Be honest, I know you were worried. Every Friday I release a devlog updating you on how Blessings of the Forge is going. But... I'm a little late. Last week got a little hectic and I just was not able to get things written down. So, I sincerely apologize for the tardiness of this post. That being said, I have some pretty exciting updates on the game to share.

Per my last couple of devlogs, I said I would set an ambitious goal of getting alloy creation added to the game within two weeks, and shop management added over the next two. Well, I almost hit that mark. I still have a couple of issues to work through, but the designs and groundwork for alloy creation have been laid, and I'm excited to get everything put up this week. Not quite the ambitious goal I had set, but still much closer than I had expected. I've gotten work times added to the game which really helps with game feel (although it still needs a lot of polishing on the numbers and stuff) and that's going to be really helpful for the alloy creation system I'm implementing.

Okay, I'm sure your like, "We've been hearing so much about this alloy creation system. What the heck even is that? Why is it so cool?" Well, let me share that with you. The alloy creation system is going to be a mechanic where you can do one of two things. You can either smelt down two of the same metal in a crucible to increase its purity, or you can smelt down two different metals to get an average of the stats of the metal. Okay... that doesn't sound crazy exciting, What's the fuss? Well, the whole premise of this game is to create a crafting game with the imperfections that come with real crafting. I want to put the skill of the player into the swords they make. This is reflected in the smithing process where the different steps determine the final sword. The alloy creation adds this idea into the very metals you are working with. Now, your skill isn't just in how well you can make a blade, but it is also put into the very metals you are working with.

Got your attention now? Great! So now the question is how will this work, and how will this be fun? The basic idea is this: you must find the reaction temperature of the metal and hold it there for a given time until the metal reacts. Based on how well you hold it, your metal will get an increase in stats. Then, where the skill comes in, it becomes harder to get a stat increase with a higher purity metal. So, the player's skill in refining or combining metals will determine the final quality of the metal the player gets to work with. Refining will be easier than combining for right now. What this also means is there will hopefully be a lot of depth to even just a few metals. Given even just three metals, you almost have a full tech tree created. You would have metals A, B, C, AB, AC, BC, and ABC with each of their purity levels. Again, this means the player has a high degree of freedom in the base stats of the metals they are working with, which I think is very exciting. It also allows for some fun game mechanics down the line of having NPCs find new or rare metals for the player to get and work with, or certain alloys being ideal for custom order swords.

As with most things in this game, all these ideas are very iterative. Down the line I could add percentages to the alloys, allowing for a 30% Metal A,65% Metal B,5% Metal C alloy to be made, but that's much farther down the road. I first want to get this in place to see if people even like it. That being said, it makes me really excited for the next playtest to come in around early April. Hopefully my next post will cover how well the implementation went and initial ideas and plans for shop management. But that's for next week. I've also been working on a few other things like art, cleaning up the controls, and sound design, which all will hopefully be in place by the next prototype.

If you have any ideas, fell free to share them, and if you want to give the current build a try it is available on main page for this game. Feedback is always welcome and it really helps me sort through ideas and see what people like/dislike about the game. Anyways, I'll see you Friday!