Hey!
First of all, I want to say thanks to everyone who's added the game to their Wishlist and played the demo (there are already over 500 and 300 of you respectively!). And special thanks to those who left feedback (even the negative ones, heh).
If you run into any issues or want to give me advice, please post in the Steam threads.
I quite often make changes based on your suggestions! Especially since Steam Next Fest is coming up, and my demo is participating!
So, Demo 2.0 is now available to download for Windows and Mac.
🖥️ Game interface
The main thing that annoyed me while playing was the interface. I tried to rework it logically (especially since there are new features to talk about below):
Now there are 6 tabs instead of 7. You can still switch between them with F1–F6 (QWERTY on Mac). The tabs are split by action:
・Operations: all actions related to picking contracts and building routes
・Map: almost unchanged, for quickly finding the optimal route and checking country events
・Market: now contains almost everything you can spend money on — buying coins or stocks, exchanging currency, buying resources
・Assets: what you already own and what income/expenses it brings
・PDA: your personal space with mail and connections to the darkest things in the game
・Feed: the news block, moved out of the PDA but upgraded
⚖️ Game balance
・Removed the double reputation multiplier: contract payouts are now more fair
・Large contracts now also depend on faction reputation
・The transition to larger contracts is (hopefully) smoother now: you have more time to prepare
・Loss ceiling: if you lose cargo, you no longer pay out all the money you didn't deliver. You get a reputation hit and a financial penalty that won't bankrupt you
・But one thing has gotten harder: holding CHF now always costs a commission, so it doesn't turn into a defensive multiplier
📚 Tutorial
The in-game tutorial has been significantly improved (this is the 3rd attempt, fingers crossed):
・It now goes step by step: the first email walks you through the basics over 3 turns
・After that, the boss sends you letters for each tab in the game: you can go through them or skip them, up to you
・There are even more explanatory tooltips (well, why not?)
🌐 New feature: Darknet, devices, and flash drives
Starting from turn 3, the Darknet unlocks (inside the PDA), where you can buy various devices: flash drives with ciphers, mining equipment (more on that in the next section).
・Flash drives come in two types: regular and special
・Regular flash drives come in 3 tiers: common, rare, and legendary. The higher the rarity, the lower the chance (but never zero!) that you'll end up with trash as a reward (heh)
・Regular flash drives refresh in the shop every turn
・Regular flash drives randomly assign a quest, which you complete. Usually this is a cipher-matching mini-game (a hack)
・Regular flash drives (if the drive contains it) give you bonuses like coins, upgrades to base growth metrics, etc.
・Special flash drives have special quests and rewards. Usually, after the hack, you'll have to make a choice that significantly affects the game. They're expensive. There aren't many yet - try them all!
Now a quick word on equipment. A Cold Wallet has been added to the shop. A wonderful thing to keep you from losing everything during a freeze or seizure! No limit, but withdrawing back takes 3 turns.
To activate a flash drive, you need to buy it, "insert" it into the PDA, and go to the Devices section in the PDA.
⛏️ New feature: Crypto mining
Added a small passive layer to the game:
・In the Assets section, there's a Crypto Farm sub-tab
・You need to buy equipment for it on the Darknet (unlocks after turn 5) and place it correctly on the playing field
・For now there are only 3 components: ASIC hardware, cooling, and power. Each element is split into 3 tiers
・You can choose to mine DARKCOIN or GOLDCOIN. To collect what you've mined, go into the Crypto Farm and withdraw with a button
・Equipment wears out! This is especially important if you keep playing "after victory"
📰 Improved feature: News
The news is now its own big block in the game. Closer to release I'm planning to expand it significantly!
Key changes:
・Visuals have been significantly changed (I think this is noticeable)
・News now warns you in advance that "something's about to happen" so you can figure out whether you can profit from it
・Many in-game events now show up there, so you don't miss anything
✨ Small stuff
Here I'll talk about all the smaller things that were also done:
・Added a difficulty mode with achievements! When choosing your starting event, you can now pick a more hardcore mode. Beating it earns a special Steam achievement! What the mode is about is described on the selection screen
・Improved CRT effects
・Improved visuals on the exchange chart (feels more on-vibe now, in my opinion)
・Improved (probably not perfectly) performance on Windows
・Added a font toggle right on the main screen: try it out and see which one feels better to you
・Various small effects and improvements: fewer glyph and notification problems in Chinese, way fewer text fields "spilling out" of windows, and stuff like that
Phew, I think I covered everything! I'll still be happy to hear your feedback and bug reports - I'll try to fix things ASAP!
- BadGafi