v00.01.44

Peter

Developer
Staff member
Jan 2, 2023
79
1
8
Features:

* CONTAINERS! You can now craft crates which can be placed in stockpiles! (currently only for raw stone)
* Load/Save now shows a screenshot to better identify your savegame

Bugfixes:

* minor ones, not worth to mention

Additional Information

This update actually brings a new feature to the game, which is not a small one actually, even tho, it's more like a soft-update, as the new functionality is not yet fully exposed everywhere, but the game now supports CONTAINERS. But what's that? A container is basically an item which allows for other items to be stored inside it by a larger quantity than it would be when stored on the floor. With this updates come one of those container in the form of a wooden crate, which can be crafted in the wood workshop. Once crafted, you can place it into a stockpile.

Because this is fully new functionality, it currently only works for RAW STONE. So instead of being limited to 5 raw stones per storage field, the crate actually allows to store 30 of them in the crate - which is a huge improvement in terms of needed space for your rocks! I will expand "container-able" items soon, but let's look a bit deeper into it:

Each item can now define in which type of container it can be stored and how many of them can be stored in that container type. The Item Editor was upgraded accordingly to not only make new containers (currently only crate type available) but also allow for configuring your own items if and how they can be stored inside a container.

Another nice feature of this is, that it does not only lower the burden on the renderer but also the burden on the jobsystem, as less "single" items has to be queried.

Be aware, that containers do currently NOT facilitate "Actions" or "Access Points" - a container will currently always allow for being "operated" from every field around it - not above it, not below it - the Villager has to be able to stand at any field directly next to the container. That also means, they cannot go "through" containers - so leave gaps for the Villagers to be able to access those containers.

Next to this change the other one may not even be noticed - the game does now take a snapshot of your screen when you save, so the next time you load your game you can see a preview of it in the Loading Window. Sounds meh - I know. BUT. What you don't know yet, this little new feature on the engine to take screenshots during gameplay is something which I may later use to allow for autogenerated timelapses! A feature I miss a lot in other games, so let's see how this is going to turn out in the future.