Ostranauts - spaceship management sim set in NEO Scavenger universe - now available on Early Access

[dcfedor]

It's true that rote steps aren't that exciting. But there are still some things I want to be modelling under the hood to keep it meaningful. Maybe some examples will better illustrate:

• If you skip purging the core, the lasers will implode the pellet, but the "dirty" gas in the chamber will suffocate the fusion before it can take off. Sort of like flooding the carburetor in an older car. Or maybe more accurately, trying to start a car with water in the cylinders.
• If you skip the cryo system, you don't get cooling, and the field coils won't be superconducting, resulting in an uncontained reaction blowout that consumes the ship.
• If you skip the laser alignment, the lasers just miss their pellet target and shoot across the chamber and don't do much.
• If you skip the pellet feed, the lasers hit the empty space where the target is supposed to be. Again, no fusion.
• If you fire before the caps are charged, they may not have enough power to implode the pellet, and you get a spent pellet and no fusion.
• If you skip the field coils, the reaction consumes the chamber walls and the ship.
• If you skip the MHD generator, the fusion exhaust is not tapped for energy. You get thrust, but no power.

So it's a bit more interesting than a binary on/off result. And if I get my way, things like damaged field coils might limit the max safe pressure/temperature of the reaction, requiring the pilot to adjust the reactant flow or open/closed cycle amounts.

I still have to build a lot of this, of course. Right now, only a few of those effects are in place.

Re: stickies and manual, why not? Moar stuff! But yeah, I agree that both would be cool. And user-generated stickies would be an interesting addition. Now if I could just find those other hours missing from my day...

 

[LESS T_T]

https://bluebottlegames.com/content/alternate-crew-mesh-and-anims

Alternate Crew Mesh and Anims

Hey Folks! Decided to try something a bit different today: crew graphics.

After posting a few videos, I've noticed a lot of folks get distracted by the crew graphics. I always figured I'd go back and refine them at some point, but sooner might be better than later if it's going to stick out like a sore thumb.

So I spent a little overtime last night, plus the better part of today, to try an improved rig, mesh, and animation setup. I replaced the "sprite sandwich" mesh with a low-poly human mesh.

The sprite sandwich had the advantage of just being a series of overlapping textures not much different than the item sprites already in the game. So this new mesh aimed to keep things simple. The texture it uses for a material looks a bit like a minecraft person, so is pretty easy for modders to adjust.

The new mesh also has the advantage of depth when viewed from every angle. The sprite sandwich illusion failed as soon as a body part turned edge-on to the camera, while this mesh maintains volume regardless of orientation. And it's seriously low-poly, like Quake II era. It should be comparable in performance (I'm hoping).

And here's where things get interesting: this 3D mesh approach, combined with an industry standard skeleton, means I can download and plug-in animations from a wide range of sources. Between free and paid assets, there are probably thousands to choose from.

Today's image shows the mesh doing a walk cycle from Adobe's Mixamo service. The left side has a suit and helmet on, the right side shows the body inside that suit.

I had to tweak a bunch of stuff on the map to work with this new model, like raising the Z-height of walls. I also needed to enable ZWrite on the shaders so the feet wouldn't appear over the body. I think we're going to need to take care with transparency sorting, too, though thankfully no issues showing yet.

It's pretty impressive. The movement is way more expressive, and that might mean I have a new dimension available to me for making the AI express themselves better. I can download animations for angry exchanges, crying, laughing...you name it. The visual vocabulary of the AIs stands to increase quite a bit.

Of course, there's more to do. The normal map is blank, so we don't get bumps yet. The shape could be smoother. I still need to figure out part-swapping for different clothes and races. And the texture map/UV unwrap is a hack job I threw together as quickly as possible.

The big thing is that part-swapping. If I can get that to work, I can safely replace the old crew with this. The rest is just polish.

 

[LESS T_T]

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

https://bluebottlegames.com/content/crew-management-loop

Crew Management Loop

dcfedor
onMay 13, 2019

Hey Folks! Hope everyone had a good weekend. We had company visiting, so most of our time was spent catching up and sight-seeing. And eating, of course.

Back at the office, I had to apologize to Michael for missing some files in my last version control check-in. He unfortunately had to waste time figuring out what I missed. But he was able to, and at least we're getting back on track.

