Weekly Update - 8th August 2023

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Hi there!


Last week I planned to work on a remake of the Save Management System, Continue Work on the Settings Menu and do additional work on the Background Remake (I won’t be talking about that last one still, Big Secret)


To quickly get one of the 2 out of the way, I finished moving all the old settings over to the new settings, Settings Cloud Sync is all planned out and I should be able to get it working in a basic form today, as I’m a day late! (Expect a post on my socials later in the day, or early tomorrow)


Custom Keybinds have been delayed for now, But it’s still planned, there’s just stuff I want to do first!


Before I get into this last week's work, I have a few topics I’d like to discuss!


MacOS Support


Macs cost a lot of money and as much as I’d like to buy some fancy M2 whatever just for The Idle Undead, I just can’t and I’m stuck with an old insanely slow Mac Mini made sometime between 2011 and 2014 I can’t remember.


And although I can test The Idle Undead on there it’s kind of… annoying and I can’t test the game on newer non-intel Macs and can’t guarantee the “experience” will be good, or work at all.


My current idea is to remove reference to MacOS support on Steam, But still make builds for it (and test it on my old Mac Mini) available on itch.io as long as it doesn’t become a massive waste of time.


If I ever obtain a newer Mac or gain a friend who has access to one (who will let me test the game on it…) this may change.


Accessibility + Random Settings Suggestions


It’s my intention to make The Idle Undead as accessible as I possibly can make it, Although I don’t have a great knowledge of this, And although I plan to implement features I am aware of like Colourblind Filters and Key Rebinding. I may overlook certain stuff!


So feel free to join my Discord, Message me on Twitter (@OliverMacdona1d) or Instagram (@olivermac_games) or by email at support@olivermacdonald.net with suggestions of things I can keep in mind when developing the game!


You can also email and dm for more general setting suggestions, Like motion blur toggles or whatever you wish most games had.


Thank you in advance if you send any suggestions in!


Discord Server & Instagram/Threads


Don’t know where you may be reading this from but there are lots of places you can receive updates about The Idle Undead!


Recently I've started to use Instagram and Threads a lot more, And I plan on making these 2 apps a frequent place I post updates and such, You can follow me there at @olivermac_games


I also plan to use my Discord Server a lot more, And use it as a place to gather feedback from people about ideas I have and if a piece of UI looks good or not.


The issue is I need people there to do most of this stuff, It’s a little empty at the moment but join and ask a few questions or just say hello if you want!


https://discord.gg/h2W347NPSN


Slot Management Remake


Although this may seem somewhat boring, Mainly cause it is, A lot of my old code etc is really bad and it creates a lot of work when I try and add new features cause the old stuff is causing loads of problems!



The Old Save Select Screen had 100 buttons preset in the scene for each individual slot, this new one, does not.


It also allows you to delete saves, As well as shows you the Player Level, Playtime and the Date & Time last played!


It also allows more than a maximum of 100 saves to a theoretical 1 billion or something (I wouldn’t do that), Although Cloud Saves will have a limit much below this, In which I plan to add a warning when you're nearing this limit soon.


Some work still needs to be done like renaming saves, Although the Save System now supports saves that aren’t called Save + A Number. 

Backups are created in the background, Although I'd like to add the option to create manual backups and export/import them soon, As well as add an in-game option to load from backups! (You’d have to rename the backup file at the moment)


This Week’s Plans



This week I plan to add Themes to allow the Player to customize the colour of certain UI elements, As well as find sound effects (which I’ve forgotten to add so far) for certain UI and such!


Work on the City will of course continue and additional changes to the Save Slot System and Settings will happen!


I also plan to create several bi-weekly posts explaining the mechanics of The Idle Undead!


I also plan to write a much longer and better thought-out post about the development of the game so far, What my focus is currently on and several mistakes I've made!

 And with that, See you next week!


  • Oliver Macdonald

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