Esoteric Update #107 - Noticing Changes

Alright, back on track!

So let's start with lore. I must have been an absolute flummoxed buffoon two weeks ago since I uploaded lore and then... didn't add it to the update post. So, below you will find four lore links in total. Two from two weeks ago and two from last week. Why no lore for this week? Well, let me rant for a bit. WordPress decided to change the editor from the old one that I'm used to writing in, to the new and horrible block editor. Don't get me wrong here, the block system is perfectly fine, it's the editor that's an unwieldy mess. On top of that, they removed the justify button. I will not stand for having my justify taken away from me like that. So I spent several days trying to fix this. Of course, the logical solution should have been to just go back to the classic editor. Nope. The classic editor had the justify option removed as well. Eventually, I did find something that can justify text, it's not a perfect solution since it requires additional steps. But hey, it works now, that's the important thing, right? So from next week, there will be the usual two lore postings per update.

Lore: The Mask
Lore: IIIrd Nicanor Meditation
Lore: Frank Drake Was Wrong But Also Right
Lore: To Kill a Metaform

Now let's talk about development. Firstly, I decided that taking clothes off and putting them on didn't have the right degree of feedback. So now when you play around with your equips, you will be informed what the changes to your stipulations are. I've also done the same with cosmetics, both when applied or removed (by washing your face or using nail polish remover).

We've also been working on clothing, with lots of input from Lala here. There are currently almost a thousand clothing items in the game, and we're still hammering away at it. What's the status?

Sweaters: done;
Skirts: done;
Armwear: writing done, awaiting encoding;
Legwear: writing done, awaiting encoding;
Panties: under research;
Shoes: under research.

But during the last two weeks, it wasn't just about adding new clothes, it was also about making adding them efficiently.

So, before this whole effort started, clothing had to be made manually. That just didn't work. Two weeks ago, we began by introducing an automated, template-based method of generating clothing. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough, the items did not vary sufficiently. So I extended that method to be more parametric, at first just probing the water. This method turned out to be a lot better, but I had more ideas. The parametric approach flirted with attribute inheritance over an item hierarchy for a bit, before that got scrapped as well (yeah, I won't bore you with why, it wasn't on a whim, it just couldn't do certain things) and the current system took its place. The current system is based on ontological connections between stats and item attributes. It's not as complicated as it might seem, but the take away is that items can now be defined quickly and efficiently.

There's also some other minor stuff, but it's mostly for me. API changes, adjustments to some old code, fixed typos, the usual.

Finally, I've decided to remove the post mentioning last weeks incident. I'm fine now, the paperwork was taken care of, though I'm still waiting for everything to resolve.