Monday Dev Update #13
Greetings,
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The past two weeks have been very busy, with game work primarily, as well as other, unrelated work (gotta pay those bills that won't pay themselves).
At the moment, the roadmap for the mechanics of that specific segment of the game contains 27 items, of which 6 remain to either update, finish or fix, the rest is done. Here is a a picture of said roadmap, or more like Checklist. It's indicative, so it's missing a lot of finer detail and specific bits, including and especially stuff that's already done:
Once that roadmap/checklist is done, we'll focus on strictly gameplay material: tuning the gameplay/experience of those systems; because unfortunately, having lots of systems doesn't in itself suffice to create or guarantee a game experience so a good amount of work will be needed to ensure actual playability and even fun.
There is a similar list for the Character (Creation, Growth, Meta...) and Strategy (Base-building, Base Life, Base Defense, etc...) layers of the game but for the time being they must remain under wraps. More lists also need to be summarized and curated for other aspects of the game (Relationships, Storytelling, Combat & Crafting come to mind...) but you know where the current priorities are at the moment.
With that being said, here is the list of what was taken care of this past couple weeks:
Mood
We are reintroducing Player Mood, a key mechanic to the Survival component of Wilderness gameplay, by which events shift the Player's Mood positively or negatively, all within in the following logic:
- Player Conditions (Survival Needs) decrease Mood as they rise or better Mood as they fall
- Fulfilled Player Urges improve Mood, skipped or unfulfilled Player Urges lower Mood
- Mood can then be used at Campfire or Hearth to acquire "buffs" or clear debuffs
In the original system, Mood evolved specifically, from one particular Mood to another. Currently, it's only a score, positive or negative, indicating a good or bad Mood but not more specific than that. We will move towards restoring that system in future updates and will tell you more as we do so.
Notice Update
Notice is the system by which the Player's presence in the environment is signaled to said Environment. In turn, the Environment may react with Events of increased severity as Notice goes up. It is therefore in the Player's interest to watch their Notice footprint so that it doesn't get in the way of progress or interfere with actions and interactions.
- Notice has been separated into two: Local Notice and Global Notice
- Local Notice affects the current Area the player is in and rules local incidents (Ambushes, Patrols, etc)
- Local Notice is triggered by:
- Detection by Eye of the Wild Critters
- Destroying Obstacles
- Making Fire/Hearth outside of Landmark Areas
- Global Notice carries across the entire Region and rules global events (Weather, for example)
- Global Notice is triggered by:
- Fully Recalling a Faded Structure
- Harvesting % of a Resource Node
- Claiming an Area
Patrol Stealth Update
- Patrol Incidents now function as proper goals, updating as needed:
- Avoid Patrol, if the Player is yet Undetected
- Escape or Overcome Patrol if the Player is Detected
- "Hiding Spots" are spawned at Map Generation
- Hiding Spots can (and should) be Discovered by interaction
- When trying to Avoid or Escape a Patrol,
- The System will indicate the direction of the nearest Discovered Hiding Spot to the Player
- The player can then enter that Hiding Spot, or any Hiding Spot along the way
- If the Hiding Spot is not in the Bot Line of Sight at entry, the Player will be Hidden
Surveying Incidents
- Critter
- An unaware Critter will walk into the Player's vicinity
- The Critter may turn into an "Eye of the Wild"
- "Eyes of the Wild" increase Local Notice when they Detect the Player and escape him/her successfully
- The Critter can detect the Player by Line of Sight or by environmental Motion
- The Critter will run away from a Detected Player
- The Critter will try to reach the nearest Escape Spot
- Tracks
- Tracks appear by the Player
- Examining Tracks will reveal a Direction
- Walking in that Direction will reveal further Tracks
- Tracks are generated in the way that prevents backtracking and crisscrossing
- Walking up the chain of Tracks will lead to a Tracking Outcome
- Patrol
- Patrol Bots spawn & flock together - Patrol Walks to nearest Hostile Camp
- Patrol has a Line of Sight
- Standing in Line of Sight causes Detection - Patrol Detection have a displayed Detection Area Boundary - Standing within the Detection Area Boundary triggers a countdown - Detection if Countdown reaches 0 - Escape Detection Radius Countdown refills by 1/s after 3s out - Detection causes Bots to Chase/Attack Player - Player Goal updates accordingly from Avoid to Escape to Defeat Patrol - Escape or Avoidance can occur through Hiding Spots - Hiding Spots = auto success to Escape when colliding with them - Must first Scout (F) Hiding Spot for it to show up as Escape goal - Can still use unscouted Hiding Spot. It's just not Pointed to - Hiding Spots have Active/Inactive state toggle
Mood
- Conditions (Survival Needs) increases lower (negative) Mood. Conditions decreases increase (positive) Mood
- Urge fulfillment increases (positive) Mood. Failure to fulfill Urges decreases (negative) Mood.
Stamina, Regen & Conditions Fixes
- Restored Passive Stamina Regeneration in Locomotion Mode
- Restored impact of Stamina Loss & Regen on Conditions (Survival Needs)
- Thresholds of Stamina Regen increase Hunger
- Thresholds of Stamina loss while Running or Sprinting increase Thirst
- Thresholds of received Stamina Damage increase Injury
- Exertion increases passively as other Conditions are triggered
Everything else was mostly mechanical nitty-gritty and updates to functions, which there was a lot of.
Our next moves will be with Outpost Mechanics and advanced Hearth Mechanics, as well as a sprinkling of gameplay fixes and additions.
We are on track for a completely functional Wilderness tech demo for the end of the year. Wish us luck!
Take care and thank you for your interest, patience and support!
