Back in the Saddle - Development Log #368

The team is back in action and ready to take on 2023!

Avatar Michi

Michi (molp)

After a pretty short last week with lots of catching up to do, I am now back in the office, ready to get my hands dirty again :)

I have yet to talk to Fabian to decide where we want to start with the planned user experience improvements and who is going to implement which part of it. As a reminder: The idea here is to identify (which we already did) and fix UX problems that keep new players from playing. We also want to add more interactive tutorials that replace the static hint system we have in place right now. Additional introductory faction contracts will also help in teaching new players how APEX works. The goal is to reduce the steep learning curve at the very beginning of the game and thus keep more players in the game and engaged with the game.

On the side, I will continue to work on the UI refresh we talked about in the live stream and that I mentioned in one of the last devlogs of last year. The UI was designed by Martin and myself in the very early days of the project. Therefore it lacks proper art direction and has many inconsistencies in spacing, font and color usage, etc. With the UI refresh, we want to address that. We won't design a new interface, the functionality stays as is, it is just about finding a new UI design language in terms of colors and types. We don't feel comfortable showing screenshots just yet, but they will soon follow!

Avatar Nick

Nick

Let it be known that all of the tutorial videos have now been redone and are live on YouTube, including the last 3 videos for advanced gameplay. Another big shoutout to SeaPear for helping us with those. We've asked him to continue to help us with video content for future projects. Stay tuned for more info when something concrete has been decided.

You can also check out another sponsored video by TotalXclipse, which we have worked with before. It's always nice working with content creators that you know will do a good job, and he has never disappointed! There should be another sponsored video this month, which I will share once it is live.

As always: we'd love to hear what you think: join us on Discord or the forums!

Happy trading!