New Version Almost Finished...
Just a little update to tell you how the next version is coming along. We’ve only got 1 feature left to finish off and some bugs to squash, so I’m pretty confident it’ll be released next month, in July.
90% of what you see in the patch notes below is finished, we’re just finishing up what's left at the moment.
One good bit of news for us is that we’ve now completely finished all the behind-the-scene coding aspects of the game - boring stuff like having to make databases, or redo cameras, and things that don’t create new fun content but are very necessary to keep everything working. This means Nick, our main coder, can focus now on adding new stuff like new buildings, features etc and not have to spend weeks finishing the framework of the game.
I’m pretty excited we’re at this point at long, long last. This is more or less like gaining a whole new programmer, so that should speed things up for us. It also means we're on the downward slope...
Meanwhile, over the last month, Adam has more or less has finished the electricity and building upgrade feature that I mentioned in the last blog. This was a huge task as now practically every building has an upgrade of some kind and there are 11 unique types of upgrade. It’ll be down to you to decide what building is most important to upgrade first. I’m still re-balancing the game so it feels more difficult until you upgrade the buildings.
We also finished the night-lighting feature, so your town comes alive after sunset if you’ve upgraded it. The lights are real-time and cast shadows so it does look quite cool (but still post-apocalyptic).
Nick has now totally finished the big camera redo completely (a task that took 2 months!). If we’d known what we were doing at the start, we would’ve made our camera this way in the first place, but making your first ever game has been nothing if not a learning experience! It doesn’t help the game has a real-time strategy game style camera and a third-person camera. Getting them both to work nicely without getting stuck in scenery on very hilly maps has taken some head-scratching, but it’s all done now. Finally.
The one feature we’re still finishing off is the new Research Centre (one of 3 new buildings coming to this update) where your citizens study pre-war objects to work out new plans. This means in the new version not every building will be open from the start. You’ll have to pick and plan what to unlock based on what you think is most important. It adds an extra layer of strategy.
I’m hoping the combination of trade, upgrade and research systems to the game will add a nice extra level of depth.
Other News
Our big focus in general now for Atomic Society is just to add a bunch of new buildings (and challenges that demand those buildings) and new moral/social issues to deal with until it feels like there’s plenty to do. That and fixing bugs and (eventually) translating the game.
We’re happy with the way the game keeps selling, given that we didn’t expect so many people to check out our first ever attempt at making a game, and we’re just continuing to make the game with the least stress possible. It helps to have fun when you’ve spent 4+ years working on a single project day after day. Team-wise, we’re doing well. We’re still having to juggle day-jobs and serious health issues (not as bad as earlier in the year), but work keeps happening. Thanks to all our players for their patience. All being well we’ve crossed the hardest part of development.
Here’s a look at what’s coming in the next version. Obviously it isn’t finished yet, but most of what you see here should be in it unless something goes badly wrong. As I say, we’re aiming for July with all this.
Atomic Society Version 1.0.1.6 Patch Notes
(Preview, Work In Progress)
New Content Coming…
• Trader Shack Building Added. You can now build a new trade building. This will invite an trader to come and setup an outpost at your town. You can then barter with this person for various goods you may want. It will be down to you to try and find the best deal.
• Wind Turbine Building Added. The wind turbine has been added. The wind turbine is expensive to make but will produce charged batteries that can be used to upgrade various buildings around your town.
• Research Centre Building Added. Several buildings in the game now need to be researched before you can build them. This requires you to build a research centre and unlock buildings via its menu. This adds an extra level of strategy in how you go about expanding your town as you need to decide what structure you most need in advance.
• Building Upgrades Feature Added. Almost every building in the game now has an upgrade panel. There are lots of different types of upgrades, so it is up to you to decide what building to upgrade and when. Each upgrade costs a charged battery, which the wind turbine can make, or you might find one by salvaging. The game has been rebalanced to make upgrading feel important. Scavengers can also be upgraded now to become more effective.
• Night-Lighting Feature Added. When you upgrade a building with electricity, it switches on a light, allowing you bit by bit to visually restore electricity to your wasteland settlement. Is a cosmetic feature that lets your town really stand out as you improve it, at night.
• Camera Completely Redone. We have completely remade the game camera from scratch in order to make it smoother and easier to control at all framerates. It should also be much harder to get it stuck in hills and mountains. In addition you can now scroll the screen by moving the mouse to the edge of the screen and camera sensitivity options have been added.
• Cloud saving support added.
Other Changes & Bug Fixes:
• The avatar now decides to drop off good based on how far away he/she is from the storehouse by walking distance, not in a straight line. Should prevent some very unusual routes!
• Citizens now fade out when they enter a building, which looks a lot better than just disappearing.
• Fixed a bug where sometimes you could not destroy the Punishment Centre manually.
• Fixed a bug where the Town Hall radius effect graphic was incorrectly appearing when you opened the Town Hall outpost.
• Condensed the storehouse menu slightly, removing some outdated resources. This may help with an issue where players at 4k+ resolutions were having trouble with it.
• Changed the forum link button so that when you report a bug it goes to the new Steam forums, not the old pre-alpha ones.
• Fixed a missing title on the video options panel.
• Fixed some spacing issues with text in a few places where things could get cut-off at certain resolutions.
• Fixed the missing tooltip and icon for garrisons in the jobs priority list if you make a ruin into a garrison.
(And more bug fixes that are too arcane to mention here!)