Robin is the one who created the algorithm, the monster algorithm. With this algorithm we can combine billions of physiscs rigged monsters and have them walk however they are made.
Take this opportunity to ask any questions to our Dr. Frankenstein.
Huge congratulations to our Weekly Showdown Grand Final Winner, Luvtrotters who wins with the only clear round on one of our hardest 1.40 courses! Congratulations to everyone who made it through and did so well! :)
Which member of the team will win, join Max, Yoh and Gwé for an hour on Unspottable, we'll play the level included in the demo and more to give you a taste of what is coming in the release on the 22nd!
We'll play online using Steam remote play together from 9am BST on Tuesday.
We'll do more stream during the festival, wishlist the game to get all the updates. ;)
Please note that the hardware mechanic will not be available in older Alpha 11 saves, since they require changes to the software types, which are embedded in the save file. However, they will still load.
Major changes
This update adds conveyor belts, forcing you to plan out your logistics in more detail than just placing down some printers and some pallets. With conveyor belts comes a lot more options for how boxes travel from printer to courier. They can be routed through walls, floors and even out of a building directly to a parking lot.
Hardware manufacturing seems like a natural offshoot from conveyor belts. Hardware manufacturing currently affects how you have to approach console and phone development. You also unlock new hardware contracts with 2 business stars, and you'll receive hardware manufacturing deals whenever a competitor develops a console or phone operating system.
Employees will sadly no longer partake in majestic flights through empty elevator shafts. Elevators now require queueing and load balancing. 2 new larger elevators have been added and each of them has a display showing current floor, load and direction.
Roadmap changes
The final release of Alpha 11 has been pushed back a couple of times now. It mainly came down to the fact that the convention mechanic hasn't panned out the way I intended, when I brainstormed it. I've decided to make Alpha 11.7 the final update before I release it officially. The convention mechanic has been shelved for now in favor of the new hardware mechanic. The "updates and expansions" update is still planned and I'm still planning on making it a part of Alpha 11.
Patch notes
Alpha 11.7.32 (2021-01-30)
Fixes
Fixed employees getting stuck eating after loading a save from before alpha 11.7.31, if they were already eating at a table
Fixed game breaking due to employee missing food while in eating state when loading old save game
Fixed not being able to rotate a group of furniture if center furniture can't rotate on its own
Fixed parking spot prioritization for security staff
Fixed acoustic foam sticking through roof
Fixed custom height furniture not being placed exactly where mouse is
Alpha 11.7.31 (2021-01-30)
Changes
Added eating animation and a "fork"
Added ability for employees to eat in couches, by their PC or just standing around
Vending machines and mini fridges now output food objects that employees have to eat before their hunger is satiated
Improved look of conveyor belts at 90 degree angles
Employees will now pick subway over bus, if it's closer
Fixes
Fixed modded furniture sometimes combusting on load
Fixed already broken furniture sometimes causing fire on load
Fixed noise overlay sometimes not updating in real-time
Alpha 11.7.30 (2021-01-27)
Changes
Limited which UI sound effects are affected by reverb in a room
Added new reward
Fixes
Fixed chance of employee getting stuck when trying to flee outside while already outside
Fixed game showing error dialog when a code mod fails to compile
Fixed issues with injection of error handling code into code mods when methods contain yield and control statements
Alpha 11.7.29 (2021-01-26)
Changes
Added proper code mod error handling
Added ability to place some wall hung furniture at custom heights
Added room acoustics with reverb sound effect, which affects noise propagation, and effectiveness of meetings and social interactions
Added new reward for releasing software
Fixes
Helicopter now subtracts money instead of adding
Fixed headphones loading in at the wrong position if worn by an employee
Fixed having to pay for a subsidiary's patents and frameworks
Alpha 11.7.28 (2021-01-21)
Changes
Game now caches shadows from in-world lights, making it possible to play with "More shadows" on non-super computers, but moving objects no longer cast shadows inside rooms
Upgraded the manufacturing panel with scrolling conveyor belt graphic and printer/assembly color indications
Increased price of helicopters to $6500 per pickup
Quadrupled market recognition gain
Component printers can now be limited to specific print jobs
Project info window now lists active publishing tasks
Added warning when manufacturing process doesn't end with recycler
