There are still a few things I need to fill in before I can call it complete, but the story segment is down to needing not much more than the story dialogue. It's otherwise mechanically complete and ready to enter the testing/bug fixing phase. The critical path is the only bit that close to completion, but that's the goal right now.
I'm still not totally sure if I want to go with this "no enemies except the one chasing you" setup, but there aren't a lot of ways to do a "stalker" type of enemy in RPGM that both keeps stakes high enough that you care to run away and doesn't become an annoyance. A lot of games that use the mechanic have the stalker hand you a game over on contact to force you to run away, but I don't like that idea. Forcing you to run makes the first few encounters intense, but after a handful of appearances, it becomes a notification to stop what you're doing and leave the room or do whatever other mechanical thing the game lets you do to end the chase. It's not really engaging gameplay, and can start to feel like the game is built for you to disengage in order to progress.
That's why I'm not sure if I want regular enemies. I'm sure the variety would be a good thing, but I feel like adding regular enemies to what I have will result in the same issue, with the stalker becoming annoying or frustrating more quickly. Especially if you dodge around the regular enemies on a first pass through the room so it's an obstacle later. The first few times might be a solid, intense chase, but if it results in a game over (or an engine bug that I can't fix that happens when two combats trigger simultaneously and the game crashes), it's gonna stop being fun real fast. So hopefully the more complete test build will provide some feedback. While I am pretty happy with how it works so far, I haven't gotten any yet, so it remains to be seen if this segment is going to be a fun change of pace or a giant pain in the ass for people who aren't me.
As for the rest of the update, the optional content should go fairly quickly. Most of the work I managed to get done before leaving town at the beginning of the month was making maps, so while I might need a few new enemy types to stop these new maps from being more of the same from v0.17, what's left is the sort of work I should be able to get done in a day or two on each area. With only two more wilds segments and two more Estates, that should turn out to be less than a week of work and the side content for v0.18 will be finished.
Though I do still want to focus on the critical path, like I mentioned last week. Getting that done and polished first still feels like the best way to get this update to a reasonable state for both testing and a relatively quick release. I don't want to put a date on it and jinx it, especially with the backlog of bugs I need to find and fix, but I'm optimistic.
In the mean time, there'll be a considerably more complete test build going up on Patreon and Subscribestar on Friday for VIPs to mess around with, and patch notes with more details on the build going out to everyone else. If that interests you, give one of those links a click.
Oh, and happy Halloween!
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