As we approach Early Access, I’ve been reflecting on how Research has evolved in MoteMancer, particularly when it comes to Infusion Altar space and ingredient management. Early on, I was well aware of how the novel research design of altars and pedestals came at the cost of space efficiency - you aren't just piping ingredients in like any other structure. So I wanted find ways for research to be space-efficient and allow for shared ingredients across altars to be paramount. Two ingredients felt like a sweet spot where you can have one central shared ingredient and share between 3 corners of nearby altars. And that worked well enough, but...

Of course, there’s a tradeoff. The tooltips sort of imply that the player should constantly swap ingredients. Even though this wasn't necessarily true in practice (you can just add a third pedestal), I realized the game wasn’t explicitly teaching that as part of the flow.

After letting it bake for a few months with a lot of testing and feedback, we're reverting back to our original design: branches now add ingredient requirements instead of replacing them. This subtly encourages adding more pedestals to keep things flowing, while making the research tree feel more natural. Instead of the mental two-step of swapping and removing, players simply add, making the experience smoother overall. This also helps encourage the factory to grow, which of course, it must.

And as for research throughput? Turns out, it’s less of a concern than I anticipated. Since you can set up an ad-hoc Altar site anywhere and alters still share 4 sides naturally, players can scale their research in creative ways - both functionally and aesthetically.

We’re just a week out from Early Access, and while there’s still a lot to build, the foundations are set. There’s plenty to explore, and I can’t wait to see where this journey takes us.

Catch you on the Elemental Planes,
~CyanAvatar