Demo is Out

[p]Hello,[/p][p][/p][p]I know its not Monday yet everywhere, but I wanted to give a little heads-up how things are going and what is planned next. Also I have just released the Demo version of the game, so might as well do it in one update - more on that below.[/p][p][/p][p]First of all I want to send my Thanks to all of you for helping me make it to through to 1.0. That's all the Beta testers, community contributors, streamers and of course all the players who bought and played the game.[/p][p]More than four years ago I decided to make a game as a hobby project next to work and family to prove myself it can be done. And thanks to all your support it turned out it can! [/p][p]After 6,000 hours on the project we made it through seven major release beta tests, each with its specific quirks and problems. We twisted and turned mechanisms, we made stuff work for various play styles. We added tens of new features based on your feedback each update - extending this early access period to more than twice the expected length! So massive thanks to all of you. [/p][p][/p][p]And because my wife is also part of the player community I want to express special huge thanks to her for everything (especially for two wonderful kids she gave us during these four years). And actually you should all know ... the mammoths were her idea.[/p][p][/p][h2]Upcoming updates & patches[/h2][p]As you may have noticed there are some usual bugfixes and balancing updates coming every couple of days now - I am estimating most of the problems will be stabilized within next two weeks via patches (guessing based on how previous updates went, though this one has undeniably higher influx of new players and thus more ideas for improvement). [/p][h3]Civilization recovery[/h3][p]One particularly hot area is that of rebuilding a fallen civilization. As you may of may not have figured out, collapsing (at least partially) is almost inevitable part of the game. My take here on the story of human civilization is that it is a story of rising, falling and about cultural persistence that beats individual nations falls, death, wars and famine. And so the Collapse has a big role in the game as well. [/p][p]While a collapse may also be a source of major frustration when challenges are too frequent and too unfairly difficult, the core of the game is the ability to find strength to stand up again. This is an ambitious goal since it is a common practice if players can magically make all problems go away and reload the game after a mistake, or sell all progress for prestige points instantly an start anew. So deliberately taking away this option from players creates a more 'hardcore' feature than may appear on paper. [/p][p]One of the old teaser screenshots of the game. Turned out we're not this hardcore after all (yet). Notice the old concept included a time-travel technology (with the flux-capacitor icon)[/p][p][/p][p]At this point the civilization recovery mechanism has been updated with the redesign of worker vacancy and small adjustments to the grace period advantages. But more updates in this area are in the making process. Specifically I am looking into a kind of a revenge system (I would like to take an inspiration from the Orc Vendetta system from the Mordor games and twist it to our little world of crises). But we'll see if the concept is feasible.[/p][p]Nemeses are also long due for an update but more on this another time.[/p][p][/p][h2]Demo is up[/h2][p]Based on feedback I decided to do a tiny change in plans and release the demo version of the game today. My original plan was to do it prior to the endless mode to have a fully stable version as a basis. So this will likely make things a little more complicated...[/p][p]But I think it will be a big advantage for people to test the game before deciding if they want to buy it. The game blends several genres together so it is easy to mis-communicate the entire game experience through a few screenshots and videos. There are people expecting a cozy idle experience, some expect a traditional prestige system, some are looking for a city builder....etc. Which are all understandable expectations when the game is seen only from a single perspective. So a demo should hopefully help manage that better than my own words or store screenshots.[/p][p]The demo currently contains main game content up to Classical era (including all its ascensions) and allows seamless transition to main game with the existing save. It doesnt have any limitations on drops or any other in-game features, so players can farm as much as they want and bring it to the main game.[/p][p]Achievements are disabled for demo, but some of them will be automatically unlocked in Main game later. [/p][p][/p][h2]Endless[/h2][p]Not much has been said about endless mode yet. So let's fix that today. Honestly there is near nothing 'put to code' and very little 'on paper' but some concepts are already clear.[/p][h3]Endless mode or Adventure mode? [/h3][p]The endless mode is an alternate mode of the game that will exist next to the current 'campaign' let's say. The name 'Endless' is a placeholder now because in my mind this is mostly something like Adventure mode. But we're not an Action RPG (or are we?) so the name doesn't fit. I'll have to come with some new name that buzzes with both vagueness and coolness.[/p][p]Endless/Adventure mode will be a more intensified version of the campaign experience (and obviously with no fixed ending). While campaign is played on technically two big Ascension trees (if you consider the fall from Tier 2 to be end of first tree) Endless mode will be be played on semi-randomly generated small Ascension trees.[/p][p][/p][p]Size of Tier 4 tree is in my mind roughly 3-times bigger than the intended 'Endless-Adventure mode' Trees. They should fit a single screen.[/p][p][/p][h3]How does endless differ from the campaign?[/h3][p]The main difference is that endless mode will not offer one set of rules but each Ascension tree will have different score for Lotus gain, different scenarios, limitations on play-style and focus on particular feature subset of the game. [/p][p]My vision is to encourage players to try Heroes and Wonder combinations they did not have a reason to try in 'campaign' and create more 'simple life' by not having to 'farm everything at all times'. In other words, each ascension tree should motivate players to change and develop a new hero/wonder/perk/map-layout build.[/p][p]That said I would like to also continue level progression of things to higher numbers as far as the math persists and my excel files do not explode. [/p][p][/p][h3]Can you continue the main game after Final Confrontation?[/h3][p]Probably the most frequent question is - is the Final Confrontation the end? No - one of the reason endless mode will be created is so you can continue the game afterwards. [/p][p]If you choose so, your game will be converted to endless mode and you will carry your meta-progress stuff over there. This means your culture, heroes and all Lotus so far earned. [/p][p]I have not yet made decision if this meta progress would be somehow modified, capped or converted to another type of resource or fully migrated with no change. It depends highly on how progress will be handled in the new mode.[/p][h3]Can we start endless mode instead of main game[/h3][p]Yes. The endless mode will be possible to start separately even if you havent finished the campaign fully and players will start from complete scratch similar to how they started in campaign. [/p][p][/p][p]That's all for this update. Next time I hope I'll have some pictures of the new mode as promised.[/p][p]Have a nice day,[/p][p][/p][p]Ondrej[/p]