GTTOD's final update is progressing better than I could have ever hoped

WELCOME BACK

First off, that title is NOT inaccurate at all. I'm not gonna go on about it for long since I figured most people just wanna wait for it to come out, and that's valid - but I do want to say I'm really really happy with how things are progressing and the direction things are going in. I mean check this out:

A lot of the criticism I've gotten on GTTOD has been about its level design. While at first I didn't quite see what the problem was, but now that I've kinda gone down into the nitty gritty of what makes a level fun to explore and progress through, I realize what people were saying. It's not that the levels are designed POORLY from a gameplay perspective, they're just BORING. Where's the excitement? Where's the moments where you turn a corner and find something new? I feel like that was lost in GTTOD's previous versions, and with this final update, I'm wanting to try and make exploring The Shatter more rewarding and interesting - and NOT just through Bunkers.

I'm not just limiting items to bunkers anymore. Now, hidden around the levels will be various secret areas that contain MORE than just power ups - but ANYTHING. In fact, I have even been wanting to shroud these secret areas in darkness during the night, and THUS:

Flashlight button! Nothing huge, just something to make navigating at night time a bit easier.

Next up, a big complaint and area of confusion I often see is the differences between items, weapons, melee weapons, apparel, inventory items, etc. There's a LOT of different areas for different things...for literally zero reason at all. SO, I have a plan to fix that by making EVERYTHING under one system and one UI screen. Items are items. You click them to use them. You can hotkey by hovering over them and hitting 1234whatever. It's based on the Diablo 2 / Resident Evil inventory system, so it's something people are familiar with. I think this is going to clean up GTTOD's general loot loop a TON.

Levels are now also FULLY GENERATED, with each segment having WAY more variety than even an entire level would have in the past. Part of this change also means I have way more budget for performance, since the way that levels generate is easier to render. As a result, GTTOD's first levels have become FAR more overgrown.

And LASTLY, but likely most importantly - GTTOD is currently undergoing the final "code reconstruction" I'll ever do. Managers are being merged and removed, scripts are being simplified and cut, and systems are all becoming just a little more homogeneous. By the time I'm done, I hope to have some of that kinda janky, shaky feeling cleared up that currently exists in GTTOD.

ADDRESSING THE COMMUNITY

SO, I normally try not to do this, since I know most folks are only here for the game and they just want it to be good. That's super valid, and to those people, I hope I make you proud with 1.0. BUT, recently there's been some kinda...weird things going on, and I just wanted to address it. First off, the reviews have been really crazy negative, and often times are targeting me as an individual and pairing it with some out-of-context screenshots. Steam has actually removed a few of them off of their reviews for harassment, and even more of them have had their links removed (though I don't know the exact reason why, I think it's kinda obvious). I have seen some edits to reviews saying that the dev is the one doing it, but actually I literally cannot do that at all. That is all Steam determining that the reviews and screenshots are breaking their rules and not actually centered around the game at all.

BUT, still. I think this all started when I publicly responded to someone named Juggernaut in an ADMITTEDLY dumb way. Now, the context is that this person had posted DOZENS of posts in the Steam discussions daily for weeks, and the more they posted, the more they insulted me as a person individually in them. They were literally calling me every name in the book for WEEKS before I responded, telling them that they need an exorcism. Here, I've only ever blocked ONE account on Steam, so this is him:

The truth is that I was honestly kidding, and I did NOT think it would blow up like it has. Hindsight is 20/20. But he responded, and he kept responding...and he did not stop responding until I believe Steam banned his account for harassment.

WARNING: SCREENSHOTS OF AN INSANE CRASHOUT:

Thankfully, while they don't have a problem with harassing someone for weeks, they DO have a problem with swearing, so they have poorly censored themselves.

These screenshots are how the person responded to me apologizing. I have a few other screenshots that are actually worse, but I'll stop here. This ended up kinda sparking a movement in the current community, who seems to think I just randomly started insulting some innocent customer out of nowhere, but no I was literally responding to harassment.

People then started taking screenshots out of context. For instance, one I was talking about my experience with OCD, and how I have learned to not obsess over my reviews. As a result, I get called ignorant and accused of ignoring my customers - which is VERY FAR FROM THE TRUTH. Even one that currently is up I believe takes a screenshot of me asking for ACCURATE reviews, and then the reviewer instead says I'm begging for positive reviews.

Unfortunately it seems the link was either removed by Steam for violating their policy, or by the reviewer, who may have realized they can't spin a lie when the truth is in the screenshot they themselves posted, SO here's the unedited screenshot:

I literally did not ask for positive reviews. I addressed an issue of miscommunication and misinformation, and provided the literal only solution...accurate reviews. I do not understand why anyone would think asking for accurate reviews is a bad thing.

SIGH

There's far far more, by the way. You can find some of them still undeleted by Steam. Part of me wonders if this is Juggernaut making an account, getting 30 minutes in game, and then writing a review. Some of the reviews that have been removed had the exact same manner of speech, which includes calling me ignorant and censoring their swear words with numbers and exclamation points. That doesn't matter, however, because all of these reviews have one thing in common: TONS of rewards. It seems there's a really crazy growing sentiment out there that I'm a bad person, that GTTOD is a boomer shooter (and a terrible one at that), and a few other misconceptions that are leading to some REALLY dark places...not just for the game, not just for the community, but also for some of us more personally.

So, what do we do now?

Well, it's simple. Clearly there has been some HUGE misunderstandings lately, and so I only ask that everyone gives me a second chance to prove that I'm not ignoring you, I'm not hating on you, I want to make you all happy, and that I'm honestly trying my very very best. I don't really wanna dwell on the community being kinda confused as to my character and what the game is, and I'd really just rather make a good game and get us to 1.0 making as many people as happy as I can. If you go back through my previous posts, I believe that speaks more for me and my character than what the negative reviews are saying about me, from people who do not know me.

That is all! Thanks everyone, and I will be back soon with more dev updates.