Added 12 month cooldown on the fan loss warning
Replaced Phone and Console tech lag with hard unlocks, to avoid making it seem like hardware research didn't work
Fixes
Fixed console history not actually being saved
Fixed possible save corruption from moving company with furniture in inventory
Fixed context menu going behind UI in Linux with UI anti-aliasing off
Fixed toilet censor rendering no matter which floor is being viewed
Alpha 11.7.27 (2021-01-12)
Changes
Added helipad for transporting boxes quickly
Added helipad to Hardware Inc starting map
Added subway to city maps (Requires moving company to spawn one in old saves)
Added matted windows for toilet privacy
Ability to select objects from the floor above if they span 2 floors
Doubled market recognition gain
Added HDR dithering to remove banding
Project management will now fast track projects whenever a phase finishes before time, to avoid long beta phases
Changed how project management prototypes are selected to allow for removing prototypes
Optimization work on employee position updates and furniture LODing
Fixes
Product storage count was wrong after undoing destroying pallets
Fixed post-tasks sticking around in project management panel after selling IP
Fixed HR not taking role assignment into account when picking specializations for education and new hires
Fixed wall generation breaking when windows or doors are overlapping
Cooks will wait for a bit after their shift has begun to start complaining about the availability of stoves
Employees will no longer walk across the map for toilets, coffee, food, loitering, etc.
Alpha 11.7.26 (2020-12-30)
Changes
Added panel to view current project management handled support and marketing tasks
Fixes
Fixed employees not being able to reach computers in some cases
Alpha 11.7.25 (2020-12-28)
Changes
Updated pallet drop point tutorial animation to show a more optimal setup
Added automation log to keep track of HR and project management
Random optimizations
Fixes
Replacing furniture will now use inventory
Fixed cases of furniture overlapping after replacement
Game now correctly considers inventory when calculating price of placing furniture
Fixed not getting inventory back, and windows and doors sometimes being doubled when undoing placing blueprint
Fixed floating point precision error in room binary space partitioning causing interaction points to be offset incorrectly sometimes
Alpha 11.7.24 (2020-12-22)
Fixes
Fixed modded furniture not being reachable when placed up against wall in certain cases
Fixed cases of furniture not being reachable due to floating point precision errors in the nav mesh
Fixed error when burglar was caught by police without any stolen goods
Fixed every active print job acting as a multiplier for each product printer's cost and degradation
Fixed employees' feet clipping through sidewalk
Fixed being able to place medium printer through ceiling mounted conveyor belts
Alpha 11.7.23 (2020-12-21)
Changes
Added furniture inventory
Police will return 75% of stolen furniture to player's inventory when arresting burglar
Contents insurance now covers half of building damage
Secondary roles are now included in consideration of whether a team has adequate specializations for a job
Merry happy!
Fixes
Fixed top of walls rendering through doors and windows when walls are lowered
Alpha 11.7.22 (2020-12-18) Fixes modded furniture not being reachable
Alpha 11.7.21 (2020-12-18)
Changes
Rooms can now be selected by clicking on their walls
Greatly lowered fans needed for higher market recognition
Fixes
Fixed total shares for a company overflowing uint32 by rebalancing shares when they get below $25
Fixed assemblers breaking too fast
Fixed cases of hardware components not being counted correctly, causing print jobs to not finish
Added FIX_COMPONENT_COUNT console command to fix previous saves with stalled hardware print jobs (Shouldn't be necessary for jobs started after this version)
Fixed security staff ignoring room assignment when looking for desks
The game will now try to move interaction points around a tiny bit to avoid some cases of unreachable furniture
Fixed warning message position when UI is scaled
Fixed entire map being counted as an unreachable room with an error message at the map origin
Alpha 11.7.20 (2020-12-10)
Changes
HR specialization filter now lists all specializations, to avoid having to remove them as new ones become available
Fixes
Fixed employees not being able to pathfind outside, causing them to get stuck in elevated parking garages
Fixed another bug in team assignment algorithm causing it to never terminate
Alpha 11.7.19 (2020-12-08)
Changes
Added yearly fire inspections with fines and insurance validation
Lowered fans needed for more market recognition
Added flammability data overlay
Improved detection of inaccessible rooms based on obstacles and elevated error message
Fixes
Fixed bug in elevator load balancing
Alpha 11.7.18 (2020-12-05)
Changes
