Weekly dev blog: back on track (Patreon)

First of all, let me thank everyone for their continued support so far. Things are going well for the Patreon itself, which isn't something to take for granted (and I certainly wasn't expecting it when I first started). I still wonder if I can do more/better, to make sure it keeps growing, but at least right now it's not a pressing concern. :)

As for this week, I tried to push harder than usual to recover the lost time (as I mentioned last time, things have been a little stormy in my life, but things are finally settling down again). Since I didn't have the time to take care of it mid-week, I'll show you some of the maps I have worked on lately now, so you can tell me what you think of them.

The one above is going to eventually become the new town you'll get to lord over (if you manage to become a noble, that is). I was worried about this tileset, and if it would mesh with rest of what I have, but actually it looks nice! If you notice a lot of events, it's because I'd like to have the town progressively look better if you do a good job helping it. I think It will also have a destroyed dock area you can fix at great expenses. I was even thinking of having it expand (like some cities do in Terranigma, if you ever played that one), but I don't know if that's overkill.

(This one will be your mansion as a noble, still working out some details on both maps).

This should be the throne room. I hope it looks as grandiose as it should. I get the impression it should be more narrow, but I think I got the general feeling right, what do you think? It still misses most NPCs and maybe some decorations, but I like the back wall.

I also changed the Temple in Tarkas, as well as slightly modified a piece of lore (I used to mention how Rahib is devoted to the Goddess, but with the water temple already there, it didn't seem right). Now it looks like a proper main temple, right? :D

There is some more stuff, but I don't want to drown you guys in maps. XD

Anyway, I finally worked out a way to make the damn mail system work as I want it to. This and the outside of the temple are example of hours wasted for little improvements, but boy does it feel good to have solved those! Now the game can remember which letters you have read (despite categorizing them properly, the script had some long-term memory issues, so to speak), and we can also get a nice visual aid when unread letters are in the mailbox (An arrow points at it). The outside of the temple took time because as you might have noticed it's larger than the original area, so I had to "transplant" it to a new map, and it involved some tedious work (hopefully no issues will arise because of this).

I have almost finished the quest I mentioned last week, and I also added a proper follow-up to the alchemy quest. Since the outcome of this quest will also play a role in the nobility path (earning you a vote among the noble councilmen who will decide on your noble title), it felt necessary. Basically, the idea for the path is save a noble's son to get a shot at the title, and then impress/blackmail/earn favors among the councilmen to secure the position. Some of your feats will impress the honest ones among them, while others might ask something of you... Or you might find ways to ask something out of them, instead!

I was hoping to get 8 nobles (+ the king) for this, but maybe 6 will be enough (so we don't need too much content to earn a majority of votes), we'll see. The kidnapping quest is coming along nicely, and it should take us around a couple of cities, as well as giving me a chance to introduce bad guys properly, and hint at some of the nefarious stuff going on in the background.

Anyway, I should probably cut this post short, as it's way too long! Expect a preview of the new art and some polls to pop-up in the very near future (possibly tomorrow), but for now, just relax (I know that's what I'll do!). Have fun! ^_^