King of Retail 2 News

Dear Retailers!

A month has gone by, and it is time for an update. Both as in actually releasing an update to our alpha, as well as our little blog to tell you what is going on. So let's get to it.




In last update we planned to start working on expansions and decorations. That is still our plan, however the feedback from the community indicated that some small things needed to be changed. Since starting a new long implementation period means these changes would not be active for a while, we chose to do a Quality of Life month which means a month of focusing on smaller implementations and upgrades instead.

[h2]Opening hours[/h2]

What many have been asking for for a while was the ability to change opening hours, which i can understand. There is nothing more frustrating then having to close with a store full of customers. So that is now a possibility.

You can also close the store for a whole day. Right now it doesn't make sense, but in the future when you can properly run multiple stores, you would most likely want that possibility as well.




[h2]Statistics[/h2]

Then i decided to give the Manager's computer an overhaul, and i hope the micromanagers out there will like the new options.


[h3]Sales statistics[/h3]

The first one to mention is the sales statistics. Now you can compare your different categories with each other, on different levels. Select a day interval, and choose your categories, and you can now compare them directly with each other day by day.



[h3]Customer statistics[/h3]

You can also analyse the traffic in your store. See which customers who arrives at which time of which day, and plan your opening hours and assortment accordingly.



[h3]Article detail screen[/h3]

The screen showing all article details are now accessible from the computer as well. You can also now see the actual sales history of the article, meaning you now have all the time in the world to analyze each article in the tiniest of detail, allowing you to maximize the sales of your store to the fullest.

[h2]Customer balancing[/h2]

Too many customers got lost already in the first days because of how the the cash register was handled. So changes have been made to address this.
Customers now overall wait a longer time in the queue, and the article processing speed has been increased significantly, meaning you can process more customers, allowing you to earn more money.

Customers also start heading for the registers an hour before the store closes, meaning not losing out on all these people who actually would like to buy something just because the store closes.
These numbers most likely still need tweaking, so feedback on this is still very welcome.

[h2]Other minor changes[/h2]

[h3]Headquarters painting[/h3]

It will be a while before the HQ really gets into play and get some massive update, as it is more important to round off the actual store part of the game first. However there was a bug where the HQ floor used the same material as the floor in the corner of your store. One of these small curiosities that shows bugs can come in all shapes and sizes.
So when fixing this bug, i also allowed for the possibility of painting the floors at your HQ as well.



[h3]Grid and movement options[/h3]

Given how the expansion part will work, it is necessary to have a world grid to align walls and such on. This has been added so it also shows when you place your inventory, you can also adjust the grid size which you can then snap things to, making it much easier to align things in nice, perfect lines.



[h3]New articles[/h3]

Regarding articles we are as always pushing hard to add new stuff to the game. The article process can be a bit complex, which is why we sometimes have articles ready that doesn't make it to a game in a specific update.

When adding articles, first we need to decide on a collection of items, and how many it should consist of. The hard part of this is to hit the sweet spot.
No category should be more or less important than another in the game. So we try to aim for an equal number of articles in each.

Then we have to decide how many unique meshes and textures it has to consist of. For each new unique mesh / texture, the work time on this specific article increases massively. So it is about figuring a good variety/speed ratio.
Supermarket items are in this regard a bit tricky in general, as it is a lot of texture work and less of modelling. It is hard to design a proper looking label. People takes educations in this stuff to do this professionally, and we kind of have to "assembly line" the process, as we need MANY of them. Also to create the individual article in a group, it means designing a new label with new texts images etc..
Compared to this when we start making clothes, we can model one t-shirt, and give it different colours and voila, a new article line in a short time.

When modelling and texturing has been done, then we have to get them ready to add them to the game. We need to optimise textures and create the actual materials. Materials are the surfaces you see in the actual game. If you look at a surface, it is not only a colour. It also have a property for how smooth it is, the level of metallicity, the bumps that simulate high's and low's, and many other things



These are usually defined by textures, but can also be tweaked with different kind of maths.

After setting up materials, we need to prepare their behavior. It it a hanging item, and from where do they hang. Is it a shelf item that is stacking, and how much do they stack. Should they have random positions and rotations to give them a natural placed look, and so on.

When this has been adjusted, we can finally parameterize them, which means adding price range, quality type, supplier, customer need offset etc. and add them to their respective lists so they show up properly in the game.
So each and every article need to go through all these steps to be able to work properly in the game


In this update, you will have new types of juices, beer can and soda cans. We also started the production of cleaning items, which will be the major additions over the next updates.

Here is an images of some of the things that will be added :)







With this update is released, we will now start on these new big features, i will explain a bit about what you can expect from them.

[h3]Expanding the property[/h3]

Currently you can rent and buy property open new stores.
With this implementation, you get certain advantages when buying property (There should be some kind of bonus to spend this amount of money).
One of them is that if you buy property adjacent to an existing store, you can merge them together, allowing for an even bigger store.
So with this as well as the possibility to increase the numbers of floors vertically your stores can end up being MASSIVE.

[h3]What do to with the expanded property?[/h3]

With these new huge properties, just having a huge building on there might be a bit boring. So the plan is to give you a whole new level of possibilities.

First of all you will be allowed to define the shape of your store, meaning you can place outer walls as you see fit,
In this outer structure you will then be able to place (multiple) entrances and exits, windows and various decorations as you see fit, allowing you to make each building rather unique.

Then you also be able to add other elements to the outer area of the store. Some of these items will boosi your store. For instance maybe a parking lot that increases overall traffic? A bus stop? A playground? A franchised restaurant/cafe? A gas station? Any other ideas? You can also place signs, billboards and various decorations here as well to spice up the looks and attractiveness.

