Creo God Simulator News

Hey there, Creostriders!

I'm very excited to announce Creo's newest update, the Tech Progression Update! This major update focuses on adding greater progression to Creo's gameplay loop through the unlocking of new technologies and godpowers. Many of these new technologies unlock extremely helpful powers and features that will make your job of growing your religion and city much easier.

Before continuing on to the details of the update, I wanted to acknowledge the time gap since our last update. I've been trying my best to squeeze time every evening/night to work on our beloved Creo. I think I've gotten into a very good development cadence recently, and I'm very excited for the next update I'm currently working on, which I'll go over more in detail at the end of this post.

Additionally, in this gap of time, I've been fortunate enough to have raised a small amount of money from extremely generous investors who believe in the future of our game. These precious funds are being used to write new music tracks which will be added in the next update along with new game art, such as the beautiful new game cover image you can see above.

With all this being said, let's now hop into what's included in this exciting new update!

[h2]The New Tech Tree and Progression System[/h2]



I've designed Creo's new tech tree to be more linear and better organized. I've also changed the technology icons to show exactly what is being unlocked with improved descriptions and playful animations that trigger when you click on a technology. These changes are not just visual: I've also made significant code improvements to make it easier to create new technologies and unlockable powers and buildings. This will allow me to add new buildings and technologies at a more regular pace.

This tech tree update is part of a broader set of game design updates which I believe will help in creating the feeling of progression in Creo: I want players to work towards goals and feel rewarded when they finally reach them.

As part of this major update, I've added various new buildings and a new God Power to the game which introduce new features and quality of life improvements which we'll go over below.

[h3]Decorations: Beautify your World[/h3]



In this update, I created a new decorations building category. In addition to this new building category, I've added the Basic Landscaping technology, which unlocks a set of decorative trees, shrubs, and flowers. I plan on significantly expanding the available decorations so that you can beautify and personalize your city!

[h3]Pressurized Willpower Storage: A Better Way to Store[/h3]



"In the world of Creo, Willpower is a physical manifestation of a sentient being's belief: being of a syrupy consistency, it needs to be stored physically to be used. The old wells we have cannot store sufficient amounts of liquid for our needs, so our scribes have developed a new way of storing vast quantities of it in a small space through the power of Willpower energy and steam!" - Priest Jan Vaktal

The new Pressurized Willpower Well increases your Willpower storage capacity by 2500, being more than twice as effective as the Small Willpower Well. This new technology will enable you to have enough Willpower to advance to the next tier of powerful technologies.

[h3]Accounting Science: When Production is Recorded, Production is Improved[/h3]



"How in the world did we use to get by without knowing how much food we were consuming and producing per day? No clue, but hey, who knew keeping track of things could be so powerful!" - Farmer Nel Supren

The new Accounting Center employs various talented bookkeepers who allow you to see detailed resource production and consumption numbers per day when hovering over resource amounts. This new ability helps you better manage your resources and reach your goals.

[h3]Tribute Collection: Let All Give that they May Receive[/h3]



"Every believer in the Creostrider must give their fair share. Gold is worthless to him who does not see what holds true value in this life." - Creolyte Salan Barunn

The new Tribute Altar employs a tribute collector who collects 1 gold from each of your followers every season (16 days). Though this tribute amount may be meager when you have a small following, over time, it can become a significant source of Gold.

[h3]Divine Conversion: Pure Willpower Will Change the Minds of All[/h3]



"How did I convert? To be honest, I was walking to the market when I suddenly felt a powerful, warm feeling in my head. At that moment, all I could think about was the Creostrider. I think it was a miracle, so I now believe!" - Miller Janess Kal Pun

The new Divine Conversion god power allows you to convert all villagers within a specific area of effect for a brief moment. Divine Conversion uses concentrated Willpower to immediately change the beliefs of all villagers who come in contact with its force.

[h2]Conclusion / What's Next[/h2]

Along with all of the new buildings and powers, I've made numerous gameplay improvements, balancing changes, bug fixes, and much more (you can learn about all of this in the Creo Changelog below).

