New Years Devlog

Happy New Years everyone,

I just found out that itch.io has a devlog thing so I figured I should try it out. This is just a small text update about what's been going on with development and this project in general, but it's been a little longer then I'd hoped and I want to get something out there.

December was a super busy month for me which did slow down development to a crawl. Between traveling the first week, followed by a very extended and bizarre Christmas with my family it left me very little time to actually work on the new update. However I did get a good amount of back end work done during November.

The biggest things I've been working on are fixing some fo the combat systems, as well as adding a bartering system and level up system.

Combat, specifically damage calculation, accuracy, status effects and stats have been overhauled. This should help me keep damage and damage calculations a bit more balanced and less spikey.

I've started adding some new enemies with proper art in the form of Sirens who have a unique attack that can charm you. While charmed there is a chance your physical attacks will fail.

I also fixed some minor bugs, cleaned up some code for the sake of making things more modular and easier to fix or change in the future. Also tweaked a few UI things that I was doing poorly because of ignorance when it comes to Ren'Py.

The level-up/bartering system was the most difficult thing I've been working on, The current plan is that there isn't a standard currency, instead plays will collect and trade items. Some items will be able to be combined with others to improve their value for selling later. Using this system you'll be able to buy new equipment, items, skills and even train to level up which will improve your stats. This took quite a while to figure out and it's still a bit of a work in progress, but it's technically functional for leveling up. I need to set up a UI and such for actually buying and selling items which I'll be starting work on soon.

I also made some tweaks to the map, removed from areas and added some new ones, including a goblin camp which you can go to and attempt to sneak in and loot. In the future I want to have the looting chance be based on your stats but at the moment it's just got some place holder percential rolls. Before I can do that though I need to figure out the math of it with the new way stats are calculated.

This is more or less the major changes I've been working on for the past 2 months. I'll be trying to get another build out in the next week or two, which will be similar to the current build, more of a proof of concept, test build. But once I get these initial systems working and stable it'll mean I can start putting out regular content patches which should come faster. The holidays being over should also help get builds going a little quicker.

Thanks for reading.