New Testing Build Available

New Testing Build Available

Hello everyone,

We have a brand-new build available for testing!

This build is based heavily on your feedback from the previous testing round. On top of that, we also added a large number of new mechanics, improvements, balance changes, UI updates, and general polish.

The list below covers only part of the changes introduced in this build. We also made many smaller fixes, adjustments, and improvements across the entire game.

The build will be available on the testing branch for the next few days.

After that, the Open Technical Demo will become available to everyone interested in trying the game.

Your feedback during this short testing period is extremely important for us. It will help us prepare possible hotfixes, balance changes, and final adjustments before the Open Technical Demo release.

Main Focus of This Build

• Major UI improvements

• More readable panels and tooltips

• Better production and population information

• New feedback and bug reporting system

• Retroactive quest tracking

• Basic performance settings

• Improved camera movement

• First visible version of Hubris

• Functional Lighthouse mechanic

• More meaningful population needs

• Stronger balance pressure

• Bug fixes and general polish

UI Improvements

Every major panel in the game received new information, previews, or additional controls.

The goal was to reduce confusion and make the game systems much more readable during normal gameplay.

• Every major panel now contains more information about what it does.

• Many panels received several new preview options.

• More values are now explained directly in the UI.

• Many placeholder or unclear elements were replaced with real information.

• The UI should now be much more informative and easier to understand.

New and Reworked UI Panels

• Added a quick ship control panel.

• The quick ship panel allows players to locate ships on the map and check what they are currently doing.

• Added an in-game Feedback / Bug Report panel.

• Feedback and bug reports are sent directly to our servers.

• Reworked the quick quest panel.

• The quest panel now shows short information about what needs to be done in each quest and subtask.

• Added a basic Settings view.

Top HUD Rework

The Top HUD has been significantly expanded and is now much more useful.

It now shows:

• Income and balance

• Main resources

• Food level

• Current Hubris level

• Current population happiness

• Production satisfaction level

• Number of active ships and their current states

The food level represents how long your people can survive before hunger and starvation begin.

Three additional Top HUD panels are still waiting for full implementation and are not available in this demo yet. These will be introduced in a future demo:

• Selected Governor panel

• Main Hubris panel

• Lighthouse development panel

Treasury Panel

The Treasury panel now calculates values based on the full population group instead of a single citizen.

Changes include:

• Added clearer day/hour-based income calculations.

• Added clearer day/hour-based balance calculations.

• Updated tax calculations to better reflect the full citizen group.

• Improved readability of economy-related values.

Goods View

Goods View calculations were updated to use hour/day values.

Changes include:

• Replaced tick/minute values with hour/day values.

• Improved readability of production and consumption values.

• Made goods flow easier to understand at a glance.

Population View

Population View now also uses hour/day values.

Changes include:

• Population data is now calculated based on the full population, not on a single citizen.

• Added early happiness indicators.

• Happiness indicators now show what affects the mood of your population.

• The system is still in a raw state, but it should already make population needs easier to understand.

Quest Improvements

Quests now work retroactively.

This means that if you build a required building before the quest asks for it, the quest will still recognize it and count it as completed.

Changes include:

• Retroactive quest completion checks.

• Improved quest flow.

• Better handling of buildings completed before quest activation.

• Clearer information in the quick quest panel.

Settings and Performance

We added a basic Settings view.

It currently includes:

• Quality Settings

• Frame Rate settings

• VSync

• Basic performance options

The Low preset should significantly improve FPS without a major visual downgrade.

Quality presets are still in their early version. More detailed graphics and performance options will be added in future builds.

At the moment, the difference between Low and High can result in:

• Up to around 50% more FPS on GPUs below RTX 3060 level.

• Around 20-30 FPS improvement on stronger cards, depending on hardware and scene complexity.

Further performance improvements are planned for future builds.

Camera Improvements

Camera movement was improved.

Changes include:

• Camera movement using Q/E is now smoother.

• Mouse-based movement is now calmer.

• Camera navigation should feel more comfortable during longer play sessions.

Building Tooltips

Building tooltips now contain much more information.

Production building tooltips now show:

• Start / Stop production controls

• Production slot assignment

• Resource generation per day/hour

• Efficiency as a percentage

• More information about what affects production

Housing building tooltips now show:

• Occupied slots

• Population type living inside

Small building tooltips now show:

• What the building produces

• What the building provides

• Basic information about its function

Ship Tooltips and Ship Control

Ship information was also improved.

Changes include:

• Ship tooltips now show what each ship is currently doing.

• Added quick access to ships.

• Ships can now be located more easily on the map.

• Shipyard efficiency is now affected by assigned workers.

New Core Mechanic: Hubris

Hubris is one of the new core mechanics introduced in this build.

It represents how far the city pushes its ambition, how much it challenges divine order, and how the gods react to your actions.

In the current version:

• Hubris can be increased or decreased by player actions.

• Hubris has several levels.

• Each Hubris level can trigger its own unique events.

• High Hubris affects how the gods perceive your city.

• Hubris can trigger buffs, debuffs, and other gameplay modifiers.

