KreatureKind will be available on Steam on the 29th of April, and what a ride it has been! If you have tried the game earlier, maybe through the demo, playtest or free key, I would suggest checking it out again. As the release has creeped closer, the game has evolved and started getting closer to something we can feel proud of – and we sincerely hope you will like it as well.
The largest thing weāve been working on recently is getting the controller support to work properly. It kind of worked, but there were too many cases where the game simply āforgotā where it was and no buttons were selected when moving the joystick. This was because the game relied partially on Unityās input system, which has its purpose but simply didnāt cut it in the end. Instead, we (I say āweā but itās basically just me) disabled it and made a system that always keeps track of which screen the game is in and which buttons are on it. After a week or so of overhauling the system, it should now work as intended!
Related is also that Iāve put in quite a bit of work to get the game working smoothly on the Steamdeck. In addition to fixing some unique controller issues (for example, the left joystick scrolled between cards in hand when you didnāt even touch it sometimes), I had to tweak the UI to fit neatly on the aspect ratio. Some concessions have been made, but I think itās good enough both at 16:10 and 16:9. Outside that, Iām afraid you may experience some strange behavior – but the game should still be fully playable. Otherwise, do let me know!
In addition to this, Iāve worked on soooo many quality of life fixes. One example is that playtesters missed that they could unlock more activists beyond Luca, simply because they didnāt notice that the Event node reactivated. For context, there are seven playable characters – and apart from the original three from the tutorial, the following four are available for unlocking when their respective factions can be visited on the World Map. What I did was to move the Event node to a central location on the map, animated it when itās active, and added an ambience (carnival music). Time will tell if itās enough of an improvement!
Worth noting is that weāre still waiting for localization to be finished, and will update the game with the translations as soon as we have them. It should be in before launch, but worst case weāll update as soon as we possibly can!
I truly do hope you enjoy the game. Iāve tried my best to make a good game under what can only be described as challenging circumstances, and knowing that it meant something to someone would make it all worth it. So, please wishlist the game, share it with a friend, and let me know what you think!
Anna
