UPDATE:
The German censored files keep downloading in the International files place, so Steam and I are working on things, while I break everything even more while waiting. THANK YOU GERMANY FOR PROTECTING US ALL FROM THE EIGHT STICKS ARRANGED IN A SPIRAL SHAPE.
UPDATE UPDATE:
Okay, it looks like things are set up properly, or I am about to release a video game that gets me arrested in Germany because the files are all confused, IDK; I know the files on the International version are working properly though. I had wanted a Thursday or Friday release, but Saturday will be the day of release now, hopefully in accordance with the cool Saturn god and not the uncool one. I am putting it off to maximize the time in the new release featured section, and trying to hit it right around the daily roll over time. I don't know if this matters or not, because there are 30 games released on Steam on any given day, and a Halloween sale happening as well; not the best time; but it's make or break time here at my one man studio.
If the German version doesn't launch properly, please tell me in the bugs forum. I had to give the files their own unique name to get around Steam smashing them all together for some reason. It SHOULD work, if it doesn't work; then my bad, give me a minute to fix it.
So 9 or 10 AM, Saturday morning, October 28th, 2023; I will publish my first video game, unless something further happens, IDKWTF it could be, but you never know with this all. Knock on wood.
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So it's finally here. Release day. I just have to do one final check to make sure things are working before hitting the publish button.
There is ONE game crashing bug that I have been able to recreate. I am currently trying to find very specific details about it from crash logs; but what I believe it is caused by is my 10+ year old video card; and from what I can tell it only happens when I speed run through the entire game in one single shot, whereby it then quits to the desktop. From other rare posts about this crash I have found, this issue doesn't happen on higher end more modern machines. HOWEVER if you do experience it, first; let me know in the bug forum, along with your hardware specs. Second; the game autosaves at the start of each level; simply boot back up into the game and start from that level again, it will have cleared the video ram and will run properly again. It might also be my specific video card, and the specific version of GZDOOM.
And while the game isn't intended to be run through all at once without actually looking at anything along the way; I am sure someone out there will do this, and will crash the game; and hopefully will file a bug report in the community forums.
BESIDES THAT; I would like to say: This is version 1.0. It is what I consider "The Core" of A Fool's Art Gallery. I had to pick a specific point to say "This is when the game will release"; as if I went with an "early access" style release it would be in early access for 50 years. Even now I had to stop myself from adding more content, just to ensure getting the game out the door and get the public launch done.
This core goes up to about 2020, there is tons more art to add, and finish, and will be made in the future. The NPCs you see are a mixture of made specifically for A Fool's Art Gallery, as well as NPCs from another game I am working on. As time goes on, NPCs from my other titles will see their way into a Fool's Art Gallery also, and more custom NPCs just for A Fool's Art Gallery are planned.
A Fool's Art Gallery is also a "realistic" project that could be finished by myself in a limited time frame in order to get the wheels turning, in the hope that enough copies sell over time that I can focus 100% on game development, and not split my time between whatever job I have at the given time, transit time, and working on games time.
As the game lay out takes up 4 levels of space, instead of the 1 giant level as originally planned (Due to video RAM limits etc.) this leaves a bunch of empty level slots, I think it can go up to 32, not sure about beyond. But with these empty level slots are a number of worlds that will be experimental works of art in their own right, and very large weird environments to explore and relax in. I would like to over time, make this the weirdest video game that has ever been released.
As for the future of my video game development efforts; I currently have a sci fi FPS well under works, it started out as a cyberpunk genre game, well before the genre blew up into what it is; and because of that I have been steering it away from the typical cyber punk look as of late, and into another direction to seperate it. I also keep wanting to do "some kind of Robinhood/Knights of the Round Table" type FPS game too, but have no idea what that is about. But in the future, as things progress I will be asking the community what they think about different ideas.
Thanks to everyone who supports me and my work, I appreciate it.