[h3]And inside the store?[/h3]

Inside the store you will be able to place various elements, and even create your own designs. You will have access to various shapes you can combine, change and place as you seem fit. That means custom walls, walls with different doors, pillars, overhang elements, etc. etc. Allowing for total control and customisation of your store.
I also plan to make a designer for this to you can experiment, save and share your constructions with each other.
I also plan to add other different decorations as well. Plants, benches, chairs and what not, should also be possible.

[h3]When will it be ready[/h3]

I have allocated around 3 months of time for this, so how much of the above that will be part of this sprint, and how much that will be saved for later on i don't know, but my plan is to allow for all of this at some point.
I also plan to allow for a poster system like in KoR1. However i know that this feature in itself is quite heavy to make, so it will not be a part of this decorations update.





We also hosted our monthly contest, and this month the focus was on creating the best looking bakery. We had a record high of participants and submissions, making it hard to determine the winners, also considering that people are starting to use the display designer in many new and creative ways. It is used for making walls, lamps, tables and chairs, which even i had not imagined.

And personally i always like to see people push the boundaries of the game to their fullest.

But on to the winners.

[h3]1st place[/h3]

The winner of this months contest is "GodGutten" with "William's Bakery"

A nice clean looking bakery, with various types of displays to showcase the bakery. The spacing between the elements is perfect. It does not feel too crowded, nor too compact. It also features various drinks sections to compliment the store, as you would expect in real life as well.

It is a simple store but well executed, which is hard when you try and keep it simplistic.

The keen eye will also notice the back wall is actually the backside of huge displays, so a creative way to limit the size of your store.

Here are some images of an award winning store:



[h3]2nd place[/h3]

On second place we have "Sparks" with Sparks Midnight Bakery.

A more spaceous bakery, that is sure ti give some energy to those going midnight shopping. It features long good looking rows of various bakery items, and with the evening sunlight shining directly on the bread, makes it look REALLY delicious.

Here the display designer has really been pushed to the limits.
Again the shape of the store is made of displays, and it also features café elements, where tables, chairs and nice decorative elements, that fits well into the energizing midnight vibe, also are made of custom displays. Each aisle of bakery is also fitted with a special lamp as well.

Here are some images:



[h3]3rd place[/h3]

On third place we have "HeyHannes" Baguetting Better.

A more classic looking type of morning service bakery. Here we have the large counter where customers come up to the counter and gets served by the clerks, where they have to ask for one of the delicious types of bread.

So it is a smaller store, featuring one long line of articles, as well as an adjacent café section where the customers can go and eat in peace.

This store also has spent time on creating a good looking storage area, which adds to the overall score.

Here are some images:







For our next contest we will take a look back, and make a challenge in the original King of Retail instead. So to try something new, we would like people to create the coolest gaming store that they can. Importing things to consider is making a coherent theme, store layout and article presentation. Using the poster system for ultimate customisation, will also be noticed.

So you can



and join in on the chance to win a Steam gift card.





Our community is also helping translate the game into many different languages, which i am very very appreciateive of. This is a constant ongoing word, as new translations arrive or change with each update. So if you would like to give a hand with translating King of Retail 2, you can do that on

Localizor

This is how the translation is going so farr:






That was all i had to say for now.

Feedback, ideas, bug reports and all these things are as always very welcome.
Now I will return to my cave and continue on making the best game possible for you to enjoy.

So until next time, i wish you a happy sale.
Cheers
Daniel

Hello retailers!

GunthorNC here, I’m thrilled to share some exciting news with you all! It’s August 31st, and as we promised, we’re unveiling a truly MASSIVE update that has been eagerly anticipated. This update has been months in the making, and we’re beyond excited to finally reveal it. Get ready to dive into all the details, I’ll be breaking everything down into sections to make it easily digestible.
[hr][/hr]

The Staff Update!

We’re excited to introduce a long-awaited feature: the ability to hire and schedule staff! This addition is a significant step forward for the game, addressing a crucial missing element that many of you have been eagerly anticipating. With this update, you can now fully manage your store's workforce, making strategic decisions about hiring, assigning roles, and scheduling shifts. This new functionality adds a layer of depth to the game-play, allowing for more intricate management and planning.

This update represents one of our most complex projects to date. We’ve developed several new systems from scratch to ensure a seamless and polished experience. We’re thrilled to finally have these features implemented so that you can enjoy them. Your feedback is invaluable to us, so we look forward to hearing how these new features enhance your game-play and any suggestions you might have for further improvements!

[h2]Key Features:[/h2]
[h3]Character Designer[/h3]
We made a character designer so that you, and your staff can have unique appearances. Some features and customization's are:

• 20 Hairstyles and unlimited colors to choose from
  
• Gender, First and Last Name, Birthday, and Age
  
• Detailed Facial Features (including sliders for precise adjustments)
  
  
• Eye Color
  
• Customizable Uniforms
  

[h3]Staff Managment[/h3]
But it's not just about what your employee's will look like, That was just the ground work, we also had to add in way's to recruit, assign roles, and schedule them, On the manager's PC you'll find systems to handle:

• Staff Recruitment
  
• Staff Scheduling
  
• Staff Role Creator
  

[h3]Employee Depth:[/h3]
We've also started to implement way's to have staff be less of a two dimensional element, these are thing's that will still need expanded on later.

