Sep 28, 2023

Big round of playtesting has wrapped up!

Ira Act 1: Pilgrimage - Ore

Play Testing

This round of play testing has been the single most helpful round of place testing to date. Being able to watch people play, and see their facial expressions was pivotal in understanding when the experience was actually working for someone, if someone was frustrated, if someone was laughing at a joke, or if someone was (in general) empathetically connecting with the characters on screen. After doing all of these tests, I now have a good idea of what's working and what needs to be brought into balance for the release (of the first part) of Act 1!

Seeing The Forest Through The Trees

As a game developer it's important to not have to explain your game, and what's happening in it (unless it's intentional); it simply needs to be able to stand on its own. Sometimes that's what's going on within the story itself, the gameplay mechanics, and how they work in various situations. Someone should be able to pick up the game, and start to experience it without too many hang-ups, frustrations, or interruptions.

I view my game as a piece of art, and as a piece of art that means that much of it is subjective to what I find entertaining, and meaningful but there's a balance that I want to strike as well. What I create still needs to be digestible for folks. A playable game not entirely subjected to my creative whims, but in the format of a playable experience as is the medium I’ve chosen.
For instance, I could tell when watching the playthroughs that some individuals love this type of game already. They knew what to do, how to do it, and they loved that it was a chill and narrative based experience. It's as much an interactive novel as much as it is a “game” (if not more). Did I make a solid list of refinements? Yes indeed, as there were key areas that need refinement. That being said, all the criticism was valid when taking into account someone else's personal perspective / expectations.

I’m going to touch on an outlier example, because I found it enlightening. I had one playthrough where the person became angry, and frustrated by the amount of text they had to read! They wanted a button to skip all of the text. They wanted platforming! Jumping on boxes and floating walkways! Action! Boom pow type of experience! And you know what? Their perspectives / feelings are entirely valid, but also not what Ira is about!

Obviously this person isn't my target demographic, but there were still things to be learned from this interaction. An option to bypass text, or have characters opt out of conversations might have a place in Ira. Periodically giving people the option to opt out of longer scenes if they are not as interested isn’t bad advice when blanched with the heart of the game. The player can decide what they are interested in exploring further in certain instances, and there is merit to that!

Ira will never be a platformer, but they picked up on the character controlled sections needing more depth / refinement. As a person who loves getting behind the wheel of a character, they found some of the interactions / controls lacking. Specifically tool use was a little wonky, and at times a bit underwhelming. Watching them play gave me some solid points of refinements to make in this area.

All that being said, getting a diverse set of play testers both inside and outside of your demographic is pivotal in understanding what you’ve created, and should always be leaned into. A person who is attune to character controlled action games might bring a different sensitivity to round out your refinements!

One of my favorite additions has been the darkness that envelopes a character when their flashlight isn't on. You get swallowed by it, and when you flip on the flashlight it cuts through the darkness and unveils things to interact with! It’s a simple, yet fun and mysterious interaction. I know it seems little but sometimes that’s all it takes to push something over the edge.

Anyway, I can’t express enough gratitude for everyone that reached out and took the time to play the demo. What I learned has been invaluable for the next steps in refinement, and the updates are well underway. Once again, I’m grateful and appreciative of all of you!

Please reach out if you are interested in round 2 of playtesting at info@iragame.com! This should be the last test before the first part is released.

MegaGrant Phase 2 Funding

It’s been about 74ish days since requesting more funding to finish Ira the way it was meant to be, and hire a 2nd person! I should hear back within the next 2 weeks either way. That being said, it's rare to get 1 MegaGrant, let alone 2 of them! Fingers crossed folks!
Currently I’m planning on / working towards releasing the smaller episode as talked about in a previous update. It’s basically going to be a refined version of the demo with extra content switched on totaling 1.5 hours or the first 1/3rd (roughly) of the game.

Wrapping Things Up

Anyway, that’s how things are currently going and I hope all of you are doing well! How are you folks doing? I want to hear about it! I've really enjoyed getting to know many of you over the years! It was a treat meeting many of you as play testers. <3

Until next time folks!