And since most of my work was text-based today, I unfortunately don't have any screenshots to share. So instead, have this sneak peek into the next concept art!

And despite there being no screenshots, that doesn't mean the text work isn't interesting. I'm actually doing some game loop mockups for crew management, and learning some useful things about the way the game will feel, minute-to-minute.

I'm basically taking scenes from some of my favorite inspirations for Ostranauts, and trying to convert them into game engine events. What things can the game engine do? What can't it do? What things are superfluous? Where does the player act, vs. the avatar AIs, vs. some overarching game plot system?

So far, it's working better than intended. I'm finding existing mechanics to cover a lot of the scenes' beats. And what's more, I'm starting to get a better sense of when the player is taking control, and how.

Presently, the scenes I'm testing a slightly more action-based, so the player has direct control over a large portion of the crew. E.g. moving them around, using objects, taking cover/firing, etc. And the player is constantly managing morale to keep that control, or else crew members panic/check-out for a while. And all the while, the game's PlotManager is adding periodic tension through major events, like incoming fire, an accident, or other threats.

I'd like to get some more low-action scenes mapped out like this before I start coding. This current example works well in situations where an away team is on a mission, but there will be times when the crew is largely autonomous and self-serving needs (sleeping, eating, chatting, etc.). Player intervention will still be needed periodically, but I expect most of these non-action phases will be AI free time, where the player controls the captain, and uses that avatar to affect control without directly ordering people.

The cool thing is, this seems more concrete than any picture I had before. Perhaps this is finally taking shape? We'll see!

https://bluebottlegames.com/content/new-anims-roles-and-drafting

New Anims, Roles, and Drafting

dcfedor
onMay 16, 2019

Hey Folks! A bit of new animation today, Michael's plan for roles and jobs, and the ability to draft crew now working.

Michael sent me his rough outline for crew roles, and I think it's sounding good! Some details are still up in the air, but the rough idea is that there are several roles on a crew, and each crew can be in zero or more roles at a time. And there can be more than one person per role.

Each role covers certain actions on the ship, and people in those roles will take care of those actions when appropriate. And if they have the required skills/tools. (The simple example now is repair broken walls as they appear.)

In addition to the simple job-type stuff, we're talking about some sort of dramatic events that occur as part of the role as the crew moves from objective to objective. How this works is still being defined, but it seems like a good basis upon which to build.

While he's on that, I resumed my work on drafting/undrafting crew, and think I have that working now. I had to tweak a few more things to ensure selection honored the draft status, and that the context menus showed correct options at each stage of hiring, drafting, and undrafting.

In the process of testing that, I noticed I was having a hard time telling what was going on when AI interacted at some points. Some interactions had missing animations, or used the "Use" animation for lack of anything better. This resulted in a lot of "Idle" and "Use" anims, regardless of what was going on.

So I did a bit more mining in the Mixamo library, and grabbed some anims for yes, no, angry, and talking. Then I went through the current interactions we have and assigned them accordingly. It's an improvement, especially in cases where multiple crew are in one place. Before, it was a lot of idle anims, but now it varies a bit more from person-to-person, and over time.

Today's screenshot shows a cluster of AIs doing their thing. John appears to be using something (PDA?) near Cheng, who is maybe doing push-ups? Jacob is saying something to Ashton, who is just listening. Cesar might be waiting on the fridge to deliver food. And Colton's taking a nap. Must have headphones

Anyway, like I said. Minor improvement. Might be worth getting a few more anims in there to further diversify, and to make things clearer. But the fact that I could do that in a matter of minutes is what that new avatar mesh work was all about!

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

https://bluebottlegames.com/content/all-feels

Hey Folks! Continuing work on AI needs, thresholds, and other related systems today. And as you can see, I may have introduced a bug. Sorry Andrella...

In fact, it looks like a pretty minor glitch. I recently re-tooled the loot system to make it work with conditions a bit more smoothly, and in my haste to try it out, I caused all of the thresholds to apply their payloads all of the time, regardless of whether they were triggered. Should be just a matter of applying their amounts to the loot before applying the loot to the AI.

It's been a pretty busy day, though. A huge amount of stuff shifting under the hood, to make way for more AI depth and drama.