• Skills and Personalities
  
• Personal Lives, Hobbies, and Relationships
  
• Wages, Benefits and Preferences
  

We've also added many, many more tidbit's here and there that you'll surely notice, and we've spent a couple weeks solely dedicated to bug-hunting to provide the most enjoyable experience possible. There’s still some fine-tuning and additional features to add for staff, but we’ve gotten to a state where the core functionalities are now in place. This leaves us at a nice jumping off point to start to focus on the next most urgent piece of the puzzle.
[hr][/hr]

What’s Next?

We’re shifting focus to Store Expansion! The ability to expand and build your store is crucial, especially as your newly hired staff might quickly outgrow the current space. To ensure you can fully leverage the new staff features, we’re improving the store expansion system. We’re launching a new Discord channel, #Store-Expansion, to collect your ideas and feedback. Compare the previous expansion system with what you’d like to see in the new game—what worked, what didn’t, and what new features you’re excited about. Your input will help shape this major update.
[hr][/hr]

This Month’s Contest Winners

As many of you know, we hold monthly contests on Discord, each with a fresh theme. For August, our contest was an “Art Contest” focusing on King of Retail-related creations. Here are our winners:

• First Place:
  In first place we have rosedragon! She knocked it out of the park!
  
• Second Place:
  In second place we have HeyHannes, who displayed his artistic talent's with Pixelart!
  
• Third Place:
  In third we have game boy YT who made a couple really creative video's you can check out on the Discord in the August #hall-of-fame
  

Congratulations to all our winners!
[hr][/hr]

Next Month’s Contest

Get ready for September’s contest: “Design Your Own Bakery”! This contest invites you to unleash your creativity and design the ultimate bakery, with plenty of new bakery items featured in this update to inspire your vision. Whether you’re drawn to the sleek, modern aesthetic with its shiny surfaces and minimalist decor or prefer a more traditional approach, this is your opportunity to craft a unique and personalized bakery space.

Picture a bakery with a cozy, rustic charm, featuring warm wooden furnishings, vintage details, and a welcoming atmosphere that invites customers to come in and enjoy. Alternatively, you might opt for an industrial look, incorporating exposed brick, steel accents, and an edgy, modern vibe that stands out. No matter which style you choose, this contest offers a fantastic platform to showcase your design skills and create a bakery that truly reflects your vision.

This is your chance to bring your dream bakery to life and see it featured alongside the fantastic new items in the game. We’re excited to see the diverse and imaginative designs you come up with, and we encourage you to push the boundaries of your creativity. Start brainstorming and get those designs ready—we can’t wait to see what you create!

Thank you for your continued support and enthusiasm. Stay tuned for more updates, for the most up to date information, make sure you:


Best regards, and happy sales.
GunthorNC
Community Manager, Freaking Games

Dear retailers!

It is time again to get an update on what has happened in King of Retail 2.

We have worked hard to add many new features to the game, which will be the first topic. Second, we can share more of the plan on going to Early Access. And third, i am talking about what we are doing to honour our great community.

But let us get into the details of it:




At the time of the last blog, we were finishing with carving out the base game. That means having the cycle of opening the shop, setting up articles, taking in customers, end the day, and redo all of the above.
That we finished, and then started with polishing this to make it a better overall experience.

During that process many new things got added.

[h2]Article management[/h2]

Some of the following features was requested by the community to make it easier to handle your articles, and since article management is very much at the core of the game, i agree it should be easy and convenient to manage. So various new features was added to improve just that, as well as returning some of the screens you know from the old game in a new and upgraded versions.
It also means we will continue to add various implementations to assist you in managing your stores in the future as well.


[h3]Article finder[/h3]



Now, anywhere when searching for articles, you can list them how you like. You want detailed big pictures, or small pictures where you can see many more at the same time.
You can sort by price, quality supplier etc, and each hovered article also presents a smaller screen with even more info.
This gives a fast and clear overview to make your decisions from, with out having to do too many steps to get the info you need.


[h3]Detailed article info[/h3]



We also added the article info screen. Here you can see and edit all the details regarding any article. Thes screen can even be accessed from multiple places, meaning you always have all the info you need right at your hand.


[h3]Summary screen[/h3]



The old summary screen is also back, but with an added calendar function. With this you can be even more specific when examining your sales.


[h3]New article implementations[/h3]

In KoR all articles had their predefined stats, which also meant predefined prices and customer attractions. So when you found out that ShirtA sold well in your first game, it would sell the same in 2nd and third game, making it all predictable and removing the element of discovery.

In KoR2 things are more randomized, meaning that you can't count on your knowledge in a previous game to carry over to a new one.

The quality of an article is semi-random, and on top of that prices are now only loosely based on the quality, meaning there can be a big difference in the profit margin of 2 articles of same quality. Likewise they can trend differently with different customer groups, so an article that was highly popular at the Orange segment, may now cater more to the Red's.

So for all of you micromanagers out there, there will be much money to be made when diving into the right stats :)

More will be added to the flow of articles in the future making them more dynamic.
For instance, trends will go up and down over time, the seasons and even the weather on a given day will influence what will be in demand and not.
So no more selling winter jackets in mid-summer.


[h3]Various article types[/h3]

We also try to do the actual article handling more realistic as well.



So for instance, various articles can only be stored and shown in designated cooling units. This means the storage room will now be more then just adding the same shelf over and over when you run out of space, but instead you have to plan a bit more ahead in this area as well.

Cooling units requre power, which you will see on your utilities bill etc. so we are also trying to go one dig deeper regarding all the small things that ultimately makes for a more realistic game.


[h3]New articles[/h3]



We are also constantly adding more and more articles. Our main focus has so far being to add supermarket groceries to the game, close to reaching 1000 unique articles. And so far we have covered the following:

• Dry Foods: Various cans, jars, bottles & bags. Coffee & Tea, Cereals, Bread.
  