So, what's next for Creo God Simulator? Quests and Dialog.

As part of my plan to improve the progression and gameplay loop of Creo, I'm now working on a new questing system that will include main quests and side quests you can complete to receive resources, willpower, and more. I also plan on upgrading the current dialog system to help improve the tutorial and questing experience, since the current tutorial is a bit "wall-of-texty" for my liking; I want to make the tutorial more conversational and natural.

I also plan on including three new music tracks for Creo (written by our talented composer Olivia Crawford), more art, buildings, technologies, powers, and events.

The future is very bright for Creo, and I have big plans for this game! As always, I'm honored to have all of you on this journey with me to create not only a game, but a new world full of lore, stories, and more.

- Esteban




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[h2]Creo Changelog for Version 0.7.0[/h2] - 10/28/2024

[h3]Big Changes[/h3]

• Did a complete UI overhaul of the Inspiration Menu, which is now easier to read and see what you will be unlocking. Also added locked and unlocked tech animations.
  
• Added the new “Divine Conversion” god power, which allows you to convert all villagers to believe in you within a certain movable area of effect for 20 seconds. The power costs 3500 willpower to use.
  
• Added the ability to see detailed daily (per second) production and consumption rates for all resources. This ability is gained by researching the “Accounting Science” technology.
  
• Did a complete overhaul of the villager and job management system - now each villager you see actually represents a villager with a name, age, job, etc. This impacts things as you would expect: destroying a villager at a specific workplace will remove that villager from that workplace and open a new slot there.
  
• Added the new Basic Tree, Shrub, and Flower decoration sets, each with 4 new decorations to place, bringing the total decorations available in the “Basic Landscaping” technology unlock to 16.
  
• Added the new Pressurized Willpower Well building with the corresponding Pressurized Willpower Storage technology unlock, which increases your willpower capacity by 2,500.
  
• Added the new Accounting Center building with the corresponding Accounting Science technology unlock, which allows hiring Bookkeepers who, when all workplace positions are filled, allow you to see detailed resource production and consumption rates.
  
• Added the new Tribute Altar building with the corresponding Tribute Collection technology unlock, which allows hiring a Tribute Collector who collects one gold for each believer per season.
  
• Post-processing - added ambient occlusion, anti-aliasing, and slight bloom.
  
• A new “Decorations” building category was added, which allows cosmetic items to be placed.
  
  

[h3]Small Changes[/h3]

• Updated loading screen background image.
  
• Decreased mouse scroll wheel zoom speed.
  
• Farms are now capable of showing an estimated production rate per day - this calculates approximately how much food it produces per day, though the full amount is harvested once the crop is ready.
  
• Increased the damage to buildings caused by the meteor: the new damage varies between 500 and 1200 HP.
  
• Added a new animated pixel-art god hand cursor to the game.
  
• Added children (under age 18) to the game.
  
• Increased the birth rate at higher populations, and increased the maximum possible children able to be born at a time.
  
• Increased the Ranch’s food production rate.
  
• Changed rain power’s impact on farms to accelerate growth by a factor of 2.5. This accelerated growth will continue until the current crop cycle is harvested, regardless if the rain is still present.
  
• Improved initial Creostrider Plaza placement animation to better follow game particle style.
  
• Added new willpower building animation on mouse hover over a building under construction.
  
• Changed willpower fragment’s sprites to be small squares to match game style, and lowered glow intensity.
  
• Updated building placement positioning animation not to use green but rather, the original building color.
  
• Updated in-game UI menus.
  
• Set the building limit of the Small Willpower Well to 4 structures.
  
• Set the building limit of the Kitchen to 4 structures.
  
• Set the building limit of the Market to 3 structures.
  
• Set the building limit of the Small Temple to 3 structures.
  
• Set the building limit of the Large Temple to 2 structures.
  
• Set the building limit of the Pressurized Willpower Well to 4 structures.
  
• Set the building limit of the Tribute Altar to 1 structure.
  
• Set the willpower cost to unlock the "Repair" technology to 2,000 WP.
  
