I’ve almost run out of trivial improvements, and all unfinished features seem rather large. I take this as a sign to start wrapping the version 0.5.2 up, and continue other tasks in the next release. I should probably learn to make releases more often. It’s just that my methods are quite experimental and ineffective, so definition-of-done can be rather unclear. I also spend too much time on small bugs, which causes me to miss many of the more important ones. More frequent test sessions would certainly help with this.
But let me summarize the current situation:
- GUI and controller navigation works rather well, although 0.5.2 will probably have some minor issues still.
- I’ve refactored GUI widget objects/code, and cleaned up their appearance a little. Graphics will be finalized later; now I should be able to concentrate on them instead of constantly tweaking the functionality.
- Multiplayer selection screen is usable yet cumbersome. I will redesign the layout for 0.5.3.
- AI has already improved a lot since 0.5.1, but personalized opponents are not ready. Each one will have a portrait that, with my graphical skills, takes most of the time.
- I have a vague idea of how to improve the tutorial. It may even make it to 0.5.2.
- The game currently takes 1.5 gigabytes of disk space (0.5GB compressed). It isn’t all that much nowadays, but almost half of it consists of light and shadow maps that, honestly, don’t even make things look that much better. I’ll rebake those; very low resolution should suffice for darker scenes.
Away from home, without access to my dev machine, I won’t be jamming the thread with GIFs this time.
Have a happy whatever you’re celebrating! And if nothing, be happy anyways.