World Turtles News

Hi all!

I’ve been working on a lot of new things and I would love to share them with you.

One big thing I’ve been working on is the the layout of the new Research Overview Screen.

Each row contains one of the "categories" (Settling, Gathering, Improving) of buildings, while the tasks and research items for each building type is set out around it. Locked items are greyed out, currently researching items are marked with a thicker frame, and all research progress is indicated in the frames of the icons. Whenever any of this updates, the icons, frames and greyed-out status update automatically.

The research items under the Research Hub are "realm wide". Each building type can either work on its own research items, or direct its efforts towards the realm-wide research (which can thus be boosted considerably at the expense of the building-type-specific research). Whenever something else is selected at the Research Hub, all the icons at the other buildings are also updated and the research changed for those that are set to realm-wide research.

Here’s a quick peek at what I have so far for the Research Overview Screen - I’ll be adding more later so stay tuned!



I know that it’s different than how games generally do it, but I really don't like the system where you "gather" a bunch of research points beforehand, and then select what you've supposedly researched when you have enough points built up. I also don't like the "only one item is researched at one time by everybody", so I wanted to bring in building-type specific research and an overall tree. That’s why I landed on this!

Second, the first elements of a "Water System" has been added.

Water will have to be supplied to buildings from time to time. At first, only unsafe water sources will be available (from lakes), which will negatively affect Meep health, but access to safe water can eventually be secured. By constructing Water Towers and Wells and by extending the reach through Water Points, the amount of effort the Meeps need to assert to cater for all their Water needs can be reduced over time. In the screenshot, the range of the Water Tower (to where Water Points can be commissioned) is indicated - this is dependent on the elevation level of the water tower as well as the contours of the surrounding terrain.



Here’s what filling up the water tower looks like!



Another thing I added is that you will also be able to prioritize resources to be cleared (for example to create space for buildings). Any Meeps close-by that can harvest that resource type will ignore all other priorities set at their building and focus on clearing these resources, before going back to their set task priorities.



Areas set to be cleared will be indicated by small icons above the terrain, and the specific hexes will be highlighted when you hover over the main hex like in the screenshot below.



Lastly, here is how you’ll be keeping track of the water supplies!



Once again, thank you for all of your support, encouragement, and excitement throughout develpment. I can’t wait to share more about World Turtles with you!

If you want to be more a part of the journey, feel free to join our Discord where you can hang out with myself and the community.

De Chelonian Mobile
Gideon

Hi all!

The biggest new feature at this time is that I've started working on letting you, the player, manipulate the terrain.

For example, builders will be able to raise and lower terrain hex by hex. They need to do this to guide new procedurally generated rivers that spring up when outcrops burst through fault lines in the ground, so that the realm is not overrun (buildings damaged) by these rivers.

You can pick which hexes to be raised to form the "wall". This assigns tasks, the builders perform them and the terrain adjusts bit by bit as they work.



You can also add and cancel waypoints (indicated in yellow) to build a more elaborate wall.



Sometimes, things may go a little awry… I was testing the "flood fill" that will be used to identify enclosed dams or areas. Help! 😅



When things go right, however, this should be what it looks like. The dam wall has been completed and the dam is filling up!



Once again, thank you for all of your support, encouragement, and excitement throughout the last two and a half years. I can’t wait to share more about World Turtles with you!

If you want to be more a part of the journey, feel free to join our Discord where you can hang out with myself and the community.

De Chelonian Mobile
Gideon

Hi all!

I am proud to announce that World Turtles is now being published by Freedom Games. For those of you who may not know, a game publisher can take care of a lot of the business and marketing side of releasing a game. That includes managing the store pages, marketing and advertising the game, helping showcase the game at both digital and live events, PR, and a lot more. Really it lets me totally focus on working to make the game the best it can be, and provides me with the resources to do so.