Increased fan gain chance per sale
Capped how long a room can be on fire for and increase rate of spread to reduce overall time
Sprinklers now protect furniture below them from being destroyed during a fire, but will break electronics that are on
Improved dot, indexing and negation parsing in SIPL
Fixes
Fixed game breaking on extremely underpowered graphics cards, instead of just being slow
Fixed bug in team assignment algorithm causing it to never terminate and create stuttering during thread locks
Various other fixes
Alpha 11.7.17 (2020-11-28) Fixes game breaking when running some feature scripts after loading game
Alpha 11.7.16 (2020-11-28)
Changes
Added shortcut to filter employees by next class column, to only show employees with education available
Added type checking to SIPL to avoid loading mods with obvious script errors, instead of them failing mid game
Added support for indexing into non-variables in SIPL
Fixes
Fixed team assignment algorithm not correctly allowing teams in rooms that are available due to room pass through
Alpha 11.7.15 (2020-11-27)
Changes
Changed how fans are summed in UI so it no longer looks stuck
Improved market recognition dropdown
Increased traffic density based on environment type and time of day
Added talent pool, plot, utilities and ISP cost modifiers to environment type
Enabling "pass through" on a room now allows any traffic and is disabled by default
Removed green team labels for when game inferred team assignment from surrounding rooms
Reduced debuff from incompatible co-workers a tiny bit
Fixes
Fixed some instances of game incorrectly complaining about rooms in or around other rooms while building
Alpha 11.7.14 (2020-11-23) Fixes not being able to load saves with printers or assemblers
Alpha 11.7.13 (2020-11-23)
Changes
Improved chart highlighting
Fixes
Auto-complete room has been mapped to a button, to avoid clash with pillar creation
Fixed inconsequential bugs from room team assignment algorithm
Undoing destroying printers or assemblers didn't refresh their output sticker
Alpha 11.7.12 (2020-11-22)
Changes
Overhauled market recognition to be more consistent
Added back simulation of fan loss over time
Made it easier to gain market recognition intially, depending on profitability of software
Put keyboard shortcuts on screen when building
The game will now infer actual room assigment and warn player if there are issues, leading to less lag from pathfinding
Added meeting status to team window
Added ability to create pillars by holding Ctrl. Basically rooms without interiors
Added option to change medium speed multiplier
Added Teams data overlay to visualize which teams are allowed where
Added LOAD_FROM_LOCALIZOR console command to download unfinished translations from Localizor.com
Improved grass and cloud shaders
The "More shadows" graphics option is now disabled by default in all quality settings
Alpha 11.7.11 (2020-11-12)
Changes
Component assemblers will now stop accepting input when they are outputting finished assemblies, to clear out after a conveyor back up
Server electricity use now depends on actual usage
Adjusted server wattage to balance out watt per MB between servers
Added ability to bind key to move furniture, default M
Improved table group prioritization for meetings
Improved data overlay
Fixes
Fixed employee data overlays not working when zoomed out
Fixed game breaking when undoing replacing furniture with furniture that had multiple layers of snapped furniture
Fixed bottom most tasks sometimes not updating if task panel was full
Fixed roof dissapearing when room had stairs and wasn't fully covered by room above
Alpha 11.7.10 (2020-11-04)
Changes
Improved data overlay
Disabled publisher printing deals for hardware products
Fixes
Fixed deadlock that had chance to crash game when a print job finished
Fixed conveyor splitters not updating routing when changing assembler output
Fixed couriers not prioritizing garage ports in rooms player actually owns or has rented
Fixed invisible room floors when using garage ports and opaque windows
Alpha 11.7.9 (2020-10-29)
Changes
Conveyor Splitters will now auto-route components to the right assemblers
Added conveyor belt flow visualization when placing conveyor objects
Updated Unity version
Fixes
Fixed game crashing when loading a game with texture resolution set to low using DirectX
Fixed floating point bug in sub-market comparison that could tank market recognition, among other issues
Fixed hardware component icons not showing up on boxes after last patch
Fixed issue where product boxes would get stuck at garage port because they were empty
Various other fixes
Alpha 11.7.8 (2020-10-25)
Changes
Added randomization to staff parking prioritization so they don't always park at the same building
Made couriers prefer garage ports over pallets when choosing parking spots
Made manufacturing limits work like product printing limits, by not taking current stock into account
Added extra check to assembler to make sure old manufacturing jobs didn't get locked up by new jobs
