Vivaio alpha 9 - Shop Update

Hello and welcome to the 8th devlog of Vivaio! 

We’re going to talk about... the Shop Update!

First of all, if you want to help with the development with ideas or bugs, or just want to talk with us (which would be awesome!), you can join our Discord channel: https://discord.gg/GaeF67c.

After a year and a half working on this, Cristian and myself (David) has decided to give the development a break so we can focus on the last months of the bachelor’s degree we’re studying. Thank you for all your support, the early donations and your kind words about the game. We know Vivaio isn’t the best game, but it has the potential to be one: if you see how much every Alpha has improved Vivaio, you could think that for the Alpha 15 or 20 Vivaio could be an important game in the tycoon genre. Patience is a powerful tool!

You can know how the development is going using Twitter (or Discord!): https://twitter.com/VivaioGame.

So, this is what we’ve been working on for the Alpha 9:

New features

• Christmas Edition added! It comes with a Christmas themed song from Suarez!! And a bunch of fancy sprites too!
• Added a lot of new objects: water bottling machine, glass bottles, bottles recycler, food stand, beverages stand, outdoor light, marble tiles and dirt tiles.
• Added a new product: water bottles! They can be produced using a water bottling machine (placed near the river) and glass bottles. Sell them on the beverages stand, and get the glass bottles back from the customers with the bottles recycler (recycle! Always!).
• Added a new menu: Shop. With this new UI, a couple of new mechanics have been created: inaugurate the shop so customers will start coming to the shop, and see the earnings and the amount of stock (once the shop is inaugurated).
• At the start of the game, the character will appear with a House item in the inventory. It can be placed wherever you want, and moved again using CTRL + Right Click.
• Top right bar can be hidden now, showing only 1 button. Right clicking a button will swap it with the main button (the one that will be displayed with the bar hidden).

Improvements

• Stands improved. Shop tables and small tables are now called big and small vegetables tables, and they only accept vegetables. Also, all stand displays are updated depending on the amount of product (this is pretty cool!).
• AI pathfinding reworked. Yay! We’re closer to having a smart Ann. Now, she walks using better routes, and there’s also a bunch of fancy things that makes the AI more interesting. Thanks to Ann, who likes to create trends (she is who made the carrots famous!), now everybody walks smarter too. Just like Ann. Is not like they use the same system, this is deeper: Vivaio society has evolved, is an alive system that learns from the best. And… Who is the best? Ann!
• UI improved. Again. Added icons and tooltips to buttons, and a bunch of stuff more. Also, inventory now is fancier. Basket shows products in a better way. There’s a lot of new sprites and sprites reworked.
• The loading game error handler has also been improved. Now, it is harder to get an error loading the game. But if you ever get one, it will be easier to go back to the main menu, and there’s also a fancy button to send us the error you got (with just a click!) so we can check it and fix it. We’ve added an ingame error handler too.

Changes

• Garbage cans and cash registers are now objects that need to be bought from Farmazon. You can also buy several!
• Loans won’t charge the daily debt if you have less than 600 coins.
• Delivery boxes, storages, composters and product boxes are now 2x1 big (instead of 2x2).
• You can no longer build at the entrance of the house.
• You can no longer plow where you have placed floor tiles.
• The product box now accepts glass and water bottles.

Bugfixing

• Fixed: soil getting plowed when clicking the hoe to get it back to the inventory.
• Fixed: wrong mouse detection when taking letters from the mailbox.
• Fixed: game can’t be loaded after saving with specific items placed on the floor.

As always, thank you for reading! And Happy New Year!