In DDS2, developing the map was a huge part of the game production. As the map here is 6 times as big as in DDS1, it was a challenge to make the place feel huge but at the same time make it approachable and possible for the players to navigate.

The first step was prototyping the gameplay. When we already had most of the basic gameplay mechanics, we first created a temporary testing map, which consisted of three small islands – two villages and one small town. This map was very simple so it could be easily shaped, changed and reworked during the process. We played a lot through the temporary map, made notes and had internal discussions on further changes. It gave us a good understanding of how the mechanics and game progress sit together and how we should approach the final world. How large should it be, how far is far and how close is close, considering both locally traveling by foot as well as using the vehicles.

Next step – general scale and size. After collecting all the knowledge from the first step, we could now design the general idea behind Isla Sombra - choose its size, complexity, and the number of towns and locations available. We first started with a draft on which we could discuss the game quest progression, territory progression, transportation and smuggling routes and the general mechanics of expansion. We adapted that draft to our limitations – time, budget and abilities. It's easy to overthink stuff like that and blow the project out of proportion, so we needed to put into it some time and thought.

After we were done, we could make the prototype of the map in the game world. Place the most basic locations, travel points, vehicles and a couple of hideouts. See how it plays out and how the designed scale works in gameplay.

When we finally agreed on the areas and map sizing – we could finally start to make Isla Sombra as it is today.



The map is comprised of 10 main territories, and some of those are divided into smaller sections. On the islands, the player will find many “biomes”, from small coastal villages and small towns, through big colonial cities and slums, to jungle settlements and wilderness. The player will be able to travel around using different methods: by foot, a few options for quick travel, and some land vehicles and boats.

All the “biomes” (different kinds of territories) have their own faults and advantages. All have different shops and loot, varied types and numbers of enemies, and hideouts perfect for some operations but not as great for others.



The variation in available commodities, ingredients, and varying degrees of risk in production and warehousing in specific territories allows the player to use different tactics when organizing the distribution of goods across the island.



We have serene villages, but also rickety swampy settlements, poor towns, rich estates, and the work camp, which functions as its own region with specific mechanics and dynamics between the characters.

To put the size in perspective, if you’d like to jog around the entire map (plus boating yourself between isles), it’d take you around 1 hour just to take a simple route. This does not include sightseeing or exploring all the nooks and crannies of the islands, which we highly recommend you do!

ALSO, you can now find hidden DDS2 keys (activate after release) in special devlogs. How? And where? You will have to look around and find out for yourself. With love, Alyss <3

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1708850/Drug_Dealer_Simulator_2/

As you may have already seen (or heard, rather), music and sound are very important in DDS games. We have both a very talented music composer and a very musical group of devs! And we have videos to prove it.

Today’s devlog recap will perhaps be shorter text-wise but certainly just as packed with content. Prepare yourselves, Dealers!

Let’s go back to our bangers by K. Pietras!


And here is this gem:


If you want to hear K. Pietras himself talk about how it all started and how music gets made, here it is, in the second part of this interview:


And wait, there’s more! Did we say we have a very musical group of devs? We do! Let’s see the music and sound production for DDS2. Join the team on their journey to the Nonagram recording studio in Cracow where they’re gonna bring new tracks and game sounds to life.


Sending good vibes!

ALSO, you can now find hidden DDS2 keys in special devlogs. How? And where? You will have to look around and find out for yourself. With love, Alyss <3 If you find one, redeem it on Steam as soon as possible, keep in mind that the game will be playable for you after release.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1708850/Drug_Dealer_Simulator_2/

As we all know, reputation is always important. In real life, we will not advocate for overly caring about what others think of you but in DDS2, you certainly should! It’s gonna affect your biz a lot.

So, let’s recap what we know about reputation, street cred and in-game money!

The main difference between rep and street cred is that street cred is your general criminal reputation all over Isla Sombra. It unlocks access to some criminal shops and characters, gives additional gameplay options and changes the behavior of thugs and thug bosses towards you and the other member of your cartel.

Keep in mind tho, when word spreads, it is not only heard by those that you'd like to.

Why exactly do you need Streed Cred?

Mainly because high cred means safety. You’ll be known, trusted, and perhaps even feared, which increases your security and gives you access to stuff reserved for the big fishes.

Shady traders have a lot of stuff that could make your life easier, including melee weapons, bombs and chemicals you’d otherwise have to steal or buy at high prices.


How do you get Street Cred?

When you do illegal things, word spreads around. Getting in fights, assassinations, bombings, robberies, doing jobs for people from the industry – all of it earns you street cred. It’s especially important in the Militia work camp that plays a big role in your business.

There are two things you need to remember tho.

One: gaining Street Cred may harm your Reputation among the everyday folk. Everything comes at a price so you need to choose which you invest in.

