-Changed Fire Dragons Name To (Blaise) And Added 3 New Attacks To The Dragon. -Updated Quest Text For The Fire Dragon. -Created Discord Server (https://discord.gg/V8besBeCST) -Removed Enemy From House That Was Causing A Bug. -Changed Reward Of A Chest In The Charred Lands. -Added Main Menu To The In Game Pause Menu UI. -Added Acient Coins Book.
Hello, Heroes of Bermesiah! We will be having an emergency maintenance for gamer server stability.
<Maintenance Schedule> November 1, 08:00 - 08:30 (UTC+0)
<Bug Fix/ Improvement> Fixed the problem that zombies did not appear in the dungeon - Users who played during the problem period will be rewarded by mail (November 2)
<Guide to lifting user sanctions> Among the users who were sanctioned for abnormal play in Berkas' Lair, a number of incorrectly sanctioned users were included. Incorrectly sanctioned users will be removed from the sanction upon inspection, and compensation will be sent by mail. (November 2) *Attendance points and guild points are rewarded at the next inspection.
We will keep trying our best for GrandChase Classic. Thank you.
-Added a map of the main points of the city near Luna's house. -Improvements have been made to level 2 and 3 of the Caves. -Bug fixes in Crystal collecting achievement. -Some improvements were made to combat General Dencra and some minor bugfixes were made.
Follow me on social networks @Luamargames.
Soon I'll be creating the game's Discord group and putting it right in the description of the game.
Development continues to proceed smoothly. No major road bumps or incidents this month! The areas outlined in bold below have seen an improvement since last month.
Character Art - 100% complete Event/CG Art - 100% complete Original Soundtrack - 100% complete Script - 95% complete Background Art - 100% complete (Finished!) Programming - 75% complete Visual Effects - 70% complete Audio Effects - 70% complete Mystery! - 10% complete
I’m sure you’ve been curious about the little mystery section we included in last month’s update. This is a major announcement that we hope to reveal within the next few weeks. All the pieces are in place, and we’re just waiting on a few tiny little things to be set into motion before we make the official announcement.
Want a clue?
Maybe we’re making one of the Kickstarter stretch goals happen… even though we didn’t quite meet the funding.
You’ll just have to wait and see!
Our background artist has finished the final background for the game. Due to spoilers, we can’t show it off in this update, but now the artist can take a well-earned break while we work on the rest of the game.
PART TWO - Character profile: Tomoe Watanabe
Tomoe’s a fighter, through and through. She’s strong, opinionated, unapologetic and has a foul mouth. She’s a Japanese ‘gyaru’ (gal) girl - armed with a fake tan, bleached blonde hair, long nails and over-the-top clothes.
Thanks to her overbearing personality and stand-out look, Tomoe doesn’t really fit in anywhere. She definitely doesn’t seem to fit the standard look of an office worker, yet she’s a corporate employee just like Noriko.
Something about Noriko rubs her the wrong way. Tomoe can’t help but instigate conflict whenever they bump into each other in the office. This has created an overwhelming level of tension between the two.
As is usually the case, there’s more to Tomoe than meets the eye. Why does she hate Noriko so much? Why is she so quick to jump to violence?
Perhaps you’ll dig a bit into Tomoe’s life during the course of the game. And maybe - just maybe - you’ll find that she’s not actually as bad as she seems on the surface...
PART THREE - Screenshot showcase
Feast your eyes on a selection of new screenshots of the game in action!
That’s all for this month’s development log! Be sure to stay tuned for our next update at the end of November.
The cosmos is tearing itself apart. Wrecks of long-dead starships are full of horrible, interdimensional creatures. The dead roam surfaces of moons, and you're being hunted by technically advanced soldiers.
Welcome to Signal Lost, Screwfly Studios' return to Deadnaut's grim and ruthless future.
While Deadnaut: Signal Lost is situated in the same universe as the original and features similar, mission-based gameplay in procedurally-generated locations, it is not a direct sequel.
You play the role of a remote handler who controls the action "at a distance" via a physical console, however, Signal Lost is focused on a single Deadnaut, rather than a squad.
