Item / Resource Distribution

I recently optimized a ton of blueprints and items so they could be distributed across the world with minimal FPS loss. I also added shadow spawns to every single building across the world, because if players attempt to hide inside at night (hoping to skip shadow encounters or escape the siren) I want them to be in for a rude awakening. To make up for that I also added fireplaces to these non-hideout buildings, that can be used in emergency situations. However they are all under the open sky, so when it starts raining they will be extinguished. But if that happens, the siren's view will be clouded by the weather effect, so the player's main concern in these situations will be the shadows close to him.

Testing has shown that the item/resource distribution was always unbalanced. In order to alleviate this, I added text render components to each blueprint, so I could check the distribution from afar. Each resource and location now has a massive colour-coded sign on top, which makes it easy to immediately determine where a specific resource is missing.

This looks chaotic, but it's actually incredibly informative. Red font is related to firewood spawns, green is related to tinder, and yellow indicates a hut filled with additional resources, such as matches, a lighter, vinegar or keys.

I also did a complete overhaul of all light beings in the world. They will now spawn in small groups of 1 - 10 and are treated as a natural resource across the world.

The biggest issue, that remains is related to the difficulty of finding specific resources on a densely foliage populated forest ground. Depending on light and shadow distribution and time of day, these items are incredibly difficult to perceive. I added an ambient light halo to the main player character blueprint and each resource has emissive material, but even then it's difficult to detect specific items.

Nonetheless, the world looks pretty and it feels great to see a hut or dilapidated building from afar to explore it and discover valuable items and resources. By adding these special campfires I'm also giving players a choice between "just surviving" with minimal resources, or committing to a hideout and making a serious attempt at a chess piece or valuable item (clock, compass, cage, protection, health container a.s.o)

The main goal is to get three map sections ready for 0.5.3 and then record gameplay videos during testing. These gameplay videos can then be used as social media fodder and with extensive testing I'll also discover a bunch of other gameplay issues I may not have been aware of up until this point.