Hey there!
Its been another month and time for an update from the developer - aka me :)
This past month I have started on various big changes to the game. The main focus is of cause still to add multiplayer - however there are a bunch of related things that I'm currently working on.
Keep in mind that I am here talking about things I am working on at the moment. You won't have access to these until the next open beta + they might have changed before we get to that.
Just want to make that clear, so you do not expect to see this in the game right now.
Upgrade to Unity 2022 LTS
For players this might be a bit of a boring thing, however, for the game long term, its a big deal.
From my experience in previous projects, I know it's very important to try and keep up with Unity versions as much as possible. If you first get too far behind, it can be a nightmare to get back up to speed, resulting in the game never getting to latest Unity version.
So why is it important to be on the latest version of Unity?
Unity keeps developing their game engine. This means both features, stability and performance.
So by staying up to get the game get a lot of stuff for free and it gives various possibilities to do new thing via new features in Unity.
So will you as a player feel this upgrade right a way...maybe or maybe not. I haven't done any measurements, but it "feels" a bit faster in terms of load times.
However, what you will feel is a "side-effect" up this upgrade, as I had to change the "Player controller".
New Player Controller
The Player Controller in the game, is essential the logic that determines how the player character behaves and move around when you press a button or move the mouse.
The one I am currently using in the game (as of August 2023) is the same old Unity "Standard" one that I have been using from day one of the game.
As you know, it have worked fairly well and done a good job so far. However, there have all along been some major downside with it, essentially that it was very hard to customize and make changes to.
For instance, this is the reason there are currently no "Crouch" function in the game, no fly-mode etc. Its not that it wasn't possible, but it was unnecessarily complicated to get it to work, so I noted to myself to replace sometime in the future.
The time is now - because upgrading to Unity 2022 LTS broke the old Player Controller. Well, I could maybe have gotten it to work, but as it was one the todo to replace anyway, I decided that now was the time.
It's how to explain, but the player "feels" a bit different to control now, for the better if you ask me, but there might be a bit of getting use to the new feeling.
When that said, this new Player Controller makes it a lot easier for me to add various new features, like Crouching, 3rd person (we get to that next), players being affected by explosions so you are actually pushed back or into the air, if the explosion is powerful enough, multiplayer footsteps etc.
This is for sure something you will feel - so you can look forward to that in the future.
Animated player characters
(YouTube link to above short video)
One of the extra challenges of adding multiplayer, is that you can now see each other.
As you might know, so far I have added some fancy glasses and hats to the default white "bean".
That has been working fine so far, but in the long run the bean might be a bit too boring.
Therefore, I have now started looking into adding more real characters with animations etc.
Also as part of the new Player Controller, I am working on adding 3rd person perspective, as I will now have to have animated characters anyway, so you might as well be able to play like that.
Not 100% sure if it's something that I will keep, depends on if it ends up good enough, but my tests so far is going really great.
None of the above is done, it is all work in progress and not always working as expected as you can see...
Stay tuned!
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- Enjoy!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1079260/Fireworks_Mania__An_Explosive_Simulator/