• Hubris can affect population happiness.

• Hubris can affect production and general city stability.

• The current version is an early implementation of a much larger system.

In future builds, Hubris will be connected more deeply with:

• Deity reactions

• City development

• Long-term consequences

• Catastrophic events

• Disaster pressure and recovery

Some of this foundation is already prepared internally, but large-scale disasters are not part of this demo yet.

In the future, high Hubris may lead to more serious divine consequences, such as floods, violent seas, storms, or other catastrophic events.

For this demo, Hubris is mainly used to introduce the first layer of pressure, consequences, buffs, debuffs, unique events, and divine reaction.

New Core Mechanic: Lighthouse

The Lighthouse is now a real gameplay mechanic.

Previously, it was mostly a visual and narrative element. In this build, it has actual systemic effects.

The Lighthouse now affects:

• Migration

• Hubris

• Population happiness

• Resource consumption, depending on its active mode

We also added the first version of the Sacrifice mode.

In this demo, one Sacrifice mode is available.

In future builds, different Lighthouse modes will affect:

• Buffs

• Debuffs

• Resource costs

• Hubris

• Deity-related systems

Population, Balance and Pressure

People now matter much more than before.

This system technically existed in earlier builds, but the values were not strong enough and did not fully reflect what was happening on screen.

In this build, we rebalanced population needs, production values, and consumption so the city now creates real pressure.

What changed:

• Population needs are now more meaningful.

• Citizens consume more realistic values.

• Food production and supply chains are now much more important.

• Building without understanding the production chain can lead to food shortages.

• Food shortages can lead to hunger.

• Hunger can lead to death, unrest, and rebellion.

• If ignored for too long, these problems can cascade into a death spiral.

This does not mean that the game is designed around a simple Game Over screen.

Even in this demo, with some mechanics still limited, the city can usually be brought back from a bad situation if the player reacts in time.

The goal is to make collapse and recovery part of the experience.

A badly managed city may suffer, lose people, and fall into crisis, but the player should still have a chance to stabilize the situation, rebuild production, and recover.

This system also connects with Hubris.

Hubris can affect production, happiness, and the general stability of the city. Combined with population needs and food pressure, it creates the first layer of real systemic tension in the game.

Food, Hunger and Starvation

We added the first visible version of the food pressure system.

The Top HUD now shows the current food level and helps players understand how long the population can survive before hunger or starvation begins.

This system is part of our larger balance direction.

The city should feel more alive, but also more fragile if poorly managed.

Graphics

We made several visual adjustments.

Changes include:

• The sea is now much more turbulent.

• Nights are now brighter and easier to read.

• Overall readability during darker hours has been improved.

Bug Fixes and Polish

This build also includes many smaller fixes and general polish improvements across the game.

These include fixes related to:

• UI readability

• Quest flow

• Production control

• Tooltips

• Ship information

• Performance settings

• General gameplay stability

What Is Still Not Final

Some systems are still in an early state.

In particular:

• Happiness indicators are functional but still raw.

• The main Hubris panel is not available yet.

• The Governor panel is not available yet.

• The Lighthouse development panel is not available yet.

• More detailed graphics settings will be added later.

• Content volume is not the main focus of this demo.

This Technical Demo is focused mainly on:

• The core gameplay loop

• UI readability

• Feedback collection

• Production clarity

• Population pressure

• Balance pressure

• Early Hubris mechanics

• The first functional version of the Lighthouse

• Performance and stability

And This Is Only Part of the Update

This is only part of what changed in this build.

We went through your feedback and tried to address every actionable point that could realistically fit into this Technical Demo.

The only major area we did not expand heavily yet is content volume.

This demo is not meant to show the final amount of content. It is meant to test the foundation:

• UI readability

• Production clarity

• Population pressure

• Hubris

• The Lighthouse

• Balance

• Performance

• The overall core gameplay loop

More content will come later.

For now, the goal is simple: make the game clearer, more stable, more readable, and more meaningful to play.

Final Note

After testing this build, we would really appreciate your honest feedback.

Please let us know:

• If you find any bugs or technical issues.

• If the new systems are clear and understandable.

• If you think the game is moving in the right direction.

• If you believe the changes improve the overall experience.

• If anything still feels confusing, missing, too easy, or too punishing.

And This Is Only Part of the Update

This is only part of what changed in this build.

In addition to the changes listed above, we also made many smaller fixes, balance adjustments, UI improvements, tooltip updates, performance tweaks, and general polish improvements across the game.

We went through your feedback and tried to address every actionable point that could realistically fit into this Technical Demo.

The only major area we did not expand heavily yet is content volume.

This demo is not meant to show the final amount of content. It is meant to test the foundation:

• UI readability

• Production clarity

• Population pressure

• Hubris

• The Lighthouse

• Balance

• Performance

• The overall core gameplay loop

More content will come later.

For now, the goal is simple: make the game clearer, more stable, more readable, and more meaningful to play.

That is all for now.

Thank you again for testing the game and helping us improve it.

Cheers!

The build is now available on branch.