Sep 18, 2023
Instruments of Destruction - Radiangames
Version 0.360 launches today for Instruments of Destruction. This release signals the beginning of where Instruments of Destruction is heading, with Version 1.0 expected in early 2024. There's a lot of new things in this release, particularly with the New Campaign (from the PAX Demo) now being the primary mode for the game, and the old campaign starting a transition into being the Build & Destroy campaign. The old campaign hasn't changed a lot yet, but it will no longer offer 3 modes, and many of the existing islands will be changing in the future. They'll either be revamped to be included in the Main Campaign, or edited to fit the build mode campaign.
You will also notice the menus and UI have undergone a large transformation. Almost all of the smaller text is now larger, the buttons have changed fonts and got a bit of a stylistic change, and some buttons are now centered instead of being offset to the right. The HUD has been simplified a bit, particularly outside of Sandbox mode, and the 3-star system is much simpler and easy to understand. There are other changes, though I covered a lot of those in the previous news post about the PAX Demo.
The NEXT big update will focus on redoing the interface for Build Mode. I've been playing similar games like Beseige and TrailMakers on console to see how they handle the various issues and streamline things. Besiege is not a bad reference on console (or in general), while TrailMakers' console controls felt very clunky to me. While I will be focusing on making the Build Mode controls usable on a controller while revinsing the UI, I believe doing so will benefit the PC (kb+mouse) experience as well.
I'll try to maintain the various shortcuts and systems that exist currently, but some elements of Build Mode may change in the future. I expect that overall speed and usability for advanced vehicle builders will not be affected in a significant way (either negatively or positively), and there may a slightly re-learning curve. My hope is that the changes will improve build mode for everyone, but the focus is on the initial usability and user experience.
Beyond the build mode UI changes, the old campaign will be morphing into a new sequence of tutorials that unlock more and more functionality and parts over time. Between the new tutorials, improved UI, and better documentation within the UI of the advanced editing capabilities, vehicle building should be a more enjoyable experience for everyone within a couple months.
As mentioned previously, the new campaign will also be expanded significantly. I expect there will be around 50 islands in the Main Campaign by version 1.0, each with its own custom vehicle and bonus mission. The Kraken will be featured in 20 or more missions of the Main Campaign, with additional obstacles, challenges, and objectives providing more variety than what is seen currently.
So those are the two biggest things coming to 1.0, but there will be plenty of other tweaks and improvements. Another significant change coming in the next couple months: the camera system will likely be completely redone. The camera system is just a complete mess at this point, and it's very difficult to do anything with it. The Follow camera will be the primary camera mode because the Main Campaign is built with it in mind, but it will be rebuilt to be much cleaner under the hood while having the flexibility to transition/blend into gameplay-specific cameras as needed (for mission intros/outros/etc). Orbit camera mode will remain as a toggle of some sort, while a new photo mode with other ways to adjust the camera will be added as a separate mode. Some of the exact camera details are still TBD, but that's the general plan.
I'm not going to do a changelist this time because there's just too much to list and I haven't been writing a lot of stuff down. I've tested this build a lot, but I'll still be actively fixing things ASAP if anything snuck through.
ON THE UNITY DEBACLE
I've used Unity as an engine since 2011 for my games. I've used C# as a programming language since 2004. So this has been a really tough week seeing Unity completely destroy their relationship with developers. There are so many ways their proposed Runtime Fee and what they've done is wrong, but I don't feel like going over all of them here.
Up until the past few years, my games barely needed Unity to actually run. They used Unity as a shell for running a ton of C# scripts, playing sounds, drawing things, and processing input. Most of them have just a few game objects in Unity, and I could port one of them to a framework like FNA or MonoGame in a day or two. [Both of those are XNA spin-offs, which was the first C# framework I used to make games back in 2010.]
That easy portability is not true of my latest 3 games: Instruments of Destruction, Rhythm Storm, and Speed Demons. All 3 are more tightly integrated with Unity's systems, especially Instruments and Speed Demons. They would be significantly more work to port to another framework or engine than my previous games.
Let me rewind a couple weeks. At PAX West, over 20 different people asked me what engine I used for Instruments of Destruction, and I gladly told them it was Unity. All but two of them said something like "Oh really?" or "I thought it was Unreal". [For the record, I don't think Instruments looks like an Unreal game.] I even had a guy from Unreal visit the booth 3 times (his son loved the game) and give me his card all 3 times. He wanted me to switch to Unreal for my future games, and I politely told him Unreal looks great but I was happy with Unity.
That feels like a long time ago, even though it's only been 14 days. I've been planning to release PC and console versions of all 3 games (IoD, RS, SD, and maybe one more tiny one) in 2024. That will not change, and I'm excited to finish them all. 2024 will be Radiangames' fond farewell to Unity (and C#), and I'll be going out with the biggest bang I can.
After wrapping those games up, I had been planning to finally switch to Unity's HDRP renderer and upgrade to the latest version of Unity (I still use Unity 2019 and the old Built-In renderer). I was excited learn to use all the latest Unity tech and tools that I've been purposefully avoiding for the last couple years. Those plans have changed a bit. I'll still be learning about some great new tech and tools, but in another engine instead. I'm fortunate that the timing works out in that way.
In the end, the game engine is just a piece of software that game developers use to help bring their games to life. Many types of artists and creators use software. People generally don't care what software was used to make the things they like (music/art/movies/etc), and artists often use software of companies they don't like (hi Adobe!). As much as I now don't like Unity as a company, I still like the software, and I'm not letting my games suffer because the company screwed up.