• Set the willpower cost to unlock the "Economics" technology to 4,000 WP.
  
• Set the willpower cost to unlock the "Pressurized Willpower Storage" technology at 4,000 WP.
  
• Set the willpower cost to unlock the "Forest Creation" technology at 4,000 WP.
  
• Set the willpower cost to unlock the "Stone Creation" technology at 4,000 WP.
  
• Set the willpower cost to unlock the "Divine Conversion" technology at 4,000 WP.
  
• Set the willpower cost to unlock the "Celestial Destruction" technology at 10,000 WP.
  
• Removed the Patreon link on the main menu.
  
  

[h3]Bug Fixes[/h3]

• Fixed bug on Ranch colliders where ranchers would collide and clip with ranch they were standing in.
  
• Fixed bug where when pausing the game, if a god power was selected and being placed, the power could still be interacted with from within the pause menu.
  
• Fixed bug where when placing a building, building limits would not be taken into account, and an unlimited number of buildings that normally have a building limit could be placed.
  
• Fixed bug where small and pressurized willpower wells would add their willpower storage capacity before they had finished construction.
  
• Fixed bug where the construction animation would conflict with the demolition animation causing jerky vertical motion upon demolition of a building under construction.
  
• Fixed a bug where a building under construction’s related construction particle effects and temporary colliders would not be deleted upon demolition/destruction of the building under construction.
  
• Fixed bug where striking a villager with lightning or meteor after they died would cause the death animation to start again (spawn a new spirit and scream).
  
• Fixed typo in English Ranch description.
  
• Fixed bug where language localization/translation was not working on build menu category information.
  
• Fixed bug in New Game menu when generating town name - it would simply assign the god name to the town. It now creates a unique town name.
  
• Fixed a bug where, when clicking on willpower fragments, they could reward the player with willpower beyond the willpower capacity limit.
  
  

I'm excited to announce our newest regular update, version 0.6.7! In this update, I've added various new game mechanics, animations, quality-of-life improvements, and bug fixes. Thanks to the feedback that many of you have shared with me privately and here on Steam, I was able to find various places where improvements could be made while making the game more fun.

Without further adieu, let's hop right into the newest update!

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[h2]The Arrival of the Ancient Willpower Fragments[/h2]

Long ago, the ancients of Creo created curious tablets infused with powerful willpower. They would use these tablets to power their ancient machines, while also using them to transmute matter to whatever they needed. Over the years, these fragments became buried under the ground of Creo, but sensing your presence as the new Creostrider, they've begun to rise from the ground. Collect these ancient fragments to grow your power, gain valuable resources, and unlock powerful ancient technology!

Willpower Fragments are a new gameplay mechanic I've added that performs (and will perform) a variety of functions, such as:

• Will allow the player to gain resources (gold and metal) at any time if one is found and clicked
  
• Will help prevent the player from accidentally soft-blocking themselves in the early game
  
• Will be collected and used as a form of currency to unlock certain ancient technologies that will add big improvements to the resource management of the player's city
  
• Will be used as a target resource to collect for quests
  

These new fragments will appear regularly around the map, and it's up to the player to find them. At any time, there are no more than two fragments on the map. Additionally, these fragments only exist for three minutes, after which they disappear, opening a slot for another to appear elsewhere on the map.

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[h2]Placing Buildings Now Create Building Supports[/h2]

Several members of our community have asked for some sort of indicator to show where buildings have been placed that are under construction. I certainly agreed with the suggestion and went forward and created 34 unique voxel model construction supports for each structure in Creo.

These supports appear to show where buildings are under construction, but additionally, they also appear when buildings are being repaired. Though this a purely a quality-of-life improvement, I love the look of them, and would love to hear all of your opinions too!

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[h2]Buildings Can Now be Rotated by 45 Degree Imcrements[/h2]

You read that right: no more trying to gently rotate buildings to get the perfect angle! You can now hold the shift key while pressing the building rotation buttons to rotate buildings by 45 degrees! This was another solid community suggestion, and I was more than happy to get it added in since it makes things much easier.