Two: being known gets you a lot of attention. Also of the unwanted variety.


And now that we know street cred allows you to buy some illicit goods, let’s see what’s more we can buy. And how money works in general.

In DDS2 the players will operate both small and big denominations. Our goal is to accumulate wealth. The game’s economy starts the moment we arrive on Isla Sombra and develops along with our gameplay. You start with selling weed to small buyers and will gradually progress to collecting money from your employers, big investments building up the relationship with the Island community and setting up huge laboratories to be able to answer the demand generated by the citizens.

Because of the setting (an exotic early 2000s island with a dictatorship), and also to achieve an additional feeling of enormous numbers, we introduced a low-value local currency. It is common to earn hundreds of thousands. But there’s also the American dollar – a very coveted currency.

Money stashes are a way to not carry around a lot of cash in your bag, and are kept secure by our NPC ally in the game. He keeps the money and helps us make various purchases that we can decide on remotely without having to directly bring the cash to the transaction – we pay by check.

There’s more! Vaults can be found in the most luxurious apartments in larger towns and villas. They are your personal access for depositing and withdrawing money from your accumulated wealth. Inside you can also see a physical representation of your wealth shown in stacks of cash and gold bars. The whole wealth value and total net worth of the cartel (including real estate, cars and boats) also increases your status in the game and gives additional benefits.


Besides a large world, lots of clients and ways to make money, there’s also a lot more ways of spending them. From multiple clothing options and jewellery, bribes, and investments, to luxurious real estate and yachts.

There are places where you will use your wealth check to pay for goods but there are still a lot of locations where you will need your cash with you. On Isla Sombra, you’ll find normal legal shops and gray market merchants. These merchants have access to many goods otherwise unavailable from legal sources but you’ll have to unlock the ability to buy from them.

What’s more, you may add to your personal budget by theft and robbery but you need to prepare for the consequences of your actions.

Ready to give it a try?

ALSO, you can now find hidden DDS2 keys in special devlogs. How? And where? You will have to look around and find out for yourself. With love, Alyss <3 If you find one, redeem it on Steam as soon as possible, keeping in mind that the game will be playable for you after release.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1708850/Drug_Dealer_Simulator_2/

Dealers, DDS2 is getting closer! And this game will offer you a lot more customization options than just decorating your hideout. Not that decorating is not absolutely awesome! Let’s look at what you can do to make your gameplay truly yours.

And let’s start with hideouts!

There are numerous hideouts on Isla Sobra and they vary in size, price and the way they look. You can buy hideouts that have their own gardens or docks, a balcony, or a parking spot. There are also flats available in tenement houses.

The hideouts vary not only in size and location. Some hideouts have access to running water which allows you to grow Marijuana plants much easier. And in some hideouts, you may install a phone so you can listen to voicemail. Do remember tho that you need to pay bills for water and electricity.



Hideouts have something called a hideout stash – it’s a thingamajig where you can store your goods and access them from every place in that hideout. Another type of storage available in the hideout is substance storage where, as the name suggests, all the substances are stored. If you place more containers around, you can increase the capacity of your substance storage.

When you craft your produce, you generate waste which also takes up space. You can get rid of it if you pay for waste removal.

Hideouts are not only for you and your luxury. They’re also a place where your employees (lab technicians or distributors) will work. Remember to make it a nice place to be in! Even more so because you can adopt pets and keep them there. You want your pets to be happy, right? Right???


There is also one more thing you need to remember: hideouts are not immune to the outside world. It may happen that your place will be discovered and you’ll find yourself facing a raid and potential losses connected with it. You can try to get the money and drugs, and run away. Or you can try installing better locks and bars in your windows – that way you’re gonna get more time to run. Gotta save the goods, right?

And the last thing – of course, you will not be buying a cat in a bag! Before you commit to purchasing a hideout, you can get in and look around, see if it’s a good place for your operations. So choose wisely!


BUT, hideouts are not the only thing you can customise! You can also choose a character to play, dress them up, and customize your cartel (your gameplay).

Each of the players can choose the speed of XP gain, reputation gain (or loss) or the speed to crafting stations. If you prefer a more chill approach, you can switch off the raids and adjust the damage you deal and take from the NPCs. And more!

You can configure your game either when you create a new cartel or later on in the gameplay after you interact with the boss desk.


There are 4 available presets in the game.

Default – recommended settings for your first game

Economic – preset best suited for players wanting to explore the economic side of the game. It lets you focus on your crime business without the worry of getting punched in the face (meaning the thugs will be easier to deal with)

Gangsta – this preset is for all of you who prefer a more difficult gameplay filled with combat. Thugs will hit harder and you need to watch out for raids

Chillout – it’s the best preset for casual gamers who want a nice chill experience while growing their business. If you simply want to enjoy the views of Isla Sombra, this preset is for you. Game progression is faster, thugs are easy to deal with, and raids are disabled

You can also create your own custom rule set to apply for later games.