You may also be concerned about horror stories of publishers ruining the vision of a game or forcing arbitrary restrictions on the dev team. For Freedom, that can’t be further from the reality I have experienced with them. Freedom has been a great partner to me, only enhancing and supporting my vision. I was very careful when considering whether to go with a publisher or not, and selected Freedom because they are committed to my vision of the game, and only want to see it reach its full potential as I see it. I maintain complete creative and development freedom, and Freedom (heh) wouldn’t have it any other way!

With all of that being said, we are going to delay the game just a little bit. With the addition of a publisher and more funding, I am going to take a bit more time to make sure the game is the best that it can be, before asking you to invest in it.

Freedom’s investment (money, time, skills, experience and industry contacts) makes it possible to present a much improved World Turtles to a bigger audience, making it more probable that I can create a decent career out of this opportunity in the longer term.

Without all of you and your support, encouragement and excitement throughout the last two and a half years, I would not have found myself in this position. I hope to have you along for the next exciting leg of this journey! If you want to be more a part of the journey, feel free to join our Discord where you can hang out with myself and the community.

De Chelonian Mobile
Gideon

Hi all!

While the Campaign/Tutorial combination serves the purpose of bringing in some back-story, it is a little long-winded for someone who just wants to quickly learn how to play the game, so I've designed a completely new tutorial alongside it.

The new tutorial is dynamic (it can be run on any random map, so it adjusts to the map you've been dealt) and interactive (you can make a few decisions and it will adapt the tutorial to those). It hides some of the interactions at the start and then introduce them step by step, so that the early game isn't as filled with information and "new stuff" as before. It guides you through completing the objectives linked to the choices you've made.

Highlights:
- You can work through 13 building types, harvesting, research items, building upgrades, and more mechanics in about half an hour at 3x speed, which plays comfortably. Using 6x from time to time makes it faster still.
- It proposes proper locations for the buildings but doesn't force you to choose them.
- It takes you up to the first building upgrades to Crafters. I plan on expanding on it as development progresses.
- As of the previous update, you can now click on the models of buildings/units/etc. on the map itself to select them instead of only on the UI elements or terrain hexes. There were a few glitches with this, which has been corrected.
- As of the previous update, there are now icons for things that were hidden behind key bindings before, but they now also have toggle indicators to show whether they're on or off.
- The UI reacts much smoother now after I added some checks, smoothing parameters, etc.
- The UI is more visible in-map after some background and other adjustments, making sure that crops and other items are more spread out (less overlapping UI) on the map, etc.
- I've used a more readable font for the detailed messages / labels. I will need to replace the "header font" as well, since the current font does not cover all the required characters.
- I am about half-way through converting the game to allow localization by entering text in external files!
- Improved some behind-the-scenes workings.

I'd love to hear how you find the new tutorial. I'm hoping it will grab more attention from people who want a quick introduction/guide without going into minute details.

De Chelonian Mobile,
Gideon

Hi all,

The UI has come a long way since the "horrible first drafts" I was working with for such a long time!

Today's demo update adds a very significant improvement, and a few smaller ones:

• You can now click on the building and Meep models themselves to open up the specific UI elements.
  
• For an alternative UI experience, try out the "reduced clicks" mode (the toggle can be found below the minimap), which opens and closes some UI elements without requiring a click. For example, keep the cursor relatively still for a fraction of a second over a building model and that building's UI panel will appear. Simply move the cursor far enough away from the UI panel and it closes automatically.
  
• The UI should play much smoother, since I streamlined how it reacts / zooms in and out.
  
• The default volume levels the game starts with have been adjusted. Saving and loading of settings is on on the way...
  

Next, some questions I'd appreciate your feedback on:

• The "reduced clicks" mode: Does the fact that the UI panels pop up / close down when the cursor is relatively still / moves away from the UI bother you, or does this improve the experience since you don't have to click as much?
  
• The game's font: The font is maybe a bit too "bulky". A simpler, streamlined font would probably improve the ease at which information is processed on the various UI panels. Any thoughts/recommendations on this?
  

Thanks!
Gideon