Hello! Welcome to another Weekly Update, Before we start next weeks goals will be the same as this week's! Today Ill show the progress Ive made in remaking the games HUD!
Heres the concept I made for the new HUD, Its supposed to look nicer, be more customizable with themes and such, and show more/less information if you want it to! The right side would be a Widgets section, Where you could pin various information you want to see! The concept shows Active Effects, Notices, Wave Information and Daily Tasks! (Daily Tasks dont exist yet) You could also add these currently planned optional ones: - Stats (Total Enemies Killed, Clicks, Kills per Minute etc.) - Quick Buy (Favourite Upgrades will show up allowing you to quickly upgrade them without opening the shop) So far Ive implemented all but the widgets section into the game, which will be the main focus of this next week as well as working on better controller support!
Heres what Ive implemented so far! As you can see its a little bit of a mess but you can see it looks a little nicer from what it used to look like (I hope), the old version is seen below:
It also matches your chosen theme thanks to the work of last week! I also plan this week to add better controller support mainly with a wheel that will show up when you hold down a button allowing quick access to menus and actions (that you can customize) or with a different method, shown later. I also want to allow you to set the 0-9 keys to open various menus and actions of your choosing, in the future hopefully allowing you to assign any keys to actions. To end this weeks update Ill show 2 concepts I have for better controller support:
The first is a simple wheel, Youd hold down a button and then use the stick to select what you want, Let go and the selected menu opens! This one is very simple and is used in a lot of games, The second one below I just came up with like 5 seconds ago
The second one is a bit more confusing but would support up to around 16 shortcuts Youd hold down a part of the d-pad, and the Up button would have 4 other buttons assigned to it. So youd hold down the Up button and then press A to open the Shop, But if you held down Right, A might be assigned to something else of your choosing Does that make sense, I hope so! Tell me your thoughts and such (If anyone does) Ill see you next week!

[ 2023-08-29 23:25:16 CET ] [ Original post ]

Is this a Weekly Update?? oh must have forgotten about that part, sorry! Welcome back to another Weekly update which if not for my massive general laziness problem, would be an accurate title. This last week I worked on adding Themes to The Idle Undead which currently only applies to the Main Menu, Which is the only part of the game that has had its UI revamped so far, This week the main HUD will be reworked!

Themes

Cause I like being able to customize the colours of buttons and stuff, Ive added Themes to The Idle Undead! Currently there very simple and change the accent colour of certain parts of the UI, Later I could expand it to add different designs to menus and add stuff like a Light Mode!
These are the current colour options Ive added! More will be added and some will be changed slightly for reasons such as readability, or cause I have a bias over Orange and Green. I also plan to allow you to choose the very specific RGB value you like the most in future (You can technically modify the save file and do it now but no, thats cheating (it isnt)) Here are some of the themes so far:
When I remake the games HUD I will showcase that in some of these themes as well!

Sound Effects

Sound Effects need a lot more time but Ive spent this week making a long list of the ones I need, Take a little look: There they all are, Theres quite a bit below this as well! I plan to add these while Im doing other work to eventually hopefully have a sound effect for everything on this list (even if some are temporary ones) Id also like to create some myself, or find people to help make some at some point!

This Week

This week I plan to remake the games HUD to: - Look Nicer - Match Your Theme - Allow Hiding Certain Elements I also plan to add a wheel to access frequent menus, And allow assigning menus and actions to certain keys! Thats about all for now! See you next Monday (as if I'll meet that) - Oliver Macdonald

[ 2023-08-23 00:09:36 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi there! Last week I planned to work on a remake of the Save Management System, Continue Work on the Settings Menu and do additional work on the Background Remake (I wont be talking about that last one still, Big Secret) To quickly get one of the 2 out of the way, I finished moving all the old settings over to the new settings, Settings Cloud Sync is all planned out and I should be able to get it working in a basic form today, as Im a day late! (Expect a post on my socials later in the day, or early tomorrow) Custom Keybinds have been delayed for now, But its still planned, theres just stuff I want to do first! Before I get into this last week's work, I have a few topics Id like to discuss!

MacOS Support

Macs cost a lot of money and as much as Id like to buy some fancy M2 whatever just for The Idle Undead, I just cant and Im stuck with an old insanely slow Mac Mini made sometime between 2011 and 2014 I cant remember. And although I can test The Idle Undead on there its kind of annoying and I cant test the game on newer non-intel Macs and cant guarantee the experience will be good, or work at all. My current idea is to remove reference to MacOS support on Steam, But still make builds for it (and test it on my old Mac Mini) available on itch.io as long as it doesnt become a massive waste of time. If I ever obtain a newer Mac or gain a friend who has access to one (who will let me test the game on it) this may change.