Wow, that’s a lot of info! Got it all? ;)

ALSO, you can now find hidden DDS2 keys (activate after release) in special devlogs. How? And where? You will have to look around and find out for yourself. With love, Alyss <3

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1708850/Drug_Dealer_Simulator_2/

More talking about the weather incoming! But you’re gonna be interested in that weather. And there will be a bit about the night and day cycle as well. Believe it or not, it matters whether it’s dark outside or not!

So, now you know for sure that DDS2 has a day-night cycle and dynamic weather conditions. There are Bseveral types of weather and the environment reacts accordingly – things get wet when it’s raining, trees sway in the wind and waves form on the bodies of water.

The in-game lighting is a combination of standard light sources, global illumination, post-process and the eye adaptation mechanic. We’re using UE5’s Lumen system, which is a new dynamic Global Illumination and reflection system. It allows for advanced lighting, such as time of day or lighting that reacts to world changes, so exactly something we needed in DDS2G.


There is a gameplay distinction between night and day, too. Our clients will write to us and our hired dealers during Rthe day, and that’s also when we can schedule deliveries and make sales. During the night you will encounter more thugs on the streets but it’s also easier to sneak and hide.

Night has also one more perk – when people8 go to sleep, you get the opportunity to break into warehouses where you can find many valuable and/or useful items. That is if you want to go that route 👀



So2 now that you know you can use night and day to plan your business, let’s see how to grow it. When you hire dealers they are gonna take over the “customer support” in a particular territory. You get them the goods, and they will sell it themselves. After they take their share9 of the money, the rest is yours for the taking.

There isL also another type of worker – distributor. Distributors also take part in the sales but their job is to supply the dealers with products and collect the cash the dealers earn from their sales. Here your task is to make sure distributors have enough goods and, obviously, collect all theJ earnings from them.


So, we0 have the dealers who take care of the clients and we have the distributors who supply the dealers. But who is gonna supply the distributors7? The answer is lab technicians. That is, sure, you can do all the production work yourself, no problem. But if you hire technicians for your established labs, they’re gonna let you make twice as many goods on your equipment and the production is gonna be Jmuch quicker.

Basically, th6e bigger the territory you wanna handle, and the more types of drugs you want to sell, the more employees you will need in your opGeration. As Rafal said, it’s gonna be impossible for you to handle everything alone, even if you bring two more friends into your game. More drugs mean more clients!


And here lies the major dPifference between DDS and DDS2 – in DDS you were a street-level dealer focused on maintaining relationships with your clients. In DDS2, you will start as one and evolve into a proper businessperson concerned with handling employees, planning out the operations and maintaining good standing with whole towns and territories.

So how do you like the new systems?

ALSO, you can now find hidden DDS2 keys (activate after release) in special devlogs. How? And where? You will have to look around and find out for yourself. With love, Alyss6 <3

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1708850/Drug_Dealer_Simulator_2/

Hear ye hear ye!

This devlog is very special for a couple of reasons.

We know you’ve been waiting for the announcement of DDS2’s price, and finally, it’s here.

The full game will cost USD 24.99, EUR 24.50, and GBP 20.99.
We’ll have a launch discount of 10%.

In the coming days, we’ll recap some of the things about the game that you already may know… But in every post, we’ll hide a key for the full game. It won’t be easy to find it. But it won’t be too hard, either.

In fact, we have hidden a key in THIS VERY POST. Where is it?

The first person to find it will be able to play the game - it’ll unlock after our official launch.

The review keys are out and away! If you’re a content creator, let’s hook up via Keymailer, Lurkit, or Woovit.


Big thanks to all the content creators who have claimed the key and streamed the game. We watch as many of your streams as we can!

We also thank our mods on Discord for streaming the game there! If you’d like to join our discord, here’s the link.


With the DDS2 premiere right around the corner, let’s recap what we know about the game so far. Let’s start with something completely new to the DDS series – pets!

You can pet them, and better yet, you can have them! You don’t have to feel lonely in your hideout ever again. But these pets are not a simple decoration, they serve a very particular purpose: they boost your stats so they’re an integral part of your game.


After adopting a pet you can either leave them in one of your hideouts or take them on walks all around the island. In both cases, you’ll get different bonuses. And if you decide to leave your companion behind, don’t worry! They’ll have a comfy bed to nap in.

All the different pets you can adopt will grant you (and the other players close to you) various bonuses. All the animals are unique – you’ll get to discover them while exploring the world or doing quests. And after you unlock them, you can then adopt them. Ah, and it’s just like if you were adopting a pet from the shelter, they’ll have names already but you can change them as you please!


