The game will be updated on Steam fairly soon, this makes the third alpha version. After the next update, the game will move onto beta-testing for which I will involve more testers. The hope is to have most of the buildings and underlying systems ready for the beta, although some of the ui etc. will be underdeveloped.
This week I've finished the upper middle class tier of residences. This means that cities will now spawn the highly skilled labour required for the third tier industry (medicine and jewelry among others) and buildings like clinics and hospitals.
Prior to changing the buildingblock size, buildings grew out of the blocks. To prevent buildings from popping in, they were contrained to the same size as each block. Since there's now a completely new sequence for when buildings are constructed (still WIP but detailed in earlier post), this limitation no longer serves a function. As such, the top densities for the upper middle class residential and commercial zones will be taller. This can be seen here:
This should make for more interesting city silhouettes once players start building for highly skilled labour.
The upper middle class and upper class tiers have high demands, Requiring buildings such as the library to be built nearby as well as consumption goods such as jewelry and processed food.
Since I recently added medicines as a resource, clinics and hospitals have been updated to require medicines as an input to function properly.
I've updated the UI to work with a new class - Window. Some ui-functions will be window based, like the options menu and global economy view. This class is used to manage windows better and make sure that if one is open, it's closed before a new one is opened to avoid cluttering up the screen.
Options have been implemented in a fairly limited, but functional form. It allows toggling some of the more demanding visual features.
Moving into next week I will get back to work on traffic, which sadly didn't make it into this update due to time constraints. The upcoming week will be heavy on systems work, like road connectivity and resource distribution systems. I should be able to finish a few of the remaining 30 buildings left for the EA-release of the game.
/ Dispersing minds
