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Status update and what's new in 0.5.0
January 23rd, 2015

This week we continued to work on 0.5.0 update which is either available right now or will be shortly. Here's the list of most important changes for this new update as well as the stuff we've been working on this week. New version includes loads of balance changes (some of which may not be very noticeable), but I'm not gonna go through all of them to keep the changelog relatively short.

Note! Savegames from earlier versions of the game are not compatible with 0.5.0.

Three new resources: lore, magic and fame. Lore is used for research, magic and fame are currently not used for anything.

Lore, libraries and research. Lore is collected by a librarian who works at a library. Librarian wanders around the city collecting lore generated by your houses, much like a tax collector. The more evolved your houses are, the more lore is being collected. You can spend lore on research. You can see the list of currently available improvements at the Research screen [R].

Magic and temples. Magic is collected the same way by a priest who works at a temple. There are some ideas what magic may be used for, but it will be implemented in one of the future updates.

Fame, minstrels guilds and fame. Fame is collected the same way by a minstrel who works at a minstrels guild. You can also get fame by defeating rivals. Town hall, statues and fountains generate fame over time.

Crime, constabulary and burglars. High unemployment increases the crime level in the city, which can be lowered by constables. The higher the crime level is, the higher is the chance for a burglar to spawn near one of the houses. Burglar goes to a nearest tax office or town hall and steals some of your money.

New game window has been re-arranged and now includes difficulty levels and starting gold! Difficulty levels affect almost everything: crime, taxes, workforce, plague, immigration, monsters, politics, rivals' strength etc. It's hard to say at which difficulty level the game previously was since a lot of those things were re-balanced. All I can say is that the easiest level should be pretty easy while the highest one is quite brutal, especially at the start.

City name, ruler name and title can be specified manually.

All color combinations for the realm shield are allowed (if the appropriate switch is on).

Clothes are now required before boots. This may actually make city development a bit smoother, so thanks for the suggestion.

Overview window [O] has been improved greatly. Apart from lore, magic, fame and medicine it shows potential production rate of each resource and current demand.

Employment window [E] has been improved as well and now can be set to show only existing industries.

Storage yard window has been re-arranged for better usability.

Map generation and rendering code has been optimized for better performance and universality.

Clicking on upper panel opens the respective window (Overview window for coins, magic and fame; Employment window for population; Research window for lore).

Ctrl+S saves the game.

Monsters now attack invaders and vice versa (Thanks for pointing that out!).

Before requesting goods or sending troops you can see the chance of success, which makes things clearer and saves time.

Contact us at info@hearthlands.com.
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Stay tuned and see you soon!

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Status update
January 16th, 2015

This week we've been working on tweaks and fixes for the 0.5 update (which comes out next week, hopefully), as well as made some new buildings and characters.

I rewrote map generation and map rendering code for better performance and universality. Maps look mostly the same, but should render faster and different tile types can now be combined easier.

Monsters now attack invaders and vice versa (Thanks for pointing that out!).

Raw resources availability has been rebalanced (more fish?).

The concept of crime has been introduced:

The higher unemployment you have the more likely a burglar will spawn near one of the houses. Burglar runs to a nearest tax office or a town hall and steals some of your coins. He then runs out of the map. To prevent burglars from spawning you need to build a constabulary. Constable walks around the city much like other walkers do decreasing the crime level in every house he passes by.

(Click to enlarge)

New characters include minstrel (for minstrels guild), burglar and constable.

A developing city with new buildings and characters (see if you can spot constable and minstrel):

(Click to enlarge)

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Status update
January 9th, 2015

Not much in terms of graphics this week, but I hope will be able to get back on track with that next week.

Minstrels guild (a fame generating building):

I've been focused mostly on various improvements and suggestions for the upcoming 0.5 update. Here are some of them:

- Clothes are required before boots (as an experiment).

- Overview window includes lore, magic and fame.

- City name, ruler name and title can be specified manually.

- All color combinations for the realm shield are allowed.

- Clicking on upper panel opens the respective window (Overview window for coins, magic and fame, Employment window for population and Research window for lore).

- Ctrl+S saves the game.

- Houses require more furniture and clothes and fewer pillows (+ some other balance changes).

- Storage yard window is arranged better.

- Employment window can show only existing industries.

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Status update
December 26th, 2014

This week we continued to work on the next update, which will include some tweaks and improvements (a lot of which were suggested by the community) as well as new things.

Overview window slightly changed to include medicine as well as potential production and demand rates for food, alcohol, luxury resources and medicine (also apparently it wasn't working very well).

Three new types of resources: lore, magic and fame (names may change).

Lore is collected from houses by a librarian (the higher the house level is the more lore it generates) and can be spent on improvements. There'll be 3 or 4 categories of improvements. And each improvement will have 3 to 5 steps.

(Click to enlarge)

Magic is collected from houses by a priest who works in the temple. Not sure yet what exactly magic will be needed for (spells?). Also you'll be able to build magic towers to shoot enemies with magic missiles for the cost of magic points. Yes, there are too many words "magic" in that sentence.

Temple is big:

(Click to enlarge)

Priest is small:

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Status update and what's new in 0.4.5
December 19th, 2014

It was a busy week! We've released Heathlands on Steam and I'd like to thank everyone who supported us buy purchasing the game, leaving a review, suggesting a feature, reporting a problem etc. You guys are amazing.

Throughout the week I've released 4 updates with various tweaks and fixes, and today the fifth one comes out (or came out already), which makes the latest version of the game to be 0.4.5.

Note that savegames from earlier versions are not compatible with 0.4.5.

The new update has a tutorial (yay)! Now you will finally be able to learn how you supposed to play the game:)

Westeners and southeners now grow cotton instead of sheep herding to make textile. Cotton works the same way as turnips or grain and is being planted/harvested by a grower.

Click to enlarge

Library is something we're going to add in one of the next updates.

Click to enlarge

And a librarian.

Like Hearthlands on Facebook.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel.

Become our watcher on Indie DB.

Get the game on Steam.

Stay tuned and see you soon!

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