Short, sweet Mondoid this week as the constituent parts of Build 33 are still being industriously bashed with code hammers. It is an exciting time for us too though, as at the end of the week we’ll be getting a +2 personnel boost in the form of General Arcade returning to us for a few months to work at the PZ coalface again.

The thinking is that their primary role will be on MP stuff (the desire for easier server creation in our MP community is pretty strong, and VOIP is something else we’re hopeful for) while the rest of the team concentrates on solo/main game stuff. We’ll let you know the specifics once they’re back in the saddle though!

Elsewhere RJ (new FMOD sound system, menus, random factor houses etc) and Turbo (furniture movement, radio/TV wavelengths, MP walkie talkies etc) are finessing their systems and chasing bugs – and if they’re all ready to go prior to Creative Mode then we’ll most likely release them in an IWBUMS public test and then drop Creative in afterwards. There’s plenty in there for testing, after all, and it’s all stuff we can’t wait to get public feedback on.

Something that has changed a little since Mondoid last saw it is Turbo’s furniture movable system, which previously worked like this. When we’d played with it for a little while we realised that the UI felt too cluttered, so Turbo has been playing around with the system to make it a little more user-friendly. Let’s go over to Holland for the latest…

So what wasn’t quite working with furniture movement?

Well the main problems were the way to get to the movable mode itself, and the GUI in general. People who played with it thought that the UI felt a bit cluttered, and that new players would feel a bit drowned in it what with all the different options.

So how has it changed from what people have seen in your previous videos?

Primarily, there’s now an icon that’s been added for accessing the movables cursor instead of the right click context I had before. Once it’s activated TAB can still be used to cycle through pick-up/place/rotate, and also context menu commands if you so wish. Here’s a video of what we’ve got right now:

We’ve also made it a load more obvious just where stuff can be placed. Before I was using all these flashy red and green colors, but that didn’t work – so now I’m using neutral colors and everything aligns a lot more like pre-existing mechanics like Construction. Finally, when you’re trying to pick stuff up tile contents are drawn in the info panel and the selected object is highlighted there instead of on the actual tile – and will be coloured red when requirements aren’t met.

The layout of the info panel got a little fix up as well. It’s all boring UI stuff I guess, but it has a big impact on how it all plays!

How about bigger or more bulky items?

The system I describe above applies to single tile smaller objects or objects that can be deconstructed, but we’re also making the system a bit more believable. As such we’re having it so that multi-tile items or bulky stuff like fridges have to be moved tile by pushing/pulling from tile to tile rather than shoved into people’s inventories. No-one has pockets quite that deep!

When everything is in public testing and I’m waiting for the bugs to roll in we also want to add in a system that will allow you to deconstruct bigger items (like beds, for example) into constituent kits which can then be carried elsewhere and reconstructed. We think that’s the best way to keep the coolness of the system, while also keeping it within the boundaries of common sense.

Finally, before we go, we’d like to underline that this image of Spiffo that appeared recently is most certainly not canon. Spiffo is uninfectable. Okay Evilmonk?

This week’s featured image from TheLeonBM (again!) over on Steam. The Centralised Block of Italicised text, as well as once again being in awe of TheLeonBM’s screenshot prowess, would also like to direct your attention to the PZ Wiki should you feel like editing or amending something, and the PZ Mailing List that can send blogs like this and patch notes direct to your mailbox.