First of all, I finally got around to adding the rest of the stats. Up until now, I've had stats for:

• Achievement
• Altruism
• Autonomy
• BodyTemp
• Contact
• Defecate
• Esteem
• Family
• Food
• Friendship
• Intimacy
• Meaning
• Oxygen
• Privacy
• Security
• SelfRespect
• Sleep
• SleepComfort

Basically, a small sampling of the NEO Scavenger physical needs, plus a full suite of emotional needs (new in Ostranauts). Most of this was to get proof-of-concept working, and I had always intended to follow-up with the "rest" of the stats when the system was done.

Well, today, as I was thinking about how various character traits would affect needs, I hit this particular roadblock again. And rather than kicking the can down the road again, I finally added the remaining stats from NS, plus some new stats I wished I had in NS (* denotes a new one):

• Atrophy* - muscles/body wasting away due to low-g and/or lack of use.
• Blood - Red blood cell volume, same as NS.
• Encumbrance - Same as NS.
• Hydration - Same as NS.
• Hygiene - Cleanliness.
• Infection - Same as NS.
• Pain - Same as NS.
• Poison* - Non-disease toxins in body.
• Rest* - Fatigue, as opposed to sleep debt.
• Rads* - Radiation exposure.
• Satiety* - How hungry one feels, vs. actual malnutrition.

A couple of these are splitting the old NS stats into two or more new stats, since the old NS stats covered a couple of things. E.g. one needs a rest after sprinting, but not necessarily a nap.

Now that these are in place, I can finally start bringing over a lot of the conditions I've been meaning to from NS. Things like nausea, headaches, vomiting, etc. And I can start hoking them up with stats and other conditions.

Which brings me to another change: I realized I'm going to need certain conditions to chain-apply certain other conditions when received. E.g. when one gets the "headache" condition, it should apply pain stats, and maybe some others like a decrease in altruism.

As it turns out, my conditions already did this for sleep (sleeping would impart a negative sleep comfort per-hour to simulate waking up after "enough" sleep). The threshold system can do this, too, but some cases will make sense on every recipient, while others only apply to recipients with that particular threshold listener.

And yet another area I explored today was coping mechanisms. For each stat deficiency, AI should have some coping mechanisms to use.

Currently, we have about 1 or 2 for each stat, which is where you see things like push-ups for achievement, or chit-chat for social contact. These are, again, there as proof-of-concept.

In the final game, I'd like for there to be more to choose from. If an AI is stressed due to lack of security, there should be both healthy and unhealthy coping mechanisms for it to use. Selfless types might use charity or helping others to cope with anxiety, neat freaks might clean. Cruel types might "punch down" on weaker crew mates, while optimists might rationalize failures as for the better good.

This is more of a "hard" filtering that can be applied to branching decisions in the interaction chain. While a "softer" effect might be the thresholds being higher for certain trait/stat combos.

Overall, the desired effect is for certain AIs to feel like they have personalities, certain ways to deal with things, and somewhat predictable-yet-unique outcomes when presented with choices. And the bulk of the work just ahead of me is finally filling-in a lot of the blank data slots for things I laid out a long time ago.

https://bluebottlegames.com/content/iuh-sorry-about-tinah

I...Uh, Sorry About That, Tinah!

dcfedor
onMay 29, 2019

New stats...check.

New loss and heal rates...check.

New tickers...check.

New threshold rules...check.

New symptoms, ailments, and diseases...check.

Okay, let's just fire-up the old engine here...oh. Oh no. We have some problems. Aaand she's simultaneously dead, oppressed, and anxiety eating kung pao chicken packets. Whoopsies!

So it looks like we have a bit of debugging to do. And frankly, this is to be expected after any new injection of data. With something this huge (maybe 50-75 new conditions and data pieces), mere typos can cause cascading failures. And that's not to mention errors in my logic (particularly in converting NS stat values to new scales.)

The good news is that a lot of this appears to be "live" now, and it's likely just a matter of tuning the starting values for random crew. Also, making sure these fatal conditions actually dead-ify crew, instead of just making them play dead but continue to eat.

