Release v0.2.1 - The 'Brewing and Stewing' Update

Heyo, Zampa here. An update for my current project, Brew and Stew, a small game about managing a Tavern and serving food and drinks to customers. Or at least, until today! Introducing version 0.2.1, the Brewing and Stewing update! Where you will finally be able to, you guessed it, brew your own stew and stew your own brew... no, wait a second...

Jokes aside, as the fantastic name (courtesy of my naming sense) implies, in this update you will be able to make a variety of beers (up to 5 different types!) through a quasi-realistic process, and also cook two different kinds of foodstuffs!

Aside from all that, I'm happy to announce that this Project finally has mucis and sounds! And new and shiny UIs and all that jazz. Plus, a Tutorial to help you understand what you're actually supposed to do!

I have a few complains about this project all in all, now that I'm done with this first big update. It took me a week or two longer than I actually anticipated, although I did spend most of one week doing absolutely nothing at all, so that was to be expected.

My first big complain is, as a friend of mine also pointed out, that I probably made this game into more than I really needed to, although we probably have a different view on what this means.

I like the complexity I created, in making your own food and beer and serving it to your costumers, but I probably introduced all these mechanics before they were really needed at all. There is no real reason to brew your beer in any different way rather than another, and I don't think it feels very rewarding as of now. The process of brewing beer is also overly complicated, as I tried basing it at least somewhat in reality, but it ended up seeming excessive, for a small variety of five different brews.

The code I wrote for the NPCs' behaviour, and the Tutorial itself, have to be the two things I hate the most out of all this project, though. They are both garbled messes, which I should really look to disentangle in the future.

All in all though, I feel satisfied. This is not only a project I feel I brought to a playable level, it is also one I was able to continue working on, uninterrupted, for quite a while. Trust me, I know my habits, the fact that I managed to not abandon this game halfway is simply astounding to me.

Now, I have a few plans for the future, but unfortunately for anyone interested in this project in particular, none of them involve Brew and Stew. I'm going to distance myself from this project for the next month, and work on something else. All of this is really me playing around in various genres, throwing stuff at the walls and see what sticks.

I'll probably be back to continue working on this some day, because I enjoyed myself and I like the overall idea, but for now, I think I'll take a break. See ya'll soon!

The Brew and Stew Game.

The Brew and Stew Trello Board.