Hey there everyone! As usual I have not kept up on my communications, so as I wait for the engine to fire up I thought I would play catch-up.
As you may know I originally slated my next update to include a library of pre-constructed levels I would draw from. Well I got to talking with a member of my community, Zothen, and they really sold me on expanding the level generator instead to include the level of detail I wanted, and to accommodate the extra features. I was hesitant about doing it because it would push back the update, but then I remembered one of my favorite sayings "anything worth doing is worth doing right", and I don't have a solid deadline to get the game finished. So I started tinkering.
Turns out I couldn't re-use the current generator. It was too basic, and handled things differently than I would need. So I built a new generator from scratch. It's working great. I'm able to set which layout I use for each security level in the system, as well as customize the trappings and decorations for each level. One thing I was nervous about was getting the AI to navigate a spawned mesh properly, but the IC patrols also seem to be working good (after some tweaking).
I have also designed the new contract generator which handles things completely different. This will go hand in hand with the new career progression, where harder contract types and target system types are unlocked with promotions or new handlers.
The compromise I have made due to deciding to use procedural level generation is that I will be focusing on one style for now, and the content won't be as robust as I was hoping when the update drops. However I will be fleshing out the content pool in future updates. That being said, that one style I have worked on is pretty stellar and in my opinion, really captures the feeling of cyberspace. I'm excited for everyone to try it!
I've had the opportunity to focus exclusively System.Hack again, so I've been putting in full days for the last couple weeks. The new update will be dropping soon, but it's always difficult to pin down specifics.