Been a while. Life has been busy and this is unfortunately not able to be my top priority right now. Thankfully, I got some technical help with the project now, and so we've managed to get the ball rolling again.
To start, we got a few small additions to the sandbox: a new flyer enemy, the "Cephalopulture," as well as two weapons, the trench gun and flechette rifle.
The Cephalopulture
This beautiful creature is still incomplete on the animations, but look how majestic she is anyway... Just adorable.
As as flyer, Ceph is the first enemy who can "escape." Currently that doesn't mean a whole lot since the negotiation system needs refinement, but theoretically an escaped creature reflects poorly on your performance in a mission, and thus less pay.
Trench Gun and Flechette Rifle
As part of expanding the arsenal, we've also introduced the pump action Trench Gun (a shotgun) and the burst fire Flechette Rifle.
The former has a fairly straightforward archetype most people should be familiar with.
The latter will be designed as a kind of "precision spam" weapon. While none of its shots are particularly powerful individually, we are designing it to be easy to hit weakspots quickly, particularly in hordes. So, it should cut those down, with a backup use as a medium enemy killer when focused on a point. It is weak to armor, however, like Ceph's boney head.
What's Next
My main priority will be overhauling the Negotiation and Performance rating systems of the game. I tried a "systematic" approach to how MilSpAMs rate your performance, but the results have been... uninspiring and difficult to apply.
Not to say too much before it exists, but the intent with the reimplementation will be to have custom behavior on each MilSpAM. Each will have an entirely different equation behind their score, and that equation might go out the window some days if they're feeling particularly grumpy or happy...
Or if you did something to screw with them while exploring.
Alright, that's it for now. Hopefully the next update comes sooner than the last.