Vapourware Zodiac Legion - X-COM and dungeons

[ERYFKRAD]

Wow I can actually tell Aries, Capricorn and Taurus apart now.

 

[cyborgboy95]

In some castles, the sanitation tower was designed to be the last bastion of the defenders. In @zodiaclegion, you can also bring the fight to the latrines.

 

[The Wall]

Shit keeps getting better. Is this published by MicroProse?

 

[Serus]

In some castles, the sanitation tower was designed to be the last bastion of the defenders. In @zodiaclegion, you can also bring the fight to the latrines.

This is paying attention to small details that makes games memorable. I'm not even joking. Keep it up.

 

[Iluvcheezcake]

When is the release date and is the game coming to GoG?
Paging mr Galdred

 

[Galdred]

Shit keeps getting better. Is this published by MicroProse?

No, we still remain independent so far.

This is paying attention to small details that makes games memorable. I'm not even joking. Keep it up.

Thank you!We wanted to have all the bricks required for a functional castle, but funnily, the latrine was one of the first room props we got, because the hearth, forge and boiling cauldron all required more work.

When is the release date and is the game coming to GoG?
Paging mr Galdred

The release date had to be pushed back because of how little geoscape there is at the time. We plan to release in EA in early 2023, but I am still not 100% sure about early access, given how these get perceived on Steam.
The game is definitely coming to GoG. We got their approval, so I only need to setup the page now.

 

[The Wall]

Don't be afraid to do Steam Early Access, if you need early cash. User feedback is different thing. Unlike money, not all user feedback is good. Gotta be filtered. All in all, excited for Zodiac Legion!

 

[Skdursh]

Giving this a try for the first time. It uh, does not seem to play well with 4K monitors. The initial screens don't scale to fit the available space and the text is so small as to be unreadable. Gonna try to power through this bit to see if the actual gameplay is properly attuned, but if not I'm going to have to shelve this until it has proper scaling.

Edit: Played for a bit. Got through what I assume was most of a dungeon. After ending my turn the computer sat doing nothing for it's turn for about 7 minutes until I finally figured it wasn't going to fix itself and I quit the game. It seems fun, but definitely needs a lot of work before I'd be willing to give it another spin. Oh, and apparently I killed the guy I was supposed to rescue. WOULD HAVE BEEN GREAT IF HIS SPRITE WASN'T THE EXACT SAME ONE AS USED FOR PROBABLY A DOZEN OF THE ENEMIES I HAD JUST KILLED AND HIS HEALTH BAR WASN'T RED LIKE EVERY OTHER FUCKING ENEMY AND INSTEAD BLUE LIKE, I DUNNO, AN ALLY.

 

[Galdred]

Don't be afraid to do Steam Early Access, if you need early cash. User feedback is different thing. Unlike money, not all user feedback is good. Gotta be filtered. All in all, excited for Zodiac Legion!

Thank you! Some other devs I talked to told me they felt like the Steam alorithm had buried them as soon as they launched into EA(and several events won't accept an already released game, even if it is only in EA). It is a risky proposition, because it can kill your momentum as a dev, but it seems to be a non issue with a good launch.

 

[Galdred]

Giving this a try for the first time. It uh, does not seem to play well with 4K monitors. The initial screens don't scale to fit the available space and the text is so small as to be unreadable. Gonna try to power through this bit to see if the actual gameplay is properly attuned, but if not I'm going to have to shelve this until it has proper scaling.

Edit: Played for a bit. Got through what I assume was most of a dungeon. After ending my turn the computer sat doing nothing for it's turn for about 7 minutes until I finally figured it wasn't going to fix itself and I quit the game. It seems fun, but definitely needs a lot of work before I'd be willing to give it another spin. Oh, and apparently I killed the guy I was supposed to rescue. WOULD HAVE BEEN GREAT IF HIS SPRITE WASN'T THE EXACT SAME ONE AS USED FOR PROBABLY A DOZEN OF THE ENEMIES I HAD JUST KILLED AND HIS HEALTH BAR WASN'T RED LIKE EVERY OTHER FUCKING ENEMY AND INSTEAD BLUE LIKE, I DUNNO, AN ALLY.