• Dairies: Milk & various milk based products, Cheese, Eggs
  
• Cooled: Ice Cream, Various frozen foods, meats & salads
  
• Candy: Candy bags, chips, bubble gums, chocolate
  
• Beverages: Sodas, Juice, Beers, Wine & Liquor
  

And we will of course not stop here. Currently we are finishing the food section, planning to add fresh fruit and greens, meats, bread & fish. But more in a deli way, where they are free and not already packaged.

After that we will cover the "Cleaning" section of a supermarket with soaps, detergents, toilet paper, and stuff like that, closing off the supermarket.

Then we can move to a different section of retail, where we will go to "Clothes", and here the selection comapred to the previous game will also be bigger as well.

[h2]New environments[/h2]

Up until this point the outside enviroment of the store was a gray plane. Go to the edge and you could easily fall off it, into the deep eternal void. That is no longer the case. Now you will instead see the actual part of the city that your store is placed in, allowing for many different areas to run your store. It makes each area unique, and allows for greater immersion.

However to make the environment look decent at a close up level, the city map received an overhaul as well.



This is just the beginning, When it is time to really focus on this area of the game, much more will be added to this. There will be different maps to play, and many possibilities to add to the variation.

• Should you be able to choose between climates? Maybe.
  
• Should there different environment types? Why not.
  
• Should there be visible seasons and weather? Definately.
  

This, together with the city generator that will be overhauled as well, will certainly add replayability of the game, and make each game feel unique. But at the moment other things are more important.




As we progress with the game, it also becomes easier to see what we need to do and to estimate how long it will take to reach Early Access.

I would like to be able give people a proper gaming experience before the game goes into Early Access, so it is not just another tech demo. And as far is i see it, a few things need to be ready for an enjoyable experience:

First of all, there is a hard limit on the playtime as it is right now.
When your reputation has grown enough, you will simply not be able to handle the customers at the register. That means at this point, you can't grow more. Customers will start to leave due to the service, and an eqilibrium has been reached, and there is nothing you can do to change that.

[h3]Staff[/h3]

So staff is next on our to-do list on the game, and it will be my sole focus for the next 3-4 months i estimate.

We already started preparing characters and various visuals for the different persons the game will require, meaning that soon you will finally be able to customize your manager.



After that, the actual implementation as staff will start.
It will be a heavy task since it has so much depth. First the general AI and basic shop behavior needs to work. For you to actually give them roles, it means scheduling and role assignmens need to be implemented. And for that to matter, it leads to implementing skills and personality.

With those things, you can handle staff at your store.

But then we have the staff managing. That starts with the application, negotiation and hiring process, which leads in to general contract management and staff progression, such as job satisfaction, life events and various requests.

With this, a sold core staff system is up and running. That however excludes HQ and high level AI managers, which will be saved for later.

But what when staff is done?

Again as i see it, a natural stopping point shows up again. At some point your little store is up and running with good personnel and now you would like to expand it to a bigger store. Or else there is simply not enough room for storage, registers, displays etc.

And that means expansions need to be possible as well. And it will work very differently from KoR.

[h3]Expansions[/h3]

You will be able to buy the neighbouring buildings connect them to your stores area which will give you a bigger area to build on.

On top of being able to build the outer shell of your store as you see fit, you will also be able to design the outer areas as well.
In this free build mode, you will be able to place outer wall parts such as entrances, windows and structural decorations, and inside you can add various extra elements as well. Walls, pillars, roofing and other decorative shapes to really make your store look unique.

And finally there is the possibility of building upwards, adding multiple floors, escalators, elevators etc, to truly completing the build possibilities.

This will be part of the "Expansion" phase, and will also take a few months to do as well,

[h3]Early access[/h3]

With these two things complete, i think the game will have a very solid single store experience where toy can play for a long time. Add some extra time to polish the game, remove bugs, add more content etc. and have what for me would be acceptable for Early Access.

With a rough time estimate, we arrive around the beginning of the new year.

In a dream world, I could make games without having to consider anything else but the game itself, but unfortunately that is not how it works. Then comes the real life stuff that influences all of this as well.

Unless you have a huge marketing budget, it is advised to stay away from releasing anything around this time, as the big companies and big games are fighting for all the christmas attention, and a little indie dev like me would completely drown in that noise.
The more sales the game will make, the more cool stuff i can add to it, which will make it sell more, and round it goes. So that means it is better for me, the game, and you to stay clear of this time. And instead of hurrying it up, it is better to wait and do it properly instead.

Furthermore, Early Access is kind of considered the actual launch of a game, so close up until this point the marketing need some solid attention. So i need to set some time aside for taking care of this as well.

So with that in mind our goal is the following:

[h3]--- Early Access in the first half of 2025. ---[/h3]

That should be a realistic timeline, as that includes proper time time to do all of the the above without putting too much pressure on ourselves.
When we get closer we will at some point be more specific with the actual release date itself.

[h3]What else?[/h3]

So the above is what i will be focused on, and as mentioned, we will continue to add articles.

But now that we are almost done with creating the characters of staff and customers in the game, we can now finally start bringing them to life.

The biggest investment of the game by far, has been to buy our own motion capture suit, and now it is finally time to start using it.



In KoR1 since as neither i nor anyone on the team was animators, the game was very limited on this way, leading to some, at best, clunky work. With our new motion suit, it should be MUCH easier, and MUCH faster to add some good animations for the game. So we have planned to add animations, and different varations of them to make the people in game seem more alive and unique, and also make it possible for the player to "read" the customers based on their actions, and i hope this will bring the game to a whole different level.

