Another week comes to its end and your weekly update of all things Ale Abbey is out right now.
Today's post feels a bit juicier than the rest. We might be oversharing, but we don't think that leaves room for any complaints there. To be honest, get used to the updates getting juicier, there's more news coming your way, soon-ish ;)
Now, get ready for the words.
-- Rooms are almost done
Most of the asset creation so far focused on the inhabitants of the Monastery and its rooms. With Raimo and Francesco on overdrive, many rooms have been signed off as complete and we have rapidly moved from room to room so meticulously that we even cleared the rubble from the "under construction" ones!
The latest update is that the Dormitory is almost over. A few assets need to be set right, a few corrections to increase the Monks' quality of life and that'd be it.
Next in line, the Library. Even if the Library was one of the first rooms we designed "as is" for promotional purposes and pitches to potential publishers, we will - of course - be reworking its look and feel from the ground up. You'll be happy to know we're already on it ;)
Hint hint... the Abbotts and Abbesses of Ale Abbey will soon have a place to call their "humble" abode.
-- Zooming out for perspective!
Using an entire point of today's post to celebrate one of the first times we zoomed out from working on separate assets to do a double take on how glorious and (almost) complete they look lined up together. Yeap, this is what the Abbey will most probably look like on your display in the future!
Having said that there is still work to be done (assets to be created, color corrections to be had, and many others), but we still want to bask in the glory of a near complete Monastery.
In addition to that... allow us to drop the video that made the rounds online last week, in case you missed it ;) It's like zooming out, but with stuff moving around!
-- Further development of UI
Emiliano is hell-bent to work on the UI until it starts looking at the very least decent. From last week's post about working on prepping a recipe to be brewed, we're slowly moving into more levers and buttons, barrels and Monks!
UI has in no way been put on hold, we are slowly working on what will not only look good but also be functional and as fitting as possible to Ale Abbey's time period.
-- What to do with spent grain
Spent grain is the leftover grain after it's been used to produce beer. It looks like a mess of its former self and it has already served its purpose, but it's still a sizeable amount of "food" to just discard.
Accounting for almost 85% of the industry's waste, it definitely bites a bit harsher when we're talking about doing something like this at home. Of course, thanks to their profit-tethered ingenuity, those big brewers found solutions that apply to any size of production; homebrewers rejoice!
So, a few ideas, for when the time comes to discard that spent grain:
- make tasty, tasty bread (of course the Germans have a word for it: "Treberbrot")
- use it as a pizza base (Yannis' favorite)
- animal feed (you can actually use the grains for livestock or as treats for other house pets, but please be aware that hops are toxic to canines)
- pity that you can't use it as food, but adding it to compost provides it with more nitrogen and helps with the smell
Just remember that spent grain is a very wet byproduct and you might have to drain/dry it according to your needs. Now, let us see those pizza bases!
Thank you for your time and enjoy your weekend responsibly! See you next week ;)
-- Hammer & Ravens
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