Cosmic Construct News

[p]Welcome to the week 38 devlog for Cosmic Construct. Each week I write a devlog covering work done since the previous devlog.[/p][p]To follow the game's progress you can join me at:[/p]

• [p]My bluesky account which gives more frequent updates.[/p]
• [p]The Cosmic Construct community discord server.[/p]
• [p]Also Wishlist Cosmic Construct on Steam and follow it's steam page.[/p]

[p]---[/p][p]\[] Achievement icons to be used in a new objectives submenu, and for steam achievements.[/p][p][/p][p]I've spent most of the development time for this week doing a combination of drawing the icons, and establishing how to best to arrange the icons to work on them more quickly later. Many of the icons I need to do are effectively the same image with various roman numerals over them, and a change in border color.[/p][p]So, I decided to take on some of the more artistic designs I wanted to make, like for the stacks of currency. Something which I can reuse throughout the game later. It's convenient to have these art assets where I want them. I also enjoyed making "chibi" versions of some of the game's menus.[/p][p][/p][p]I was getting a little freaked out when I realized I would have to do all of the icons twice, but of course I could just use a neutral threshold greyscale filter or shader to do all of this. Needless to say, it will not be a problem. Cutting the tileset out for steam can be done in python.[/p][p][/p][p]I have an animation timeline at the bottom for various sheets, and there will be I think 11-12 sheets in total by the end of development. Yet another art asset I need to complete before release, but this is my life now.[/p][p]\[] Dice rolling animations and UI display for the Sparkle minigame.[/p][p]I've been having some difficulty with making the dice rolling animation look as natural as I want it to. Something I can ascribe to being a skill issue. The hand will be rolling six dice off of a backboard from either side. Its the hand opening and release that I am having an issue with looking how I want. Definitely the most difficult animation I've made in a long time, if ever.[/p][p]\[] Structure art (If I have time)[/p][p]I didn't work on the structure art at all.[/p][p]---[/p][p]Things that will be worked on over the next week.[/p][p]- Finishing the die rolling animations for Sparkle.[/p][p]- More achievement icons, and achievement viewer UI.[/p][p]- Structure art (If I have time)[/p]

[p]I know I said the 10th, but I am one day late on this one. Better than seven. Anyway, welcome to the 37th week devlog entry for Cosmic Construct. It's been rather productive. Although, I doubt this entry is going to make it look that way. When I make a list of objectives for the week, it is what I plan to do. However, plans change at the whim of my creative spirit. So, prepare to see some dice I guess.[/p][p]To follow the game's progress you can join me at:[/p]

• [p]My bluesky account which gives more frequent updates.[/p]
• [p]The Cosmic Construct community discord server.[/p]
• [p]Also Wishlist Cosmic Construct on Steam and follow it's steam page.[/p]

[p]Each week we cover the development goals set during the prior week. Let's take a look at those.[/p][p]---[/p][p]4 new structures. (one of which is a multipart structure, which I will explain later)[/p][p]I did so "some" work on the structure art, basically amounting to an outline of the buildings I am going to draw. Realistically, this is nothing so I'm going to say this one was a wash. The structure I am working on is the City Hall building, which fits into together with multiple parts. To get credit for building the structure, you have to build at least 3 parts of the structure. You can build any 3 parts, but the building will make more visual sense if built and assembled together. You could build 3 center sections or 3 west wing sections if you wanted to. I'm going to keep it open ended for creativity.[/p][p]Improvements to Pawn AI to include structure garrisoning.[/p][p]As I always mention, the pawn state machine is very complicated. It's now borderlining an economic simulation. I'm almost at the point where all of the current buildings can be occupied by pawns and produce resources as they are supposed to. I'm still considering doing a "refactor" of the professions themselves. I currently have "General Gathering" handling harvesting tasks, when it would make more sense to have a dedicated farmer. I'll see how I feel about it when all of the buildings are in.[/p][p]A bulk of the AI work is going to come after the art is done, when I start working on the more complex game features, like economy, taxation, tourism, and all that jazz.[/p][p]Work on art for the first minigame; Sparkle.[/p][p][/p][p]Now that the framework of the minigame is done, I can start working on the art assets for Sparkle. Since this is a dice game, I need to at the very least make dice. I could have gone the cheap route of making a single image with a text number over it, or the slightly more effort route of 6 unique images. Nah, how about a full 15 degree step die rolling animation. [/p][p][/p][p]This should cover enough orientations to make it look like an animated die roll. At least at Cosmic Construct's squigglevision frame rate. I am proud to let you all know that I intend to have these dice more or less rolled from the hand of the player at the table. So I need to animate a hand opening and a cloak sleeve as well. Then color it appropriately based on the player at the table. Should look real slick when finished.[/p][p]Some for the achievement icons to be used in a new objectives submenu, and for steam achievements.[/p][p]I didn't do a single one of these. ;--; I have more than 500 to draw. (It isn't as bad as it sounds.)[/p][p]---[/p][p]For the upcoming week, here is what I plan to get done.[/p][p]- Achievement icons to be used in a new objectives submenu, and for steam achievements.[/p][p]- Dice rolling animations and UI display for the Sparkle minigame.[/p][p]- Structure art (If I have time)[/p][p]Really, I need to get all of the art assets done. Kinda starting to regret making such an art heavy game, but what can you do.
¯\\_(ツ)_/¯[/p]