But it's cool seeing some of those new stat thresholds in play! Organ Failure, Hypovolemic Shock, Dehydration, Filthy, Septic Shock, Poison, and Bursting (Satiety) were all triggered by random starting stats going too high in their respective categories. And I can already see a bunch of stuff players will want to do when crew gets these. Things like showering, drinking, medicine, treatments, and even just plain old rest. The fun of managing biometrics in NS will live on here, in the midst of more wider-scope issues like crew relations, finances, and ship integrity!

edit.
https://bluebottlegames.com/content/my-old-friend-cholera

My Old Friend, Cholera

Spoiler

Hey Folks! The long process of porting NEO Scavenger's medical simulation over to Ostranauts continues today, as I add the first dozen or so conditions and their logic.

One of the things NEO Scavenger did pretty well was to model complex health issues, so I want to salvage as much of that as possible. Quite a lot of it will still apply to Ostranauts, as crew will still need to grapple with trauma, disease, and drugs. And while some diseases might be more uncommon in space than on post-apocalyptic Earth (Cholera), it's still useful for me to carry them over. I can verify the new system handles the range of effects I might need, and quite often, I can slightly alter certain effects to model other, newer ones.

So far, I have the list you see in today's image. And this means chain progression, stat effects, recovery effects, side effects, and everything else that's involved. And so far, it's mostly going smoothly. I have a few things that need adjusting to new scales in Ostranauts, but I can map pretty much one-to-one.

One particular shortcoming, though, I just noticed while finishing up cholera: my immune system recovery rate cannot go into negative values. I missed it while doing hepatitis, but the effects of those diseases were to invert the immune system recovery rate so the patient progressively got worse.

But my immune recovery rate just has a multiplier >=0. I can halt recovery, but not simulate degrading health.

It's possible I might need to have a few stats with negative counterparts, since nothing can go below 0 in the game. E.g. immune recovery rate might be 1.0, and immune degrade rate starts at 0, but can superceded recovery by becoming something like 2. And as long as the payload for degradation is a negative amount, 2x a negative will outpace 1x a positive, resulting in a net health degradation. (This also solves the problem of "lost" bonuses when a value crosses 0. E.g. if you have 3 and subtract 5 during a disease, and it cannot go below 0, the disease will restore 5 when done, leaving the patient with 5, or a net gain of +2.)

A lot of these subtleties were hidden in the NEO Scavenger codebase and data. Some real minefields to navigate!

Anyway, that's food for thought over the weekend. I have to check-out early tonight for a school function. And also, Monday is a holiday. So I'll see you all on Tuesday. Have a good one!

 

[thesheeep]

Why does every portrait look like the person is completely shocked and/or mouthbreathing?
It's ... quite silly. Just close their mouths

 

[oscar]

They're dead Jim

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Why does every portrait look like the person is completely shocked and/or mouthbreathing

Low G space is exhausting.

 

[Infinitron]

https://bluebottlegames.com/content/new-avatars-pov-changes-jobs-concept-art-and-stats

Hey Folks!

Time for another video, so I collected some new art and features we've been working on since last time.

So what's new?
New avatars! Plus ship roles, new captain-only POV, ailments, and more:

New Avatars, POV Changes, Jobs, Concept Art, and Stats

In this video, we take a look at the new avatars and animations, a change to the player's POV, new concept art for Hyun Lee Petware, the beginnings of a job and role system, and new physiological stats.

If this sounds interesting to you, please wishlist Ostranauts on Steam here. Wishlisting it will give me an idea how much interest there is in this game, and how much time I can spend on it.

And if you know anyone else who might dig this type of game, let them know! Spreading awareness is something everyone can do to help me continue to make games like this.

Thanks for your time, and stay tuned for more spacelife news!

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

https://bluebottlegames.com/content/social-combat-and-more-admin-work

"Social Combat" and More Admin Work

dcfedor
onJune 10, 2019
Hey Folks! Hope everyone had a good weekend. Beautiful weather here, and visiting friends pretty much all weekend. So a nice change of pace! I welcome the summer.

Unfortunately, a lot more administrivia for me to do today, as I answered emails, did more project planning, and generally try to course correct for the long term. However, Michael saves the day with a last-minute check-in of his recent work on "social combat!"