So yeah, it's been a week. My plans have changed slightly for the future, but 2024 is still going to be a big year for Radiangames titles, and finishing Instruments of Destruction is the first step in making that happen.
You will also notice the menus and UI have undergone a large transformation. Almost all of the smaller text is now larger, the buttons have changed fonts and got a bit of a stylistic change, and some buttons are now centered instead of being offset to the right. The HUD has been simplified a bit, particularly outside of Sandbox mode, and the 3-star system is much simpler and easy to understand. There are other changes, though I covered a lot of those in the previous news post about the PAX Demo.
The NEXT big update will focus on redoing the interface for Build Mode. I've been playing similar games like Beseige and TrailMakers on console to see how they handle the various issues and streamline things. Besiege is not a bad reference on console (or in general), while TrailMakers' console controls felt very clunky to me. While I will be focusing on making the Build Mode controls usable on a controller while revinsing the UI, I believe doing so will benefit the PC (kb+mouse) experience as well.
I'll try to maintain the various shortcuts and systems that exist currently, but some elements of Build Mode may change in the future. I expect that overall speed and usability for advanced vehicle builders will not be affected in a significant way (either negatively or positively), and there may a slightly re-learning curve. My hope is that the changes will improve build mode for everyone, but the focus is on the initial usability and user experience.
Beyond the build mode UI changes, the old campaign will be morphing into a new sequence of tutorials that unlock more and more functionality and parts over time. Between the new tutorials, improved UI, and better documentation within the UI of the advanced editing capabilities, vehicle building should be a more enjoyable experience for everyone within a couple months.
As mentioned previously, the new campaign will also be expanded significantly. I expect there will be around 50 islands in the Main Campaign by version 1.0, each with its own custom vehicle and bonus mission. The Kraken will be featured in 20 or more missions of the Main Campaign, with additional obstacles, challenges, and objectives providing more variety than what is seen currently.
So those are the two biggest things coming to 1.0, but there will be plenty of other tweaks and improvements. Another significant change coming in the next couple months: the camera system will likely be completely redone. The camera system is just a complete mess at this point, and it's very difficult to do anything with it. The Follow camera will be the primary camera mode because the Main Campaign is built with it in mind, but it will be rebuilt to be much cleaner under the hood while having the flexibility to transition/blend into gameplay-specific cameras as needed (for mission intros/outros/etc). Orbit camera mode will remain as a toggle of some sort, while a new photo mode with other ways to adjust the camera will be added as a separate mode. Some of the exact camera details are still TBD, but that's the general plan.
I'm not going to do a changelist this time because there's just too much to list and I haven't been writing a lot of stuff down. I've tested this build a lot, but I'll still be actively fixing things ASAP if anything snuck through.
ON THE UNITY DEBACLE
I've used Unity as an engine since 2011 for my games. I've used C# as a programming language since 2004. So this has been a really tough week seeing Unity completely destroy their relationship with developers. There are so many ways their proposed Runtime Fee and what they've done is wrong, but I don't feel like going over all of them here.
Up until the past few years, my games barely needed Unity to actually run. They used Unity as a shell for running a ton of C# scripts, playing sounds, drawing things, and processing input. Most of them have just a few game objects in Unity, and I could port one of them to a framework like FNA or MonoGame in a day or two. [Both of those are XNA spin-offs, which was the first C# framework I used to make games back in 2010.]
That easy portability is not true of my latest 3 games: Instruments of Destruction, Rhythm Storm, and Speed Demons. All 3 are more tightly integrated with Unity's systems, especially Instruments and Speed Demons. They would be significantly more work to port to another framework or engine than my previous games.
Let me rewind a couple weeks. At PAX West, over 20 different people asked me what engine I used for Instruments of Destruction, and I gladly told them it was Unity. All but two of them said something like "Oh really?" or "I thought it was Unreal". [For the record, I don't think Instruments looks like an Unreal game.] I even had a guy from Unreal visit the booth 3 times (his son loved the game) and give me his card all 3 times. He wanted me to switch to Unreal for my future games, and I politely told him Unreal looks great but I was happy with Unity.
That feels like a long time ago, even though it's only been 14 days. I've been planning to release PC and console versions of all 3 games (IoD, RS, SD, and maybe one more tiny one) in 2024. That will not change, and I'm excited to finish them all. 2024 will be Radiangames' fond farewell to Unity (and C#), and I'll be going out with the biggest bang I can.
After wrapping those games up, I had been planning to finally switch to Unity's HDRP renderer and upgrade to the latest version of Unity (I still use Unity 2019 and the old Built-In renderer). I was excited learn to use all the latest Unity tech and tools that I've been purposefully avoiding for the last couple years. Those plans have changed a bit. I'll still be learning about some great new tech and tools, but in another engine instead. I'm fortunate that the timing works out in that way.
In the end, the game engine is just a piece of software that game developers use to help bring their games to life. Many types of artists and creators use software. People generally don't care what software was used to make the things they like (music/art/movies/etc), and artists often use software of companies they don't like (hi Adobe!). As much as I now don't like Unity as a company, I still like the software, and I'm not letting my games suffer because the company screwed up.
So yeah, it's been a week. My plans have changed slightly for the future, but 2024 is still going to be a big year for Radiangames titles, and finishing Instruments of Destruction is the first step in making that happen.
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