[h2]Our community[/h2]

[h3]Contests[/h3]

On our the Discord the community is growing and becoming more and more active as a result. Quite a few has also joined as alpha testers to help with the development of the game.
As an acknowledgement to our great community, i have been thinking about what we can do to give something back. And as a result we decided to start monthly contests, where you will be able to win prizes.

- Aprils contest

The first contest was about designing a store.
Here HeyHannes actually chose to work with the very limited clothes options that currently exists to make a luxurious looking store. It also shows a creative usage of the display designer to make the wall partitions between store and storage, since these walls by themselves are not existing in the game yet.



- Mays contest

This contest was a more free for all to be as creative as possible, and just take a cool picture in the game.
Letsi made a huge supermarket, and used the in-game photo mode to take a lot nice images of the shop from various angels and distances, showing of the fully stocked aisles and displays, as well as the store being busy with customers



- Junes contest.

In the last update, we allowed players to import and export their displays in the game, as it turns out far from everyone is a fan of building their displays from scratch.

So to further improve on that, we have opened up community sharing of displays on discord. Then we chose to let this month's topic to be to create the best looking displays.
Some of these will also enter the game as default displays, a great way of getting the creativity of the community to become actual in-game content.

[h3]Translations[/h3]

We have also continued with our translations, which we are doing on Localizor.com and this is the progress is so far.



This is another example of our great community, as all of this is purely community translated. If you would like to help, you can also sign up and help with translations as well.



----------------------------------------------

That was all the news for now. I hope you enjoyed the read. You are very welcome at our Discord, which you can join here:



I will return to working on staff, so i can bring you some more interesting news in the next update.

Thanks for reading and following along, and until next time, happy sales.
Cheers, Daniel.

Dear Retailers!
It is yet again time for a little update regarding King of Retail 2.


[h2]What happened since last time?[/h2]
[h3]Big alpha update[/h3]
A few things has happened. First of all i realeased a big alpha update allowing alpha players to play the full core game. Yes, it has bugs, and is many features are missing, but it's playable and you can run your stores continually.

[h3]Contests[/h3]
Many people now engaged in the alpha, the community is in general very happy and positive and it is a pleasure for me to engage in. So i thought it was time to give something back as well. Contests are good for that, so from now on there will be a monthly contest on our Discord with prizes for 1st, 2nd and 3rd place. Each month will have a new topic, and we start this month off with a free-for-all "Design the best looking shop". I really enjoy seeing your unique creations, and i hope you will enjoy participating.

[h3]New admin[/h3]
We also got a new person on the team. He has been very active on the Discord since it started, and was very interested on joining our little team. He will manage some of the community tasks like collecting ideas and bugs, as well as some other things which will free up some of my time, so i can work more on the game itself.


[h2]Whats in the game[/h2]
When i made the last blog only the design features of the game was available on the alpha. So there was something to play, but only people who enjoy the aesthetic parts of the game would get real pleasure out of the game, and even though i can still spend a good amount of time just messing around with displays, that is of course not was the game is about.

But the creation of our Patreon, and the possibility to open for an alpha version, i quickly needed to set some limits to the playable parts rather fast. But then my goal has since been to open up for the real gameplay so you have some actual retailing going on.
And last week i released en update for the alpha, where it is possible to go "full circle" with the game.

Now what does "full circle" mean? It means the core game is up and running, with the following included:

[h3]Game startup:[/h3]

• Full city with navigation and building management.
  
• Explorable HQ with Manager's room and computer.
  
• In store placements of inventory.
  
• In store ordering and delivery possible.
  

[h3]Daytime (where shops are managed):[/h3]

• Full customer flow. Entering store, browsing and taking articles, queuing and paying at register.
  
• Customer interactions. All customers are approachable when looking at articles.
  
• Day starting, running and ending.
  

[h3]Evening (where headquarters are accessible, and buildings can be managed):[/h3]

• Article statistics at office.
  
• Financial statistics at office.
  
• Concept floor allows for limited branding.
  

That is what is in the alpha this very moment. Taking an analogy from the post last month, we have now built the "skateboard" in our quest to build a fine tuned sports car.
But work of course does not stop there.


[h2]Whats next? (The theory part)[/h2]
Skip to the next headline, if you don't care for a long section of theory. :)

With the basics up and running, what is then on the to do list?
When thinking of a way to describe it, an old university graph that i have not had in my mind for many years, suddenly pops up. Something called the "Agile Unified Process". A theory on how to manage a software project, like a computer game.



This in a way explains some of the phases i go through when making this game. It is generally applied for the whole lifetime of a project, but for me it can also be put on a smaller scale with a few adjustments. Let's try and explain them in human language.

[h3]Inception phase[/h3]

Ideally this is where you gather ideas and design whatever you are working on. That is shown in the graph as "model". You try to model what it is you are about to work on.
We can also see "implementation", "test" and "deployment" are non-existant at this point. That means, you actually don't do any programming at all. That is no work on the actual game. You sit with pen and paper, whiteboards, minmaps, planning programs etc. and try to figure out the best combined idea, for whatever it is you want to add.
It is at this point the "Great Ideas" forum on the Discord comes into use as it is at this point check out the great suggestions you might have.
This phase does not necessarily take a lot of time. Around a few days, to get the core ideas jotted down.

An example could be our goal of getting the customer flow to work. In the inception phase we could for instance deal with following question.

Should customers be unique, and if yes, what makes them unique and how do we group them and identify them?