"Social combat" is sort of a phrase we've been using to describe the negotiations player has with AIs during certain situations. It stemmed from a conversation where we talked about NEO Scavenger's battle system as a fairly interesting tool for conflict resolution. And over time, has evolved to encompass some situations unique to Ostranauts, with the crew management system.

Basically, we envision certain situations where the player and the AI have incompatible goals, and need to resolve that difference. Could be with words, threats, actions, or tools. And in many ways, this feels a lot like the NS encounter screen mixed with the NS battle screen. We have skills (e.g. persuasion), contextual limitations (e.g. range, rank/authority, danger), tools (e.g. promotions, money), and other levers we can pull to steer the negotiation.

Verbal parrying, dodging, and attacks? Could be!

Anyway, today's screenshot is Michael's first step towards setting this up. An even happens (in this case, crew collapses on the floor), and the camera focuses on it, clears the UI, and adds letterbox to the screen. What happens next is still being determined, but it seems like this is where a local event gets sorted out. Possibly via a "social battle" UI.

We may also need to pause action on the ship so this doesn't annoyingly interrupt important stuff elsewhere. And allow diving out and back into this as it proceeds.

I think there's some potential for cool interactions and gameplay using a tool like this, so I'm excited to see where this goes!

 

[HeatEXTEND]

Moar stuff!

Any chance on a revamped NEO scavenger after this? This might be good an' all but Y U NO GIB MOAR NEO SCEVENGER

 

[dcfedor]

Any chance on a revamped NEO scavenger after this?

Good chance, yeah. I actually made an attempt at a revamped NS engine a while back, but had to put it on the shelf after hitting too many roadblocks. I'll probably take another kick at that can some day to wrest NS from the clutches of Flash.

And Gaben willing, Ostranauts will hopefully give me enough runway to fund whatever new thing comes next. NS2 is still on my list, and enough time has passed since NS1 that I'm looking forward to walking those well-worn halls again.

 

[HeatEXTEND]

wrest NS from the clutches of Flash

Honestly why not just FO2 the thing; Same pans but more of 'em, spice it up here an' there. Most importantly act like it's new and make some extra bank off the public.

Spoiler

pretty please

 

[dcfedor]

There's a not-small chance I can't make new builds of that old Flash engine these days. A chunk of the pipeline was stuff that doesn't exist anymore.

Which isn't to mention some of the limitations built into that old engine, due to using Flash. (E.g. being stuck using browser cookies to save data, lack of localization features, no GPU support, etc.)

I'll probably be ready to re-issue NEO Scavenger in a Unity engine right around the time Unity drops support of the engine and Apple forbids it from running on their OS

 

[Adidas-Clichèd Cringe]

Holy shit I loved NEO Scavenger and had no idea something like this was in the works. With this and Six Ages, perhaps 2019 won't be so shitty after all, video games-wise.

 

[LESS T_T]

https://bluebottlegames.com/content/social-combat-sneak-peek

Social Combat Sneak Peek

Hey Folks! Hope everyone had a good weekend. Apart from the spambotpocalypse Discord seemed to suffer, it was fairly low key for me.

Still more admin work this morning, involving banks, company annual reporting, and email. But once that was done, I was able to finally sync with Michael's work. And lucky you, you get a sneak peek!

What you see in today's screenshot is an early prototype of social combat. And if you're thinking, "where have I seen this before?" you're not alone Michael's been sort of salvaging pieces of the NEO Scavenger battle UI as a basis for this, so we have the familiar "us" on the left, and "them" on the right. We also have our actions available on the left.

Some differences, however, are that we now can see the full 2D situation, instead of the abstract 1D "range" of NS. The game is already played on a close-quarters 2D grid, so we might as well use it!

We also avoid the old "transfer items left to right and confirm to take an action" regime. This time, we're thinking you'll click whatever action you want from the available pool, then execute it. We might still need to allow for clicking multiple actions before executing, such as using a specific tool combined with an action. But we have yet to decide, and testing will help dictate that.

Michael's also experimenting with an "objective" system in here, seen above the "Player" portrait. At least in some cases, we'll be negotiating over some social objective, and "winning" the negotiation grants that objective.