The action is more intimate and tactical, and you can develop your Deadnaut with numerous suit upgrades and abilities. Furthermore, the gameplay is turn-based, not real-time, which helps focus the action.
This update contains major changes to the game loop, as well as it marks the start of the next Hall Of Fame season. As always, all boards have been reset and you need to create new saves as of Nov 1 to post scores to the leader boards. If you use an older save there will likely be some weird issues with the new patch due to major changes to some core systems. It is recommended you create a new game, but you can use old saves at your own risk.
If you want the quick bullet list of changes you can view the short bullet list provided in the patch_notes channel of the #GDM Discord
There is a handful of small tweaks, changes, and quality of life additions that we won't cover in these notes that players can just experience on their own. These notes will focus on the larger changes / additions and how their system work.
Changes
-Reworked how bankruptcy is checked
Especially with the addition of the new store fronts that pay monthly, I wanted to ensure bankruptcy was the very last check at the start of each month. I moved it to its own function that is called after all revenue - expenses have been calculated from all sources. This will now ensure that if you start a new month in the green (or low red pending bankruptcy tolerance settings) it will clear any warnings / bankruptcy chances. This is still at the beginning of months after expenses are taken from your account. Reaching a positive balance on week 4 for example does not count, it is only where your balance sits post a new month's expenses being reduced.
-Some large balance changes across several systems
Many systems have been re-balanced to make digital stores as well as self-published (current release method) be valid. A key aspect to this is self-published games return much more fans, and sales are heavier influenced by your total fans. This money also comes in much faster with the standard 12-week sales period (modified by conventions), compared to digital stores that pay per month, but can earn money for years. More on this subject when we reach the digital store description.
-Added the ability to do individual worker tasks while doing studio projects
This is a topic that has been discussed by myself and a few other players. It was something I always wanted to examine implementing, but with the recent changes to digital stores being added, it pushed that need forward to make the game play feel better.
You can now train / research with workers while doing any special work. Ie you can train with 3 workers while the other 3 handle contracts / dlc / console ports / engine creation / game updates etc..
You are still required to have the entire studio be free to begin game development projects, and this includes starting new sequels / remakes.
-Removed date of birth and country from the main menu
These systems were in place to tie into a feature we might add at a later time. However, I have pulled them for now until such a time that they might be required for an added feature. This just stream lines player creation, and removes fluff.
-Removed Company Programs
I always had ideas of how to make this system interesting and fun, but so far that has failed to happen. I have taken it out and replaced it with digital stores to keep the main navigation bar from getting out of hand. If I can come up with a better way to work in company programs it will make a return at a later time.
-Reworked DLC creation
I have stream lined DLC creation as its now a fantastic tool tied into digital stores. All you need to do now is add the features of your choice and based on the tech of the game / the features added / the stage weights and some other stuff. You have a special project target to reach instead of a period of time to work. Creating DLC is much quicker and cleaner, but some in game clarity may still be required to explain scoring. When you make DLC you will get a mail about it. You can create DLC for self-published games and will receive instant cash. Or, you can make DLC for digital store games and reduce its sales age and add hype. More on that in the digital store section below.
-Reworked Marketing Upgrades
Hype is a fantastic way to boost sales and I like the new marketing system in the game. However, I found the cash side of the upgrades made it difficult to improve the cheap campaigns to a point where I was happy. So, to address this I took cash out of marketing upgrades. This now only costs RP to unlock and should make it more viable of an option in the early game where it is meant to be used.
Additions
-Added a cheat menu to the game
A few players have been asking for some cheats, so they are in there now. You can access the cheat menu when in game from the options menu. You must agree to enable the cheat menu to gain access to the cheats. Doing so removes your ability to post scores to the leader boards as well as earn achievements. However, if you just want to have some fun or try out an idea now you can.
The current available options for the cheat menu are: -The ability to add money -The ability to add fans -The ability to enable perfect reviews
Perfect reviews, will do what they sound like and give you perfect reviews. However, it is still made normally, and will give feedback normally to show you how well a game was made and what were if any mistakes etc. However, it will score perfect 10s and generate sales as a 10 (9 for smalls).
