Horse Racing Manager News

Added
- Succession system added to game, player can now get a spouse (..or lover) and get children, this includes a family tree if you go to any persons profile
- First version of traits for persons added to the game, traits effects skills and outcomes of certain social events, children can inherit traits
- Added social events/interactions to persons, you can find these interactions when you go to a persons profile. Persons now also have a sociability skill.
- This includes hostile actions, like attempting murder or suing persons
- NPCs also use these events towards you
- Secrets now added to the game, you can learn and gain secrets depending on what you do in the game. If you have public criminal secrets you can get sued by NPCs. You can also sue NPCs. You can also trade secrets.
- You also get random trait events, where you can gain and loose traits
- CPU can taunt/challenge you to events to wager either cash or horses
- In person options, you can now choose your living standard/lifestyle options. Certain lifestyle choices can protect you against NPCs, like security and what law firm option you choose.
- You can now favorite two persons/horses, this will show them in the sidebar below your name. If you go to their profile, and then on the right side there is a star
- In standings a new "families" category, that ranks what family name has the biggest family and most wealth
- In race register table/panel there are now quick toggles for grade filtering
- You can now get economic summary either monthly, quarterly or yearly
- You can choose to stop sim at social events and trades now
- Add breeding ability to the top bar of the horse profile page
- Ability to change how much persons under 18 and over 18 age per year, when starting a new game in game options
- In pin table added more information about the horse, like potential, form, earnings etc.
- In breeding table, show for player horses their current breeding fee, also added to both tables lifetime breeding fees
- Internal tooling "Gatsby" created for creating new events and editing old ones easily

Improved
- Instead of removing registration for all races when horse gets sick, should only now remove and estimate of registrations until it heals. So if expected healing time is say 1 month, then registrations in next month, but keep registered two months out
- Race registering scene now defaults to showing the eligible horses
- Make CPU race registering a bit more efficient
- Make simulated auctions more efficient, this was a small bottleneck in massive saves
- Changed how the buttons for the favorite, bookmark and notes show
- Improved the mane and tail assignment to where it's closer to what is expected (still WIP)
- Lethal white overo now presents visually as dominant white
- Audio system changed to now use our own Chirp system

Fixed
- Buyback of shares works again
- When you had custom tabs, and moved to a horse and back, you were moved to the first tab instead of the tab you were on
- In stables change the first tabs name to "Racers" to better reflect the category, same for home screen
- Newgens not generating
- Betting results after race are no longer hidden
- Fixed multiple incorrect horse coat spritesheet assignments
- Save names are again properly checked for invalid prefixes
- Fixed camera placement in the race scene
- The racetrack surface now defaults to the first available texture if no match is found
- Fixed an issue in the table logic caused by a missing null check
- Fixed scroll wheel not working with the scroll container in the horse detail -> options tab

Known issues
- Slider sound is disabled due to some issues with it

[p]In the last devlog we talked about Early Access, Harness Racing and Tutorials.[/p][p] [/p][p]We released our development roadmap, showing the major features coming from current point till full release. While it is not in strict chronological order, this is how we plan to proceed with development.[/p][p] [/p][p] [/p][p]We added first version of universal trade system that lets stables trade horses, cash, shares and breeding contracts. This system is accessible from the new Trade tab in manager profiles, or can be also found directly from horse profile or stable profile. CPU stables use the same system to propose trades to the player.[/p][p] [/p][p]Overview of Trade System[/p][p] [/p][p]We expanded the ownership system with stable shares, allowing player to buy and sell shares of any stable. Stables can be fully taken over if majority ownership is acquired, and the player can also lose control of their own stable if they lose majority ownership. NPC investors will make share purchase offers occasionally and all share transactions can be viewed in global share trades list.[/p][p] [/p][h2]Breeding, Genetics & Birth options[/h2][p]We expanded the breeding system with breeding contracts for both stallions and mares, including CPU generated offers and requests. Contract valuations were rebalanced to be more reasonable and the breeding interface was improved with new visual breeding layout. [/p][p] [/p][p]New visual layout for breeding, can also be viewed as list.[/p][p] [/p][p]Genetics now support a full coat index that lists all available coat variations and allows reverse searching. Custom coat imports were fixed and made more reliable. Coat inheritance for foals and yearlings now matches their descried coat whenever an adult variation exists. We added hidden breeding ability as a new genetic factor, and corrected inbreeding detection logic. [/p][p] [/p][p]Overview of Coat Index and reverse searching[/p][p] [/p][p]We expanded breeding options with a new birth mode where horses follow natural pregnancy length while still aging on Jan 1st. Birth rules can now be changed mid-game without affecting ongoing pregnancies. We also added breeding ability directly to horse descriptions. [/p][p] [/p][h2]Medical[/h2][p]We improved the medical system with more consistent illness and injury handling. Recovery logic was unified after removing the old healing allocation system, and healing rate calculations were corrected to use proper specialist logic. Simulation can now pause automatically when one of horses become ill or injured, we also fixed bug so deceased horses no longer appear in future social events.[/p][p] [/p][h2]Training & Staff[/h2][p]We made training more efficient with new autobalance tools that distribute trainers, jockeys and stablehands evenly across the horses. Training dropdowns now refresh instantly when staff are assigned, and overall training performance was heavily optimised. [/p][p] [/p][p]Preview of autobalance tool[/p][p] [/p][p]Staff management became more dynamic, with the ability to give bonuses and salary increases. Staff now provide clearer explanations why they leave a stable. [/p][p]Scouting was expanded to include person scouting with progress indicators, and the player can assign themselves as scout. [/p][p] [/p][h2]Bookmarks & Stable Tools[/h2][p]We added Bookmarks page for horses and persons. Pin functionality was expanded with racing, breeding and retired pins, and deceased horses now have their pins cleared automatically.[/p][p] [/p][p]Overview of quick pinning horse[/p][p] [/p][p]The quick register system became more consistent, it now only shows races where participants exist, instead of possible empty races. Distance preference filters were improved with S/M/I/L/E toggles. Bulk sales, bulk training updates and bulk pin operations were added to make large stables easier to manage.[/p][p] [/p][h2]UI & Presentation[/h2][p]UI Quality has seen improvement since last devlog. We introduced a redesigned auction detail page and reorganised the pause menu for clarity. Interface elements now follow theme colours more consistently. [/p][p]Email handling was improved with Read All button, and an Economic Overview email that can be sent monthly, quarterly or yearly. Injury, illness and trade emails were rewritten in more neutral tone.[/p][p] [/p][h2]Performance, Engine & Database[/h2][p]On the last update of previous devlog, we updated our project to Godot 4.5 and since that we have implemented multiple optimisations. Save files are now roughly 50% smaller due to database cleanup and purge systems. Autosaving now runs asynchronously to remove freezes during gameplay. Heavy systems like race registration, training and world economy updates now run on weekly or monthly cycles instead of daily. [/p][p]Migrations handling for older saves was improved through many updates. We optimised coat indexing, social system calculations and injury checks to improve late-game speed. We also replaced unstable audio libraries with our own native Chirp auto backend that we have been building from scratch.[/p][p] [/p][p]We have member count of over 800 already. If you have suggestions, ideas or something else you want to talk about, it's a great platform and an easy way to reach us. Join the server here!

