Hey everyone,
We hope you enjoyed the start of Chapter One, and thank you to all those who've expressed their excitement, helped us nail down on bugs and continued to suggest where they want the future of It's Only Money to go.
We thought now would be a good time to address updates and how we want to handle them post launch of Chapter One. Chapter One was a big update for our team of 5, which we developed simultaneously with over 30 weekly updates along the way throughout Chapter Zero. As you can imagine, not only was it a fairly full-on development schedule making new content, but equally time consuming packaging and testing those builds and quite often tearing it down and starting over when we found a bug (or 50).
While we're proud of our ability to rapidly iterate with lighter pieces of content while working on a more substantial larger chapter update simultaneously, however it also meant we had to scope specifically to hit a weekly target. That meant some of our more exciting ideas falling by the way side. A lot of the suggestions we get here on Steam, or in the Discord community align with where we want to take the game, however, some if not most of those suggestions would take more than a week, so naturally finding time to manifest those ideas can be tricky.
From today, we're going to address what we're working on ahead of time, with a larger picture of what the game should encapsulate by the time we arrive at Chapter 2 and beyond. We're going to release updates with new mechanics, features and content as we finish them, as opposed to holding them off for a larger update down the road. This'll lighten the burden on us as a team having to dedicate days to QA'ing a weekly build, and get content in the game faster. This is not to say we won't move immediately on crippling bugs, or throw in a lighter update here or there if we want add more Weiner badges, missions or clothing pieces. Our ability to rapidly iterate is a strength of the game and studio we don't want to leave behind.
Looking forward, our road to Chapter 2 is going to have a focus on improving the vehicular experience. A long standing request from the community is the ability to buy and customise vehicles. Additionally, we want to add new types of vehicles to drive, better and more robust driving behaviour from AI, including police chases. We want to overhaul the way the vehicles respond to crashes with a new damage system, and improve the ways you can steal vehicles and give you more reasons to care about doing so.
So, let's look at the first portion we're working on: Purchasing Vehicles and Garages
Several garages will become available to purchase in Rockhaven and doing so will be essential to store a huge fleet of vehicles. From anywhere in the city, you'll be able to use a new application on your phone, "Valet", to have any one of your vehicles delivered to you. Be sure to tip the delivery driver, as the more you do, the more his service will improve, and of course, you'll be in for some sweet rewards.
So, where do you get vehicles? Dealerships, of course. Different dealerships throughout Rockhaven will offer different vehicles and vehicle types for purchase. Big O's might have a sensible sedan for the family oriented criminal, while 4 Real Automobile is more than happy to sell you a lawnmower. Customisation will come in a later update, but at the very least, you can select a sweet paint of your choice to start off with.
We're happy with how the system is shaking out, and as soon as we've polished it up with some sounds and fancy feedback elements, we'll put it out with some accompanying general improvements, missions and other minor additions. Then we'll talk about what's next in a blog post like this, shape it up and ship it out to everyone.
Infact, we've already started prototyping out the next phase: Bikes and other two wheeled vehicles. The results? Doing a bunch of sweet stunts through Rockhaven.
Keep the suggestions coming along the road to Chapter Two, and we'll keep you posted along the way.