Sep 28, 2023

20230929 0.8.30.0 Patch and Update Notes

The Matchless Kungfu - ghoststreet614

1. Optimize the interface for build buildings and add a batch of new building templates
2. Optimized some character models to improve game performance and make the frame rate more stable
3. Optimize the logic of determining the outcome of the competition between NPCs in the Kungfu Contest
4. Optimized some text descriptions
5. Optimized for low image quality to improve rendering efficiency
6. Adjust the ambient light brightness at night
7. Optimize the logic of family relationship generation
8. Optimize some adventure events
9. Optimized the random size value of NPC
10. Optimize some model materials
11. Optimize some game effects to improve game performance and make the frame rate more stable
12. Optimize the LOD of the game model to improve game performance and make the frame rate more stable
13. Optimized the scene of large land plots to improve game performance and make the frame rate more stable
14. Optimize the favorability value required for learning skills
15. Adjusted the attitude value generated when teaching skills, inner kungfy, and abilities to NPCs
16. Increased the output of animal skins
17. Optimized the texture of the building module
18. Repair interaction has been added to the Party Flag
1. Add greeting, team formation, and command functions (you can now use shortcut keys or shortcut buttons on the main interface to proactively greet the surrounding NPCs and ask them to look at you. When your favorability is up to standard, you can form a team and order them perform some action)
2. Add some new adventure events
3. Add firecracker props, lighting firecrackers can set off fireworks
4. Add festival system. During the festival, merchant ships will change their models and sell firecracker props
5. Add baby-making system. When conditions are met, characters of the opposite sex can be invited to share the same bed and give birth to offspring. The offspring can inherit some attributes, abilities and destiny of their parents, and the offspring can grow into real NPCs.
6. Some bed facilities add co-sleeping interaction, and you can sleep on the same bed with your characters who follow you, team characters, and pets
7. Add the ability to interact with the City Guardian to pray for offspring
8. Add some game sound effects
9. After the player is born and chooses his parents, he can assign attributes once
1. Fix the problem that the disability buffs may still be retained after traveling through the world
2. Fixed the issue where NPC would overlap with existing buildings when constructing buildings
3. Fixed some problems that may affect gameplay when placing decorations in buildings
4. Fixed the problem that if the station is placed on the edge of the land, the teleportation function may not work properly
5. Fixed the issue where a female monk would appear if the player was born as a female and the father was from the Shaolin sect
6. Fixed the problem of incorrect LOD when initializing the plot scene
7. Fixed the problem that the game will report an error after the Toxin Worm Caster's head is taken
8. Fixed the problem that the treasure map may have blank content, and the comparison map of the treasure map may have blank content
9. Fixed the problem that some ability training will still be triggered when dying
10. Fixed the issue where blank options may appear in dialogue options when an event is triggered
11. Fixed the issue where the NPC's head expression icon may not appear correctly
12. Fixed the problem that when the goodwill between characters is reduced to a certain level, the grudge relationship is not correctly generated
13.Fixed the problem that the effect of karma [Ill Fate] did not work correctly
14. Fixed the issue where the corresponding attitudes may not be generated correctly when creating a relationship between characters
15.Fixed the problem that the skill [Toxin-casting Spell] may not be effective

Sep 28, 2023

NPC Team-up function + Giving Birth, and other updates!

The Matchless Kungfu - ghoststreet614

Dear heroes, long time no see! With the latest version update, the NPC team-up and command function, as well as giving birth function have been updated!
In this announcement, we will briefly introduce the new features. If you encounter any problems while experiencing new features, you are welcome to submit bug reports through the game's main menu and ESC interface, or let us know on the Steam forum. We will continue to pay attention to your feedback and optimize the new content!

1.NPC greeting/teaming function

Currently, you can see the greeting icon and team management icon at the bottom of the game interface. Click the hello icon to make nearby NPCs notice you. NPCs with an attitude greater than a certain level will automatically join the team, follow you up the mountain of swords and into the sea of fire, and follow your command to fight the evil, or sleep, or soak in hot springs, and pray for the weather, ect..

Next to the greeting icon is the command icon. Click to enter the team command interface. You can use click selection to specify each individual NPC or all NPCs to interact with the specified items in sight.

●Different from the delegation mode, in the team mode, NPCs will receive resources into their own bags when collecting. Of course, when they need to spend money, they spend their own money.
●In team mode, you can hide behind and let your NPC friends come forward to help you beat up some people you don’t want to mess with for the time being...
●In team mode, you can command NPCs to do some interactions on various items, but there are some interactions that you cannot command NPCs to complete.
We have added basic information about the teaming function in the ESC Heavenly Scroll, check it out!
The shortcut keys for team mode can be set in the key binding function!

2.Sharing a bed/producing offspring

If the NPC's attitude toward you is greater than 1000, or he or she is in romance with you, and is following you or in your team, you can click on the bed to choose to sleep with him or her to enhance your relationship.
You can also share a bed with pet puppy!

If you feel that the time is right and want to have children, you can first go to the City Guardian Temple to ask for a child, and then sleep with the person you are in love with.
You can choose your baby's name, attributes and karma. Before your child grows up, your family (loverr by default) will inform you of its growth through letter.
Before the baby grow up, they will be an "icon" in the Relationship interface.

If the partner left the world while the child is growing up, and the child does not receive adequate care, the growth (attributes) will be affected.ːsteamsadː！

3. In addition, in this update, we have also optimized and enriched the building options in the building interface.(H)

4. Now In the settings menu, a new option is added to change the background color when player release a skill in fight.

The Mid-Autumn Festival has arrived, and we wish our dearest players all a happy weekend! For that, we prepared a little surprise on the merchant ship. Check it out!!
ːp2cubeː

Sep 28, 2023

Blambangan's Troop in Fall of Bali

Fall of Bali - Sengkala Dev

Dear everyone

We want to explain one of the main culture in Fall of Bali, Blambangan.

In research Blambangan's troop, we consulted with Blambangan's expert, Ms. Wiwin Indrianti and Blambangan's Museum in Banyuwangi. About Blambangan's cloth. They advise to use cloth based on a novel set in Blambangan-VOC war

For name of Blambangan's troop based on a name we got in Babad Tawangalun. Babad Tawangalun is a script tells the story of the Kingdom of Blambangan in 17th-18th century and the downfall of Blambangan. This manuscript recently translated several years ago by Ms. Wiwin Indrianti and her teams.

There is probably another version of Babad Tawangalun as Babad written by many writers which have the different interpretation in telling the story of Blambangan.

In this Babad, there are 12 pupuh or chapters since Babad Tawangalun actually song tell the history of Blambangan.

Picture of original Babad Tawangalunin Universitas Indonesia's library

Blambangan's troop consists with 6 types of soldiers and all soldiers call as "Prajurit" or solider..

The building require to train this units is a Balai Dukuh. You can read about building in https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2105440/view/3737481075248399601

1.Prajurit Dhuwung

2.Prajurit Tumbak

3.Prajurit Tulup

4.Prajurit Bedhil

5.Meriam.

6.Prawira.

Thank you for reading this .

Follow Sengkala Dev at https://twitter.com/Pedalahusa to know more the latest development and join Sengkala forum in Discord https://discord.gg/GESArnC84d