-Added a few additional gameplay options and difficulty options
There is a new difficulty slider for digital store growth. This refers to how fast you gain visibility, well go over store stuff shortly. There are a few new gameplay options to help keep the mail system clean. You can suppress contracts, digital store sales, subsidiary sales mails. From my own play testing I love the mail system, but when you start selling games on all 3 digital platforms each month while spamming contracts or have all the companies late game. The mail system gets overwhelmed and I tend to just delete all or ignore it. This leads me to miss helpful mails such as trends / new consoles coming and other more critical feedback. By default, you will still receive all these mails, but you can suppress them in the options menu if you prefer.
-Added "Update Game" to archive HUD for games that are published digitally
Updates can be run for games on digital platforms once per month. They require a portion of the game's total tech + design as a requirement, and this is considered a special project in terms of skills and workers.
Updates reduce a games sales age by 1 each time they are run. More detailed info regarding this can be found in the digital stores section below.
-Added a Company Paragon / Rebirth system
Now that we have reached a more stable end game, I have added a way to reset your game with a twist. For the mere cost of $10 billion you can buy a paragon reset from the studio options menu.
When you reset your company, you keep your name / logo / character but everything else is reset and the procedural generation is recreated to mix up your game as an identical experience to a standard new game. However, you gain one paragon point. When you have a paragon point when you visit the paragon menu you will see a skill tree to spend your points on.
Once you put out your point(s) and hit accept your paragon is locked in for that save. If you reach end game and buy another paragon reset, you will have an additional paragon point and the tree is reset for you to spend your points again.
With paragon points you can purchase an increase for Sales, Fans, Milestone Multiplier, Starting Cash, or Starting Fans.
Obviously with paragon points you will be able to reach even better milestone scores and ranks. With the current monthly resets during EA this plays less of a factor, but post launch the boards will run for much longer and paragon will reward hardcore players if they so choose to do so. I plan to add a paragon purchased leader board at a later time as well as an additional way to flex your GDM love and mastery.
-Added Digital Stores to the game
OK, this is a new feature I have been talking about as being planned for a long time. It has finally been realized, and I think I found a really great way to bring it to the game. I cannot wait to hear your feedback around this new system, as I am quite proud of it, and I had a blast testing the system this month while creating it.
There are now 3 digital stores, and they are relative to the platform you made the game on
We have the Xcube store for xcube games, the game station store for game station games, and Steam for PC games. Because GDM is a steam exclusive game full of steam achievements, leaderboards, and steam friends. I believe its OK free use to say actual Steam, and I love that touch of realism. Obviously if steam has an issue with this it will be immediately changed, but I believe it is allowed provided steam is the only platform for the game.
All 3 stores operate identically. I considered doing varied revenue sharing / audience numbers. However, this would prove impossible to balance. For the game's sake each store takes an identical portion of sales and has the same pool size of potential buyers.
To use a digital store, when you complete a game, you now have two options. Self-Publish and Package Game. Self-Publish refers to the old system and package game refers to preparing the build for a digital store.
Self-published games are the older system where games sell in 12-week period they always have, which can be increased through conventions. These have been reworked to give larger increases in fans, and have a higher return of sales based on your studio fans. This option will help grow your fan base for big digital store sales as well as get you money much quicker than digital stores. The leader boards are still based off Self Published games as they have finite end periods and are easy to track.
Packaged games can be placed on digital stores. Once you have a packaged game, open the digital stores menu (shopping cart icon). Then the store that matches the platform you created the game on. With that menu open you can press the button to submit a new game to the store. You then pick the build from a drop-down list of available packaged games, and write a short description of the game up to 250 characters and hit publish.
Every published game has a hype from 100% - 0 and a sales age from 0 - 6 and you can choose to keep a packaged game until you are ready to sell it. If you want to get 2 or 3 together before adding them all to the store that is a valid option. Or, you can publish them immediately.
Every month as it passes digital store income is calculated and each games sales is based off its current hype and sales age, modified by the quality of the game's development and store factors (discuss that shortly) to calculate sales, fans, and wish lists. As a game loses hype it makes less sales. As its sale age increases it makes less money.
In order to maximize a good games digital sales, you need to keep the hype up, and the sales age down.