KoR had very specific groups. Pensioners, Students, Labrorers, Celebrites. To me it was a bit limited. These are just titles as in written text the game itself doesn't care about. But for the player and their immersion, it would be better if more gropus were represented.
So the "segment" system works. But it can then be improved if we identify them by colors instead. A color can then represent a larger group of people, and differentiate them by their primary occupation.

So i did some reasearch and found this:

Collar Workers

There are of course as many opinions as there are colours, but it was a foundation to start from, and i could adjust it to fit the game. So we ended up with following colors:

• Gray (Retired people)
  
• Green (Ecological aware people)
  
• Blue (Manual labrorers)
  
• Red (Administration sectors)
  
• Pink (Service sectors)
  
• White (Financial sectors)
  
• Yellow (Tourists)
  
• Orange (High paying sectors)
  

This is of course very caricatured, but we are making a game, and that is how games work.
Now we have a system, which can contain a multitude of people. First problem solved.
Next question, how should they differ, other than a color?

In KoR we used a matrix. Quality focus (Buy cheap, or get the best product available), and Fashion focus (Be concerned about how trendy something is, or only focus on quality/price).
This was a very mathematically streamlined solution, where everyone have their own little area on this graph. But it was too clean.
So instead they will be defined by personalities telling what a group focuses on when shopping.

The gray segment can be described as low income. They also have plenty of time, and can be a bit unsure. So when a gray segmenter goes shopping, they dont care about queue times, or waiting for a salesperson. They have plenty of time, so things taking too long will not impact them negatively. However if they can't get help, get bad help, or a quick brushoff at the cash register, they will take serious offence to that. They want respect, and want someone who take their time to give the proper help they need. Due to income, they are focused on saving money, and will look for the lower pricings.

THen we have the blue segment. They are busy workers and earn decent money. They expect quick service and a short lines at the register so that they can return to work immediately. They don't need good service as they know what they want, so if a salsperson can just point them in the right direction, they are good.

Yellow can be anybody on vacation visiting your store, so they are very random. Orange are willing to pay big money, but expect the best of the best regarding service, time, quality etc.

So i feel this system captures real shoppers better. It also challenges the player to adjust your store to the right set of people, and not only by adjusting prices. So we have planned out customer segments. Then we can go on to the next phase where we can start actually coding them.

[h3]Elaboration phase.[/h3]

With the ideas ready, you can now prepare the foundation, setup the needed code structures etc. While in this phase you can still get the ideas as they present themselves. "Maybe they should also measure how much they care about cleanliness in the store".

So a way of setting up this structure could be preparing tables like these:



And along the way you populate these tables when ideas come along.
(And doing this, i found a bug. The sharp reader will notice that Pink is not part of the rows in the first table.)

And as more work gets implemented, you spend less time on coming up with ideas, as the core is getting in place, meaning getting many new ideas will not fit in with what is already in place.

And slowly you transition into the construction phase.

[h3]Construction phase.[/h3]

As described above, you get to focus more on the actual implementing of your ideas. A new idea can enter but they are more related to improving what already exists. For instance it could be "When i interact wiht a customer, i would like this and that to be shown".
And as the implementation gets more and more complete, you begin spending time with testing your implementations as well. And when you are relatively satisfied with this, you are at the final phase.

[h3]Transition phase.[/h3]

This is the final phase where you get ready to release your work to the users. That means getting the system tested by professionals, preparing various system that needs to be setup for the users to access the program etc.
This is again mostly for ending big scale projects, and is where we diverge a bit. Looking at the cycle of smaller implementations, the transition phase is for me more of an reactive phase. It is also this phase where multiple updates comes with shorter intervals.

I can't make an update in the the construction phase, as the game often is completely broken in this period becaust parts of the game can be disassembled to fit the new additions. Imagine merging two spider webs together. Until it's fully assembled the temporary web would be a mess.

So an update i made when reaching the transition phase. We added new stuff, spent a lot of time playtesting and fixed the most severe bugs we find. But we can playtest forever and still find bugs. So that means it's better for you to do playtesting at this point.
100 players WILL find more bugs then i do. One is the simple math of time. 1 hour from each player is 100 hours of testing, which might be what the team can do with a whole week of testing.
Furthermore 100 players means 100 different ways of playing the game, leading to the discovery of new bugs i will never find.
So this update is to get the real bug hunt going. During this period, my time is spent on fixing the bugs you submit.

Fixing a bug is like fixing a very small piece of the spider web. That means the game is playable most of the time, meaning i can send out updates more often. Sometimes feedback also reveals something that should be added. Not a bug, but more some quality of life, or smaller implementation. These can and should also be added during this period, as this is where it is still new to everyone, meaning it has the highest chance of getting feedback.


[h2]Whats next? (The factual part)[/h2]
[h3]Tutorials[/h3]
We were through a longer development phase of implementing customers and proper game flow. Now we reached this transistion phase of finalizing this, and starting the next big development. It means that i for the next period, will fix bugs and add smaller implementations. For instance, feedback indicated that many had a hard time figuring out how they should get to actually playing an ingame day. This means that i am currently working on a tutorial system, that will help you through the first stages of the game in a more steamlined way.

[h3]Other QoL[/h3]
When tutorials are added, i will look at which quality of life features are needed the most right now. So that is where i need your feedback, as you will have very big influence on what i will add.

[h3]New characters[/h3]
We are also laying last hands on implenting the actual customer characters. The current models are quick placeholders for the original "robot" that some of you have seen pictures of. The new customers will contain 1 male and 1 female models for each segment, themed in the segment color for easy recognition. They will contain randomized hair (10 male, 10 female), hair color and skin color.
This is also part of the foundation for the character customization system which will be added later on.

