Since we decided to develop our little game jam game into something more polished and worthy of a place on Steam a lot has happened. So let's dive in:
Destructible environment and an overall mess: I had so much fun creating stuff that shows your time on the field that we now have to figure out how you can still see the ball with all the chaos around. Oh well, that is a challenge I like more than having a clean, boring game.
Sprinting and UI: We added sprinting and limited the number of powerkicks and tackles (sorry) and created a UI so you know what's up
Progression system: There is now a small XP system you progress through by picking up little gems (you know the type) which over time will give you MORE tackles, MORE powerkicks and longer sprints. We already have plans for even more level up rewards.
between matches and right before, the pitch is yours. So if you like you can just kick around with your friends and get to know the controls.
More enemy types: the masses of little guys (we call them "swarmer") served us well for the game jam but we knew we need more variety. So we added a thief that will steal the ball (wearing as it's head) and the brute that tackles you if you are not fast enough
Steam integration: we did not manage to get Peer-to-Peer multiplayer working (I wrote about it some months ago) but at least we do have functioning "Remote Play Together" and can use the players Steam names in game. Also we do have Steam achievements and stats integrated, so that is pretty cool, too.
Then tons of quality of life features, that everybody kind of takes for granted but in game development every detail has to be created first so:
main menu with settings
translatable texts so we can provide the game in English, German and French at the start and - maybe if the community helps us - even more in the future.
making the player and ball visible when they are obscured
explanations on how the game works (very bare bone at the moment)
And I am pretty sure I forgot a lot of smaller details. All in all we are happy how the game feels right now and are looking forward to polish the thing together with everyone who likes the game.
I will write more about what we have on our "would be cool" list but that has to wait until the actual Early Access release. So stay tuned.
Till then, tata
-- Fjo