We have to confess it, we're lagging 2 weeks behind the roadmap now. The cause: the game localization. Lemme spend a few words on this.
Empires in Ruins was originally thought to be released and stay relased in english only. We always deemed it to have too many words (40-50k) for it to be worth a translation in other languages.
Then before EA release, came our agreement with an asian partner, that as part of the deal would have provided us with asian languages localizations. The occasion was too yummy to let it escape.
We did begin immediately working on the localization side by side with the other work. Worth considering here, that while our team had up to 8 members in its peak production period, I am the only programmer, from everything from gameplay to UI, steam integration, etc. So time it limited in that sense.
Ever since EA started, we are keeping up the pace pretty well. We got out Settings, Achievements and A LOT of balancing and fixes, including new UIs and features in the campaign map as well. The first 2-3 weeks were crazy with bug fixing, but we can see now that the bug report tool stays silent, that we did succeed already in smashing most of them!
But localization is taking forever. Imagine manually copying strings from xml files, text files, UIs, code ( i know, some bad coding practices happened in the past ːlunar2019grinningpigː ) into excel files, fill them up with comments to help the translators work and quality, and then modify properly the whole system to accept multilanguage settings. Tooltips alone are 438.... 438!!
WE are also producing the new Arcade maps that we are adding to Arcade mode only, the second one is almost done too. A snowy one this time. A third one will show up in the next month too.
That said, I don't mean to sound tragic, but to clarify why we're 2 weeks late. We're almost done with localization now, i think in 2 weeks the system will be ready. And probably in one month, we will have Italian, Chinese and Greek as first localizations ready ( I know, strange combination to start with, but one gotta work with what one has!)
In the next two weeks though, it's not gonna be just about localization anymore, but I start adding some new heavily request features. The first one will be the Instant buy button for province assets (meanwhile George is almost done with the settlements views, so those are about to get into coding pipeline too). The second one is gonna be the tribute system. A recurring tribute to pay to the crown, with rewards if paid in time, and growing punishments if not paid. If not paid several times in a row, it will lead to the hanging of Heimer!
That said, guys, if you like our work and our game, please don't hesitate to review it. It's the best way to support us in our fight against the visibility algorithms!
Now, I feel better having explained it all, now back to coding!
Cheers,
Dr.H