Hello everyone,
Sorry for the delay with this weeks updates. A new build should be uploaded either tonight or tomorrow. There was a serious medical emergency with a family member that happened towards the end of the week which as far as the game is concerned meant that I could not finish everything I wanted to this week. However a good portion of the work did manage to get finished but the rest of it will be finished next week in a sort of "tying up loose ends" update. This will include organising the selection and manipulation options into a hideable UI, marquee selection (fingers crossed) and new entries for the help menu. We also should be able to add a new fish, fix some bugs and add a few more tweaks and enhancements here and there.
Dragon Mosaic Guppy (Female):
Dragon Mosaic Guppy (Male):
Finally we managed to get these lovelies finished. Sometimes the most colourful fish are tricky to paint because quite often painting is a discipline where the painter uses as few colours as possible to describe something. This male guppy just had so many colours that it starts to look more like a fruit salad than a fish if one is not careful.
New Backdrop Menu And Settings:
Most of my week was spent working on the backdrop code. Backdrops have not been worked on for quite a while but we do have a lot of very interesting things planned for them. Before new backdrops can be added to the game and existing ones tweaked it was necessary to update the UI so it is consistent with the rest of the game. That means allowing players to choose a backdrop from a scrollable list menu that uses icons and further control details of the backdrop via a "settings UI".
Seabed Backdrop Settings:
Above you can see some colour settings for the seabed being modified. The compression in the gif is not great but what is happening is that the water fog colour is being changed as well as the overall background colours. There is a lot more planned for this backdrop. At some point we will add some more things in the distance swimming around like whales, the occasional submarine, debris and small plants in the foreground, a crab or two walking about the floor looking for something to nibble etc etc
Abstract Shapes And Patterns:
This was alluded to last week, We have added a few more abstract backgrounds. Their colours are not by any means final but what is in this update should serve as an example of the types of things players can expect to see in the future. The whole idea of the abstract backdrops are similar to what is seen in product advertising. Usually the backdrop is designed to better show off the colours and shapes of the subject as well as just help make an interesting image.
The overall aim for backdrops in general is to have enough variations of themes and styles so that players can really make some interesting images and allow for a lot of variety and re-playability. The current set of backdrops up until this point are feeling rather boring because they are few in number and have not been updated in so long. We promise this will change and this update is the first step.
Probably early Monday I will create a backdrop list thread on the forums that has a list of the backdrops currently in the game as well as some that are planned and as usual we encourage you all to give us your suggestions.
This update also includes everything from last week too since we were not able to make an update last week. Check out last week's post to see what that includes.
We wish you all a pleasant weekend and look forward to improving Fishery more in the coming week.
The Fishery Team