Welcome to the 8th devlog for our game, Wicked Warehouse!

This week was mostly spent improving play feedback via sound and particle effects. We also added in more final art assets for better readability, as well as tweaking our color choices a bit to increase clarity in the level.

A lot of playtesting was also done this week, which lead to numerous balance changes. This along with all the player feedback additions and extra art pass makes the whole game a lot more fun and enjoyable!

Code

So wrapping up the final week for coding, we mainly spent our time adding in our final features and cleaning up whatever needed to be cleaned up. We finally went ahead and updated our collectionzone to it's final version, with it now opening up and dropping down the boxes when the timer reaches 0. Next to the collectionzone we also updated our performance meter to now properly be linked with our asset on the back wall.  We then also then added a lot of player feedback in regards to particle effects when completing/failing an order and also sound effects when the player undergoes certain actions. Overall not a lot of new content this week but rather updating of older content and getting them closer to their final version, with the way things are going the end product will definitely be something fun to play!  

Art

- Environment:

For the environment it really came down to replacing the last assets that were still there as placeholders. With still some final finishing touches all Big and Medium shapes within the level should be done, but in the meanwhile we've also made sure to set dress the scene into a proper Wicked Warehouse. Not your most convenient workspace with all the mechanical hazards, but still a lovely one.

Our plan as of now is to get the final assets in that just needed a little modification, and then make it complete. After that we will make sure to tweak parts to finalize the look. A color correction and lighting overhaul are bound to happen in the next two weeks.

Another thing that changed the vibe of our level a lot is the way boxes spawn in right now. First we've just had everything dropping in via the tubes we've created. But with feedback and us questioning on how to improve it, we've come down to have 3 zones where the 3 boxtypes spawn. The greatest improvement of this system is that the whole map doesn't get as cluttered with boxes like before, yet it gives the feeling this Warehouse is really at work with all the other machinery. Eventually with players screwing over the playground, chaos will most likely ensue.

The most common box, the cardboard box, spawns in from the right and moves down the conveyor belts to the top of the map. These boxes should be the easiest accessible with no further hindrances besides your coop partner.

The wooden box, our second in line, comes down from the top left area. Not a hard zone, but it's farther off and needs some slight walking and one creepy crane claw to avoid.

The hardest and most rare of the boxes, the metal box, is in the bottom left area. With the forklift as a hindrance, this place takes trial and patience.

- Assets:

This week : We remade our texture for the boxes and metal since we felt that our previous texture wasn't working for the wooden and metal boxes so we retextured it to fit our game. This time we made it more cartoony and simple to fit the game.

This week we also made our company logo. It's a simple design we feel like it really sells the fact that players are working in a corporation. 

We also made the main menu and the game overscreen more appealing. We made the start menu simplistic and the game over screen more interesting which also has a nod to our previous concept.

This week we also spent a lot of time on environment assets to flesh out our level more. We made various conveyors, pillars and crane beams. We also decided to rework the box dropoff machine into a dropoff zone. Players were often confused as to where they should drop off the packages.

A nice side effect of this model change, is that the new one has a much more satisfying animation when an order is completed.

VFX:

This week player feedback was also very important to us. One way we've tried tackling that is by using visual feedback in the shape of Particle Effects.

Some positive feedback once a delivery has been completed.

Some other feedback if you happen to fail a delivery. What. A. Shame.

But all in all we've tried making it more obvious to a player what needs to happen where. With a new timer element and ringing alarm lights on our renewed delivery zones, it should be somewhat more obvious to new players that there might be something going on at those zones.

There is still more space for additional VFX features we've been thinking about to spice things up a bit, but have to see what can happen and where it's needed to not overclutter everything. Overall this has been a great trial, not overcluttering whilst still trying to give the scene a sense of fun chaos.