Sorry, I introduced a bug making opponents turn freeze lately, when I changed the way the AI handles doors. I had fixed most of these issues, but not all apparently. I'll have a look tomorrow.
Good point about the ally. I need to make its bar and look more distinct, and prevent accidentally killing him.

As for 4K, I'll work on adding UI scaling next time I do some UI work. It is a big issue indeed on non-giant 4K monitors.

 

[Galdred]

Giving this a try for the first time. It uh, does not seem to play well with 4K monitors. The initial screens don't scale to fit the available space and the text is so small as to be unreadable. Gonna try to power through this bit to see if the actual gameplay is properly attuned, but if not I'm going to have to shelve this until it has proper scaling.

Edit: Played for a bit. Got through what I assume was most of a dungeon. After ending my turn the computer sat doing nothing for it's turn for about 7 minutes until I finally figured it wasn't going to fix itself and I quit the game. It seems fun, but definitely needs a lot of work before I'd be willing to give it another spin. Oh, and apparently I killed the guy I was supposed to rescue. WOULD HAVE BEEN GREAT IF HIS SPRITE WASN'T THE EXACT SAME ONE AS USED FOR PROBABLY A DOZEN OF THE ENEMIES I HAD JUST KILLED AND HIS HEALTH BAR WASN'T RED LIKE EVERY OTHER FUCKING ENEMY AND INSTEAD BLUE LIKE, I DUNNO, AN ALLY.

In which mission and on what turn did the infinite turn happen?
Did you experience awfully long AI turns before (like more than 2 minutes)?
As for the skeleton prisoner (and any future prisoner for that matter), maybe I will make it trigger joining the party as soon as he is in the LoS of a friendly character.

 

[Skdursh]

Giving this a try for the first time. It uh, does not seem to play well with 4K monitors. The initial screens don't scale to fit the available space and the text is so small as to be unreadable. Gonna try to power through this bit to see if the actual gameplay is properly attuned, but if not I'm going to have to shelve this until it has proper scaling.

Edit: Played for a bit. Got through what I assume was most of a dungeon. After ending my turn the computer sat doing nothing for it's turn for about 7 minutes until I finally figured it wasn't going to fix itself and I quit the game. It seems fun, but definitely needs a lot of work before I'd be willing to give it another spin. Oh, and apparently I killed the guy I was supposed to rescue. WOULD HAVE BEEN GREAT IF HIS SPRITE WASN'T THE EXACT SAME ONE AS USED FOR PROBABLY A DOZEN OF THE ENEMIES I HAD JUST KILLED AND HIS HEALTH BAR WASN'T RED LIKE EVERY OTHER FUCKING ENEMY AND INSTEAD BLUE LIKE, I DUNNO, AN ALLY.

In which mission and on what turn did the infinite turn happen?
Did you experience awfully long AI turns before (like more than 2 minutes)?
As for the skeleton prisoner (and any future prisoner for that matter), maybe I will make it trigger joining the party as soon as he is in the LoS of a friendly character.

I was playing the mission where you are supposed to rescue the guy from the prison cell. I killed him about halfway through exploring the map and didn't realize that that was the dude I was supposed to rescue until I went around the rest of the map and realized there weren't any other doors or areas to explore. I had one longish wait prior to the one I quit on. I believe that the final wait happened after I had likely already killed all the enemies on the map and the game just didn't seem like it knew what to do when it was its turn because either it had no units left to move or because the units weren't able to figure out a path to my position. Also, if the mission is to rescue that guy and they die or the player kills them shouldn't that have prompted some sort of fail state that ends the mission or at least informs the player that they fucked up?

