AeroMogul Update #12 (2023/11/21) (Patreon)

Greetings Everyone,

While waiting for the GearCity Milestone #2 artwork to finish, I've been working on AeroMogul. Since the last update, I've completed the Quick Route Information panel. The game displays this panel when the player clicks on an existing route from the world map. It contains the selected company's schedule and details about selected flights. When the player controls the flight, this panel will eventually have additional features that allow you to change prices without opening the Full Route Panel. From a developer standpoint, I can now check individual route data without digging through thousands of lines of text logs.

The game also now displays what tasks the server is doing in the background. This feature is helpful for me at this stage to avoid having to bounce back and forth between virtual machines to check processing status. 

I've also fleshed out the Building and Financial side panels in preparation for the 'Create A New Company' GUI and functionality. Some of these side panel options may not make it into the game. 

Internally, the game now has an individual savegame account login system. When a player connects to a multiplayer game not hosted by our network, they must create a local account for that save game. They'll also need to log into the account when reconnecting to the save game. These accounts can be password protected (although, at this time, passwords are not encrypted. That will change before this feature becomes public.) In-game Companies/Players are associated with an account  

Players will not need this feature for single-player or VENT-hosted multiplayer games. However, for Hotseat, LAN, and off-network online multiplayer, you'll use this feature to protect your Company/Players from peer sabotage.

I'm currently working on the internal data structures for individual nations. I need this information in the 'Create A New Company' system to filter airports. It will also have many uses elsewhere in the game. Once this is complete, I will finish the 'Create A New Company' UI and work on the internal systems for founding a company. Beyond that, I will begin fleshing out several features we already have in place, such as aircraft procurement, route creation, etc. And start adding more advanced features, such as time-based scheduling and slot negotiations. These latter two features will also require some AI work. But at that point, we should somewhat have a game.

In GearCity News, some progress has been made with the new artwork, although it's taking much more than I hoped. Serhey is hoping to make some progress this weekend. Once he completes a vehicle in the new system, things should move faster as he'll have a base to work with. I hope to share some images with the next FBS fundraising update. With Milestone #3 funded next month, we'll likely be skipping the artwork requirement for Milestone #4 since Serhey is not complete with Milestone #2 yet. 

That's all for now, the next update should be in about 10-14 days! Until then.