[p]Welcome to the 36th week devlog for Cosmic Construct. Just as a reminder from the end of last week, this post isn't going to contain much as to progress on the game. In addition to combatting burnout, I have some other personal project I needed to upkeep. Going forward, we will return back to the normally scheduled progress posts. I also wanted to make sure these devlog entries get back on schedule. Upcoming devlog posts will be scheduled for the 10th, 17th, 24th, and 31st of August.[/p][p]To follow the game's progress you can join me at:[/p]

• [p]My bluesky account which gives more frequent updates.[/p]
• [p]The Cosmic Construct community discord server.[/p]
• [p]Also Wishlist Cosmic Construct on Steam and follow it's steam page.[/p]

[p]Deck of All Things[/p][p][/p][p]If you, like me, play 5th edition Dungeons and Dragons, you maybe be familiar with the magical item, the Deck of Many Things. For the last couple years I've had a collection of art work for a DnD themed tarot deck I made for fun. At the same time I had a half completed custom magic item rule text written up for an "improved" Deck of Many Things with more available random options. So thus...[/p][p]The Deck of All Things, and its accompanying web app. It is available for free in browser for full size monitors. It also has a download available which can be run without installing (as a portable application). It has a total of 160 unique effects which highly effect your character for both the better and the worse. It is a powered up, complete drop-in replacement for the Deck of Many Things. Thrice as dangerous, thrice as deadly, and thrice more fun.[/p][p][/p][p]There are 80 cards here including all of the major and minor arcana's as well as a few added cards. I was considering making a physical deck for sale at some point, but never got around to it. All of the art here, except for the logographic typography is a mixture of stock vector graphics and my own art. [/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]As I mentioned before there are 80 cards, but have a normal and inverted side, creating 160 total card reading which each have an accompanying effect. If for some reason you can't use the webapp, there is a homebrew page on DnD Beyond and you can follow the rules from there.

---[/p][p]Alright, now the most important news. I will be returning to the normal devlog format starting next week.[/p][p]Here is the work I expect to get done by that time.[/p][p]- 4 new structures. (one of which is a multipart structure, which I will explain later)[/p][p]- Improvements to Pawn AI to include structure garrisoning.[/p][p]- Work on art for the first minigame; Sparkle.[/p][p]- Some for the achievement icons to be used in a new objectives submenu, and for steam achievements.[/p][p]That is all, see you new week.[/p]

[p]This is the Week 35 devlog for Cosmic Construct, which while being a good week for my general productivity, hasn't contributed to Cosmic Construct. I really wanted to make this week short, but I just didn't do that. It needs to be done, so I will try to do it for this week. Obviously, I can't promise anything, because I'm apparently bad at keeping to a schedule.[/p][p]To follow the game's progress you can join me at:[/p]

• [p]My bluesky account which gives more frequent updates.[/p]
• [p]The Cosmic Construct community discord server.[/p]
• [p]Also Wishlist Cosmic Construct on Steam and follow it's steam page.[/p]

[p]Quite simply, I didn't work on the game over the past week. In addition to preventing general burnout working on the same project and providing updates for 31 consecutive weeks (I did not have devlogs before week 4); I have other projects that occasionally need my attention.

In lieu of an update on Cosmic Construct, I will go over some of my other concurrent projects that need to be maintained, and what I'm doing that isn't Cosmic Construct. [/p][p]---[/p][p]Simple Space Ship System[/p][p][/p][p]I have a few tabletop games that I sell. One of them is Simple Space Ship System, a tabletop wargame with simple rules, and a legacy progression mechanic. I'm not trying to pitch to you here, but recently it has seen a bump in sales I didn't expect. It caught me off guard, and I would like to capitalize on that by taking the opportunity to update the book. Both to make it more visually appealing to drive sales, and to improve rules explanations and provide visual aids as a quality of life inclusion.[/p][p][/p][p]To provide visual explanation of the games rules and corner case problems, I modeled a virtual tabletop in blender. So that I can speed up to process of making arrangements to show in the book. In this case, it is a flanking rule.[/p][p]I didn't get everything I needed to get done for this book done during the week, but its rewrite took up a bunch of time I didn't expect. I do still need to get this done, but its whatever.[/p][p]Orros[/p][p][/p][p]In addition to tabletop wargames, I also make tabletop roleplaying games. This is Orros, one of my "back burner" projects. It is a superhero themed d10 roleplaying game system. This book is about 80% complete. As it gets closer to completion, motivation to work on it over my other projects, including Cosmic Construct, increases. There might be a week in the not so distant future where I will drop everything to push that game to release. The book is... entirely artless at the moment. So behold, this wall of text.[/p][p]Keygemin[/p][p]In addition to games, I also create content for a "fiction IP" called Keygemin. This includes a game on itch which I haven't touched in a couple years. I operate a wiki, which details everything that is public about that universe. It is a massive creative effort, and I would love you to check it out. This one I will absolutely pitch to you.[/p][p][/p][p]Recently, on youtube, I have been posting readings of the stories I have set in that word. I've spent some time this week recording those. I've broken them down into shorts, and they seem be received well. I'm not too worried about view count as the content is "evergreen". Anyone who runs into it that likes the story can continue down the playlist.[/p][p][/p][p]Various Games[/p][p][/p][p]I have many other game development project that I'm looking into reusing or readapting that content for other purposes; including for Cosmic Construct. I'm just going to provide this game screenshot out of context. Feel free to strongly interpret it.[/p][p][/p][p]tl;dr - This has been the side project week.[/p][p][/p][p]---[/p][p]Over the next week, I'll be working on only structure art.[/p][p]This next devlog post should be on the 3rd of August.[/p][p]My birthday is on August 2nd, so we will see if I actually get any work done. :P[/p][p]Just being honest with you all, I might be in the mood to take a break.[/p][p]Thank you for being here to listen to my excuses, I'll see you in the next one.[/p]