 

[Galdred]

Giving this a try for the first time. It uh, does not seem to play well with 4K monitors. The initial screens don't scale to fit the available space and the text is so small as to be unreadable. Gonna try to power through this bit to see if the actual gameplay is properly attuned, but if not I'm going to have to shelve this until it has proper scaling.

Edit: Played for a bit. Got through what I assume was most of a dungeon. After ending my turn the computer sat doing nothing for it's turn for about 7 minutes until I finally figured it wasn't going to fix itself and I quit the game. It seems fun, but definitely needs a lot of work before I'd be willing to give it another spin. Oh, and apparently I killed the guy I was supposed to rescue. WOULD HAVE BEEN GREAT IF HIS SPRITE WASN'T THE EXACT SAME ONE AS USED FOR PROBABLY A DOZEN OF THE ENEMIES I HAD JUST KILLED AND HIS HEALTH BAR WASN'T RED LIKE EVERY OTHER FUCKING ENEMY AND INSTEAD BLUE LIKE, I DUNNO, AN ALLY.

In which mission and on what turn did the infinite turn happen?
Did you experience awfully long AI turns before (like more than 2 minutes)?
As for the skeleton prisoner (and any future prisoner for that matter), maybe I will make it trigger joining the party as soon as he is in the LoS of a friendly character.

I was playing the mission were you are supposed to rescue the guy from the prison cell. I killed him about halfway through exploring the map and didn't realize that that was the dude I was supposed to rescue until I went around the rest of the map and realized there weren't any other doors or areas to explore. I had one longish wait prior to the one I quit on. I believe that the final wait happened after I had likely already killed all the enemies on the map and the game just didn't seem like it knew what to do when it was its turn because either it had no units left to move or because the units weren't able to figure out a path to my position. Also, if the mission is to rescue that guy and they die or the player kills them shouldn't that have prompted some sort of fail state that ends the mission or at least informs the player that they fucked up?

It is supposed to be the case, but maybe it only happens if the AI kills him. I will rework it, thank you for your help!

 

[Galdred]

Skdursh I changed the color bar to the prisoner to blue. I also made it impossible to target him and made his death a lose condition even before he gets recruited (before, you had to recruit him, then get him killed to lose).
I'm still trying to find the origin of the AI halting. I could only reproduce it once, but I didn't find anything useful in the logs.
I'll update the demo once it is done.

 

[cyborgboy95]

 

[Galdred]

Thank you!
Regarding the AI halting, I identified a few issues, but I need to test more to determine whether it still happens or not.
Since I switched to threaded calculations during AI turn, I don't get error messages whenever I get an error, so I missed quite a few of them.
What made the AI cycle endlessly was having a friendly character block its target opponent or door.
It should be fixed this week-end, but if I fail to do so, I won't be able to change things before a few days, as I'm relocating back to France next week (which will be the 3rd relocation for the game!).

 

[Galdred]

Thank you!
Regarding the AI halting, I identified a few issues, but I need to test more to determine whether it still happens or not.
Since I switched to threaded calculations during AI turn, I don't get error messages whenever I get an error, so I missed quite a few of them.
What made the AI cycle endlessly was having a friendly character block its target opponent or door.
It should be fixed this week-end, but if I fail to do so, I won't be able to change things before a few days, as I'm relocating back to France next week (which will be the 3rd relocation for the game!).

This should be fixed now, but I didn't have time to test the latest build much. I killed everyone, and I didn't get any AI turn freeze.

 

[Galdred]

I fixed the bugs with AI not opening "alarmLocked" doors. AlarmoLock is a system I put to prevent AI characters from opening some doors unless the alarm threshold was passed. This allowed them not to all charge from the beginning of the mission, without having them be too passive.
However, now that it has been solved, I need to rebalance all levels, because I was constantly chased by AI groups over the whole level after the fix (which also made the need for teleporters appear more critical, because half of the level was resultingly empty after the defenders had left their area to support their engaged comrades.

We will soon switch to semi randomized levels (I just need to make doors be replaced with walls on the edges of the map, and find a good way to have keys and levers always be accessible before or at the same time as the area they open).