[h3]New characters part 2[/h3]
The above will feature in the next update. Next step of the characters will be skin aging, eye colors(Was a very popular request) and face morphs, and after that, work will start on making the manager/staff characters.

[h3]New articles[/h3]
We have also again gotten new articles in the game. Previous update contained various beverages.


And in the next one we started preparing for the candy shop, where we will begin using articles of the "spear" type.



[h2]And further away?[/h2]
[h3]Staff[/h3]
Currently there are a quite a few major implementations that needs to be done. Construction & building, staff, running multiple stores & simulations and headquarters & events are probably the biggest ones. To me the most important is staff. Currently they are the bottleneck of what needs to added to the game. For instance:
Too many customers at your store? We need staff to man another register.
Open a second store? We need staff to simulate how is goes in the first store.
Want a busy HQ, we need staff to man the positions.

Construction and building, is the only one that doesn't rely on staff. But would we like to be able to expand a store, but still being the only employee in it? Or would we like to get most out of the store and the visiting customers by having staff to manage?
To me it's an easy answer. Staff is such a central part of the game, that it needs to be the next thing to be added.

[h3]Character customization[/h3]
So when characters are ready and staff will come in, it would make sense to add the character customization at this point as well, including unifroms, such that you can personalize your stores.

And this is what the next big development sprint will be focused on.

-------------------------------------------------------

That was yet again a lot of writing and i will go back to writing tutorials.
Again, thanks a lot for the interest and support :)
If you are not already there, you are very welcome on the Discord server, and feel free to give comments, feedback, bug reports and/or ideas. They are all very helpful, and very appreciated.



Thanks for reading and following along, and until next time, happy sales.
Cheers, Daniel.

[h3]Dear retailers

Here come the first monthly dev-blog for King of Retail 2. Here i will tell you about the state of the game, how it is being developed, and anyhing else that can be interesting to talk about along the way. 🙂
[/h3]

[h2]--- Why do this? ---[/h2]

The interest for King of Retail 2 has once again caught me by surprise. The amount of feedback, ideas etc. that you have given is amazing. It is very appreciated and very motivating to know so many people look forward to play the game. 😁😁😁

My focus is always on making progress with the thing that is most needed this very moment. That can be programming, 3D modelling, testing, planning etc. But one thing is never on top of my list. That is community management. 😁
Not because i don't want to. I very much enjoy being an active part of the community.
But when writing a big post like i am not working on the actual game. And i want to repay you by making a game you can enjoy as soon as possible. 🙂

I also know that it doesn't give you anything right now. So i also think:
"I need to show something to the community" or "I need to do a livestream", but always return to "I will do it tomorrow". But "tomorrow" has a new task, and i think "If i don't do it, no one will do it". So tomorrow gets pushed again, and suddenly months have gone by, giving me a feeling of guilt.

Even now when making this post the above happens. 😅
But when we started the Patreon, i promised monthly Dev-blogs.
I have been looking forward to make this post... but i also know it will take me half a day to do properly, and right now my head screams to me that "We need to finish the sales interaction with customers, or else the game will never be finished".
And now it has almost been a month, meaning i will break my promise if i don't make my post. And if there is something my mind can't stand, it is not keeping deadlines. 😁 So by promising a monthly dev-blog, i kind of hack myself to give you proper insights on a regular basis.

So here we go... 😁😁😁

[h2]--- Where are we at? ---[/h2]

When making a game like this, it is like making a building out of Lego. Everything is like small bricks that comes together to make a finished product.
For those of you who follow regularly on Discord, i have mentioned a few times "The foundation needs to be in order", but what is that?
For me the foundation is what is needed for making a MVP, a Minimum Viable Product. And what is that?

Imagine you want to create a car. In this case it's only purpose is to transport you from A to B. You can now make your car in two ways:

Method A: First you start designing the whole car. You design the wheels, the engine, the chassis, the electronics, all at the same time. When you have designed it, you then go and make it and put it all together simultaneously. And when it is done you have a car. The positive of this is that you have a clear vision, and a clear goal all the time. The negatives are you don't have anything useable until the very moment it has all been put together.

Method B: Here you start making 4 small wheels and attach them to a piece of wood.
You now have a functioning transportation device.
This is an MVP . It is not remotely comparable to a car, but you have something that actually transports you from A to B much earlier in the process. Then you maybe add a handle so you can steer better. An upgrade has been made, but it still fulfill the purpose. And you go on and on like that, until you actually have a car.

Process B can be slower than process A, but you have a useable product all the time. Now you can get feedback, change direction of the production and so on.



What do i then consider the foundation? Well, we are making a Retail Simulation Game. So it means we need to have the simplest playable version of this, and for me that means the following:

• Your manager can move around and interact with things.
  
• You have a store
  
• You have customers who shop in your store.
  
• The customers have articles to buy.
  
• Relevant inventory exists to manage the articles and customers.
  
• Allow the days to start and end indefinetely.
  

That is basically it. Solve these 6 and you have a playable Retail Simulation Game.
However i would like to retarget my MVP a bit:

It should be a ENTERTAINING Playable Retail Simulation Game. We play to be entertained, so that should be a part of the MVP. You can always make the simplest of the simplest, but it doen't mean it is fun to play. So for it to have some entertainment value more needs to added.

Some things that i have worked on might be a bit excessive to even the revised MVP. Why make a city editor, when you can't even play the game? Why make this very deep display design system, and not start with basic displays? Well, there are 2 answers to this.

First answer: To save time. Building a quick system to test articles, only to soon remove and recode the system, is to me a waste of time.
If we are only a handful who are working on the game, then why spend extra time on a system that will soon be irrelevant. So if i know the displays will be fully customizable, then why not do it immediately. Since these are part of the MVP, making the Display Designer a part of the MVP as well.