[p]Welcome to the 34th week devlog for Cosmic Construct. Sorry that this one is a little late. I really need to get the schedule back on track. This should be a week 35 post, these posts are more than a week behind. I think I'm going to do two short weeks just to get them lined back up.[/p][p]So sorry for remainder of this month. I'll get it back where it needs to be with some short posts.[/p][p]To follow the game's progress you can join me at:[/p]

• [p]My bluesky account which gives more frequent updates.[/p]
• [p]The Cosmic Construct community discord server.[/p]
• [p]Also Wishlist Cosmic Construct on Steam and follow it's steam page.[/p]

[p]As usual, I will be covering the goals set in the previous posts, and discussing ongoing work for and about the game.[/p][p]---[/p][p]Finish the new biome.[/p][p][/p][p]There was a bunch of art needed for this one. 135 frames total, which is more than any other biome I think. Discounting the farmable resources. I've made a new tree type, which isn't just a repurposed general tree, and these took a while to figure out, because they are just trunks. I wanted the tops to be "cut off" at the top, but didn't know how that would turn out once everything was put together.[/p][p][/p][p]Visually, 4 varieties of mushrooms were added which each have 5 variations. This biome functions as a sort of "mooshroom" biome, for Cosmic Construct. Food and wood is plentiful. It's a biome that exists purely as a boon to the player. A place that the player can seek out get out of shortages through simple passive grinding. It's the AFK chop, biome so to speak.[/p][p][/p][p]It's important to show this, as its hard to describe, and see. Many of these just looks like copies of the same drawing over and over, and in a way they are. Squigglevision animation requires small changes between frames to look convincing. It quadruples the amount of work compared to just putting flat static images in an environment. I could probably get away with using a distortion shader, but I feel that the squigglevision animation is more  "genuine". You can feel the hand drawn aspect of things. I don't want people to look at the game and think it is lazy.[/p][p][/p][p]Anyhow, here is the finished biome which I have named the Akyulands. I didn't even talk about the grass, which is yet another thing I needed to draw. The shapes are simple, but they have a very distinct appearance. To think I have another 4-5 biomes to make before I feel comfortable saying that I'm comfortable with the amount of exploration content.[/p][p]Do some new structure art.[/p][p]Didn't get to doing this, the biome took alot of work to complete, due to 6 new interactable objects being added.[/p][p]Continue work on the first minigame.[/p][p]There are two minigames I've been considering and working on them concurrently. One is a pretty normal dice game. Most people will be familiar with it. I want to have a betting component, and luck modification to make a combination of skill and luck based.  This will be the first minigame, called "Sparkle". The second minigame I am working on is far more complex, and I'm not sure if I can even pull it off given alot of factors. It's something difficult to do in gamemaker, but figuring it out as a puzzle has been fun. I am happy to say I got it working, and has to do with optical character recognition. I'm not going to describe it further, because I want it to be a surprise.[/p][p]Make improvements to Pawn AI, to allow the game to be played further in.[/p][p]Discussing Pawn AI is pretty dry. The details of the state machine, and small adjustments made to it are just boring to detail. Its like showing code of, nobody really cares. All you need to know is that the pawns are being integrated into the buildings that are already in place. The garrisoning, works and the pawns are processing resources from the garrisoned buildings. I have some of the businesses set in an "open for business" and "closed for business" state. So if a pawn responsible for say a Tailoring building, if they are sleeping; that function will be disabled until they wake.[/p][p]Another thing I am working on is pawn retirement. When a pawn leaves the settlement, they can later return. There is not an age mechanic, so they pawns never "die". But they can leave due to unhappiness or stress. I would like the pawns to still visit as tourists, or ask to return to the settlement if it has improved.[/p][p]---[/p][p]This week will be very short to get the devlogs back on track. I'm tired of them not being correct.[/p][p]- Do structure art.[/p][p]Yep that's it. My level of success will be determined on how many new buildings I add.[/p][p]See you next "week".[/p]