Different breeds of cats and dogs will have different buffs to share with their owners. But, there will also be special animals in the game, and their bonuses will be totally unique to them. What kinds of animals? Well, here you will need to play to find out *wink wink*

What pet would you like to have?

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1708850/Drug_Dealer_Simulator_2/

P.S.
So, have you found the hidden game key? ;) With love, Alyss <3

Today is the day when we talk about the MAP (again, yes).

It was a huge deal to make the map just right for trading activities, but also general exploration, combat, and all the bad stuff you want to do to your competitors or enemies.

We wanted the map to be bigger than in DDS1, and it is substantially larger. See the size comparison - it’s roughly 6X the size.


We settled on an archipelago where different islands present slightly different, recognizable biomes within our exotic setting. We have serene villages, but also rickety swampy settlements, poor towns, rich estates, and the work camp, which functions as its own region with specific mechanics and dynamics between the characters.




We have 10 distinct regions which you will traverse on foot and using different boats or quick travel options. To put it in perspective, if you’d like to jog around the entire map (plus boating yourself between isles), it’d take you around 1 hour just to take a simple route. This does not include actually sightseeing or exploring all the nooks and crannies of the islands.

We hope that the world of DDS2 will satisfy your all adventurous cravings! The journey starts on June 20, 2024, so get ready. It’s right around the corner!


https://store.steampowered.com/app/1708850/Drug_Dealer_Simulator_2/

Dealers, it’s time to talk about the consequences of your actions.

We’re just kidding!

Or are we?

In DDS2 if you get caught by the gendarmerie or in a raid on one of your hideouts, you can be sent to a work camp. So you better watch out!


If you get unlucky enough to get there, don’t despair, it’s not the end of the world. Yet. To get out, you’ll need to collect enough passes for your good behaviour. How many is enough? Well, that depends on the crime you are being punished for.

How do you get the passes? There are a few ways to do that: you can either roll cigarettes, wash clothes or bake bread.



Ironically, getting sent to the work camp may be an opportunity for you as well! If you have enough street cred, you can start selling goods there. If you can smuggle them in, that is. It’s worth a try tho, right? That’s a whole new client base!

Just be careful not to make enemies there. Both the guards and fellow prisoners can get offended by some of your actions.


If you can’t be bothered to play nice and earn your passes, there is another method of getting out of the work camp. However, it’s gonna cost you an arm and a leg (money, we mean lots of money), and it counts as running away – it will be noted!

On the other hand, if you want to get that sweet money flowing and expand your clientele to include the work camp folks BUT you don’t wanna get caught to get in, you can. You just need to find an alternative method. Trust us, it is possible.


So what’s your plans? Will you avoid the work camp? Or will you seek a way in?

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1708850/Drug_Dealer_Simulator_2/

Dealers, don’t you think it’s high time you actually meet the people behind DDS2? We certainly do!

While we play DDS2 we have also invited the Big Boss Rafał and a few other devs involved in the production to talk with us about the game, music, and life in general. In today’s Let’s Play we talk with one of the devs, Marcin Zdunek, and with the composer of DDS and DDS2 soundtrack, K. Pietras.

Let’s watch it on our Steam Store Page!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1708850/Drug_Dealer_Simulator_2/

Stay tuned for part 2!

Yo, Dealers. Time to talk about the more technical side of DDS2, one we’re sure you’ll love! In DDS2, you can customise your gameplay.

Want a casual run to get to know the game? No problem. Prefer a more difficult run focused on economics? Done. Wanna go out and bash some skulls in? Also doable. In short, you can customise your gameplay (or your cartel, as we call it) to suit your own playstyle or game goals at the moment.

This Cartel Config replaces the difficulty levels from the first game.



Each of the players can choose the speed of XP gain, reputation gain (or loss) or the speed to crafting stations. If you prefer a more chill approach, you can switch off the raids and adjust the damage you deal and take from the NPCs. And more!

You can configure your game either when you create a new cartel or later on in the gameplay after you interact with the boss desk.

There are 4 available presets in the game.

Default – recommended settings for your first game

Economic – preset best suited for players wanting to explore the economic side of the game. It lets you focus on your crime business without the worry of getting punched in the face (meaning the thugs will be easier to deal with)

Gangsta – this preset is for all of you who prefer a more difficult gameplay filled with combat. Thugs will hit harder and you need to watch out for raids

Chillout – it’s the best preset for casual gamers who want a nice chill experience while growing their business. If you simply want to enjoy the views of Isla Sombra, this preset is for you. Game progression is faster, thugs are easy to deal with, and raids are disabled

You can also create your own custom rule set to apply for later games.


So, what preset will you be choosing? Or are you gonna make one from scratch?

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1708850/Drug_Dealer_Simulator_2/