Accessibility + Random Settings Suggestions

Its my intention to make The Idle Undead as accessible as I possibly can make it, Although I dont have a great knowledge of this, And although I plan to implement features I am aware of like Colourblind Filters and Key Rebinding. I may overlook certain stuff! So feel free to join my Discord, Message me on Twitter (@OliverMacdona1d) or Instagram (@olivermac_games) or by email at support@olivermacdonald.net with suggestions of things I can keep in mind when developing the game! You can also email and dm for more general setting suggestions, Like motion blur toggles or whatever you wish most games had. Thank you in advance if you send any suggestions in!

Discord Server & Instagram/Threads

Dont know where you may be reading this from but there are lots of places you can receive updates about The Idle Undead! Recently I've started to use Instagram and Threads a lot more, And I plan on making these 2 apps a frequent place I post updates and such, You can follow me there at @olivermac_games I also plan to use my Discord Server a lot more, And use it as a place to gather feedback from people about ideas I have and if a piece of UI looks good or not. The issue is I need people there to do most of this stuff, Its a little empty at the moment but join and ask a few questions or just say hello if you want! Discord Server Invite

Slot Management Remake

Although this may seem somewhat boring, Mainly cause it is, A lot of my old code etc is really bad and it creates a lot of work when I try and add new features cause the old stuff is causing loads of problems!
The Old Save Select Screen had 100 buttons preset in the scene for each individual slot, this new one, does not. It also allows you to delete saves, As well as shows you the Player Level, Playtime and the Date & Time last played! It also allows more than a maximum of 100 saves to a theoretical 1 billion or something (I wouldnt do that), Although Cloud Saves will have a limit much below this, In which I plan to add a warning when you're nearing this limit soon. Some work still needs to be done like renaming saves, Although the Save System now supports saves that arent called Save + A Number. Backups are created in the background, Although I'd like to add the option to create manual backups and export/import them soon, As well as add an in-game option to load from backups! (Youd have to rename the backup file at the moment)

This Weeks Plans

This week I plan to add Themes to allow the Player to customize the colour of certain UI elements, As well as find sound effects (which Ive forgotten to add so far) for certain UI and such! Work on the City will of course continue and additional changes to the Save Slot System and Settings will happen! I also plan to create several bi-weekly posts explaining the mechanics of The Idle Undead! I also plan to write a much longer and better thought-out post about the development of the game so far, What my focus is currently on and several mistakes I've made! And with that, See you next week! Oliver Macdonald

[ 2023-08-08 00:36:43 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hello there! This is the first of hopefully many weekly updates on the development of the games Im working on, as well as general stuff! So far the only game Im working on right now is The Idle Undead, So lets talk about that! These weekly updates will release every Monday, Detailing what I worked on for the past week! After that, Ill give my plans for the current week!

Settings Menu Redesign

The new Settings menu shows a new UI that I plan to bring to the rest of the game, At the moment the games UI is all over the place and looks different from one menu to the next. Over the next few weeks, I will be redesigning the UI of most (if not all) of The Idle Undead to match a similar theme and style to the Settings menu. This settings redesign also includes a rewrite of the old crappy code that was used to manage the games settings and replaces it with new slightly less but still crappy code. You can open the settings in the game now, An amazing never before seen innovation. Also dont worry, Im not done with the Settings redesign, I still need to do the following for it! Add more Settings, Including Keybinds etc Add the ability to Import / Export Settings Its not usually a good idea to store the games settings in the cloud, As settings such as Graphics settings are usually very specific to one device, and you dont really want them matching across every device most of the time. This feature will allow exporting your settings, Then when importing them manually later, You will be able to select what settings to import, and what to exclude.

Game City Redesign

Heres a screenshot from the game! You may notice, I hope, 2 things: There are no zombies, where are they? The background looks low quality and kinda bad Now I'm not showing anything I'm working on for the background redesign, I want to redesign the Steam page and unveil the new background, Along with the (probably placeholder) zombies, UI etc at the same time, With a new better (hopefully) trailer! Although I may post teasers a few weeks before, or show random props or stuff here! But this week Ive started the redesign for the background, and made a horrible-looking zombie placeholder, Which will be the placeholder to the placeholder, for now!

