First of all, we want to use this update to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
Enjoy your (hopefully) free days with family and friends and stay healthy ????
At the end of each year the mortals of Fata Deum meet at their local bakery to prepare a delicious Christmas meal!
Even if they believe in you, of course!
A bakery doubles your food production and can be built in cities only!
Just as a side note ????
And now for something completely different:
Game Localization
During the last year we have received a lot of requests for a localization of Fata Deum for a specific language. Initially we planned to provide a localization of Fata Deum for English and German only (for EA release). But based on your feedback and the high interest we decided to provide a localization for the following languages for the EA release already:
English, German, French, Italian, Spanish, Polish, Portuguese (Brazil), Russian, Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), Japanese, Korean
And we have already achieved a lot in this regard!
A first “very basic placeholder” translation has been done for all languages to check for technical problems (font issues, different sizes, special grammar cases etc.). These checks have already been finished and after some fixes here and there everything works fine!
We are currently in negotiations with different companies to translate all texts for the EA release!
So, this is set in stone!
Most people on this planet will be able to play Fata Deum in their native language right from the beginning!
The imp learned some Chinese and Russian words already ????
Steam Next Fest
As described in our last update we improved the Fata Deum demo a lot based on your feedback. During the last two months we further improved the tutorial and we are now ready to give the demo another go!
But we will wait until the next big event:
The Steam Next Fest (end of February).
Until then we will of course keep improving the game (and the demo)!
Stay tuned! Further updates regarding our participation in the Steam Next Fest event are planned for next year ????
AI Development
The AI is getting smarter day by day!
Maybe we should get started to be scared (world domination, etc.) ????.
The whole AI system, which is used to control the AI gods, the settlement and the prayer logic is finished technically. We are currently fixing bugs and apply a proper balancing / configuration for the different profiles (different gods, different settlement profiles, etc.).
We expect to finish the work on the AI (for the EA release) at the end of January. This is the last big piece of code which needs to be done!
The heart of the AI system is a planner which is able to calculate complex plans (for world domination or getting a coffee) based on its current status and a large set of available actions.
It is like:
- You want to build a large city?
- For this you need stone, mortals, wood, food.
- For this you need a quarry, a residence, a lumberjack, a farm.
- For this you need wood, too.
- For this you need to push your people to work.
- For this you need to multiply your mortals.
- For this you need food, too.
Calculated plan: GetWood, BuildFarm, GetFood, MultiplyMortals, PushMortalsToWork, GetWood, BuildLumberjack, GetWood, BuildQuarry, GetWood, BuildResidence, GetStone, GetWood, GetFood, MultiplyMortals, BuildCity
The AI is able to react on changing situation, reprioritize its goals and calculate an adapted plan whenever needed (player has a big military force?! => BuildDefenceTower, BuildBarracks, TrainSoldiers).
One thing we need to teach the AI:
-which actions are available
-under which precondition the action can be executed
-what are the effects of an action
This does look like:
Based on these definitions the AI is able to calculate a chain of actions to get to its goal (building a city...). Hopefully, you liked this little technical excursion ????
Next Steps
The preparation for the Steam Next Fest, the localization for 12 languages and the current AI development will be finished around end of February. Afterwards, we will add a second level and take the new feedback (from the Steam Next Fest and from our Alpha Kickstarter backers) into consideration.
We will than focus on balancing, bug fixing, polishing and prepare the EA release marketing-wise.
Looking at our current progress and our todo list, we are not able to release in Q1 2022, sorry.
But it is getting really close!
We are moving the release date to Q2 2022 and expect to provide you an update on this estimation shortly after the Steam Next Fest!
Thanks for your patience!
Quality first!
We wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
Enjoy your (hopefully) free days with family and friends and stay healthy ????