Made assemblers clear out any lingering components from cancelled jobs
Fixes
Fixed bug where manufacturing process could get stuck because components were assembled in an order where they wouldn't fit together
Fixed bug where headphones worn by founder would stick around after quitting game and starting a new one
Fixed freezing bug from potential deadlock in component machine code when turning on and off
Alpha 11.7.7 (2020-10-24)
Changes
Sped up conveyor belts by 25%, and improved assembler logic and effectiveness calculation
Increased fridge capacity and added warning when all are empty
Made it so conveyor belts don't have to line up exactly to connect
Fixes
Possible fix for some DirectX + GeForce related crashes
Fixed not being able to do alpha reviews for hardware products
Fixed marketing and price warnings being disabled at some point in the past
Alpha 11.7.6 (2020-10-18)
Changes
Manufacturing contracts now pay out on delivery rather than at end of day
Halved penalty on manufacturing contracts
Improved component assembler logic for a tiny speed boost
Capped complaint demands to 25% of current salary
Fixes
Fixed employees complaining about having to pee while going to meetings
Put software category tech lag in tooltips, so Console and Phone won't have wrong unlock year for 3D and Network in UI
Various other fixes
Alpha 11.7.5 (2020-10-16)
Changes
Added effectiveness stat to printers and assemblers, which is reflected in the manufacturing overlay
Fixes
Fixed not being able to change screen resolution on some computers
Fixed game breaking when starting press release without any selected teams with employees
Fixed reward count being stuck with unclaimed rewards and permanent unlocks enabled
Alpha 11.7.4 (2020-10-15)
Changes
Made specialization panel in new game screen scale with screen width
Added progress bars to press releases and warning for missing specialization levels
Added manufacturing contract warning
You can now cancel manufacturing contracts with no penalties if you haven't started printing yet
Removed screen refresh rate options, as they aren't used in windowed fullscreen mode
The penalty from raising the price of a product now slowly decays over a year
Fixes
Fixed couriers not prioritizing garage ports correctly
Fixed box elevator not being valid in basement
Fixed employees getting stuck in other teams' bathrooms and complaining about a lack of seating after the sink was added
Fixed bugged human color mapping, causing all-blue staff members
Fixed publishing deal not resetting when changing software type or category
Fixed Employees tutorial
Fixed employees getting stuck in parking structures after panicking over burglars
Various other fixes
Alpha 11.7.3 (2020-10-12)
Fixed boxes and printers not being simulated when skipping time
Alpha 11.7.2 (2020-10-12)
Fixes
Fixed contracts not refreshing on pre-alpha 11.7 saves
Fixed game breaking when trying to pick component outputs on pre-alpha 11.7 saves
Fixed game breaking due to AI changes in couriers being incompatble with pre-alpha 11.7 saves
Fixed instances of boxes getting stuck
Alpha 11.7.1 (2020-10-12)
Changes
Added hardware toggle for software categories, making them physical distribution only and altering their sales simulation
Added hardware manufacturing, allowing players to print products from components using a series of printers and assemblers
Added hardware contracts and made contract generation algorithm pick more varied contracts
Boxes now have to be transported using conveyor belts
Elevators are now simulated with limited capacity and load balancing
Added security desk to micro manage security staff locations
Employees' work timer no longer starts until they have walked into the office, and they offset their arrival time by how long their commute takes
Default room style has changed to drywall and concrete floors to encourage player customization
Overhauled look of UI
Heavily increased payout from bigger contracts
Updated default rent buildings and added a new building for hardware manufacturing
Added TOGGLE_SPEC_CAP console command
Fixes
Fixed bug causing software with categories overriden in mods to always be priced at 0, making the AI bankrupt constantly
Fixed not being able to override name generator when modding existing software with no categories
Fixed bug where bus could get stuck waiting all day for employee that didn't plan on using it
Fixed bug in path calculation causing employees to lose several meters every day when playing at max speed
Fixed snapped furniture not always getting corrected to avoid wall clipping, causing PCs to not line up with chairs
Fixed being able to pick software features unsupported by any OS, as long as OSs had already been selected
Fixed subsidiary price adding player stock worth twice, making it almost twice as expensive as intended
Launch week is finally here, just 3 more days until our game goes live, so we hope that you are all just as excited as we are!
