Engines & Tutorials

Hi comrades, this is another part of pre-update news. Let's get straight to the point.

Engines Reworks

Engines! As a reminder, you can either use them as a passive bonus, or Overdrive and break them for the rest of the adventure.

I like that there's a choice between slight bonuses to how you play and having an active way out in a tough spot. In this update, I reworked the animations logic, with a goal of reducing wasted time Overdriving the engine. I also enjoy how engines now start to grind, spin and sparkle when you inspect them in the middle of a duel.

Requirements mentioned in previous diary are also present for engines, both for passive bonuses and Overdrives. You probably don't want to break your engine healing yourself if your health is already full. And certain passive bonuses don't need to run and distract you if they are going to do nothing.

There are 3 new engines and 2 reworked ones in the factory. Here they are:

• Nostalgy Engine is a memory of how good your life and health were when you were young. Restore a certain amount as Overdrive, or get +1 health for every wasted magic unit at the end of a turn.

• Drama Engine is an invitation to play with the fates. Its Overdrive guarantees the success of your next crit roll, and its passive pulls an Act 3 on your turn, rerolling the element of your last remaining unit (which can both save and annoy you! Plan accordingly.)

• Inspiration Engine makes your workers work twice as hard for the same pay. Overtime your departments after they've already taken their turn, or apply a random Quirk to a random magic unit on the start of a turn.

• Train Engine has been reworked slightly. Its passive now grants you +1 Fire damage for the rest of a turn when you use a Fire unit. Previous passive always gave you 1 gold unit each turn, which I now think is a bit too predictable. Gaining momentum!

• Revolution Engine has new visuals and its Overdrive now opens Build mode in the middle of a duel. I've been cheating my way into the Build mode since forever, and now you can too. Busy departments are not movable — the inventory office refuses to handle dangerous magic materials. Cowards.

Hidden Quirk

There's also a new quirk in town: Hidden. When a unit is Hidden, you can't see what's inside of it, and have to deduce the element based on what departments agree to take it. Opponents get confused by Hidden units, and forget to evaluate how valuable their turn is.

On a side note, I did a fair bit of UI work to obscure the unit's element, but completely forgot about sounds at first, so you could hear what's inside very clearly (swoosh! zzzz! cha-ching!). Fixed now, no robbing you of detective work.

Updated Tutorials

Since the release, I've heard (and saw!) that tutorials are not as intuitive as I smugly believed. After all, spell factories are not a common concept, and what is obvious to me after years of development is a mystery to new players. Another game-making rake stepped on, another lesson learnt.

I reworked several tutorials to make sure the player does understand what they are doing before the tutorial is dismissed. Tutorials still retain their free-form nature, which is something I'm proud of. For example, just in the beginning of the game the tutorial tells you to use Ice. But you don't have to — maybe you see a better turn? It is a pain to account for the possibilities, but I like how the player has space for creativity while being taught something.

As one last small thing: you can now hold shift and drag your mouse to quickly move parts between factory and inventory! Catch you out there, Overseer.