This month saw the introduction of leaders to Advanced Tactics Gold with the release of the beta patch v2.12 (in the meantime already updated to v2.13). This month also saw the release of beta patch v1.05(c) for Decisive Campaigns : Case Blue. I think Case Blue is really stable now and if you haven’t got it yet you might want to jump in :)
Sadly I did not spent as much time on development this month as I’d like. The holiday season and the seasonal festivities (read: social life) really put a dent into the hours worked. However I did make some further progress on the “Mystery Project”. Its is slowly approaching a state where almost all core features are in and functioning. Soon i’ll have to flesh things out by adding more units, details and do some actual rules & balance fine-tuning in order to work towards a fully playable alpha version. I would really like to tell some more but this projects future is still not 100% sure so I am going to stay secretive for a little while longer. One thing I can say is that it is not an easy feat to develop a completely new engine from scratch. Another thing is that I think that if I get all my ideas and code together it will be quite an original game.
The majority of my time is invested in the new mystery project, but I hope to have at least 1 day a week available to work on ATG/DC patches and maybe even a new DC title. I am not sure yet, but I mentioned in the Case Blue forums that I am considering working on a new DC game doing Operation Barbarossa. For now don’t read this as a promise though, but as a wish. Time is something that is increasingly scarse.
I hope you all had a merry christmas and a good end of the year!
Best regards,
Vic
Beta patch v2.12 has been made availble for Advanced Tactics. For the first time since People’s Tactics commanders make an appearance again in random games. This new feature will require a lot of testing and balancing, but I am confident that with help of all the AT players this will not be a big problem.
This month I finally promoted the DC: Case Blue v1.04 beta patch to gold status. In the meantime I have been spending a fair ammount of time on the new “mystery project” and a very early internal alpha seems likely for end of the year. Furthermore I have been spending some more time on a big new feature patch v2.12 for Advanced Tactics Gold. The coding is already finished and just waiting for a few graphics and then the commanders and the officerpool will make their entrance for ATG in the next v2.12 patch. These last days of the month I am trying to finish up another patch for Case Blue fixing some balance issues and small bugs. But after the Case Blue v1.05 patch i’ll start work on v1.06 which is scheduled to include a brand new intermediate editor to help scenario designers make new content for Decisive Campaigns.
Although I cannot say much about the next game engine I am working on I would like to say that progress is going slow but good. I think I have been on it now for 2 months and I feel like I have something really special on my hands if it all works out as I envision. It just has a good feeling to it. And I think its important the simple things feel right: Moving your units, doing attacks, etc… So far I have mostly been working on engine stuff like 3D card accelerated 2D graphics, animation and all sort of basic coding. Today I was working on seemless PBEM replays and AI turn watching. I am trying to get an alpha version as quick as possible, then get more people on board, first some graphics people and as quickly as possible some alpha testers. I try to focus on the basics of the engine, GUI and gameplay first and then move to detailing everything. Again excuse me for not telling much about the gameplay itself, but I want to make some more progress first.
