My vacation week and long weekend have given me enough free time to kick some Faith arse. I’ve made more improvements in the last week than I’ve made in most months. I know what you’re thinking - why on earth would you spend your first free time in ages doing “work”? Well, “working” on faith is sort of like “working” as a daring superhero fighting crime (preferably one that can shoot lasers in some form). If you survive, you realize it was pretty fun, and the world is a better place.
Holy Artifacts have gotten a big boost. Artifacts can now be put up for auction to other players, creating a market similar in some ways to the advisors system in Asylum - with more cool ways to get income and less messing around with hourly payrolls. I now have a control panel for updating and adding artifacts, which isn’t at all exciting to you, but sure tickles me pink. There’s currently two dozen, but I’d like there to be at least 50 when we get to Public Beta.
The Holy Laws page has also been redone, letting you sort laws depending on what kinds of benefits they have to your people. You wouldn’t have seen this, but the old page had about 4.5 arseloads of text on it and it was too hard to find what you’re looking for.
Regions have also seen a huge overhaul. Or should they be Holy Regions? Anyway, they now vary in number between games, meaning I could set up a massive 12-region game or a tiny 2-region one. (I’ve set up a 2-region one since it’s appropriate for the tiny number of alpha testers.) A number of other improvements have been made, including balance so that the faith who has settled the most regions isn’t always the faith that has the most followers. Now it’s possible (in thoery) to kick somebody’s arse so hard that their followers retreat somewhere else.
I’ve added user pages (like in Asylum) so you can see who’s that arse is controlling “Annoyism”. I’ve also written some wiki software for the help system and started filling it with golden knowledge, most of which will end up being wildly inaccurate and fixed by other arses. I’ve added administration tools, fixed bugs, and even slept some!
So now what? Well, I’m going to add one or two alpha testers, and focus on balance, interaction, help, and arses. While it’s too early to say for sure, I’m starting to feel like a winter public beta is likely (shock and awe abound). Yes, I actually do plan on finishing. Arse arse arse.