In this Developer Log, I am going to talk about our progress towards the Steam Playtest and what we're doing next. Then below that, a big section on the current state of our Space Stations.
Road to Playtest
New things since last month:
Massive optimizations. 120+ FPS with 200 zombies onscreen + tons of gore. We still want to do further optimizations, but this is a really big breakthrough
More work on interactibles, smashable, and lootable objects
More sound implementation
New door logic and types
Extra work on the locations, such as new room types, new layouts, and more
Things we're doing currently:
Another big pass on zombie behavior and AI
More UI stuff
More work on tracking stats/resources
My estimate for the first playtest: Likely late January for a very small one. After that, if things go well, we will start ramping up towards letting people in from both Steam Signups and random selection from the Discord.
Current State of the Derelict Station Location
A lot of our time since last developer log has been spent on optimizations and Zombie AI work. This left a lot of extra time for adding to the current locations.
We've polished our existing locations, while adding new room types and layouts. We've also started work on another location type.
New Loot and Prize Rooms
When you're fighting through a location, there's rooms you want to keep an eye out. There are Loot Rooms that stand out, and also even bigger, more rare Prize Rooms.
Hydroponics
Where astronauts grow their French Fries. A great source of food, and sometimes weirder stuff.
Fuel Storage
Bright glowing green rooms, often found in the crowded and dark maintenance passages on a station.
Security
Weapons, ammo, contraband. Often also the location of Security Overrides, a way to disable locked doors on a ship without resorting to cutting the power.
Medical Rooms
Storage for the medical supplies you need to heal your crew. Can sometimes have medical-related tools, or computers you can access for Research Data.
Executive Office
Tastefully decorated. Could have a wall safe, or a keycard laying around, along with whatever supplies the person in charge left here before being eaten.
YM Corporation
Our main location type right now is the YM Corporation Derelict Station. These locations are a grab-bag of random loot types and resources. Different corporations will focus on different types of resources and have different quirks, but YM is very generalized.
We have a few different layout types for YM, but below is one layout type, with the Lockdown variant. The gifs show examples of different random generations of this.
The above is just part of the station, leaving out most of the maintenance access. The maintenance tunnels are where you'll have to explore to find a way to break the station's lockdown for this layout type, opening valuable doors.
We have different layout types for the overall shape of the station, along with further changes depending on what the mission variant is. A recent one we added is a Ruined version where there's lots of rubble and lighting is mostly destroyed, so you should bring a flashlight. We are currently finishing up a Keycard based variant.
Placebo Corporation
We're currently working on a new location theme and type, Placebo Pharmaceuticals. This location type focuses on medical supplies, medical based items, and a new resource: Research Data.
Placebo Stations also tend to be much brighter than the YM Derelict Stations. No flashlights necessary (usually). The general layout will be much different than YM's, and you'll tend to see a lot of escaped lab animals as the usual monsters.
Next Up
Next Dev Log will be on January 30th. At that point, I'm hoping to be able to talk to you about our first (very small) Steam Playtest, with some early estimate on when we'll do a more public wave. It all depends on how that initial limited playtest goes.
The main topic for the next developer log will be about Zombie AI, and about some of the monster types we're working on and planning.
As always, thanks for reading! You can see more frequent news posts in the #future-preview channel of our Official Discord, and on the site formerly known as Twitter.