To increase hype, you need to create DLC or submit the game to a convention (available for any digital game still on valid sale)
To reduce the sales age, you need to make DLC, update the game, submit to conventions, or run store sales events.
By keeping a game's hype up and sales age low you can continue to sell a great game for years. This will require you to work on that game though instead of making new games. How to balance keeping games alive, and making more hit games is on you. If a game has a hype of 0 or an age of 6 it will no longer be earning revenue.
When you create a port for a game sold digitally it will create identical pages on the other 2 stores. The games hype / age is shared across all stores. So, once you have a ported game if you can keep its hype up and age down you will make some serious bank.
Each store also has a developer reputation and visibility
Each time you publish a game to a store front you earn developer rep from that store front based on the quality of your game. Visibility is increased based off total sales on the platform. These are meant to mimic real life in some way as stores will push your products based on the amount of money you make the platform, and people tend to trust developers with larger portfolios of quality games.
When you port a game, you DO NOT earn dev rep for the additional store pages. You only earn rep based on the initial launch platform. The size of the game you are releasing increases the amount of rep gained. With AAA games you could easily earn 100% rep across all platforms if you wish. These values are used to increase sales on that specific platform for each.
For each game store you can view financial information where you can see every game total sales (newest first), your dev rep and visibility levels, and run store sales to decrease the age of all valid games on the store. You can also from here access each games individual sales records to see each month's figures.
From the main store section, you can also visit a mock-up of your games store page. This is more for fun and has no real value, but it was a good way to get my discord community involved in coming up with a lot of the reviews you can find on the steam store pages. Thank you to all the contributors, there are a lot of creative people out there and I appreciate you taking the time to leave your mark on the game. The steam page has reviews and reviews numbers, the xcube / gamestation do not as they do not have them in real life either for some reason.
I think this new system adds a neat bit of dynamic gameplay to the game, and I hope players agree. You can now make more money and keep games going for a long time, or self-publish for mass fans and faster but lesser money. I found it quite fun myself running game updates, making DLC and keeping an eye on digital game stats to decide what I wanted to do each month. I felt like it added a fun bit of choice to my experience when testing. I very much look forward to hearing your feedback on the system. We can work to balance / tweak anything as needed, but I hope you like what this feature brings to the game.
What's Next
This month I expect a to test and balance a fair bit(few hotfixes incoming perhaps well see), and I plan to create a crypto market for the game. This will be an optional activity for fun, if I can make it work the way I want. Pending how long that takes we will continue to add what we can. We can continue the discussion in discord for anyone interested. Thank you so much for the support, and I very much look forward to hearing feedback on this new system. If you want to show extra support, please consider reviewing the game. Thank you, and have some fun.
The cosmos is tearing itself apart. Wrecks of long-dead starships are full of horrible, interdimensional creatures. The dead roam surfaces of moons, and you're being hunted by technically advanced soldiers.
Welcome to Signal Lost, Screwfly Studios' return to Deadnaut's grim and ruthless future.
While Deadnaut: Signal Lost is situated in the same universe as the original and features similar, mission-based gameplay in procedurally-generated locations, it is not a direct sequel.
You play the role of a remote handler who controls the action "at a distance" via a physical console, however, Signal Lost is focused on a single Deadnaut, rather than a squad.
The action is more intimate and tactical, and you can develop your Deadnaut with numerous suit upgrades and abilities. Furthermore, the gameplay is turn-based, not real-time, which helps focus the action.
The cosmos is tearing itself apart. Wrecks of long-dead starships are full of horrible, interdimensional creatures. The dead roam surfaces of moons, and you're being hunted by technically advanced soldiers.
Welcome to Signal Lost, Screwfly Studios' return to Deadnaut's grim and ruthless future.
While Deadnaut: Signal Lost is situated in the same universe as the original and features similar, mission-based gameplay in procedurally-generated locations, it is not a direct sequel.
You play the role of a remote handler who controls the action "at a distance" via a physical console, however, Signal Lost is focused on a single Deadnaut, rather than a squad.
The action is more intimate and tactical, and you can develop your Deadnaut with numerous suit upgrades and abilities. Furthermore, the gameplay is turn-based, not real-time, which helps focus the action.