In a future update, I plan on adding 45-degree angle snapping for roads as well, so you can have straight roads too, and set up solid city grids!

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[h2]What's Next[/h2]

As I've mentioned in the previous update posts, I want to keep a regular cadence of updates every 2-4 weeks. For the following update, I've been thinking about a few items that I think I would be able to accomplish in the update timeframe:

• An updated inspiration/tech tree, with more of a shop feel. I would like to have unlockable techs and items where some are useful, and others are purely aesthetic but can be placed to customize your city!
  
• The addition of cosmetic city items, such as placeable trees, parks, fountains, benches, etc.
  
• The creation of a new quest system, where a handful of new quests will be created, such as collecting a set number of Willpower Fragments, getting to a certain population, etc.
  
• A new Large Willpower Well, so that players don't have to build so many small wells
  

I'm trying my best to make time in my evenings to work on Creo, and your support has been crucial to my work on the game. Thank you all again for taking the time to play Creo: I look forward to continuing to make it an outstanding gaming experience!

- Esteban

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[h2]Creo Changelog for Version 0.6.7[/h2]

[h3]Big Changes[/h3]

• Added new Willpower Fragments game mechanic - up to two of these ancient relics spawn in the world lasting up to 3 minutes, and if found and clicked, will give the player willpower and either gold or metal. This is to prevent softblocking in the early game, and will have lead into additional gameplay mechanics in the future.
  
• Added construction supports that appear when structures are being built or repaired: this is to help better gauge what things are being built.
  
• Added ability to snap rotate buildings by 45 degrees by holding left shift key and pressing rotation buttons.
  

[h3]Small Changes[/h3]

• Added lumberyard sound effect.
  
• Updated images playing in the main menu background slideshow.
  
• Added a new section in the tutorial covering building construction, and how it can be accelerated.
  
• The main Creostrider Plaza now provides 10 additional population capacity.
  
• Added ability to pause game speed in-game.
  
• Fully opening the pause menu actually pauses the game, rather than making it run in very slow motion.
  

[h3]Bug Fixes[/h3]

• Major bug fixed where upon loading, certain villager jobs would be filled multiple times over, exceeding the workplace's job's open limit.
  
• Major bug fixed where when turning 70, retired elderly villagers were not being registered as retired in their workplaces, and would still take up a slot even though they were not working.
  
• Fixed bug where rain collider was messing with villager colliders unnecessarily.
  
• Fixed bug where homes under construction would still apply their addition to the population cap before finishing construction.
  
• Fixed bug where saving and loading were broken due to the timescale being 0 during a pause.
  
• Fixed bug where clouds and rain clouds would spawn outside the bounds of the map.
  
• Fixed bug where the player couldn't resume the game from the pause menu after tabbing out of/unfocusing the game window.
  
• Fixed language bug where god power willpower costs were incorrect in Spanish.
  
• Fixed a small typo in the tutorial.
  

Hey there Creostriders! I'm excited to announce Creo God Simulator's newest update: version 0.6.5. In this update, I've added several new game mechanics and improvements, namely:

• A new construction system with a new construction workshop building
  
• Replaced the old 2D pixel-art villagers with physics-enabled 3D villagers
  
• Added Autosave option in addition to allowing saving during disasters/events
  

The full changelog will be listed below, but overall, a rather large set of improvements was added to Creo in this update. I have all of you Creostriders in the Creo community to thank for the outstanding feedback, bug reporting, and game improvement suggestions you have all shared with me on our Steam Community pages: it is because of this direct insight and feedback from you all that I can make a better gaming experience, so thank you!

[h2]The Rise of Creo God Simulator[/h2]

Honestly speaking, in the last few weeks, I've been shocked by how much our Creo community has grown and how many new Creostriders are out in the world playing my little game. To put it in perspective for you all: more people have downloaded and played Creo in the last two weeks than have in the last 3 years... Yes, I'm shocked by this as well! There are thousands of new players who are providing me extremely useful insight into how I can improve the game, and what they would like to see.