Plans For The Week

For this current week, I want to continue work on the background redesign, finish the Settings, and start the redesign of the Save Management screen! The current save system allows you to have multiple saves at once, But thats about it. For the redesign, I want to make it easier to delete save slots, set nicknames for saves, and see stats about the save before loading into it (other than your level), As well as have the UI designed to match the Settings! I hope to see you next Monday when I would have hopefully done this work, and then wrote another post about it! Thanks for Reading! Oliver Macdonald Also, follow my Threads and Instagram at @olivermac_games

[ 2023-07-31 21:24:23 CET ] [ Original post ]

Introduction

I keep delaying writing these dev updates, so they are not really as monthly as they should be But hopefully, Im going to write these more frequently now, despite saying this every other update. A lot has been added since the last update though!

Notices

These Notices are basically notifications that will appear in the bottom-right to show you smaller events that happen in the game, like the reward youve gained from defeating an enemy which surprisingly you have not been told since I added this. You also get notices for when the wave resets back to Wave 1 and loads of other stuff!

Enemy Grades

As you progress in The Idle Undead youll probably find that some of the enemies introduced near the start of the game are a bit too easy so Ive added Enemy Grades! What are Enemy Grades, you ask?? (asked no one) At the start of the game, youll only have Grade 1 unlocked, which means all the enemies will be at their base HP, when you go to later levels a grade will be picked at random from the ones unlocked, higher grades will have higher HP as shown below: Grade I - 100% HP Grade II - 150% HP (Unlocked at Lvl 100) Grade III - 200% HP (Unlocked at Lvl 250) Grade IV - 250% HP (Unlocked at Lvl 500)

Enemy Numbers

I recently rewrote some of the Enemy System, as it was one of the first parts I added to the game and is a bit dated and badly made. Originally 3 Enemies would exist every wave and no more than that, Now this has changed! The player starts with 3 Enemies like before, but based on how far youve progressed through the round. More enemies will spawn, currently up to 5!

Enemy Effects

I also added effects that can be applied to enemies! For example, an Ice Type Enemy can spawn that will freeze the enemies opposing them, protecting them from damage with a layer of ice until the enemy causing the effect is defeated!

Bosses

Although I will keep the bosses a secret for now, Ive finally implemented the first one! The boss even has a unique effect in battle exclusive to it! I plan to have 4 boss battles per round, every 250 waves!

Weapons

This system is still very early in development (as seen by the placeholder description), But Ive added Weapons! Weapons act as an incentive to click, as every click will power up the weapon charge, Allowing you to unleash a more powerful attack! The flamethrower surprisingly sets an enemy on fire! Fire does small amounts of damage to an enemy very quickly, on death the fire spreads to enemies opposing them.

Coins

A coin can now pop up in different places on the screen at random points, clicking it before it disappears will give you a reward!

Low-End Device Optimizations

Ive added a new feature that will change your default FPS to 30 when on a lower-end device. On every other platform these default to 60 FPS, You can of course change the FPS yourself if you dont like these settings.

[ 2023-04-24 02:54:47 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hey there! This month i've been pretty busy but i've managed to work on the cards system quite a lot over the past few days among other things! Recently i've made the decision to make the "Cards" i've been talking about for a while "Skill Cards", and making all the other upgrades like Boosts and Survivors also cards, like "Survivor Cards" etc. This is so I can make a menu that displays all the 'Cards' you've collected throughout the game, giving you a basic idea of where your at and how much you have left to unlock everything! So I have a screenshot or two of this menu to show:

I've also redesigned the design for a few things like the Game Icon and parts of the loading screens and main menus with new animations and such! I've also added some icons that show when your playing with a keyboard to show any shortcuts that are available to open something instead of having to press the button every time, here's what that looks like

You can turn these icons off in the settings if you don't like them there btw! Now that's about all i've done this month as I've only been working on the game the past few days, for the remainder of this month and into the next i expect to do a LOT more work than I did this month! I have also this month put more work into parts I can't show at the moment, like the Skill Cards, a new mini-game and such! That's all for this month's update, hopefully next month's will have a lot more to show!

[ 2023-01-23 00:41:14 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hey there! Quick Update to say I've released the first trailer for The Idle Undead! Currently this trailer is based from the 0.0.13 version, So it doesn't include some newer features like Cards and such yet! I plan to make trailers every few versions (I make around 1 version / month) so the trailer is up to date with the latest features in the game! I'm also planning to do update videos where I describe the changes I've made every month alongside the update posts here! [previewyoutube=gPTlgMGSuVU;full][/previewyoutube]

[ 2023-01-04 15:49:50 CET ] [ Original post ]

Firstly, Happy new year!

