| Early Access Build #17 - Features & Information [message #312] |
Tue, 04 February 2025 22:01  |
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Horemheb
Messages: 137
Registered: October 2022
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Senior Member
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School Simulator - As of Early Access Build #15
Thank you for joining early access for School Simulator. This post will explains the game's current state as of the early access build #17 and how you can best help us as development continues.
First and foremost we strongly recommend you register for the forums here if you have not already. We encourage you to check in regularly as development continues. New early access builds will likely be available quite frequently, particularly in the first few weeks and months.
How the Game Works
School Simulator has two main gameplay modes: Construction and Simulation.
In Construction Mode, you design your school. You decide where buildings go, lay down corridors and place rooms. During this phase you will also set initial school policies.
In Simulation Mode, your school comes to life. Hundreds or thousands of students and staff will arrive, move around and interact based on their individual personalities, traits and schedules. During simulation mode you can:
-Simply watch if you wish
-Take direct control of any character
-Modify the traits of any character
-Change some policies on the fly
In it's finished form the simulation will be divided into sixteen segments, each lasting four real life minutes and in total representing an entire school day. After the school day is finished you will be able to continue on to the following day, or make modifications to the school in construction mode before moving on.
As of the current build the simulation is limited to the first of the sixteen segments: the arrival period. This is when students and staff first enter the school campus. This might seem limited, but it is for several reasons.
Before making other segments of the school day playable, we must ensure the core systems of the simulation work correctly. If they do not work here in very first segment, they will not work in the others. In short this means we must test as characters arrive at school:
-Pathfinding
Can characters find their ways around? Are they able to use stairs? Do their movements make sense?
-Decision Making
Do character choices make sense given their traits? For instance do characters who have a non-smoker trait tend to light up anyway?
-Interaction
Do the various systems where multiple characters interacts work correctly (i.e. - corporal punishment)?
-School Policies
Are school policies the player set being respected by characters (or, if they are not, do the characters realize this)?
Now the good news is the game already is generating complete daily and weekly schedules for all characters, so once the core systems of the simulation are validated, opening up more segments of the day is easier.
What We Need From You
Any and all feedback you have is important and valued. During this stage of early access we are looking for feedback in several key areas in particular though:
Interfaces
-Do buttons, windows, menus, etc function correctly?
-Are they intuitive or confusing?
-Are they easy to use or cumbersome?
Viewing
-Can you navigate around the map smoothly?
-Can you zoom in and out smoothly?
-Do elements appear on their correct layer?
School Construction
-Do building tools work correctly?
-Are there any weird placement issues?
-Does delete function correctly?
Character
-Are characters being assembled correctly?
(Body, hair, clothes, etc seem to come together fine, etc)
-Do characters seem to move and act correctly?
Save/Loading
-Does save and loading functionality work correctly?
Technical Performance
-How do you feel the game runs on your computer?
-Any slowdowns or strange behaviors?
-Any warnings from security programs, etc?
-Any problems downloading/extracting/starting the game?
General Experience
-What felt fun? Confusing? Cumbersome?
-Anything you did not like?
-Did anything surprise you?
-For the content that is already complete, do you feel anything is missing?
-What are you most looking forward to as development continues?
Thank you all for being part of our development journey!
[Updated on: Thu, 13 March 2025 17:12] Report message to a moderator |
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