“Greetings survivor”
We have a presence, and for now it’s sustainable.
I’m fed up with just surviving, it’s time to thrive.
In the dregs of the old world we find knowledge.
Let’s upgrade. Consequences be damned!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZkkiZcC0NxU
Welcome to Floodland, “We can rebuild better”
We hope you’ve been enjoying our SteamNextFest Demo. Feedback so far has been great and we welcome more. Many of you have proven your survival capabilities.
But now it’s time to flourish. Floodland is not just about surviving the catastrophic “Event”, it’s about growing and improving your community on the path to building a new society. Once you’ve covered your basic needs of food, water, and shelter, it’s time to start shaping your community and we’ve given you powerful tools to help achieve this.
The tech tree is your primary method of developing the buildings and technology you’ll need. It's divided up into four main quadrants: survival, well-being, exploration, and growth. These are presented on a clock-style interface and it’s trying to balance these competing areas which will be one of your most crucial tasks.
As you progress from gaining a foothold in this new world, growing from hunter gatherer to electrical engineer, you’ll have access to basic raw materials like rubbish, wood, and rubble, which can be gathered and processed and turned into resources you require to develop your community. Eventually, you’ll progress all the way around the hours of the clock to unlock and manufacture advanced materials like coal, metal, and concrete.
These four main quadrants of the clock are also intimately interconnected with the buildings that you’ll develop to further enhance your society. The Survival arc, for example, concerns itself with harvesting basic resources like wood, food and water, which in turn will enable you to develop starter buildings like the Fishing Dock, Water Still, and Forager Hut.
Those first two are vital for securing your food supply and water sources, but the Forager Hut is useful for harvesting components of the old world, allowing you to sort through rubbish and rubble and repurpose them to fulfil your community’s needs. If you follow the survival branch all the way to its logical conclusion, you’ll be able to construct advanced buildings like the Shellfish Farming Center, Fishing Harbor, Water Treatment Plant, and Insect Farm (yum!). You’ll also unlock new building modes and advancements for your current structures.
This means the tech tree is a powerful way of measuring your progress but it also provides different choices so you can select your own path. City building is part of society building, it’s not about developing every single advance in a linear fashion but carefully choosing the ones you think will give your society the best chance of flourishing and facing your immediate challenges.
You’ll need to change and adapt your research and building strategies according to your current needs, as well as anticipating the challenges you may face in the near future. It’s about cause and effect, making trade-offs, and realising there’ll be good and bad. All of which will change with every different playthrough.
As Michał Rudziński, co-lead designer says,
"Research points are limited so we force you to make choices, to specialise rather than generalise. It means there’s a consequence and weight to your decisions. You can’t have everything.”
This means you’ll have to choose wisely, survivors. A Medical Tent is probably always going to be an essential path to establishing your community, but whether you develop that before or after you construct Climbing Equipment is just one of many intriguing decisions Floodland will ask you to make.
All the while, keep in mind your ultimate goal, working towards unlocking the mysteries of the power plant. Some of these, like the transformer and turbines, will need to be manufactured from those advanced materials, others will have to be discovered by exploring the world.
If you would like to become a beta tester and provide feedback you can apply on our form
here
And join us on Discord channel: https://discord.gg/Hnbxg9CJbZ
Wishlist us on Steam and keep up-to-date with our weekly DevBlogs which will continue to delve into the mudded waters of Floodland. The tide has risen and there is much to prepare you for before the November 15th release.
Tomorrow, we're having an AMA with the Devs Alex and Tomek.
That's Friday the 7th at 17:00 CEST / 18:00 BST / 08:00 PST
It'll be Streamed on our Steam page https://store.steampowered.com/app/1336180/Floodland/
Drop your questions in chat or in #🙋︱questions-4-devs on our Dicord channel and we'll answer them all .
And if you would like to win a Floodland game key with our SteamNextFest Demo just show us the beauty of survival by putting a screenshot of your starting settlement in the artworks section of our Steam community. Closing date is Monday the 10th and we'll pick some winners.
Tips: hold RMB to move the camera & consider lighting effectsand ctrl+u to toggle the U.I.
GLHF!
Using the tech of the before-times, you can follow us here for more:
Twitter
Facebook
Discord
Instagram
Come back again next week when we’ll introduice you to the clans and encounters your sure to meet as you venture forth into the floodlands.
Until then, happy surviving,
- Your Floodland Team