[h2]Creo's Patreon Returns![/h2]

Because of this incredible growth of our game community, I'm excited to announce the re-opening of Creo God Simulator's Patreon page and community. Many of you have personally shared an interest in supporting the development of Creo more deeply, and so I'm opening up our Patreon page to help generate some money that I can use to accelerate the development of Creo.

I'm planning on using funds generated by Patreon to:

• Work more with talented graphic designers to create beautiful loading screens, concept art, and user interfaces
  
• Have several more original songs written for Creo, adding to our already extensive soundtrack which you can check out on Spotify!
  
• Hire an additional part-time programmer who can help me complete my tasks a bit faster, and accelerate our momentum toward the full release
  
• Hire a writer to help me create a more cohesive lore/world for Creo God Simulator
  

If any of these things sound exciting to you, please show your support for Creo by joining our Patreon community! There are various Patreon rewards as well, and I'd love to add any additional Patreon rewards the community would want.

You can support the ongoing development of Creo here: Creo God Simulator Patreon Page

[h2]Major Changes in this Update[/h2]

I'll now go over several of the new changes I've added to Creo God Simulator, many of which were directly inspired by your suggestions and requests!

[h3]New Construction System[/h3]



As I continue moving forward with my overall vision and roadmap for Creo, one crucial aspect of the game will be having buildings be built, rather than simply plopped down. This new feature will allow you to build a Construction Workshop, which will employ builders and more rapidly build new structures.

Additionally, you can use your Willpower to speed up building construction by simply hovering over a building under construction! Along with this change, there are now building limits applied to certain buildings (specifically, on the construction workshop for now). Having limits to the number of specific buildings you can place opens up a new avenue in the gameplay loop for Creo: building limits will be able to be increased through unlockable upgrades and rewards.

[h3]Villagers Physics (Villager go boom)[/h3]



As part of my overall effort to make Creo more fun, I've decided to make villagers 3D, in addition to adding physics to villagers. I plan on adding more God Powers in the future, such as the ability to pick and move around villagers, tornados, etc. I want to make the world of Creo much more interactive, and I believe this is a solid first step as I move toward that goal.

[h3]Added Saving During Events and Autosaving[/h3]



One of the most common requests the community has made in the last few weeks has been an improvement to Creo's saving system, which I wholeheartedly agree with. Because of this, I've now made it so:

• You can save during disasters in the game (for better or for worse)
  
• There is a save confirmation dialog now, to prevent accidental saving
  
• There is now an autosave option in the game settings, which will save the game automatically every 15 minutes
  

[h2]What's Next?[/h2]



I've got a big vision for what the next update will be. As I've thought of how to make Creo God Simulator a more fulfilling and enjoyable gaming experience, I realized that I would like to make the main Creostrider character a controllable, in-world character. This will open the door for me to add numerous new gameplay mechanics, such as:

• Giving the player the ability to harvest resources on your own, with no need for structures (early game)
  
• Allowing the player to move around the map, and interacting with ancient monuments which will grant technologies, powers, and resources
  
• Giving the player more direct abilities, such as a convert power, which will convert villagers within a small area around the player
  
• Many, many more
  

So in summary, the next update will hopefully contain the beginnings of this new gameplay mechanic, with all of the logic and new features that will go with it.

If you would like to follow the development of this new feature, among many more, please hop on over to our Patreon page to unlock exclusive development content, in addition to being able to have voting power over future features, improvements, and more.

As always, I'm deeply grateful to you all for all the support and kindness you have shown me as I work on my game, and I look forward to providing you all with an awesome experience. Please feel free to create Steam Community > Discussions if you have any questions, concerns, bug reports, or suggestions. Keep on smiting Creostriders!

