Silk: Wilderness Adventures

Experimenting with FOV

For a couple of months now, there's been some experimentation with the field of vision in Silk. The demos at the moment have 30 degree FOV, but this makes turns rather motion sickness inducing, and limits peripheral vision. Because we're rendering in three dimensions, we can't go above 90 degrees, and even at 80 degrees the game starts looking quite 'fish eye'.

We are currently experimenting with 60 degree FOV, which looks like a significant improvement all around, but implementing this requires tweaking all the interface elements so will have to wait until we're a little further along with battle.

Towards Battle!

The implementation of battle proceeds apace, and we have more-or-less completed the Skirmish script, leaving the Parlay and Retreat scripts still to go. We also have a template for Troop display (mock up to the left) and are just ironing out the movement paradigm since a lot of the tactical play of the War Destinies flows from this.

Meanwhile, the map expansion proceeds afoot... we have some of the new tile sprites and most of a rough cut map, and should have Parthian territory up and running before May. Also, we have variations on the tile palette for all the territories of the game, although they need testing in-game yet.

On the road towards Beta now... after Battle, it's just Map, and Save to go!

Compass Readings

The team has been plotting the course of development this week. We're working primarily on the Battle systems, but we don't have a Troop design we're happy with and that's holding us up slightly. We also looked at a quick and dirty way to get the map up and running, but it would have only displayed the map of the visible terrain, which is not enough, so this has been put back until after Battle is up and running. I suspect this work will run into May.

New Silk Demo

There's a new Silk demo! It adds an inventory bar that shows which goods will be gained and lost in each choice, Exp notifications and level up events, Encounter notifications, new 'treasure' Encounters and a lot of additional sound effects. Download the PC version by clicking the Silk demo 005 link.

We're sending this demo to the publishers who expressed an interest in Silk at GDC, and if we sign to one this might be the last version of the demo we can share publicly, so it's worth taking a look. Many thanks to all the Kickstarter backers who provided feedback - you'll find many of your concerns addressed here.

Here's the complete change list:

• Icons now show on the Advisor text box when an item or items are affected by the choice (red is a negative effect, blue is positive)
• Improved script efficiency in certain areas to avoid hang times
• Organised the visual language folder a bit
• Fixed a bug where the player could activate the advisor screen mid roster transition, this would cause the advisor to be stuck on screen unless a mouse drag intervenes
• Added a missing AND to the silver script
• Added goods icons to advisor UI
• Added tutorials for Walking, Roster, Entering towns, town roster and trade menu
• Updated various silk speak scripts
• Fixed some issues with the notification system
• Added Exp notifications
• Added Sounds that trigger upon entering a shrine or temple
• Added Sounds for Encounters
• Added Loot function
• Updated Tutorial so player cannot move at the beginning until they open the roster
• Cleaned up the Audio folder
• Added Lost traveller and lost wagons encounters
• Encounter Notification Animation (Blue for horses and camels, red for bandits and wolves)
• Level up animation Notification
• Mossy Ruins and Ruins encounters added
• Map fixes
• Main Menu spelling mistake fixed
• Added Destiny goal to 1st Advisor Description
• Updated Map code to detect Errors in map better
• Added night SFX
• Added a slight fade to Storms and night SFX so they don't abruptly stop
• Added 3 day death penalty for no provisions
• Fixed a bug where the CampingScript would trigger twice when queued up with other events
• Updated Destiny screen tutorial text
• Added extended tutorial text that triggers after the player has opened the roster in a town, a carvanserai and out in the field
• Updated LevelUp anim so it isn't partially see-through
• Fixed a double AND in the Provisions script
• Fixed a bug where an NPC would soft-lock the game if they couldn't find a path
• Added triggers for Success SFX to Gains of Horses+Camels and Failure SFX if they +0
• LevelUps now trigger Success SFX
• Advisor Roster updates Advisor Skills whenever the Roster is opened outside of a settlement
• Fixed a bug where the player would be notified of exp gains even if they got 0 exp
• Fixed a bug where selecting Destiny 4 would soft-lock the game because Goals weren't set up correctly
• Trade checks weight to make sure you can carry the goods
• Buying at auctions will no longer affect settlement stocks
• Narration at shrines happens after SFX
• Levelup Anim is longer, hangs on last frame for a while before vanishing
• PlebMode, if activated starting advisors and new hires will start with 3 exp from levelup in every skill
• Fixed some issues with NPCs not facing towards the player
• Fixed an issue with the map missing off the last character in every row
• Encounter and Levelup anims now appear at the top layer of the canvas

Personal Portraits

Now that the Kickstarter is complete, we need to start work on the full set of portraits. If you backed a Personal Portrait, we'll be in touch with you over the next week or so to request a head shot photograph to use as the inspiration for the portrait, and to get your preferences for Class and Culture. We'll do our best to get everyone a combination they're happy with, but we'll be giving first pick to the backers who supported the project earliest.

If you pledged for Unlimited Choice, you get your choice whatever happens, and we'll contact you very soon, so get your chosen head shot photograph ready!

Look out for the email if you are a Personal Portrait backer, and please get back to us as soon as you can with your picture and preferences.

Thanks in advance, and of course - thanks for backing us in the first place!

 

New Demo Forthcoming...

A new demo is in production and should be available next week... Amongst other things, it will have a bar to show the consequences of choosing any given Advisor plan, it will show experience earned in the messaging system, and it should also have the Encounter notifications and audio fanfares.

Also, apologies to Alpha testers for the slow turnaround on your feedback. We are going to move to a more comprehensive QA process soon.