Hi all! I hope you had a great Christmas! Apologies for the slightly late update- I have been continuing work on the game throughout the holidays- it’s just been one of those few days where I’d rather work than write about working if that makes any sense! Everything is going well though. I’m hesitant to say the project is ahead of schedule as there’s still so much to do, but it’s definitely on schedule.

I’m very pleased to say there’s been some important progress on the versus mode. After spending a lot of time on it this month, I have a basic functioning AI to play against- which is already quite effective! It can’t deck build yet, which is quite a significant part of the game, but it can play nicely with the starting deck. Versus mode is exactly how I’ve envisioned it so far- it’s like city building Chess, but where you can screw each other over! It’s really exciting to get to this stage because it was the largest element of the game which was unimplemented at the time of the kickstarter campaign/preview build. I’ve said it before, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it became the game’s ‘primary’ mode. I’m certainly aiming to build a significant part of the story campaign around it. It’s a bit more thought/strategy intensive than the solo mode, so I think the two complement each other nicely.

I’m designing the AI to be interchangable with couch-multiplayer players. You can play local multiplayer with up to 4 people on 2 teams, and have any of the slots taken by AI or players. I want concrete jungle to be a game you can play sat back on your sofa in your living room with friends as well as a game you can ‘sit forward’ with on your PC.

I’m still in the process of refining the characters, although I have the final 8 finalized now. Those of you familiar with the Preview build have briefly been introduced to characters Laney and mayor Rick Selfridge. The characters will be able to acquire unique cards for their decks throughout a game, which will go towards solving the problem of something to play towards I mentioned last week. Each will be geared towards specific tactics as well, they should make things really interesting!

Lastly, and somewhat ‘least’, I’ve been revamping some old code from early in the project. It’s almost not worth mentioning, but it is time consuming, and that’s what I’ve been doing today. As the game gets more and more complex, I need the foundations to be watertight.

I haven’t been working on any new buildings this week, as I hit my month’s quota of 80 last week, so I’m having a bit of a break. Not to fear, I shall start afresh next year on some more buildings! I did cunningly hold some of my previous work back for times like these though, so here, have an Asylum:

See you all in the new year!