We still have the Titan class left but all of the playable classes plus Bandit (for the tutorial) are completed. On the client side, I went back to some of my earlier work in Unity and applied "lessons learned". For example, using layout groups (vs. manually positions) to organize items on the screen. This will make the user experience more consistent and moving items around on the screen easier.
I also added support for checking the client's version number and directing players to a platform-specific download page for an update. In this way, I can ensure all players are on a minimum release of the client. Since the client hasn't been added to any stores yet it just redirects to the platform's main storefront. I also added support for a changelog visible from within the client.
Next we will be working on the icons for the 22 heroes and 50 badges. Players may hire one hero at a time, which provide a variety of bonuses. During their adventures in Conquest! 50 badges may be earned, which carry through to the next Conquest! age (if you survive!). Badges vary from traveling to the Secret City to winning 100 battles to playing all classes. This is a new feature of Conquest! but enriches the experience for the user.
Overall, I would estimate the client is ~80% finished at this time. After finishing the icons, the next major section to tackle is class specific commands. I have our end date projected as April 14th, which is just over a year since I picked Conquest! up again. If we do finish in April, development of the mobile application in Unity would have taken ~9 months. I anticipate another 30-45 days of getting everything ready before deploying as a beta release to the Android app store (iOS to follow shortly thereafter).
Happy New Year! Work on Conquest! continues at a good pace in the new year with two more areas focused on: Questing (complete) and Fleet Maintenance (nearly complete). Looking at the list of remaining items finds Class Maintenance, Misc Icons (troops, badges, etc.), Alliances, and City Ownership left. The first two are quite large, especially the Class Commands which is where each of the 6 playable classes in Conquest! execute their class specific commands. But more on what we accomplished.
All quests but the tutorial are single commands; that is, they only require one click to complete them. The tutorial is a series of steps designed to introduce new players to the game by having them visit several areas in the game, culminating in an attack against an NPC. Unlike other attacks, this does not break a player's protection. The tutorial can only be completed once.
Fleets in Conquest! were added after release of the game to support multiple continents. Players can establish kingdoms on each of the 3 continents in Conquest! and manage independent kingdoms (very few items are shared). Initially, players could have just 1ship but this was expanded to 8. Coupled with the invasion command, which allows players to bypass structure limits on the number of troops they can field using troops onboard ships, maintaining a fleet became essential.
Fleets can be used to strategically strand others on particular continents. If you do not have enough money to buy a new ship you could be struck for a while! Ships can also be used to transport goods and troops between your kingdoms, which is useful to jumpstart a new kingdom or hide assets.
Naturally there were several changes to the game server to support the new designs. In particular, the removing of messages designed to add "color" to a text based game which now serve no purpose in a graphical one. I anticipate a major overhaul of all of the messages once we finish the UI design.
I also started looking at audio resources to add to Conquest!, such as alerting a player when they are attacked or when they find a magical item. I haven't moved forward with this yet as there is still much work to do on the graphical side.