I started development on The Idle Undead near the end of 2021, So this month will mark a year and 2 months probably that ive been working on the game! Last year I had some trouble with getting the motivation to work on the game and combined with starting university I had not done as much development as I had hoped for that year, but the hope for 2023 is to put a lot more time into development! With that here are some of my plans for this year:

Focus on the Art side of the game

Although this point is very vague at what the art side means Im going to be focussing less on adding new features and a lot more on the appearance of the game as well as aspects like accessibility and such You might have noticed in game screenshots and such but the zombie clicker game has a lack of zombies, this is because I wouldnt exactly describe myself as an artist and my pixel art skills just aren't really at the point where I can make zombie looking zombies, let alone werewolves and the like! This year I plan to practise my pixel art skills and create a lot more little icons and sprites for zombies and all kinds of things, even if some of them will be placeholders while I practise to make better ones. This includes:

• Adding actual zombies to look at
• Making more models to make the background environment look more alive or shall i say dead
• Adding more animations for random UI effects and such
• Adding some more sound effects

The much anticipated Cards system

I feel like I've been talking about this every update but I'm still working on the Cards system. This is a major mechanic of the game that's a core part of the experience that is yet to be implemented. Ive already been working on the design for several of the cards and coming up with the effects each one will have and I plan to have a basic version of the cards system implemented relatively early in this year. Nearer the time I will have a dedicated blog post and video describing how it works

Boss Battles

Ive finally started putting more thought into boss enemies and will start adding them pretty soon! Simply put, there are enemies with a LOT of health, but theyll give you a pretty good reward and I want every boss to feel like you're hitting a milestone in game progress. some bosses will give a story upon defeat, some might unlock a new upgrade!

Video Updates

Ive been doing these blog post style updates for a while now but I also want to do these in video format for each month, So I can more easily show the actual progress of what I've been working on instead of just describing them.

Marketing

This is basically just trying to get more people to know about the game, I dont plan on doing this that much until the end of the year where I have something more interesting to present, But this will include stuff like: Heavily advertising social media accounts for the game Making a game trailer Making merchandise JUST FOR ME (I would never sell merch before my game is fully out, This would be just merch for me to use all the time so if im streaming for example, my game merch will be in my camera, its smart i promise)

Mini Games

While I'm bored developing The Idle Undead I plan to make mini games for The Idle Undead, yes yes im a genius thank you. Ive already started working on one of them, These will be very very simple small mini games I can create in barely any time (1 week - 1 month) I plan to have these unlocked throughout playing the game and will give you a small optional distraction while you're waiting for a thing to happen in the main game!

Storyline

I know my personal worst nightmare, writing dialogue for characters when I cant talk to real people (gamer joke) At first these will be very very basic like a tutorial person who tells you how to do the whole game thing, and later giving you random parts of my really bad game lore. Right now it will just be a tutorial person, and right now thats all I have planned. But it will introduce fun visual novel-like elements to the game!

Some secret other stuff

Yes im keeping secrets from you, im sorry (im not) I get game ideas for features like 5 times a day and I have a long long list of stuff I want to add, I wont add most of them. So I would never announce I'm working on a thing if I decide to scrap it, well I might, but Im not going to announce every idea Ive made a tiny concept for. So this year there'll be a lot more than Ive said here, a lot more, but youll find out more about them nearer the time, theyll also be a lot more of the same stuff added like upgrades and such!

[ 2023-01-01 01:42:34 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hey there!
As you can see i've added 4 new survivors!! welll.... you can only SEE 3 but that's not the point... But i've finally decided to go back and add some new upgrades, and played the game for about 5 hours from a new save to see how the game works with the new survivors! It now takes about 2 hours to unlock everything i've added so far, and cause it's so easy to go back and add new content I can stretch that for much longer. From doing this i've learned a few things: - The first 20 minutes of the game is pretty slow, this is because you've only just started and the game doesn't pick up as fast as it should do. - After this the game is pretty fun for 2-3 hours, and you can see your progress and how the zombies are being defeated faster which is pretty satisfying! - After this it's a bit TOO easy, this will get harder if i add more content but i've noticed the game needs more input from the player and more gameplay mechanics that require the player to pay attention, other than all the existing mechanics that require the player to sit back and watch, and occasionally buy upgrades. This leads me to the next mechanics i'm going to be working on: - Weapons!!! To simply explain, while you click you will also charge the BIG click. unleash the big click to deal ultimate damage. So a weapon will have charges lets say 100 that you power up by clicking If you click 100 times the weapon will fire and inflict damage on the enemies. You'll unlock more as you progress, And each weapon will do it's own unique special thing I haven't thought of yet.... - Cards Cards will be obtained by.. playing the game. Randomly you'll find card packs while playing that when opened give you random cards, each card does a unique one time ability when used. You can choose to use a card at any time but once you've used it the card is destroyed and can't be used again. it's like a one time use upgrade. That's about all I have for this update, You can tell a lot of this isn't as detailed as usual, and that's cause I'm still fully designing and figuring out how it'll work. But i thought it'd be a good idea to make an update so yes... If you want more frequent smaller updates I'd highly suggest you follow my Twitter, or annoyingly ask me all the time on my Twitch. Goodbye for now.. hopefully!