All the best,
Esteban

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[h2]Creo Changelog - 03/10/2024[/h2]

[h3]Big Changes[/h3]

Added new building limits mechanic - certain buildings have a maximum number of structures placeable (only applies to construction workshops currently).
Added autosave game option in the settings menu (autosaves every 15 minutes).
Added ability to save the game during all disasters excluding earthquakes. Fires, swarms, and other disasters will save when game is saved.
Added villager physics to respond to explosions and god powers!
Replaced villager 2D sprites with 3D villagers - this was due to game design limitations with 2D sprites.
Added Construction Workshop - allowing you to hire builders who can automate construction process.
Added new building system - all buildings take time to build. This can be accelerated by building a Construction Workshop or by hovering over the building under construction.

[h3]Small Changes[/h3]

Added Ultrawide (5420x1440) monitor UI support.
Added a save confirmation dialog when clicking "Save Game" to prevent accidental saving.
Re-added Patreon support button on the main menu to help fund and accelerate development.
Added ability to build buildings using willpower by hovering over a building under construction.
Improved the effectiveness of the rain power by detecting all event objects in a vertical pillar up to the cloud, rather than a sphere at the floor.
Added new tutorial sections stating where the number of available workers can be found, in addition to a new tutorial section that teaches camera movement.
Added mining sound effect to metal mine.
Updated build/effect area projection method to not project on terrain mesh - improved performance dramatically when many projectors are active.
Updated villager logic to reflect changes in villager design and physics.
Added explosive force physics to the meteor and lightning god power.
Added UI elements to show when buildings are being built, or when construction is paused.
Upgraded saving/loading system in the game, which should make adding new building types/building functionality much easier in the future. *This breaks all prior saves unfortunately*
Updated building selection outline to not show silhouette, only outline.
Improved navmesh accuracy for all building models.

[h3]Bug Fixes[/h3]

Fixed info icons still showing if "show info icons" was deactivated.
Fixed bug where the delete load confirmation dialog was not removing itself if another menu was selected.
Fixed a bug where fires that destroyed a building were never removed from event lists.
Patched exploit where small altars under construction would still have their build area available before completion.
Fixed bug where prayer icon collision shape was too small to click.
Fixed bug where rain clouds' sphere collider would interfere with villager pathfinding.
Fixed bug where buildings could be placed overlapping other buildings under construction.
Fixed bug where clicking on the prayer icon above villagers did not work. Updated villager prayer icon to have its own collider.
Added work area projector to water well, which was missing for some reason.
Fixed bug where windmill collision checker object would trigger Repair buildings scan, which should only work on placed buildings.
Fixed bug where a player was able to quit during the saving process.
Fixed Spawn Trees god power not spawning trees in the exact position the player selects.
Removed a bug in the load menu where deleted slots were still being checked and triggering an error.

Yes, it's me, the sole developer behind Creo God Simulator. To get things cleared up, the development of Creo is indeed in progress. There certainly has been a large gap of time from the previous update, and I wanted to thank you, and the over 50,000 Creostriders, for your patience, suggestions, and reviews of the game so far.

The purpose of this first dev diary is to help bring you all up to speed on the progress I've made with Creo, on the upcoming large content update, and on the future release of the game, so let's hop right into it!

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[h2]Where have you been?[/h2]

I wanted to get this question out of the way first. As many of you know, I graduated from university earlier this year. Shortly after graduating, I was extremely fortunate to get a stable job as a product manager at an AI startup. I've got a wife, several children, and a tail-less cat to help take care of.

My job has proven to be extremely demanding, and though I've learned a tremendous amount in the space of project management, AI, and innovation, my time to dedicate to Creo has been very limited.

I'll be honest with you all, during these times when I haven't worked much on Creo, a deep part of my mind was troubled: it's as if an integral part of my being was neglected. Call it what you will, but for me, Creo has been my creative outlet, and is certainly the magnum opus of my life. I've been working on Creo for 5 years, and have spent thousands of hours on the game.

In recent months, I couldn't neglect this part of my life any longer, and taking much of what I've learned in my job in regards to project and engineering management, I'm trying my best to establish a regular pattern of work on Creo in the late evenings, when my kids are in bed and I've got a few hours of freetime.

I'll be working on Creo using a new sprint structure: meaning every few weeks (2-3), I will try to release a game update or at least a progress update if the content is too much for one sprint. I'm hoping doing this will create a more regular pattern of progress, and will help you all feel more informed as to what's in the pipes for our little game.

