s card will show its class, speed, the number of crew members needed to operate it, as well as the approximate amount of cargo the ship can carry.
Ship customisation screen.
Many elements on your ship can be customised. To be able to pick and choose, you need to buy the item first, otherwise, it will be locked on your customisation screen. Each element will have its stats, which among other things will inform you of their rarity and value. This way you can decide whether you build your ship as efficiently as possible or maybe just go for stylistic points.
On top of all this, we have more things coming soon! So as the devs continue their work, keep your excitement contained or share it with us on your community discord!
One of the most important aspects of surviving and constructing a fleet is fire. You will be able to experience that chase of a spark in a mini-game. Keeping the elusive arrow in one place will be a key to starting a kindle strong enough to feed a fire capable of not only cooking meals but also melting ores.
Raw materials you collect need to be processed and shaped into nails, bolts, anchors. This is an exhausting process requiring lots of time and patience, which is why developers created this arcade-style challenge. While anyone will be able to produce items they want, perfecting smithing will require skill and impeccable timing.
The number of produced items will depend on how well you perform in the mini-game. You will always produce the items (no material will be completely wasted), however, the more outstanding your work is the better results! A combo system will allow you to create more items out of the same amount of raw material.
Obviously, as time goes on, there will be more features added. We just wanted to introduce you to the first two of them. As you master them all, you will become the ultimate craftsman.
While the developers tinker away, join our discord and become a part of the community. See you there!
Above you can see the galleon in its full glory. This is an advanced model - unique and historically accurate. It is based upon an actual ship from 1684 and consists of… 1,000 pieces! So, if you’ve been wondering what was taking us so long, now you have the answer – we were creating a realistic, enormous ship (we’re not kidding, it’s 40 meters long!).
The galleon before your eyes is a draft version displayed in a wireframe mode. It is being modelled in a next-gen utility software by our 3d artists. As soon as it’s finished, we will provide you with more graphics and information.
In the meantime you can visit our Discord server and become a shipwright, as well as ask us about any details you are curious about. See you there!
Ship Builder Simulator is a game about… boat building! You guessed right.
You'll start with almost nothing. Thrown by the storm on the beach, after your last sail
was destroyed by it. You will have to work your way out by becoming the boat builder.
Current state of the game is early alpha where we experiment with various gamplay possbilities
and implementing those ideas we found the best. Bugfixing and optimisation - are made in parallel with the core game development. For example you can notice that the earth is a little bit transparent. Yea... we are fixing that.
In the released game here on the beach you will find many collectables (like tools, wood etc.) that will help you get started.
For testing, we have prepared sets of ready products and piles of resources that allow us to quickly erect test ships and test other functionalities such as crafting or wood cutting.
There will be many functionalities in the game. Let's talk about some of them.
Collecting resources is just the beginning. As we gain access to tools, we will be able to cut down trees and acquire wood for shipbuilding. In SBS we have to cut down at least half of tree trunk to fall one. The trees grow back very slowly, so with our greater demand
we will have to venture deeper into the island.
Fortunately, SBS does not need to wear each beam separately. Everything goes to our infinite inventory.
An advanced method of processing harder to obtain resources. Many ship components in larger vessels will require metal parts - nails, fittings and chains. We will make them with the help of a forge. Currently represented by an anvil.
Here is a carpentry table. A foretaste of the carpentry workshop in which we will get rid of bark and transform it into useful elements needed to build a ship. These elements include - square beams and boards.
Welcome to your first shipyard - it is simple and poor, but you have to start somewhere. The ships will be editable, giving them decorative elements such as lamps, number of masts, type of cannon and many more. Here you can build simple sailboats, cutters and boats, and when you earn enough, you will be able to build larger vessels in larger shipyards.
The game will contain raw material needed for ship construction. Among other things: various types of wood and metals. You can come into their possession in several ways:
by finding, extracting or buying. Currently, only the first two ways are implemented. Of course, the search for findings will cover the entire island not only it's beaches.
We are still working on main map. We want to provide players with the most interesting places both visually and for exploring.
Every now and then you will have access to the Site Scanning skill. The wave you send will highlight interactive objects for a short time. This hint will help you find items such as resources, collectibles and notes. It will also make it easier to find the last element that needs to be finished in the ship.
Of course, this will not be the only way to obtain materials! Everything will be available for purchase in a small port town using the money obtained for carrying out orders or selling ships. Thanks to this, you will be able to focus on building large ships without worrying about raw mats.
Let me know what you think about it. If you have any ideas, we'd love to hear them. We also invite you to our Discord server, thanks to which communication with us will be even simpler. Link below:
https://discord.gg/3nPwrq3
Cheers,
Intuition