Been a busy two weeks!
Achieving Progress
All 256 achievements have been decided! The number is a complete coincidence, and I will be sad when further on down the line I add yet more achievements and ruin the count (or I'll just have to jump straight to 512, but I don't think I'm quite that crazy :P). I've recently been working on final icon passes and here we have the entirety of the more basic "Mechanics" category, which makes up about a quarter of all achievements:
I'll be showing more of these as Beta 6 progresses, and you can maybe guess what's what ;)
While the framework is coming along nicely, though, I still have to actually start implementing all these things. 256 is... a lot xD. Just look at all this data!
That's a shot of the post-startup achievements data as seen in the debugger, but the code behind them will be a little bit more involved than some lists...
Of course we also have the built-in achievement browsing UI, with which I've so far only reached the mockup stage. Remember, achievements will be available to both Steam and non-Steam players, and both will be able to take advantage of the better browsing features I have planned, as you can see here (open at full size so it's clearer):
I like the way the design turned out--lots of control, accessible to both mouse and keyboard players, includes both filters and sorting...
Now notice again this is a MOCKUP, so these icons don't even match the achievements next to them, and there are even duplicates. Little details like that don't matter when just trying to figure out colors, layout, and functionality :).
I normally don't share mockups before actually implementing a feature, but in this case I wanted to ask real quick for any opinions on which style of icon to use for locked achievements--see the ones with question marks in them. Designing icons in isolation I originally started with the "dark" versions seen in the second mockup below, but once I put together the full mockup it seemed that brighter versions as in the mockup above are probably better since they're generally more clearly distinguishable from unlocked achievement icons that way. Obviously there are other indicators to tell whether something is locked, but it's nice if all possible vectors are equally effective. Said dark version of locked icons:
I dunno, still kinda torn... What do you think?
Cogmind the RTS
For Beta 6 I've added a fourth way to pan the map: RTS-style. Funny enough it took years for anyone to request this on top of the existing methods, but I'm happy to oblige! Here's a demo of the new feature in action:
This type of panning will of course only be available in true fullscreen mode, though according to the latest Cogmind stats that's the mode two-thirds of players are using so coverage is decent. I find it clunkier to use than the precision offered by other methods, but everyone has their own needs!
This is actually the first time I've implemented a feature like this, so I had to figure out the best way to do it. The diagram below shows what I'm doing, calculating a line from the center to the cursor and just panning along that:
I'm not 100% sure if this is the best approach, but we'll see what those who actually need it have to say once it's live :D. Technically with some more work I could probably improve on the same method, such as having it accelerate slightly at the start? In any case, the panning speed is adjustable in the options menu as well.
While we're on the subject of RTS, here's a glimpse of what a Cogmind RTS might look like, zoomed out tactical view!
I made that as an April Fool's joke a couple years back, and talk about unexpected results: last year the official Twitter account for RT used this image for their coverage of cyberwarfare in the Middle East o_O
IBM Love
By request, I've added yet more map ASCII variants at even smaller sizes.
These include Terminus 12:
Terminus 14:
And my personal nostalgia-inducing favorite, IBM VGA 14:
That's one I would love to add at all sizes, but it really only works at the traditional size it was designed for. (Unlike, say, a modern fixed width font like Terminus which is pretty awesome at all sizes.)
Here's a fully-revealed map section using the IBM font, because IBM font:
Fun and Games
We've got a lot of runs and other stuff to check out this time.
I still haven't been streaming and unfortunately won't for a a while yet (well, no Cogmind but I might stream my 7DRL for a bit after it's done!), but I did play a decent seed run you can read about here. I didn't win, but did manage to get far, beat my Beta 5 high with a new score of 35k, and had a lot of fun despite clearly making some bad calls along the way xD
b_sen, on the other hand, shared an excellent writeup of their first win. A very detailed account including screenshots and spoiler tags for all the spoilery stuff in case you want to avoid that.
We actually had two first wins in one week, another by Laida who shared a quick account in another thread.
nuzcraft shared an account of his seed run, too, one that just barely didn't win but on the way got to play with some cool tech that not a lot of people see. Very spoilery though, that one :) (he doesn't have the videos for that run up yet, but says they'll be available over the coming weeks)
nuzcraft also just added a short new tutorial video to his ongoing series, this one on Core.
fpsbossfight took a short break from dominating Cogmind to fire up the new Stellaris expansion, in which he role-played Cogmind lore <3
On the Discord we got to hear of the exploits and fates of the various robots named after us in Derelict fashion.
We also have some new fan art.
Laida drew a Tinkerer:
And also showed how to use a paint bucket to disguise yourself as an Unaware bot :P
Following up on the Cogmind-DF mashup art from earlier, b_sen created a New Game sequence mockup as if it were a prequel to the Cogmind story (note: text contains some lore spoilers)
7DRL
7DRL is here! It's that time of year when hundreds of us roguelike devs bury our heads in our IDEs to produce some new stuff.
I'll be taking the week off to work on my 7DRL entry, so there won't be a SITREP next weekend. That said, seeing as this is a fairly Cogmind-related roguelike I'm planning, it's both relevant to progress here and will benefit Cogmind in a number of ways. Stay tuned for that release--I'm sure it's something you folks will enjoy!
It'll be announced on my dev blog first, at the conclusion of the event.
Also to update: The amount of features and work left for Beta 6 is rather staggering, so... a reminder that this one's going to take longer than usual! But as usual I also want to ensure it's the best it can be :D
I noticed Cogmind hasn't been getting many reviews in the past couple months, hovering just within or outside the threshold for even having enough recent reviews on Steam to show a recent total xD. It's been a while since I asked so we maybe have some newer players here who haven't left a review yet but want to? Reviews are appreciated and really helpful, so leave one if you can, thanks <3