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[h2]The Future Release of Creo God Simulator[/h2]

As I've resumed work on Creo for a few months now, I've explored the possibility of re-releasing the game for purchase on Steam. I would like to hire a few individuals to help with the development of the game, but need to have the game generating revenue in order to fund faster development of Creo, so that it can be finished in a reasonable amount of time.

Unfortunately, I recently realized that I had made a mistake when I made the game free while in Early Access on Steam. According to Steam developer guidelines, once made free, an Early Access game cannot charge for purchase until it's out of Early Access and fully released.

This means that I need to fully release Creo God Simulator, out of Early Access.

The full release will not be the finished version, rather, it will be a solid base for continued development. Here are a few notes surrounding the future full release of Creo God Simulator:

• Though I'm not certain of the date yet, I would like to put a rough estimate of re-release in Q4 of 2024, perhaps around October or November.
  
• I'm thinking of a US$ 11.99 price for the full release version of the game.
  
• The full release of Creo will have significant improvements to the game, including Steam achievements and trading cards, additional god powers, quests, and disasters, and a clear path to "beat" the game.
  
• My biggest focus on Creo will simply be making it more fun, and making it more satisfying to play. This means I'll be working on improving the gameplay loop, and adding in more mechanics to make your average play session more fun.
  

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[h2]Progress Update - What's Being Added[/h2]

As you can see in the GIF above, I've been making some pretty significant updates to the game. I'll list some of the large updates being built out during this sprint, which should be pretty significant:

[h3]- Added Physics-Enabled 3D Villagers[/h3]

While I was playtesting my game, I felt that previous 2D pixel-art villagers—while certainly being charming—were really lacking a certain "oomph" when it came to their presence in the game world. Previously, destroying them simply made them disappear. I fixed this by replacing the 2D villagers with 3D ones. This allows me to make them have much more realistic physics applied to them, and I'm talking about destruction physics. Additionally, replacing them with 3D villagers added a slight performance improvement to the game as well.



[h3]- Added New Building Construction System[/h3]

As seen above on the right, there is a new Construction Workshop building which is necessary in your city in order to build structures. Your skilled builders will get right to work building any new structure you've placed in your city, and there will be upgrades you can unlock that speed up construction of your new buildings.



[h3]- Various Bug Fixes and Small Changes[/h3]

In addition to the several significant changes I'm making to Creo, there's been numerous bug fixes and smaller updates made to the game. Here's a selection of changes from my long list of updates which will be released in the next update:

• Updated build/effect area projection method to not project on terrain mesh - improved performance dramatically when many projectors are active.
  
• Upgraded saving/loading system in game, which should make adding new buildings types/building functionality much easier in the future.
• This breaks all prior saves unfortunately*
  
• Improved navmesh accuracy for all building models.
  
• Added explosive force physics to the meteor and lightning god power.
  
• Fixed bug where prayer icon collision shape was too small to click.
  
• Added work area projector to water well, which was missing for some reason.
  
• Fixed Spawn Trees god power not spawning trees in exact position player selects.
  

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[h2]Building the World of Creo - Step by Step[/h2]

Progress on Creo continues, and now in a more organized and regular fashion. I'm looking forward to communicating better in the future to keep everyone in the loop.

I really want to thank you for your patience while I've been building Creo God Simulator. I'm not a perfect developer, and I make mistakes, but I really do want to build something awesome and fun. So please, continue to build your cities, smite your villagers, and share Creo with your friends as we continue building out the Creoverse together.

All the best,
Esteban

Hey there all you Creostriders! I'm excited to announce that Creo God Simulator is back in active development after a long hiatus.

As many of you know, Creo God Simulator is currently being developed by only myself. For the last few years, I've been getting my university degree. To be frank, the university was much more challenging and intensive than I initially assumed, and I was severely limited in what I could accomplish game development-wise. However, I'm excited to announce that this is my final semester, and I'm graduating with my degree in May!