And I think the purpose of the "Consequences" panel is to show what will happen as a result of the chosen action. I'm not convinced we need to see this explicitly, especially if there's a chance it could have different outcomes. But players should at least know what they are risking, and this might be the way to do that.

Still a ways to go before this thing is operational, though. Mostly placeholder text right now, and we literally kill one NPC to spawn the test UI It's a cool effect, though! The HUD fades out, we zoom in on the action, letterboxes fade-in, then we get the static-y portraits and UI, begging us to start captaining. I was eager to start clicking stuff the first time I saw it!

 

[thesheeep]

*sigh*
I love the updates, but the faces of those perpetually shocked mouth-breathers are so involuntarily funny I don't even

We might still need to allow for clicking multiple actions before executing, such as using a specific tool combined with an action. But we have yet to decide, and testing will help dictate that.

Do NOT do any drag&drop here like in Scavenger!

If there is an option that action A could be combined with B, C or D, I think you can go about it in two basic ways:
1. Once option A is clicked, show a new selection that boils down to "use action A... " "... on its own", "... with B", "... with C", etc.
2. Show all possible combinations from the get-go.

I think 1) is much better, as 2) might blow up the array of options too much.

Those two could also be combined by splitting action A into "Action A alone" and "Action A with..." - with the latter then opening a further selection.
Would blow up the list of options less and still allow a quick one-click action if the player wants to use A alone.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

Developer interview:
https://magazine.pacot.es/2019/06/2...lue-bottle-games-neo-scavengers-y-ostranauts/

...
. What can you tell us about the combat we will find in Ostranauts? Will it be similar to the one on NEO Scavenger, as an example to just picture it better?

Combat is something Michael and I are still figuring out, as it covers a few different scenarios.

One thing we’re currently experimenting with is what Michael has termed «social combat,» which is sort of like NEO Scavenger’s combat applied to conversations. There will be many situations where the player wants one thing, but an NPC has a different idea, and navigating that interaction to an acceptable outcome (or failing to do so!) is part of the game.

Physical combat *should* be able to exist within this structure, since NEO Scavenger’s «battle moves» are sort of the basis for all interactions in Ostranauts. E.g. «Us tackles them» works in pretty much the same way as «Us gives a pep talk to them» on a mechanical level.
They both just apply stats to a target.

Though I’m hoping we can evolve from NEO Scavenger’s abstract, one-dimensional position concept to something a bit more like a 2D grid.

Finally, ship-to-ship combat seems almost inevitable, though it’ll probably be a far cry from most first-person space sims. If I do manage to get around to it, I expect it to be more like a submarine simulator with lots of detection, posturing, and countermeasures.
...

 

[Infinitron]

https://bluebottlegames.com/content/social-combat-dismantling-ships-health-effects-and-new-art

Social Combat, Dismantling Ships, Health Effects, and New Art!

Hey Folks!

I'm past due for another video, so here's what we've been up to!

So what's new?
More art! Belly landers vs. tailsitters! A new conversational UI, dismantling ships, and heat stroke!

Social Combat, Dismantling Ships, Health Effects, and New Art

In this video, we take a look at Michael's latest work on social "combat," the newest salvageable ship equipment, some new ship tiles and pieces. Plus, we cook a crew member alive, learn how they see rooms, and check out Ashley's latest concept art!

If this sounds interesting to you, please wishlist Ostranauts on Steam here. Wishlisting it will give me an idea how much interest there is in this game, and how much time I can spend on it.

And if you know anyone else who might dig this type of game, let them know! Spreading awareness is something everyone can do to help me continue to make games like this.

Thanks for your time, and stay tuned for more spacelife news!

 

[Hellraiser]

I want to be an Ostranaut.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

https://bluebottlegames.com/content/social-combat-progress-and-contract-stuff

Social Combat Progress, and Contract Stuff

Hey Folks! I'm sort of bogged-down with contracts and agreement stuff today, so I'll take some time to show-off more of Michael's latest stuff: Social Combat!

Today's screenshot shows a few milestones along the path of a conversation between Captain Alyssa and Crew Eric. We start with the view of the ship and participants at the top of the screen, and I slice relevant changes into rows below that.

At the beginning, Alyssa goes first. Initiative currently controls who speaks first, which might alter the tone/direction of the conversation. I opt to use a "Greeting" on Eric, which we can see might set a more agreeable tone.

