Recent News

New Game: Hoof It!

Whoa, go Easy on me!

Thaaaaat’s right, folks, Easy mode Hoof It is available for a trial run today! There, uh, there might be a few kinks in the machine, but I promise I’m working on it! Seeba has been… less than cooperative… Nothing a few good candy snacks and all-nighters can’t fix, though!

Go on and take a look at Hoof It, and tell me what you think! I hear Jay’s even got some moves dreamed up… Hee hee.

I’ve also made some updates to Paper Airplane! I heard from Necey that high scores weren’t giving out the proper Kith Attributes, so I uh, I fixed my math. Whoops. You’ll earn Kith Attributes way faster now, and high scores will earn extra points too!

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New Items: Cereals!

Good Dry or Soggy

Man, I'm starving… but have like, zero energy to cook anything… I think I'll just pour myself a bowl of cereal and eat that real quick. What? What is that look for? Cereal can be a dinner food too!
Look at this box of Wheat Cereal, see how healthy this is? Packed full of nutrients! Same with this box of Berry Cereal. And this Alphabet Cereal stimulates young and old minds alike! See? Cereal is great any time of the day! N-now let me eat my Sugar Cereal before Lycus senses I've got it back in stock and cleans me out again.

Okay, okay, look! I'll use flavored milk to prove that I'm getting a proper meal. Hm, do I want to use my Banana Milk Recipe or the Strawberry Milk Recipe? Both are made with fresh fruit so they add a great punch of vitamins into the bowl. Dang, I don't have any chocolate cereal to go with the Minty Milk Recipe... And man, getting out the blender feels like so much work...
I just wanted a easy meal...
Eh, I'll just drink the left over Cereal Milk from the bottom of the bowl when I'm done eating. It's enriched with delicious sugary energy which is exactly what I need right now.

Why am I so pooped out? Piper has been testing some new game in the backroom at all hours it feels like. I think she said she's almost got the Demo for it ready for public use. I sure hope so... My bedroom is right over the back room and those beep boops are haunting my nightmares at this point. If I dream I’m having a dance-off against a group of Kith to get them to leave my stock alone one more time, I am going to scream.

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New Items: Chef Outfit!

Good Lookin' Cookin' 

Ah, the whole town has been smelling so good since everyone started learning to cook. It has been so wonderful walking about town on my little creative breaks, taking in all the different delicious smells. So much so that I have had food constantly on the brain!

It got me thinking that you all could use some nice Aprons to keep clean while you cook with your Kith. And I know some of you hate the idea of staining a nice new one, so I made some with stains already on them so you'd be guilt-free! See, they look like Dirty Aprons right? They’re artistically intentional stains. Not at all repurposing ruined fabric that I couldn't get cleaned in time...

Ahem. As I was saying, with all of you working to become masters of the culinary arts, I've made some fluffy Chef Hats as well! If you want to show off your Cooking skills in action, why not buy a Sack of Flour to heft? Be careful, they’re heavy. The weak-armed among you can always take an Empty Flour Sack instead.

Please, let me know what you all think… I'll have these new items available at Tailored Fashions starting today.

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Opinions

Everyone’s got one

We’re reaching out to our backers again for some opinions on the site! There’s a lot of discussion going on behind the scenes, and we’d love your feedback to help make our final decisions.

First up is a visual question: what size should our items be in shops and inventories? You may have noticed that items are shown at a smaller size, 75x75 pixels, than they are in the item pop-ups at 100x100 pixels. Pros: we can fit 6 items per row in shops, and it renders nicer on Retina displays. Cons: sometimes the text overflows into three lines and looks a bit odd compared to the other items beside it, and it doesn’t always render as nicely on non-Retina displays. Take a look at this screenshot (click here to zoom) comparing the 100x100 size with the 75x75 size:



We’ve also been hearing some requests for more space in shops. As we add more Characters with more shops, we hope the stocking problems will become less and less important. However, do you think the shops need an extra row? Unfortunately, we can’t do this on a shop-by-shop basis without changing the code, so it would have to apply to all shops. At the 100x100 size, this would mean a total of 15 items, which I think works out to a very nice number. At the 75x75 size, this would mean a total of 18 items, which might be a bit too many, taking away the need for dedicated restock hunting. What do you think?

Shazzbaa also pointed out that Recipe costs have made Quest rewards undervalued now. I’d like to lessen the cost of Recipes to offset this problem, but by how much? Half? A quarter? A tenth? The cost of Tools is purposefully very high, since they can be reused endlessly and on multiple Recipes; but I see now that means the Recipes ought to be far less than their resulting product’s value. What value would you suggest? (Keep in mind that this will probably not be decided by popular vote; I still need to keep many different behind-the-scenes calculations in mind when I make this change.)

Finally, a bit of excitement: Hoof It has the Easy Mode completed, except for security checks to make sure it interfaces with the site Shards & Attributes! I know you’ve been waiting patiently for this game since we previewed it on the Kickstarter, so I wanted to ask: should I release an Easy Mode-only version to play until the other difficulties are finished? (The difference between difficulties is more dance options - Easy Mode only comes with 4 dance moves. Medium has 6 and Hard has 8.)

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New Items: Baby Food!

For Baby and Me

Ahh, Jay selling all those new recipes of hers sent me back into my family cookbook for a trip down memory lane. When I found the section on baby food, I realized that’s something everyone could use, not just parents or older siblings! I mean, newly allied Kith are sort of like human babies, right? And those little cuties might not be ready to eat harder foods yet.

So I talked with Jay and gave her 11 new recipe cards to sell at the General Store. Take your pick from Vanilla Rice Baby Food, Strawberry and Bananas Baby Food, Strawberry Applesauce Baby Food, Squash Baby Food, Pumpkin Baby Food, Mushy Peas Baby Food Carrot Baby Food, Mixed Berry Baby Food, Broccoli Baby Food, Garden Vegetable Baby Food, and my favorite as a baby Peachy Keen Pears Baby Food.

You can't go wrong with any of them really, they are all fresh and delicious! Even older Kith might like a tasty mashed up bowl of baby food if they’re feeling nostalgic. Personally I think it's good enough to eat yourself when you inevitably get some splattered in your face by a fussy eater.

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