 

[Galdred]

 

[cyborgboy95]

 

[Galdred]

https://steamcommunity.com/app/812910/eventcomments/3455968050319509686/

AI in Zodiac Legion and Tiny Teams festival update
Greetings commanders,
First of all, we updated the demo build, but the changes are mostly under the hood. However they should have a big impact on the flow and balance of the maps :

Changes

• Alarm locked doors have been added to all maps
• AI groups also have an alarm lock level now
• AI groups will now reinforce each other and seek the player party once the alarm threshold is passed and they become active. They will also open doors that have an alarm lock level lower than the current alarm level.

Fixes

• Some minor AI turn crashes have been fixed (it happened when pressing TAB during AI turn, after all the AI parties had been played, but not all animations had been processed).

This update is the perfect occasion to introduce our vision for the AI, and the general pacing of the levels in Zodiac Legion. One thing we wanted to avoid was to have the player party jump from one micro-encounter to the next. We wanted the whole dungeon to feel like a coherent battlefield, but it was not possible before, as the AI was not authorized to open doors.

But we also wanted to avoid all AI groups leaving their initial positions to charge the heroes' staging area, so the compromise we have found was to add alarm lock levels to some groups and doors.
Once the alarm level is higher than the alarm lock, the groups will become active, and be allowed to leave their area in order to engage the player party. They are not omniscient, but they will reinforce a group engaged in battle, or move to one of the previous known locations of the party to seek them. They can also reinforce objectives instead of looking for your party.

This means that the alarm level is not only about adding reinforcement to the map, but it also represents the AI groups present getting a higher readiness level, and taking more initiative as it becomes clear that it is a major attack.

The next upgdate will teach the AI how and when to deal with blocking objects. This will allow us to add the ice wall spell you can see in the trailer without trivializing the levels.
The AI will also be able to use active props too. It won't open chests to deny them, but they will use things like the thunderstrike capacitors against your party (the AI can already do that, but it is still very erratic, and the probability of an AI character doing so is pretty low at the moment).

We are also working on setting level wide priorities for the AI (defending a given objective, regrouping somewhere, going after a given character), and the low level tactical considerations, like teaching it to use and deny formation, and protecting its backline because AI archers can be a bit suicidal now, especially if they don't have enough melee friends to protect them).

We will also introduce more active terrain items, like teleporter pairs, but we'll cover active terrain elements in a following update.

Zodiac Legion will also be part of the Tiny Teams festival this week (but the game should not be covered on the stream).

Thank you for your support, and may the stars shine on you.

 

[Haba]

Ugh, that teleport animation looks kinda geh, tbf. And the sword points out of the pokeball.

Maybe make it translucent or something.

Also RE the hammertime video, does the game actually recognize being thrown against an obstacle?

 

[Galdred]

Ugh, that teleport animation looks kinda geh, tbf. And the sword points out of the pokeball.

Maybe make it translucent or something.

Also RE the hammertime video, does the game actually recognize being thrown against an obstacle?

Good point, I need to make the character appear later inside the pokeball.
Throwing someone against an obstacle or character will make him "bounce" back, and cause 1 damage to him, but maybe it would be better if it could destroy the lighter obstacles?

 

[Haba]

Throwing someone against an obstacle or character will make him "bounce" back, and cause 1 damage to him, but maybe it would be better if it could destroy the lighter obstacles?

Yes, any degree of interactivity is a plus, it makes the game feel less like a flat chess board. Of course in an ideal world we'd also have unique (death) animations for that..

If a character is thrown against a character, does the other character also take damage?

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Throwing someone against an obstacle or character will make him "bounce" back, and cause 1 damage to him, but maybe it would be better if it could destroy the lighter obstacles?

Yes, any degree of interactivity is a plus, it makes the game feel less like a flat chess board. Of course in an ideal world we'd also have unique (death) animations for that..

If a character is thrown against a character, does the other character also take damage?

Only if he misses