Home By The River Update 6

These updates apply to both the demo and full versions of the game:

• Thanks to StarlightRemix for making awesome soundtracks for HBTR! All soundtracks in the game are now original works by StarlightRemix.
• Holding down left shift and then left clicking/dragging will build a solid wall immediately. Both background and foreground layers are filled in. This makes construction much more fluid and is also great for building defence drone walls fast.
• You now get a gift box added to your inventory for every 12 tiles placed. You can open the gift box from your inventory and see what random item you get!
• Your pet now talks from time to time and may give you some prompts on what you can be doing.
• I’ve added a second tougher drone. Drones will demolish the entire plant or tree when they contact a plant or tree tile. I’ve added a warning dialogue that appears at 2pm on the first day that tells the player that a drone swarm will come every night at 10pm.
• You can now place a defensive wall tile that will do considerable damage to any drone that demolishes the wall. It is just like a wall/floor etc. tile and it is the very first tile in the construction menu. You can place them in the background and foreground for maximum damage against drones.
• I’ve added a lightning rod workbench so the player can now upgrade the power of their lightning rod!
• I’ve made hoverboard pulse modules more expensive with each upgrade. It was too easy to max out the hoverboard.
• Commodities now have a demand attribute so sugar is no longer the most valuable commodity. The demand of a commodity fluctuates and its value follows that demand accordingly. This makes trading with the trading desk more interesting and all commodities have their own worth I think.
• Whenever you use an object in game such as the stove, the game will now autosave. This will help prevent players losing progress. The autosave won’t happen if there are drones about. I didn’t make autosave time based otherwise you would experience momentary lag every time the game autosaves.
• I’ve added trash to the game and the player has to remove trash to reduce pollution. Currently only a newly started game will see trash.
• I’ve completely rewritten the pollution system to make it more interesting and involved. Pollution is now the combination of; dead trees, trash, coal power, and lack of living trees. If you use the pollution monitor the report that comes up is completely different and I’ve tried to make it clear how much each type of pollution is contributing to your total pollution in world.
• I’ve added weather effects to the game and gotten rid of the old clouds. Now the polluted world looks a lot more interesting with the animated fog. There is lightning in the background as well which adds to the atmosphere. When the world is clean you will have random weather, and it can start to rain and there will be lightning as well. This was quite interesting to add to the game.
• Now all items you have will show up in your inventory. Previously I only showed items that you could eat or drink but now I show everything. You click on non consumable items in your inventory and a dialogue will pop up telling you more about that item.
• I’ve made soda give more energy but now it will cause a small loss of spirit as well. Previously I would just keep on drinking soda and keep on building :). Now I have to better manage my stats.
• Study shelf now gives exp to the player faster and drains energy faster. Using a vending machine and water dispenser also now give a point of exp.
• Fixed damage to Sigil drone bug. The same drone was not being damaged across the network resulting in a mismatch of drones between host and clients. This is fixed now and I’ve also added a small HUD that shows how many drones are currently in the world. It appears when there are drones.

This applies to the full version of the game only:

• Nothing specific for the full version.

Future development

• I want to investigate having a trash robot from Sigil corporation. It can come at any time and will start to dump trash all over the players world! The player will have to clean that trash up. Maybe the player can damage the robot with their lightning rod which will cause it to leave.
• I’ll keep on expanding the town and adding more NPCs and quests. I’m thinking I should work on the town after I’ve added lots more content to the player side of the world. This is because the dialogue of the townsfolk should be connected to what the player is doing. Anyhow that is what I’m thinking at the moment.
• I want to add a boss droid that comes when the player removes the influence of Sigil. In revenge the Sigil Corporation will send a tough droid that will aim to demolish everything the player has built!
• Investigate having NPCs that the player can recruit. Perhaps these NPCs will have different skills  that can help the player, especially against the Sigil Corporation. The player has to look after these NPCs or else they’ll go back to their wilderness tent. 
• I want to investigate having foliage that will randomly grow on grass tiles and the player can collect them. The player can use them to make medicines. Yes, I want to investigate illnesses for the player and the player can then treat themselves by using a medicine, and if they don’t have a medicine then they can sleep on their bed until the illness disappears. Perhaps the illness will have a meter that diminishes when the player is lying down on a bed.
• Over time I aim to keep on adding dishes from all around the world to the game.
• Investigate having a laptop from which you can check the news today. You can also create social media posts that expose the Sigil Corporation, but doing so also costs you some of your hidden stat. Maybe from your computer you can also play a hacking mini game to restore your hidden stat.
• Investigate basic terrain generation and perhaps terraced grass tiles.
• Investigate a mini game for gaining back the Hidden stat fast.
• Investigate making an opening cut scene for the game.