I don't show the next few results here, but Eric simply greets me in return, and I have initiative again. Then, I use Small Talk to get a temperature reading on Eric. I learn that he seems to be upset about something.

At one point, Eric goes off for a few turns just complaining over and over, and we end up with the next row where I show the result of another Small Talk. Eric is still upset about something, then complains to Alyssa.

Finally, I decide to make my Demand (not currently defined, just generic). The log shows a bark insulting Eric, and that he doesn't like it. But he accepts the demand anyway. And our remaining option is to end social combat.

If you've played NEO Scavenger before, this will look a bit familiar. It's the same overall system by design, and will hopefully allow all the things NEO Scavenger did, plus more social stuff now that we have it.

Simply clicking through this and seeing results is already engaging, and I can't wait to see more!

 

[Jimmious]

Hey thesheeep , the faces are finally normally relaxed

 

[thesheeep]

Hey thesheeep , the faces are finally normally relaxed

Though I do hope that there will be a shocked/retarded variant so that we can add them to our avatars.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

https://bluebottlegames.com/content/ostranauts-team-assemble

Ostranauts Team Assemble!

dcfedor
onAugust 12, 2019


Hey Folks! Hope everyone had a good weekend. Ours was a bit exhausting, as we acclimated to one parent not having a lot of mobility. We did get to see some friends, though, which is always nice!

Back at the office, I basically spent the day emailing developers and artists. Which was weird. I've never been in a position before where I had more than one or two contractors working at once. But today, I had messages waiting from no less than 5! And that doesn't include non-developers I had to follow-up with.

The bad news is that I didn't get anything done personally. The good news? A bunch of other people did!

First of all, Ashley's coming in hot with two new illustrations. One for Hangzhou, and one for Luna. And both are looking good. I will never tire of seeing new artwork for my games. And if I ever become rich enough, I'll just commission art, music, words, and games for my worlds endlessly.

And I probably haven't mentioned him yet, but Bjørn from Cujo Sound is officially helping with audio design! We chatted a whole bunch back in the NEO Scavenger days about sound and music in games, and he's agreed to help with setting up immersive audio for our little spaceship sim. Today's email was sorting out a rough plan for how we're going to modify sound effects based on environmental situations.

Also new to the team is an old buddy of mine from BioWare, Chris Blackbourn! Chris has a gamedev resume longer than my arm, including the aforementioned BioWare, Lionhead, Ubisoft, and his first published game, Skidmarks, when game systems still ran on 16-bits. He's helping with programming tasks of all kinds for the foreseeable future.

Michael is checking-in with his updates on social combat, plus a performance optimization he snuck in over the weekend.

Finally, I've started chatting with a contractor about possibly fixing the Android NEO Scavenger IAP bug, plus maybe seeing if he can take a crack at the desktop back-port of the mobile edition I tried to make last year. Not quite signed-on yet, but looking likely!

Anyway, what a day! I guess I feel less stressed about not doing work if work is still getting done. But it's still a bit stressful (not least because this means dollars are going away faster than usual). I think it's all for the greater good, though. That's what I'm telling myself, at least

 

[LESS T_T]

https://bluebottlegames.com/content/ostranauts-being-published-modern-wolf

Ostranauts Being Published by Modern Wolf!

Hey Folks, big news today! As some of you might have already noticed, a new publisher was announced today. And they're going to be publishing Ostranauts! Introducing, Modern Wolf:



This is actually not the first time I've worked with some of the folks at Modern Wolf. Some of you will remember me mentioning Fernando Rizo before, who helped with marketing both on NEO Scavenger mobile and Ostranauts planning. So it's no surprise that when Fernando offered to publish Ostranauts, I was all ears!

What does this mean for Ostranauts? Well, for one thing, it means I can get back to focusing on game development. With professionals managing the marketing and distribution, they'll not only do a better job than I, but I won't have to waste time on those tasks anymore.

They'll also be handling localization, which makes translations of the game a near certainty now. (Yay!) Plus, they'll be handling QA and providing general support wherever I need it.

I've been chatting with these folks for months now, and we're basically down to minor details in the contract. Can't wait to start running with the pack!