[ 2022-12-14 10:37:19 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hey there, This is a small update to announce that progress has been slow since the start of September and not much work has been put into the game during this time while I adjust to being at university. So for this post I'm going to say what I'm planning to add for the remainder of this month and the next month, as there will be no update for November and possibly December. The main goal at the moment is to fill the game with content, as the base features have mostly been implemented, this includes:

• Adding More Enemies & Upgrades
• Adding more content to the current map I'm currently planning to scrap the map system and keep 3-5 background maps that rotate to a new one every day. Currently I want to work on the existing one to add more content to it, as well as some animations, sounds and objects.
• Recreating Game Mechanics This includes going back and recreating some older code, and mechanics that were created earlier in the game's development before there too difficult to change
• Adding Better Steam Deck Support The game current works well on the Steam Deck with the native Linux build, but I plan to add more to take advantage of the controls and to make it easier and faster to play on
• Improving UI This includes adding on screen notifications for certain status effects, making menus easier to navigate and more

[ 2022-10-18 00:31:30 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hey there! It's the 2nd monthly update and a lot has changed this month! Firstly, The "Shop" has been reworked to allow you to filter and customize what upgrades you want to be displayed!
As you can see the Upgrades now also have icons with them, And a filters button!
Pressing the Filters button opens the above menu providing many options, for example:

• Hiding / Showing Different Categories
• Only Showing Upgrades you can currently afford!
• Being able to favorite upgrades, and filter to only show those

You can also combine all of these options, to only show the exact upgrades you want and only the ones you can afford!
There's now also the option to have multiple save slots, As I plan to have different features such as difficulty selection and custom modes, it makes sense to allow more than 1 save! Currently this goes up to 100 saves! For the next month of September I plan to do a lot, hopefully making a lot of progress, like:

• An Entirely Separate Mini-Game where you manage a base and survivors, providing a boost in the main game if you keep everyone alive! (This won't get done in September, but i'm starting on the base mechanics for it)
• More Upgrades in the base game! - Currently there are very few upgrades as adding more was very easy to do, so I've been prioritizing adding other features, but now i'm going to come back and add more to test out the game at higher levels!

[ 2022-08-22 02:17:01 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hello! This is the first of many monthly development updates where I will showcase all the changes I've made and have planned for the remainder of the month!

Remade Enemy System

This month I decided to take a look at the Enemy System and decided to revamp how this system works! Previously, Enemies would spawn in 3 slots, and once one of those enemies died a new one would instantly take it's place. Now, Enemies spawn in waves, there are still 3 slots enemies spawn but if one enemy dies another one won't take it's place until all the enemies have been killed. This would be considered clearing a wave. When the Player reaches wave 1000, a boss enemy will spawn that take over all 3 slots, once defeated the wave will go to Wave 1. Bosses though will be worked on next month.

New Enemies & Upgrades

Currently I have a small amount of upgrades and enemies in game, this is because the act of adding new ones is a relatively simple task considering it's mostly implemented and tested already, and I wanted to prioritize other features that needed more work, but this month I am finally adding some more to test the difficulty when in later game!

Settings in-game

Using feedback from my early testers, I've decided to prioritize a settings menu within the game, It will feature the ability to change audio settings etc (more than in the screenshot) Previously settings could only be changed from the main menu

Tutorials

Tutorials have been added as pop-ups that appear when you need them, previously tutorials were hidden under a menu the player had to choose to go too. These are now pop-ups! (with an option to disable in settings)

Daily Login Revamp

Previously the daily login reward would check if it's a different day, and give you the reward if the date you last played and the current date didn't match. This would work great apart from it makes it very easy to cheat this system to get the daily reward very quickly. I've revamped the daily logins and added additional measures to prevent this!
That's all for this monthly update, there also many small changes not mentioned here, Like the addition of music on the main menu, and next month the whole game! Follow the Twitter and Join the Discord for more updates! https://twitter.com/olivermac_games & https://discord.gg/xs2FFpBVEk

[ 2022-07-27 11:35:59 CET ] [ Original post ]