Celestial Intervention. Development Blog.1

In this short time there have been several important changes to the closed build of the game, as well as I just want to report on what is currently in development and possibly get feedback.

First of all, the system responsible for the work in the tavern has been completed. This is the foundation for all other work, which will allow you to understand how each of the jobs available to the player in the game will work. There are currently three jobs available to the player in one location, which will unlock as they grow in confidence from the tavernkeeper.

- At first, a very simple system will be available to the player. The character will serve a random number of tables (maximum 6 and minimum 1. The game randomly generates the number of occupied tables in this range and it directly depends on the time spent and earned tips. For example, 6 tables may take several game hours and add a few dozens of coins to your paycheck, but by serving only one table the player will still get paycheck and will have the opportunity to do something else that day). In addition to a random number of occupied tables, each table has 4 unique events tied to it (so there are 24 of them). The events reveal the peculiarities of a particular city, the culture of the locals, and some of them even raise questions;

- After a few weeks of working as a waitress, the player will be given the opportunity to work as a kitchen assistant. It all depends on the character's skills - if the character can cook, she will be allowed to help with cooking. If the character doesn't know how to do anything, she will probably be sent to the shop to get groceries and then asked to clean the kitchen. While cooking, the player will have to face the crafting system, creating dishes from a limited number of available ingredients. The player's payment will directly depend on the efficiency of work, if you cook all the dishes correctly - you will receive all the promised money. If you make a mistake or several mistakes - it will be deducted from the salary and it will damage the relationship with the tavernkeeper. In the second case it will be required to actually leave the tavern, go to the shop, buy the ordered ingredients and returning - to give them, along with the rest of the money that was given for the purchase. This will also have its own special possibilities (such as lying and keeping some of the money);

- After some more time of such work, the player will be able to clean the rooms of customers who continue to live in the tavern or have recently moved out. Basically, the player will have access to cleaning, when will have to choose what and how to clean, as well as the possibility to steal something from a customer.

The game now knows how to count relationships between the main character and characters who can give jobs. In addition, the game knows how to count the cooldown of job time, preventing the player from working non-stop. My goal with the jobs is to create as many unique jobs as possible to make it fun for the player to do. In addition, i expect in advance that the jobs can be used in some quests and will not remain just a way to make money. For example, work in the tavern can take part in quests. (e.g. meet a character in the hall while working as a waitress or give something to a tavern customer while cleaning his room or poison some food).

I'm currently developing:

- Skill System. The game will have a list of open skills that will be available to the player always, as well as hidden skills that will be opened as you achieve certain goals (training, a certain level of another skill, etc.). I'm currently working on creating all the skills available in the next public build, creating descriptions for them, and creating a balance. To give you a basic idea, a high level of unarmed combat will allow the character to deal more damage with her fists, as well as learn new types of attacks. A high level of cooking skill will allow her to create better food from available ingredients;

- Creating all available locations. I don't think there's any point in putting this off until i start doing a particular location. I already have the design document of all available locations ready and i just need to add them to the game. Locations include streets and buildings. Some streets can be multi-level (e.g. Residental Area in Causham city) or represent a single location (e.g. Market Street), as well as buildings - they can be simple and include one room, or they can be multi-storey with many rooms and characters in them. For example, a tavern would have three floors and more than ten rooms available to the player;

- Notification system. I'm going to add pop-up notifications for events like getting a new character status, a new skill level, and other things that might be important. These will simply be windows that pop up in the middle of the screen with information about the new change and a short note about where the details of the change are located (e.g. open the Stats window and select Skills);

- I want to add a preset of the future game economy. My plans for the game will include a live economy system that the player will be able to influence. In fact, the whole system will be very simple, but that makes it no less interesting. 

What do we have in the current version?

At the moment, merchant inventory is randomly generated every day cycle and is just a random list of items with no attachment to anything.

How would it look?

Each merchant will have their own full inventory including money, goods and personal items. Let's take the example of a tavern. First of all - the items the tavernkeeper sells will be stored on the kitchen shelves. You can steal a roast pheasant, but you're likely to be spotted, it will damage relations, and the tavernkeeper will report the crime to the guards. But if you manage to destroy (eat) that pheasant and you no longer have this item in your inventory - after your capture, the tavernkeeper will not get the item back and will not be able to sell it, which will damage his income. Let's move on to money. Each merchant in the game will get his own wallet. Some merchants will be able to buy up certain items they are interested in at their own prices. Some merchants will buy items from other merchants. In our example, the tavernkeeper will regularly buy groceries from Market Street merchants. The tavernkeeper will lose money, but he will gain groceries from which he will make dishes to sell. The Market Street merchant will lose groceries, but will get money for it. Next, this chain will go to the point where the Market Street merchant will buy groceries from local farmers to sell or he will be a farmer himself who sells his own produce. Back to the tavernkeeper. His earnings will be based on the margin he sets on his dishes. The idea is that cooked food restores more satiety than plain groceries. You yourself, or randomly generated customers will buy his meals and eventually eat them, taking them out of the game's economy. 

The most interesting thing about this mechanic is the player's ability to affect the course of things. That's exactly what makes a sandbox game a sandbox game. Going back to the same example. You can steal the tavernkeeper's money while he's sleeping and he'll have to deal with it some way. You can steal the finished product. You can steal plain groceries, which will prevent the tavernkeeper from cooking his meals and earning money. You can buy all the groceries from the Market Street merchant in the early morning before the tavernkeeper has time to do it himself, leaving him without groceries, and the street merchant will make his money but the tavernkeeper won't be able to cook. You can buy all the groceries already from the farmer, leaving everyone else in the chain without their money. You can burn down the farm and leave everyone with no money at all.

And there's an even more interesting part of this system. A character's personal inventory. In this personal inventory, characters will be able to buy items from other merchants that they would like for themselves. This could be various jewelry, weapons, clothing, other things. You will at any time have a theoretical possibility to get into the character's home and either steal the item he bought. In addition, some purchases may lead to special quest chains. For example, a non-player character buys a treasure map and offers to help your character find it (just an example). Or some character who is in love with your character buys a precious piece of jewelry for her.

Early on, i plan to add just the basic features from this whole system. The inventory for merchants is already ready, what's left is to add their wallet and the most basic interaction. (e.g. in early builds the Market Street merchant will get groceries out of nowhere, but the tavernkeeper will still buy them from him.)

This has been my development blog during this time. Thanks to everyone who has been following my game. If you like something - talk about it, i'll be truly happy. If you don't like something - say it too, mistakes are worth fixing at such early stages. I`m still actively developing the game and will continue to keep you updated as often as possible <3