This means that I will have much more time to dedicate to the development and growth of our game in the coming weeks, though I've already started ramping up development and updates, and am entering into a new daily routine where I work on the game regularly.

[h2]Upcoming Plans[/h2]

Recently, I've had the time to plan out my vision for a "completed" version of Creo. Though I plan on creating a visual infographic progress map, I will list the crucial components I think will make Creo God Simulator an outstanding game:

• An end game and story to the main game mode. I've been writing the lore behind the world of Creo, and part of this lore involves you (the Creostrider) building certain specific structures in order to unlock "waypoint" events, which will help you progress in the story.
  
• Steam trading cards.
  
• Steam achievements.
  
• Several new structures and tiered production buildings (think a sawmill to create even more wood, or a large bakery to produce food more quickly).
  
• Various new randomized events (I plan on adding at least one new event per game update).
  
• Several new songs for our outstanding soundtrack.
  
• Various new god powers that will help balance new game mechanics and events.
  

Because of the new focus being placed on Creo and its entering active development, I would like to let you all know that Creo God Simulator will now cost $4.99 USD to download and will no longer be free to play. However, please note that if you already downloaded the free version, I will not make you pay for it! Please consider it my gift for showing your support and playing my game while it was free! This price change will occur most likely be in 1-2 weeks from the date of this update.



[h2]The Reignition Update Details[/h2]

This update contains various exciting new mechanics and features, not to mention a multitude of bug fixes and improvements. Please note that this update breaks all previous saves, so no cities prior to this update will be playable.

[h3]Randomized Event Improvements[/h3]

Many of you have stated that negative random events occur far too regularly, and seriously impede your city's development. I completely agree! So, I've now modified the code to allow for both a positive and negative event timer. This means that positive and negative events are now categorized as such, and their regularity is now directly based on the map's difficulty you selected when you created the new world.

[h3]MOUNTAINS[/h3]



That's right! Your maps can now have mountains dotting the landscape, adding beauty and challenge to your maps. Though mountains currently only take up space, I plan on adding buildings and mechanics in the future that use mountains.

[h3]And Much More...[/h3]

This update includes a variety of other improvements and changes, so please feel free to try out the update and let me know what you think! I love seeing your city designs and screenshots, in addition to answering questions and hearing your suggestions on how to improve the game.

Big Changes:


• Updated random event system so that negative events occur much less often than positive ones, and how often they occur is based on the map difficulty.
  
• Added in mountains to the game - can be controlled in the world creation menu.
  
• Added a new level of detail system which increases game performance significantly, especially when zoomed out.
  
• Increased game performance overall through several system refactorings and rendering improvements.
  
  Small Changes:
  
  
• Cleaned and refactored the entire project, decreasing build and install size by 33%
  
• Added villagers leaving if they are homeless.
  
• Added villagers dying of old age.
  
• Increased villager birth rate.
  
• Added "Create migrant caravan" as a developer mode option.
  
• Improved UI of the developer mode screen.
  
• Attempted to add more contrast to in-game UI text (prayer answered/loot drop clicked).
  
• Added text indicating the amount when loot drops are clicked.
  
• Added particle animations to more buildings.
  
• Removed Patreon link.
  
• Changed game developer back to MKSM Design LLC.
  
• Updated villager animators and billboard logic to not run when culled, increasing performance.
  
• Updated other (clouds, buildings) animators to not run when culled, increasing performance.
  
  Bug Fixes:
  
  
• Fixed dev mode not disabling when the game is paused.
  
• Fixed earthquake disasters killing more people than were available.
  
• Fixed Creostrider Plaza placement object not despawning when the game is paused.
  
• Fixed metal meteors, cat, and locust swarms spawning outside of the map area.
  
• Fixed bug where willpower well placement could toggle housing construction.
  
• Fixed wells not stopping fire extinguishing on their destruction.
  
• Fixed meteor not destroying trees on collision.
  
• Fixed repair shops not stopping repairs on their destruction.
  
• Fixed "Buy" and "Sell" button text in the trade menu not translating to correct localization.