Ahoy, mates! We know it's been a while, but hey! We bring you awesome news. Remember all that new content we've been talking about so many times? Well, you're about to check it all out by yourselves! In order to make sure that Craftomation 101 hits Early Access in its best shape, we need to know what you (yes, you!) think of the game in its current state. That is why we will conduct an open playtest on September 11-18! You can sign up right now to get notified by Steam once it starts (scroll down the game page to see the button): https://store.steampowered.com/app/1724140/Craftomation_101_Programming__Craft/
Here's a brief list of new features that will become available to you in less than 10 days:

• New robot: Cargomate Well, it's technically not an independent kind of robot read more on that below;
• Extended organics: there's now a Sulfur source on the map, which is perfect for growing a new kind of plant - Moss (and Mushrooms, too). Check out this article to learn more;
• New building: a Brewery turns Wood, Moss, and Mushrooms into nutritious ales for your Craftomates! Just add some hot water;
• Reworked graphics: new Command Center visuals, new Ancient Ice visuals, a whole new array of new visual effects
• Interaction between Craftomates: copying, pasting programs, switching each other on and off, and waiting - more on this in this article
• Program editor improvements: you can now add and delete functions, and functions can operate with variables. A bunch of new commands for checking on organics and whether a Craftomate is buffed were added, too
• New, more deliberate map design

To celebrate the upcoming playtest, we've freshened up the screenshot gallery on our Steam page: a great excuse to compare how the game looked a year ago vs. now:



The beta we're working on for the upcoming playtest is a huge content leap from what is currently available in the demo, so save the date, come one, come all! The most recent update also stirred many internal discussions and made us reconsider some of our original ideas. Let's talk about that, shall we?

Cargomates: Heavy Duty

Cargomate seemed like a great idea when we came up with it earlier: a huge loveable robot for carrying heavy stuff. But what would that stuff be? Our initial idea was that Cargomate would be moving Storage units full of items around (which could not be moved otherwise without emptying them first). But when we added the robot to the game and started experimenting with it, we found out that it was not making the game more fun to play.
It happens all the time in the lives of video game devs: a feature might seem awesome while it's in your head, but actually playing it might be the direct opposite of fun. Another thing we got rid of was introducing different kinds of fuel for Bonfires that we mentioned last time: they just turned out to be not fun. However, Cargomates wasn't exactly that case: moving Storages around made sense, it just didn't require a dedicated robot for that. Therefore, Cargomates were demoted: now any Craftomate can turn into one by brewing and consuming a special Primordial Ale in the Brewery. We also reworked the animations of picking and dropping stuff for Cargomates, to make them niftier. Check it out below (feeding a battery to the robot is a placeholder, they will be required to drink ale later): [previewyoutube=u7QwwArYKXI;full][/previewyoutube] Introducing so many ales called for some optimization tools. Therefore, we added a command that allows checking whether a robot drank ale recently. A great opportunity to program yourself some bartending robots!

What's Next?

The playtest, of course! We're now trying hard to implement some of the most important features in modern game development: achievements and cloud saves. After that we get to adding that smart find & pick command we've mentioned before. Sign-up for the playtest, and see you in less than 2 weeks! https://store.steampowered.com/app/1724140/Craftomation_101_Programming__Craft/ Here's another bunch of things that you can do to help Craftomation 101 see the light of release ASAP:

• Share this post with a friend who might like Craftomation 101;
• You can even scribe yourself into the game's credits: most of our games localizations are community-made, and we now have a spreadsheet for those who are willing to help us translate the game into their native language;
• Buy the supporter pack to gain access to exclusive WIP stuff and full-time access to the devs ears and minds
• And of course, play the free demo on itch.io or Steam, leave us a comment, or come to Discord and discuss your experience with us