DD#163 Let There Be Escalation! news - [Neolithic]To the End

Hi, everyone. Welcome to another week's developer's diary.

This week, we can see great development in our real life and in the game content.
The situation is escalating quite fast.

Just like from MP3 to MP4 and then to MP5. :)
Yes, we now have more guns!

We got MP5s as a new submachine gun.

We got an update on the Ukrainian Zbroyar Z-15s.

We also got the iconic French "Fusil d'Assaut de la Manufacture d'Armes de Saint-Étiennes" (or, in short, FAMAS) which is famous for its high rate of fire and reliability.

What's all this about?
Well, as I mentioned in the last week's developer's diary "There are so many beautiful things in the world other than video games, yet Putin still started a war on Feb. 24th, 2022." It seems this very sentence made another Putin's Z-ombie quite unhappy. So, they came and left some negative reviews on our game. They even try to justify Putin's genocide against the Ukrainian people, all those murders, rapes, war crimes, and terrorist attacks with some of Putin's propaganda. Ironically, last week, I was mostly talking about the censorship. And, it seems we immediately find a pathetic victim of such brainwashing revealed themselves.

Fun fact, that guy who loves Putin so much is actually Chinese and properly lives within a quite short distance from where I am, no longer than the distance between Bilhorod and Moscow. What makes things more funny is, that I also have many real Russian friends who do not even like Putin or support his war at all. Some of you may not believe it. But, there are indeed good Russians out there. I will talk more about this later.

Anyway, since we got some Z-ombies came here knocking on the doors again. You know how I do things. I am not going to abuse my power to excommunicate them or ban them for now. I am simply adding a lot more content they will not like and watching them cry louder and more pathetically. In addition to the guns, I mentioned above. The paused quest in Siberia is now resumed with a modified story script going directly to the war.

As you continue following a bear to find the distress signal in Siberia, you will now find an abandoned village.

With certain types of new enemies:

Well, orcs are not added yet because it will take a while to make 3D models.
But, meat cubes are real.

They are marked as "undead" and "evil." They drop strange meat if you defeat them. For our players with very... extraordinary tastes, they may also capture those meat cubes and turn them into pets. (Well, I will not do that, but I will not limit your freedom to do so.)
This is the first time we have a quest directly about this war. And its original plan was quite different. But after more than 2 years of the pause, maybe it's time to finally take a more direct approach to the game's storylines.

Just as in real life, many things changed this week. By the time I am writing this developer's diary. "Liberty of Russia" Legion is casting their "votes" in the Russian presidential election by attacking Putin's troops in Bilhorod and Kursk. See I told you there are good Russians. :)
And French President Macron also delivered a great speech with inspiration and passion to support Ukraine with no red lines unlike two years ago. (That's the main reason why I added FAMAS to the game.)

Ladies and gentlemen, we are all civilized people. But, we shall know full well that when some uncivilized barbarians start a war, we shall not play nicely with them as they know no limitation and do not follow the rules. Many of us have been following our high social standards for a long time. Especially in East Asia, we usually try to be polite, try not to offend others, and try not to bother others. Thus, when something like this happens, many of us will first try to negotiate, try to reason with the other party, try to avoid escalation and try not to anger dangerous criminals. As if, deep down in our hearts, we all fear that they have a good reason to do all those terrible things. As if, deep down in our hearts, we all fear those villains are not actually bad, they are just misunderstood.

Now fear no more! It's time to trust your guts to confirm you do not need to negotiate with them, you do not need to tolerate them. You shall take a stand, and do what is right, you have the firepower in you to support you!

So, here also comes the store page of our upcoming free DLC:

Store.steampowered.com

(It's just the store page. Content is still being developed.)

Fear no more. The righteous shall never fear the wicked.
Let There Be Escalation!
When seeing the dying of the light of life in such injustice, let us rage.

That's for this week.
Unfortunately, I am needed in Guizhou next Monday and Tuesday to do some legal investigation. Thus, the development may pause for a day or two. In other countries, this may be more of a private detective's job. But in China, no such kind of private detective is allowed. Thus, lawyers like me are also playing the role of private detectives sometimes.


The full update log for this week:
20240310
English
############Content###############
[Guns]Submachine guns no longer need 2 hands to use.
[Weapon]New Weapon: MP5
[Gun Module]New Module: Extended SMG Mag.
[Gun Module]New Module: SMG Rubber Bullets Mag.
[Bazaar]The Weapon Merchant now sells MP5s.
[Bazaar]The Weapon Merchant now sells Extended SMG Mags.
[Bazaar]The Weapon Merchant now sells SMG Rubber Bullets Mags.
[Liu]You can now directly run into the Janitor's Room without the need to click any confirm keys.


20240311
English
############Content###############
[Gun Modification]Zbroyar Z-15 now has a Ukrainian flag on its gun modification UI.
[DLC]Worked on the Steam store page of the next DLC. It will be free. :)
[Project Management]Code and localization files are now version-controlled by git in a private repository. (As I do all the coding and localization, I have all the rights to do so. Even if Github leaks, it does not matter. The same thing cannot be said about certain art and music assets. Thus, only code and localization files are on the git.)
[Project Management]"Make File" bat changed accordingly to remove anything related to the local git repository before making a release build.


20240312
English
############Content###############
[Project Management]The Records of the Russian Invasion of Ukraine is now also on GIT.
[Tileset]Added a huge snow town environment tileset: Snow Town 2024 (You can now use it in your pocket dimension. The old snow town tileset is kept as it is to max the compatibility with RMXP's map editor that the game allows you to export maps to and import maps from.)
[Siberia]New Location: Abandoned Village.
[Distress Signal]The quest moved on a bit. (But, it's foreshadowing the direction we are taking after the story's long pause after Putin's invasion.)
[Abandoned Village]Added fishing data. (Harder than other areas, because it's frozen.)
[Abandoned Village]It's defined as a Siberia outdoor area. Thus, the rules of using Butterfly Wings apply.


20240313
English
############Content###############
[Enemy]New Enemy: Meat Cubes (They are quite weak, just large in number. They are tagged as "undead" and "evil." So, you may find Holy Water and Holy Handgrenades can kill them very efficiently. They are also very easy to get drunk.)
[Abandoned Village]Meat Cubes now spawn in the west part of this location.
[Loot]Meat Cubes drop strange meat.
[Pet]You can capture Meat Cubes and turn them into pets. (It was not my intention at the beginning. But, we shall have diversity and have such choices. Just don't expect them to be very useful unless you spend a lot of effort.)


20240314
English
############Content###############
[Distress Signal]The mission now has mission logs. (Three entries so far.)
[Abandoned Village]Added decoration doors on various houses.
[Abandoned Village]You can now interact with the well in the center of the village. It's a strength check. If you pass, you can gain different items from the well. However, it costs MP on every try.
############System###############
[Skill Check]Skill Check Windows can now show the main attributions of a character to do the skill check.


20240315
English
############Content###############
[Guns]New Assault Rifle: FAMAS (Very high rate of fire, compared to other assault rifles.)
[Bazaar]The weapon merchant now sells FAMAS.
[Guns]Added various levels of penetration power on all assault rifles, heavy machine guns, and the Desert Eagle.
[Steam]The store page of the next free DLC is live.