So, several things have happened over the last year and a half to bring updates to Contraption Maker to a halt - Fire, some health issues, and mostly work on another future project.
The Creek Fire
Last year in September we were evacuated from our home for 3 weeks because of the Creek Fire. The Sherriff came by our home around midnight and said it was time to get out. Packed up what we could and left. The fire ended up coming within 1/2 mile of our home. Burned almost 400,000 acres. A lot of game dev history would have gone up in flames if it had taken out our home because I have a lot of old stuff saved here - everything I worked on over the decades - a prototype Amiga dev machine when making Arctic Fox for Electronic Arts, design docs, company docs, lots of stuff.
This is a time lapse of the fire I took from my home office in the afternoon before we have to evacuate later that night. The fire was about 10 miles away at this point:
This is one of a large number of air tankers that flew over home to fight the fire:
Surgery
In the months before that I hadn't been feeling well. Turns out my gall bladder no longer liked me. All of us from my family were staying at my Mom's house in Fresno because of the fire. This led to emergency gall bladder surgery with this no-fun drainage tube for a couple of weeks and longer than expected recovery. In the end just a bump in the road, but not a fun one.
New Game Project
Up until now it has been just me working on Contraption Maker. Or lately, not working on it. I'm currently working on a new game with my friend who owned Dynamix with me which has made it close to impossible to make time to get new updates out for Contraption Maker.
Anyway, I've figure out a way (I hope) to keep my current commitments on the new game while also getting updates out for Contraption Maker. Look for another update in a few weeks with a new part.
Now I've got to go an put out an update for my Minigolf Blast game (probably copy/paste much of this one) which is gonna be delayed even more. Haven't quite figured out that timing or how to get that one finished yet.