Moonshot - The Great Espionage News

Welcome to our second devlog post. Due to the holidays and the associated vacation, our new DevLog post was delayed. We hope you had some nice days with your families and a good start into the new year.


Currently, we are planning five different mission objectives in addition to the information gathering missions (safe-cracking and photo missions) already known from the Game Jam version, as well as sabotage, kidnapping and theft missions. This way we want to make sure that the levels are more varied. To keep the whole storyline less linear, there are certain degrees of freedom in the higher levels which have an impact on the Space Race. Leading to different game endings.


Guards and also surveillance cameras now react to stunned guards and civilians and sound the alarm. That is why in some situations it is necessary to carry tased people and hide the bodies in the dark or closets. Of course, this also affects the player character. The player will move much slower and of course can't climb ladders or shafts.



To test all the new features in combination with each other, we are currently working on the first beta release version since the Game Jam. The goal is to have the first 8 levels playable. Also we are always looking for beta testers to test our features and levels and give feedback. If you want to participate, just join our Discord server.

Thank you for reading!



Support us
Links: Moonshot Game Jam Version | Survey & Win! | Discuss with us on Discord | Follow us on Twitter

Welcome to our first devlog entry! Our goal is to report to you once a week about the current status of the project and fundamental game design changes. This was the first week we could actually start working. In the weeks before we mainly took care of the game design document and contractual things that are needed for the collaborative work.

Besides the already known team, we were able to win Sehgel, a level designer, who will take care of the new missions together with Kodkuce. Each team member comes from a different country from four different continents.


To make the level design more varied, we decided to add new guards. Besides the elite guard, which cannot be tased, there is also the guard dog. Of course, the guard dog can't be tased either, we are animal lovers. Instead, he can be bribed with treats.



During GameJam, the Dialogue System also fell far short of meeting our current needs. Which is why we have now integrated a new system that supports branches. We need this because the story will only be linear to a certain extent. We are currently planning three possible outcomes for who wins the Moon Race. The USA, USSR or Ustria. Depending on how the player decides. Also the diagloue system will get an graphical update including portraits for the player and NPCs.



We are very happy to announce that we won the first place in the 'Web Monetization Challenge 2020'! We were able to beat games like 'Relic Splatter' and 'Earth`s Secret'. Both are great games.

What is Web Monetization?

Web Monetization is an open technology that allows someone viewing a webpage or playing a web game to stream very small payments (micropayments) to the creator in real time. It is an exciting new and non-intrusive way for game developers to monetize their web games while at the same time offering premium content to their paying players.

Web Monetization is being proposed as a W3C standard. It is based on the Interledger protocol which is an open, neutral protocol for transferring money of any currency, including digital currencies such as Bitcoin.

(Source: https://itch.io/jam/the-web-monetization-challenge-2020)

Feedback
Our goal was to try new ways to monetize our games and were surprised how easy it is with the Web Monetization Standard. All you need is a meta tag on the homepage that contains a so-called payment pointer. A payment pointer is a unique wallet address. When a Coil.com user visits the homepage, micropayments are made. Through a simple JavaScript query, it can now be determined whether the user pays.

However, you run into a chicken egg problem. Since hardly anyone uses Coil.com, the amounts are negligibly small and thus, at least currently, no alternative to classic payment methods.


Thank you for reading!



Support us
Links: Moonshot Game Jam Version | Survey & Win! | Discuss with us on Discord | Follow us on Twitter

We are really happy to announce our new game "Moonshot - The Great Espionage" on Steam. This will be our first full commercial game.

Roots
It all started with the Github GameOff Jam 2020. We wanted to participate in the jam and decided to do it together. So we formed a multicultural team that spans the globe from the USA to India.
Already during the Game Jam it was clear to us that we absolutely want to continue this game after the jam is over. In the meantime a little more than a week has passed and we decided to make Moonshot a full game including going on Steam.

Content is King!
We believe that high quality content will always prevail. That's why the full version will not just be a simple port for Steam. Our goal is to have at least 20, but rather 30, varied and versatile levels. The aim of the level design is also to offer more than one solutions for the player to make the game less linear and to challenge the player to come up with new solution.

Open Source and DRM
We benefit a lot from open source tools like the Godot Engine and therefore want to give something back. That's why we decided to keep large parts of Moonshot open source. More detailed information will follow.
Besides the Steam version there will be, of course, a DRM-free Itch.io version.



Support us
Links: Moonshot Game Jam Version | Survey & Win! | Discuss with us on Discord | Follow us on Twitter