Hi everyone!
Originally I planned to name the game Harvest Peaks, so this was the blog's title. However I sense that I might be treading into murky waters, since I would be partially using words from trademarked titles of certain franchises. For example the "Harvest" part is a nod to Harvest Moon. Is it "safe" to do so? I don't know yet.
Zenimax had a scruff with Mojang because the former has trademarked the Elder Scrolls title and the latter made a game and named it Scrolls. It didn't even have to do anything with the Elder Scrolls series. It just contained a word!
"But, vdweller, you aren't Mojang! You're just a small developer! Surely they won't bother you!"
Hmmm... another small-time developer was torn a new one by InXile (you know, those true indie, game loving, nothing to do with greedy corporations, funded by the people guys). The reason? Said dev named a game "Alien Wasteland". Inxile owns the Wasteland trademark. Facepalm. The Aftermath? Title had to be changed to Action Alien
Maybe Inxile had no choice. Maybe the main guys had no problem but their legal team told them "blah blah sir we must do it because of reason X". The point is it was done. This is how things work I guess.
So until (and if) things are cleared up, I will use a temporary blog (and project) title. It's a farming game with mysteries invovled. So, Mystery Farming it is, for now! Even if I come up with the final name, I see no harm in having the address remain mysteryfarming.blogspot.com . The same applies to the Twitter username.
As for the progress so far: More graphics are ready. Below is a view of a place just outside your farm inside the Game Maker: Studio editor. The villa graphic is not yet finished. The abandoned villa is going to play a major role in the game. A mysterious man lived there many years ago, then something terrible happened...
Tools are also ready to use! Each tool has different power levels, unlocked via upgrading them.
I'm currently working on the inventory screen. I like the style of the older Harvest Moon games. I don't want the inventory to be extremely streamlined, with lots of hotkeys. I am thinking of a separate "Tools" and "Items" group of slots. You can assign 4 tools and 4 items to their respective quick slots and then you can then cycle through them without having to access the inventory screen again. Also, I'm thinking about the ability to filter the "Items" group and display only food, equipment, miscellaneous items etc.
That's all for now! See you next update!