Of course, just because it is launch week, it doesn't mean that the work stops. For the most part, we've been mainly focusing on fixing the lingering bugs, however, we were able to find the time to do something special for the game, thanks to a huge show of support from our community.
So, we are pleased to announce that Raji: An Ancient Epic now has Hindi and Turkish subtitles! We pushed out the update to the Steam Game Festival demo and our prologue versions early on Saturday so you can activate the new subtitles right away!
We are especially happy to be able to launch the subtitles now as we have been working with the tightest timetables possible, so it was a fun-but-tough challenge for us to have it ready for the game's launch!
We would like to thank everyone who contacted us requesting these languages, we always feel incredibly blessed to see that our community cares about the game this much.
Further News From Raji
For people that are playing the Raji demo via the Steam Game Festival, we realized that the version was slightly outdated (behind the Prologue version) so we have updated it to bring the demo to version parity. This update brought in a few much-needed bugfixes and small balancing changes.
Finally, we'd like to remind you that we are running a special Raji giveaway contest. Enter today to have a chance to win a copy of the PC (Steam) version of Raji: An Ancient Epic!
The event will run until 23:59 CEST on the 14th of October.
Winners will be contacted during the morning (CEST) on the 15th of October so that they know that they have won before the game's launch.
Prizes will be distributed in the form of Steam keys as soon as (humanly) possible after the game goes live!
Thank you very much and we hope that you're enjoying our prologue while you wait for the game's launch!
Narrative Designer Dennis Gustafsson has previously published nine comic books and worked on 35 games. Book of Travels brings him from Malmo to Stockholm, usually by motorbike, but soon as a permanent relocation. We hope you like his Q&A. Be sure to ask any questions in the comments, Dennis will be popping in to answer them!
Where have you been until now?
I have been in too many places to mention since my first game was released in 1991. Most recently I worked for King as a combined Art, Level & Game Design Lead in King's Malmö studio.
How did you find your way to Might and Delight?
I’m an old friend of Joel’s [Studio Manager], and when Book of Travels needed to evolve its narrative, he got in touch and offered me a position supporting the Game Designers as a Narrative Designer. I’ve always dreamed of working on a game that’s as ambitious as Book of Travels is, but until now I’ve never had the chance. As a professional Game Developer getting the chance to influence the type of game you work on is the rare exception rather than the norm! Book of Travels will be my first indie game and I'm honoured, humbled and delighted in equal measure to be invited to join the team and the studio.
What do you most enjoy about your work at Might and Delight?
Being part of a game team who's design vision is driven primarily by aesthetics and feel, all else follows in its wake. Another rare exception in game development.
Where you get your inspiration from?
Music, mainly – it has a lovely habit of kicking down hidden walls in my imagination!
Another week another challenge! Another one for content update #2 ;). Last week's winner is... Erapanzon with their beautiful Apo crossbreed: "Midnight"!
Congratulations! Check your Discord DMs to claim your prize ;). Now onto this week's challenge!
Embryo Naming challenge Create the most unique and awesome name for an Embryo in the game! Post a screenshot of the embryo's stat screen with their name and post it in the #monster-crown channel of the SOEDESCO Discord server (https://discord.gg/soedesco) and use #EmbryoChallenge by Monday October 19th 3PM CEST and win the Monster Crown player of the week title + this special Monster Crown care package of in-game items! (IT INCLUDES A BRILLIANT DRACOYLE 🐲😱)
Entries are limited to 1 per user, please only post 1 screenshot. Winners will be picked in consultation between @devotedtoneurosis and SOEDESCO. Good luck everyone! If you have any questions, feel free to ask :D
Recently we made an important announcement in regards to the release of Traffic Jams. We're still hard at work to make the best game possible and we thank you for understanding! We hope you enjoy the demo during the Steam Game Festival while it's still up!