This month I've been trying to pave way for full blown multiplayer-- This has so far been a really good decision because it's forcing me to clean up how objects interact, and clean up the structure of things. My code is getting cleaner and easier to work with as I approach actual multiplayer readiness.
With lots of new players in mind, I finally tried addressing the fact that the game has really weird controls. I watched a fair number of people play the game, and they all would try the same things at first-- So I tried to transform my controls to work with what these players tried!
I also finally got Localization in the pipeline, luckily I have a lot of friendly users who helped me with the translations-- I haven't got credits ready in the game yet so I might as well post it here:
TabbyCatface: Russian, Ukrainian Translation
Slowboii and Kujawiaczek: Polish Translation
Snaked Snake: German Translation
LynxModernWitcher: French Translation
Adept Lughir: Dutch Translation
The rest of the languages are machine-translated, if you're interested in helping with the translation, join the KoboldKare discord! https://discord.gg/WGff3rR (and poke me)
Anyway, here's the patch notes for this month:
- Added localizations for many languages, dialogue is still in the works though.
- UI rework, well more like suddenly there's UI. Should help with figuring out the controls!
- Press F to ragdoll.
- The "advanced grab" is now buried under a context button (currently shift). This button immediately detaches the mouse and lets you aim and grab stuff. It also shows some helpful UI buttons you can press so you know you can rotate, freeze, and push/pull with it.
- Controller inputs should now work properly, they still can't drive the UI, but it's possible to play with them now (with a bit of difficulty).
- Casino prototype is in, it's looking really good! Some places inside might look empty because I had to temporarily disable the games.
- Ragdoll adjustments and polish, they're still prone to clipping, still look dead, and sometimes their bones seem to unhinge-- but for the most part they've improved a lot!
- I've enabled Developer Mode for the build, this is to let players give more meaningful bug-reports. It can open an annoying debug console though, click on it to close it!
- Mirror no longer has an incorrect oblique clipping plane.
- Switched to indirect lighting for baked lighting for just a slight improvement in the baked lighting.
- Added a dynamic reflection probe that updates every 3 seconds, it can cause some weird artifacts, but in general it makes nights look nicer and the environment reflections more convincing.
- Attachables no longer apply any physics (goodbye oscillating kobold-flask abominations...)
- Hitboxes on penetrators have been refined, though if they're extremely large they'll still "magnet" into things. Smaller ones require much more specific aim and purpose.
- Male kobolds can make eggs now, this might not stick around once more chems are added though.
- Kobolds ragdoll when thrown, or when their feet are grabbed.
The advanced grab change is something that I've been thinking about for a long time. It used to be bound to the primary mouse button, and permanently affixed to the center of the screen. This caused a lot of confusion though because in practice it was secondary, or even tertiary to the primary game loop. The first thing any player does as they play the game is try to water the egg, and the advanced grab isn't useful at all for that.
And because it was fixed to the center of the screen, it made any sexual interaction really jarring as you had to shake your entire head with the motions. So I've decoupled it from the screen, and buried it behind a context button which switches how your mouse works. The decoupling lets you shake kobolds and penetrators without making yourself sick, and the context button allows for me to pop up a bunch of ui to help players learn how it works. Let me know what you all think about it!
I'll be spending the next couple days updating the patreon, twitter, and steam page to reflect the changes. Next month I'll hopefully actually be working on some multiplayer integrations.