 [/p][p]We have planned for Early Access phase to last around six months, but as game development often goes, things tend to take longer than expected. We will confirm the final game's release date once we've made more progress during Early Access. [/p][p]Right now we are working on reworking race logic, finalising our own new audio system, succession system and bringing new features to the game.[/p][p]Development is ongoing, and we will keep you updated on our progress. We are continuously working to enhance Horse Racing Manager, and your feedback is invaluable. Our goal is to make this franchise the most realistic horse racing simulator in the world. Your support is crucial for us and greatly appreciated. [/p][p]Follow Horse Racing Manager Here![/p]

Added
- In horse description say breeding ability
- Added third option to horse births, where you can have natrual pregnancy length, but JAN 1st aging.
- You can now change horse birth options during gameplay, in settings -> game rules. Will not change already ongoing pregnancys.
- Ability to toggle auto register for a specific horse, you can do this like you do the pins, either in the horse details or the pin table. If you do this, turn off auto register global settings since that will override.
- Ecomonic overview email can be turned on either monthly, quarterly or yearly in settings -> notifications

Fixed
- When you own multiple stables, the training, trade and some other tabs dissapeared, this is now fixed
- Horse gender could change in some scenarios when importing
- Contagion was still happening even if you had turned off illnesses
- Modify trade emails to be more neutral
- Modify injury and illness emails to be more neutral
- 2-year-old horses are no longer considered yearlings
- Foal/yearling color should now match their description as long as an adult version of the coat is present
- When horse dies remove pins
- When horse is dead, hide pin buttons and quick register to auction
- Strength tooltip
- Possible fix for before race buttons locking up
- Game did not detect inbreeding between parent and child, this should now be fixed
- Sponsorship contract times should now be fixed
- In the quick register, only show races with participant (only show empty as a fallback)
- Make the export text clearer that it's only DNA that gets exported not statistics, race or training history
- Ability to sort contracts table in breeding
- Should not show null anymore in social events for horse death in the future

Fixed
- Run a quick update to old databases/saves for some of the updates to take effects

Added
- In breeding tab, add a page for breeding contracts the CPU is offering

Improved
- Some optimizations done to the database, where we also added some purge functions
- We did some optimizations and database save files now 50% smaller on average
- Added way to start universal trade from horse profile trade tab, also auto adds the horse item
- Added way to start universal trade from stable detail page
- Change it where at the start of the game, people have age between 18 to 40 to stop half of the persons being retired

Fixed
- Some code in relationships where in certain situations making the game suddenly run slow
- Shortened betting notes so that they take less space
- Sometimes when you started a game, you did not see any CPU stallions in the breeding table for some time before the CPU stood their stallions. Added a failsafe for this, where they now do it immediately when the game starts.
- Remove HBOX tab in main menu
- Changed the S/M/I/L/E buttons to not have distance on them, as this was messing up some UI's
- Use custom coats was not togglable, also it did not open the folder when you pressed open location
- Some toggles had broken in the menu when we did the big rework, should now work.
- Make CPU deals less frequent, they were a bit spammy. Also change the distribution of what they offer/want, they were a bit too heavy on the breeding contracts.
- Fixed the import of horses