What's New?

Hello, and welcome back. Today I'd like to give a brief description of how the new update for the game is coming along. I am excited to say we should have our first prototype of the common order system working today, so keep an eye out for a new update in the coming weeks. We've been hard at work adding a whole bunch of new systems to the game for this update so I'd like to go over those changes in this post. Last week I shared in depth the new lighting system we built, so I will not be covering that today. Instead, I will be going over the new level, day/night cycle, NPCs, and what to expect for this update.

New Space, New Time To Be Alive!

With the addition of shop management, we must add a shop to manage. So, we have completely overhauled our level design. With other plans for expansion we added 3 new rooms to the game. Firstly is the shop, of course. Then we added a storage room and a bedroom for the player. The level design is still in flux so it will most likely change as we get to playtests, but for now the layout is setup with the storage room being pretty accessible for both Forging purposes and Selling purposes as well. The bedroom is attached above the storage room. For some reason this made sense in my head, though I cannot fully explain why. Anyways, art and design is still in flux, but here is a sneak peak at the new level.

As you can see we also adjusted the angle a bit to a 360 degree style for the walls. I feel like this fits the style of the game better and will work well with what we are trying to do with NPCs, lighting, and other things in the game. Of course this does not have all the stations in it, but that's probably for the better. With this new angle/style we will most likely be redoing or at least adjusting a lot of the station art to fit the angle better.

Also, with the new space we have added time as a construct in the game. There is now a Day/Night cycle (mentioned in the previous post), and with that comes time management as a new mechanic... sort of...

Currently, the primary function of the time system is to determine when you can open your shop. We have it set so you can only open your shop during the day, and you can sleep through the night. While this isn't much for gameplay right now, there is much planned for the new day/night cycle that I hope will actually bring a lot of immersion into the game. Events and NPC schedules are planned and we aim to build it in a way that does not become cumbersome to the player. But for now you just get to enjoy the dynamic shadows of the rising and setting sun as you waste away the midnight hours forging the best swords you can to sell during the day. 

What NPC do?

As mentioned, we are working on the Common Orders, which is the first half of the shop management system. So, what is that exactly? Well, in case you couldn't tell from our new level design, we're taking some inspiration from Moonlighter. (Definitely worth a play imo) While we plan for custom orders to take the spotlight, we want to include common orders to support player experimentation with crafting. Also, we want to give players the experience of craftsmanship, and half of that is knowing the value of your skill. So the common orders are a way to sell experimental swords while also giving the player a space to learn what is valued in a sword and how to improve on their skills. This is done by the player listing their sword for sale, and watching how customers respond (just like in Moonlighter). The difference between this system and Moonlighter's, however, is that each sword is unique and the value can vary greatly if you aren't consistent. This means players will have to learn to estimate how much their own skill is worth in order to make sales. This system will also play into the reputation of the shop down the line, and be a core part of the progression of the game.

One other thing I wanted to talk about was the NPCs themselves. To start, common order NPCs will be pretty basic: if a sword is priced well, stay interested and maybe buy it; if not, be less interested and maybe leave. Simple, right? But with adding NPCs, and this "interest" type of a mechanic, we can easily expand this to include different motivators for different NPCs. Maybe your swords deal a lot of damage, and so more hunters/soldiers will come and buy them. Or maybe they are very beautiful, expensive weapons. Then you'll get more nobility and aristocrats coming into your shop. With this system, it should be easy to add both different NPC temperaments, and motivators in your shop. This means you won't just have to worry about selling swords, but also what kinds of swords you want to sell. We intend to add systems to support this, where if one type of customer enjoyed their visit, more of the same kind of customer will come in. It's a bit of a strange mechanic, but this whole game is a sandbox style game, so I intend to expand that to include the shop management as well as the sword making.

What's Now And What's Next?

So for this next update, we will have a lot of basics added into the game. The common orders will be fully implemented, with tweaks and additions planned as development continues. Primarily, this new update will be a testing grounds for new shop management ideas. It may not be as polished as some of our previous updates, but it will hopefully give a taste of our vision for expanding the game. From there, we have three more updates planned to finish the shop management system. Our hope is that with these updates we will add a lot of sense of progression to the game with watching your customer base grow, while also laying the foundations for further narrative and content updates. 

Just for a teaser, all four updates are as follows:

• Common Orders Update (What is covered in this post. Super excited to get it out to you!)
• Resource Vendors and Shop Ledger (Adding actual characters to buy from, more metals, and a way to track recipes and shop stats)
• Custom Orders (The meat and potatoes of the shop management. Difficult orders you must haggle on, then have some days to complete)
• Polish and Misc Overhauls (New Tutorial, added achievements, optimization and bug fixes, etc.)

And even after all of this, there is so much planned ahead. But, this is more than enough to work on and this post is plenty long at this point. Hopefully this sneak peak gets you excited for what's coming next, and keep an eye out for that update in the coming weeks. As usual, if you haven't tried the game yet and you enjoy deep crafting games, feel free to give it a try and leave some feedback. We're always looking to improve things in the game, so getting new perspectives is always appreciated. Hope you enjoy!