I now have assistance from both Chris and Hananas, and I have really been happy with what they've been sending my way. The instruction manual that I've laid out is receiving some touch ups by Hananas, and Chris is preparing some hand-drawn art to insert. Here's a sample.
Unfortunately, the instruction manual requires a few changes here and there. But, this is a good thing for the game. Reworking a little bit of the gameplay is giving a better gaming experience to the player. One of the biggest changes is the removal (actually replacement) of a building. RIP Storage Buildings.
The Storage Buildings were a place to stockpile excess food and water during the game. As design decisions altered the game, it made the usefulness of this building lessen. If you look at my Design Scans page, and look at my earliest sketches, you'll see that the Storage Buildings were there from the beginning. Kinda sad. There are still 10 building types in the game though. Taking the place of Storage Buildings is the brand new Scholar Temple. The Scholar Temple will help with faster research in the game. I am definitely liking the new addition. I now have the Scholar Temple fully implemented with new building graphics. I plan on re-releasing the demo soon, and the Scholar Temple will be there, along with bug fixes, and the new Battle Casualty screen, etc (all the updates that I've had on my blog since the original demo release).
Here's what has been happening lately:
- Box & Manual work is being done
- The cursor in Battle View now 'pulses' for better visibility (while this was a small change, I am extremely happy with what it does for the game)
- When an enemy is destroyed, any other commanders that were en route to fight that enemy are auto-cancelled and start their journey home.
- Archers, Knights, Swordmen, and Wizards can now damage the wall in battles. Earlier, only the catapults could damage it.
- Brand new feature (thanks to input from arch_8ngel) - every level will include hidden Gold that can be discovered by Scouts. Three random locations in World View are chosen at the start of each level.
- The method of adding troops to a Battle Party has been changed. I really like this change, and I liked it even more that the code 'almost' worked immediately after putting it in. Adding a change like this in one night is quite an accomplishment for me
- Battles will continue to be tested and troop values will continue to be updated for a little bit before the second demo gets released.