DevBlog Update February 2025
Hello, here’s the latest news:
I’ve embarked on a new project, naturally set within Lula’s universe, but this time centered around ‘Chiks’n Eggs Factory,’ which is also the title of this new endeavor. The scope is narrower compared to ‘Holestic Adventures’; ‘The Chiks’n Eggs Factory’ will focuses more on management with a survival twist.
I’ve been working with UE5.5+, a significant leap from UE5, offering improved performance, stability, and a mature platform for development.
Many of the bugs that plagued UE4 have been resolved, prompting me to migrate Lula to UE5.5+. This move isn’t just about leveraging new technology; it’s also about escaping the numerous UE4 bugs that required extensive workarounds, making my previous workflow far from ideal.
When I began with Lula, I was a novice, making numerous errors, redoing work countless times, and when I hit engine constraints, I had to start from scratch, devise solutions to bypass issues, etc.
Days of fixing one thing led to redoing another… Days turned into weeks, weeks into months, and months into years.
This explains why ‘The Holestic Adventures’ development seemed ‘slow’ – too much time was spent reworking things and dealing with limitations.
As a solo developer, this was highly restrictive.
Now, UE5.5 offers a more flexible and efficient workflow, freeing me from UE4’s constraints.
I’ve already showcased the progress with ‘Chiks’n Eggs’ on UE5. It’s evidently faster, even though I’m still getting accustomed to UE5; there’s no doubt it facilitates better progress and faster development.
As I’ve said before, I started ‘The Holestic Adventures’ as a novice, learning from my mistakes along the way, always treating it as a ‘prototype’.
Opting for a point-and-click format for ‘Chiks’n Eggs’ has made me realize this could also be the right approach for ‘The Holestic Adventures’.
Migrating to UE5 means I’ll have to rebuild much of the code anyway, so why not adopt a new, more fitting approach?
Moreover, working in UE5 allows the work I do on ‘Chiks’n Eggs’ to directly benefit ‘Holestic Adventures’, and vice versa, creating a synergy in development.
In summary, I’m currently focused on ‘Chiks’n Eggs’; once the initial phase is complete, I’ll release it for supporters, then will commence the migration of ‘Holestic Adventures’, starting anew with Owawa, converting everything to a point-and-click format.
A note on why point-and-click:
Initially, for Lula, I aimed for 100% gamepad compatibility, considering that’s how it was meant to be played.
However, I’ve observed that many players don’t even own a gamepad…
Managing gamepad support, keyboard configurations, key rebinding, and dynamic UI adjustments for different control setups adds considerable workload.
As a solo developer, simplifying to a single control scheme drastically reduces complexity, allowing me to concentrate on core development aspects.
Voila! See you soon!
