After a long month of development, bug fixes, and optimizations the Staff Update is finally going out to the main branch, just in time for Half-Christmas too ːws_damanː
While you might still encounter a bug or two, thanks to the tireless bug reporting by the rockstars in the experimental branch, it's so much freaking better than any other update we've done so far... or so we hope :D
HERE'S WHAT'S NEW
OPTIMIZED PERFORMANCE
We've spent over a week optimizing various aspects of the game, reducing the overhead for both GPUs and CPUs. We've optimized the realtime-lights rendering, so you should be able to place more lights in your shop without melting your GPU. We redid the object pooling logic which reduced the lag felt when growing on setups, Also, we've balanced out the game's preloader logic to prevent freeze-ups when starting the game. If your PC meets the minimum requirements listed on OUR and not GTA5's store page, you should see at the very least a small boost in performance.
QUALITY OF LIFE IMPROVEMENTS
The Dope Market got updated with the much-requested Order History feature that allows you to browse your last 10 orders and re-add the items to your shopping cart. We've also added sort, search, and add to favorite functions which should help you find what you're looking for faster.
We've added confirmation screens to the Save/Load menu to prevent accidental save file overwrites and fixed a bunch of other minor UI issues. We've also enabled the Quick Save (F5) and Quick Load (F9) functionality.
NEW INVENTORY ITEMS
We've added new "wait here" spots which can be used to manage the customer flow in your shop by telling them where to um.... wait. Besides that, we've added larger capacity displays and an option to mark the items on the display as "not for sale", We've also introduced upgradeable grow room curtains which can be found in the Pimp It app.
THE STAFF
Employees can now be hired via the DO-er (still a working title ːws_smileyfaceː) app to do most of the work for you. All the staff members will earn XP and level up individually by performing tasks in your shop. When an employee levels up, they get awarded a skill point that you can then use to upgrade any of their skills. Upgrading a certain skill will make the employee perform the related tasks faster and more efficiently.
HERE'S A QUICK OVERVIEW OF THE JOBS AVAILABLE IN THIS UPDATE:
The Promoter
Tries to get customers into your shop by handing out joints and blunts on the boardwalk. You'll need to use the DO-er app and hook them up with some smokes in order for the promoters to do their jobs.
The Sales Clerk
As long as you've got weed in your shop's inventory the sales clerks will do their best to sell it all. The only thing they require to do their jobs is an available counter.
The Merch Manager
Merch Managers will restock your shelves and displays as long as you remember to assign the Merch to their inventory using the DO-er app.
The Farmer
Farmers will water, harvest, and, if you add seeds to their inventory, plant your weed for you. One thing to keep in mind though, they will not plant any seeds in busted pots no matter how many times you ask them to.
The Security Guard
Security Guards will chase and beat down any shoplifter that dares to steal from you. They'll retrieve the stolen item without destroying your customer's respect for you.
BUGFIXES AND MORE
We're not going to bore you with the bugfix list since even we can't remember all of them, however, most of the bugs reported so far have been fixed. If you still experience any old issues or got a brand new batch of fresh bugs after installing the Staff Update, let us know and we'll get those fixes out as fast as humanly possible :D
WHAT'S NEXT YOU ASK?
Naturally, there might still be a couple of bugs that we missed in the experimental, so in the upcoming days, we'll be working on getting them squashed and tweaking the employee values based on community feedback. Once the coast is clear, we'll start working on the next stage of the game that should bring a lot more life to the Weed Shop world, add more things to do and stuff to explore, and make the gameplay a lot less grindy.
We're not even 3 months into Early Access yet, but thanks to all the help and support we've been getting from our awesome community, Weed Shop 3 is already a completely different game from the s**t-sandwich that it was on launch day. We're not planning on stopping either, we'll keep grinding till we see our vision through and make it the best weed shop yet! More awesomeness is coming soon ːws_lighterː
Merry Half-Christmas everyone! ːws_damanː