Currently in development, The Frontier is a blend between business simulation and survival, exploration games. Starting from nothing - explore, gather resources, craft items, and try to survive your world, all while building up your business empire and great fortune.
Hey everyone! It's been a little while since my last post, so I wanted to give a quick update on what I've been working on. This past month or so, I've mainly been working on implementing Harvesters and Couriers, as well as overhauling the whole worker system. Harvesters can be hired and assigned jobs to mine resources, while Couriers can be assigned tasks to transport items between your different storages.
The new update isn't quite ready for release yet, but I uploaded a short video showing off the new worker system. You can check it out below. I'll be posting a detailed change log with more information after I release the update.
Also, if you haven't seen the two small updates I posted about over on the Steam page, you can read them here and here.
As always, thanks for reading!
These are the changes that went into The Frontier before it was released in Early Access on Steam.
The Frontier is now available in Early Access on Steam! You can check out its new trailer as well.
This is the second half of changes that went into the new demo.
The Frontier has been Greenlit! Also, you can check out the new demo and some of the new changes that went into it.
This is the third demo released for The Frontier (currently in development). This demo requires Java to be installed in order to play. After downloading...
This is the second demo released for The Frontier (currently in development). The demo requires Java to be installed in order to play. After downloading...
This is the first demo released for The Frontier (currently in development).
This game is amazing. Add some animals for meat and a fire to cook. And add sprint, and this game will be this best
Hey Shadow_Zone, thanks for the comment. I already replied to this on the greenlight page, but I'll post my response here as well in case anyone else wants to read it.
I do plan on adding animals and monsters to the game, but I'm still ironing out how I want the battle system to work. The plan is to have some animals that you can capture, raise and breed. You will then be able to collect materials from them over time. The other animals/monsters will drop materials if they're defeated.
Also, thanks for the sprinting request. I will see if I can implement something for it.
I think tomerbarkan has given fair analysis and advise here and I agree, 'focus on whatever will explain how to play' now. You have put good effort into this work, keep going.
Hey etherflows, thanks for the comment! And yeah, that will be my main focus for the new demo.
I like this style, can definitely see where this game could go.
Still lots of work to do, I recommend polishing your UX before adding new features, it's a bit exhausting to play as it is.
Hey tomerbarkan, thanks for the comment!
Yeah, the game still has a ways to go. If you don't mind, could you tell me some specific complaints for things that tired you out while playing the demo (e.g. confusing controls, UI menus are hard to understand/navigate)? For my next demo version I want to focus on improving the UX, so any feedback would be appreciated.
Also, it looks like you have your own game that you're working on. Good luck with it, and I'll be sure to check it out.
Sure, gladly.
For starters, having to equip the axe then the pick then the axe then the pick is a bit annoying and I'm not sure I see the added value to the game. Maybe just use it automatically from the inventory as long as you have one?
Second, interaction with the world is inconsistent. For example you have to click to chop trees/mine (BTW, it's a bit slow and annoying, but I guess once you add a chop animation it will be better. Maybe click and hold instead of clicking again and again?). But to craft and interact with the shops you need to stand next to them and press E, which I figured out by chance.
Last, once I opened the crafting dialog, I spent a minute or two trying to close it and couldn't figure it out, ended up closing the entire game.
Another thing that would improve user experience dramatically, specially with a complex game as this, is having some sort of tutorial/introduction. It doesn't have to be a step by step tutorial, but something to teach you the mechanics of the game instead of overwhelming you.
Hey, thanks for the feedback.
The examples you listed are ones that other players have also brought to my attention, which is a good thing. They all share the same problem of a lack of proper information being passed on to the player. This is the biggest issue I'll need to fix for the next demo version. And thanks for mentioning a tutorial. It's something I abandoned as unnecessary early on in the project, but it's worth looking into again. I'm also thinking about adding button prompts and an in-game guide to help players out. I'm not sure if I'll be able to get all three into the next demo, so I'm curious which one (or combination) you (and others) think would be the most helpful.
I'll also address the issues you brought up.
Equipping tools - You can actually equip up to 4 tools at the same time (the 4 slots on the left of the screen) and it'll automatically use the appropriate one, however, it's difficult for the player to know this without me mentioning it.
Interacting - I will be adding the ability to just click and hold the mouse button to make mining/etc easier. As for the inconsistency, I'll look into trying to unify the controls some more.
Closing UI - Quite a few people have mentioned this one, so I want to add a button to close each UI window in addition to the current key (X) that's used to do it.
If you ask me, at this stage in development, focus on whatever will explain how to play the game, or at least the basic knowledge from which the player can learn the rest by himself. Try to do it in a way that will not bore the player quickly (like tons of text all at once), but on the other hand something that you don't have to put too much efforts in, since as your game and UI progress, you will have to redo it, so no point in spending crazy time to make a perfect tutorial for a non-final game...
Yeah, those are good points. I'll keep them in mind when I'm working on the new demo. Thanks!