DR4X News

"Its live now"

The noderooms update has been moved to the live branch and the noderoomsbeta branch has been removed. Ive been working on this for a couple months now so I hope you like it!



No big changelog, too many changes to list. Here are the standouts though.



-Complete UI rework
I dont think i need to explain this all that much, screenshot kinda speaks for itself i think.

-Overhauled Noderooms Maps
--Completely different playstyle
--Building Replacements
--Unique Tile Effects
--17 ish new artifacts totally unique to the noderooms
--Loads of new art.
--A true liminal feel in a 4x game that no one has ever tried to make before ever.
"Run your own kingdom in the backroomsNoderooms

-Massive performance improvements
--Multithreading of AI
--Multithreading of various other things

-Numerous bug fixes

-Art improvements

-Lighting improvements



-Made tooltips more consistent

-Tooltips now will display when deploying units showing tile effects (Requested by Someone)

-Fixed typos

-Replace all references to humans, with "Human" (with quotes) or 'people' for reasons
---What why?

-Game reacts more to your name choices
--What?

-Improved liminal grocery store name generator

-Other misc changes to tooltips to make them better


The new art is super liminal so if you are into this ytou are in for a treat



Shes doing fine!



-Its simple, you NoClip there
(Or just choose it in your skirmish setup on the "Theme/Setting" dropdown.)




Next major update will be [REDACTED] themed.

I didn't get all the liminal art in, and it will be a month til its all done so expact that to trickle in over the next few weeks.

I plan to fill out the noderooms a bit more aswell, just some more polish stuff, replacing some text , some new treasure popups for the new artifacts etc. Removing the remaining placeholder art etc.

I plan for Additional UI improvements, most of the UI looks better now. But the unit info box is still horrifically ugly.

So expect a few smaller updates for awhile in this general theme until i gear up to start on the next big update.
I found that i enjoyed doing it this way, so it will get its own beta branch etc aswell just like this, this system just works.

Have a good Easter (If you celebrate it)!

Join us in the dr4x art stream.
https://www.twitch.tv/natch_evil

Lots of useful stuff in this one (In the noderoomsbeta branch of course). Another day where I didn't get as much done as I had hoped.
Oh well.
Not much left on this release now the important stuff is done, the remaining stuff is polish/immersion stuff like specific treasure popups for the new artifacts, changing wind to a "draft" and other terminology etc.



-Added new "Teams" map mode which will color the outlne based on team color.

-Made notes in office more comprehensible

-Added new pop up for when you get whispering head via treasure

-Add ability to disable default outlines in options menu

-Added "upgrades" to fire and poison crystals

-Abandoned apartment now gets proper lighting

-Fixed bug with office introduced when I added the new door

-At some point (not sure when) the lighting got all messed up in the office minigame, it should be fixed now

Hey folks! Its me again!
So, i didnt get as much done last week as i had hoped due to a mishap with Bella and family commitments. Bella hurt herself (again) this time while jumping on a bean bag chair and then suddenly yelping (Unfortunately i didn't actually SEE what happened because i was looking the other way at the time) but over the last few days she has recovered just fine with vet perscribed painkillers etc. And she seems to be mostly back to her old self again!. But since i've been worried about Bella and just comforting her. I didnt get much game dev done heh. That coupled with several family outings, has not left me much time to game dev.
But ill hopefully get some stuff done this weekend.
There are just 4 tasks remaining for this release, so perhaps it's nearing completion? I'm hesitant to make any promises though. And it will be a month til all the art gets in so it will be kinda like the old days with loads of stuff lacking unit portraits (Though the placeholders im using this time are not blank and are still very liminal).

Regrettably, I’ve yet to receive any feedback on the beta, which has been somewhat disheartening and impacting my motivation. If you have any thoughts, please share them!

I plan to release a changelog on Sunday (Though it will be a mini one). and If everything goes according to plan, I might just quietly merge the beta in next week – a simple "it's live" post without delving into the updates, aside from the gigabyte of enhancements that will be seen when the game updates for those who didn't opt into the beta. (Though i also started a new youtube channel for the game, so video devlogs might be a thing in the near future https://www.youtube.com/@DR4XTheGame ) The UI updates will require me to update all the screenshots, so that will be a subtle hint at the changes.
Honestly, I’m not too fussed about it – it seems like no one delves into the changelogs much, anyway.

At this stage, I'm primarily developing the game for my own enjoyment and not much else lmao.




Oh but i just got done adding a new teams map mode, which is cool :P

I also made a gude for how to save the dog in the tutorial for those who are interested!
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3193972003

So I worked some ui updates into the noderooms branch today. Here are the highlights



-Completely revamped lighting setup, things were simply too bright, especially on noderooms maps

-Moved camera buttons to top of screen and cleaned that up.

The red is unique to my setup, you will have whatever color your ui is (as it is randomized per player via fun values)

-Units/Buildings now have a light gray outline. This outline will change color when attacking to reflect advantage disadvantage etc aswell this is to make it easier to see units on busier tiles like forests.
(I am planning to also add a new map mode that will color the outline based on team color)


-When attacking the game gives you a little key at the bottom of your screen explaining advbantage disadvantage neutral (they also have tooltips if you want to know what exactly each color does) this is because people still weren't quite getting it.


-AI is now way better at exploring
(Thisis on top of earlier improvements, basically they use idle units to explore a bit now too)

-Turns out I accidentally nerfed the AI a while ago, it should attack properly again lol

-Fixed typo with deep entrance tooltip

-Cleaned up ui in other spots too

-Reduced mesh size of walled cities so they don't hang off of tiles quite so much

-Abandoned apartment now gets proper lighting/shadows on it

-Liminal decorations dont have the outline. This is to keep them looking liminal