The second answer is: I am human 😁 Sometimes i carried away with an idea of a cool new feature that i want to try out. A full functional city, is not part of the MVP, and a city generator is DEFINETELY not part of the MVP. 😁
But to me it was a challenge of trying something completely new. And being the one doing all of the programming, the limits of the game starts and ends with the limits of my skills. So a challenge like this pushes my limits, and gives me new skills that i can put to use in other areas of the game. So even though it seems off, it is not wasted time. Yes, it is time that ideally would be spent at a later stage, as it delays the MVP, but since it would have been built at some point anyway it at least doesn't delay the finished product.

So to answer the orignial question of where are we now, here are the major things that are currently part of the game.

The manager

• The manager is fully functioning with walking and interacting.
  

A store to shop in.

• Fully autogenerated building.
  
• Customizable walls and floors.
  
• Various store parameters like local population knowledge and reputations and opening hours.
  

Inventory

• Fully functioning and highly customizable displays to showcase articles.
  
• Fully functioning storage units to receive and store articles.
  
• Fully functioning cash registers to receive customers.
  

Articles

• Fully working article flow. Ordering -> Delivery -> Unpacking -> Displayed
  
• +500 food articles added. KoR1 had less then 400 grocery articles.
  
• Various article parameters like price, quality, individual customer segment influence and many others.
  

Customers

• Working customer flow. Enters store, looks for articles, evaluates, takes, goes to stand in line at register and leaves the store.
  
• Customer parameters. 8 different customer groups with individuual focus on articles, prices, quality, customer service and many other things.
  
• Unique customer flows based of time and nearby population.
  

City

• Fully randomized city. Each building is useable and buyable.
  
• Areas with various densities. Each building has a specific population combination.
  
• City generator. Create your own city from image files.
  

Headquarter & Managers office

• Basic functionalities. You can place your managers office and access your computer.
  
• See finance reports and article summaries.
  
• Adjust simple concept info as colours and title.
  

Game Flow

• Full year calendar implemented,
  
• Proper day flow. Start at mornings to react to overnight events (These are not added). Then day with running time where you can leave and enter shops as you wish. Then evening where you can build/redesign shops without timelimits and visit your HQ to make evening decisions.
  
• Save/Loading of game implemented (Snapshot saving of stores not implemented yet, for saving an loading inside the actual store with customers etc.)
  

This is what is added to the game as of this moment. There are af course many smaller things to mention as well, but let us keep it large scale 🙂

What are then the targets, and what is currently missing?

Stage 1. Alpha, full game flow access.
A few things are missing for opening the current full game on the alpha branch. Customers are still missing interactions with the manager. Without it, it is pretty boring. You can't pull customers in, help them in the store or anything else. So you are basically left with just waiting for them at the register. This is what i am currently working at.

The day flow needs some adjustments in the transitioning. Most of it is up and running, so this part is more about testing, and doing final adjustments.
When these two things are done, alpha testers will be allowed access to this part.

2. MVP
When above is done, then it is time to add the parts that i feel is needed for the proper MVP. These are:

• Staff. Your stores will hit a limit when working alone. So the last important part is having and managing your staff. It will be a big implementation, so it is a part that will be added bit by bit and released to you when ready.
  
• Simulations. For the game to be played properly, we need more than one store, and that requires lots of simulations. In KoR1 these were fairly simple. The store was exactly the same from when you left it, only with financial simulations being made pr. day. Now with you jumping in and out of stores during the day, simulations needs to be made on an hourly basis. So this means simulating article flows, customer flows, staff etc. which will be a big task to do, making the store look different and in full business when you visit it again 2 hours later.
  This will also make the game feel more alive. More things can happen and you can have much more influence out of the shop, improving the CEO aspect of the game.
  
• Visuals. Not so much of implementations. But some graphical work needs to be done. Design a proper main menu. Give your shop nice surroundings etc.
  

3. Early Access
When reaching the MVP, the game is what should be fun and playable. The question is now what exactly needs to be added for Early Access to makes sense. Examples could be:

• Building and Expansion?
  
• Marketing and Advertising?
  
• HQ and CEO aspects?
  
• More in store customizations?
  

But that is to be decided when we get closer to that point.

[h2]--- What else? ---[/h2]

The above was very focused on implementations. But other things are happening as well. I am so lucky to have the assistance of 3 persons who help me part time. They work on various areas which are constantly being improved as well.

One is fully dedicated to designing the articles, and she is fully responsible for all the articles currently in the game which is a big big job. She will continue to to do this as long as there are arrticles to be made. Which is a looong time, as this game needs many more articles across many categories.



Then i have the squid. He is helping me with various tasks that are quite time consuming. He has among other, implemented the articles in the game with testing and correcting. He has also been doing some general playtesting and bughunting, which is a never ending task.

Finally we have my dear wife who has started to learn to make characters and animations, and she will over the next long time be focused these parts of the game.



And that is the little team that is making the game so far. 🙂

But that is not all. There are also all the precious volunteers who helps as admins and translators, the people who already trusted the future of the game with getting access to the alpha as well as the people just keeping the discord active and a pleasant place to be.
All of this is a huge help on many different levels and i can't thank you enough. It helps with the progress of the game and keeping the spirit high, making the future brighter for King of Retail 2. 🥰🥰🥰



Phew! That was a lot of writing 😁😁

If you haven't yet, you can join the discord here and follow the development closer, and maybe also join the alpha testing:


In any case, take care, and thanks for following along. 🙂

Until next time, Daniel