Hi everyone!
Last blog post before the release, and not much to show this week. Most work goes into fixes, balancing, and just adding something small extra here and there, as our to-do list is basically over for the release. The game seems stable with no new crashes. But this is always tricky, because once more people start playing, more side cases become visible, proving that nothing is ever stable. But that is just a software thing, I guess. The release feels very exciting and scary at the same time, but I can't wait to open the floodgates!
One of the more useful small additions is route auto-naming changes. We will have first and final destinations in the name instead of pointless number order. It should be much easier to find routes that you are looking for.
Another change is making roads and rails less visible when building the other. The game gets huge, and there is a lot happening on screen, so it makes sense to reduce clutter even more when focusing on specific tasks.
I thought about the demo and its impact on development. There is some extra work to prepare and maintain it, not as much as expected. Mainly the biggest bottleneck is having two separate versions before the full game release. However, having a demo changes the roadmap with feedback you get, and you get a lot. The good thing is that we prepared for bug fixing with additional runway. This allowed us to address all the reported bugs and issues until now and implement a big portion of the feedback.
I think that the best and most addictive parts in the game that exist are due to having the demo live. Without it being in a closed developer bubble, the game would not be as good as it is now. I have a list of features we added only due to the feedback. Some are ideas purely from others, some ideas are merged with ours, but they all happened because players talked. Here is the list:
Tasks - At this point tasks define the game and allow new players to understand it. This was added before the demo, but from feedback nevertheless
More cities and destination logic
Vehicle spacing system
Route management
Demand price
Hub managers
There are also many balance changes and optimizations. The whole list would be huge, but at this point it will be impossible to make.
In conclusion, the demo these days is a must. How else do you make sure that the game you are making for others to enjoy is enjoyable for them?
See you all on Wednesday!
Click the image to see the hi-res version.
