Sunday Devlog 2: Laying the Foundation
Hi again! This week has been very dusty, but now, with a solid foundation underneath, we have started building things as we prepare update C. Letās talk about what happened this week!
Wrestling with systems
On the quest to rebrand, completing the rebranding on Google Play was a breeze. However, the same cannot be said for updating the trailers or navigating Appleās systems.
Last week I had already made a new startup animation for the beautiful new logo. However, it was animated inside Flowlabās programming. This meant I had to record the startup animation, crop it, and send it to the video. Simple, right? Well, something I hadnāt realized was that when anything used in an edited video, whether itās a clip or an image, is edited at all, it becomes obsolete in the editor.
For example, if I put an image of a cat into a video editor, but then modified the image of the cat on a drawing program to draw a mustache on it, the image has now been altered and the video editor wonāt accept it anymore.
Fortunately, this had only affected the last few bits of the video. But it meant that in order to make a new video, before I even added the new logo, I had to take a chunk of the exported video, add it into the editor, and then precisely cut a point in the edited video to go from what was actually being altered in the editor to what was already exported. The cut ended up looking like this:
There were a bunch more layers and effects at the end, but they all got replaced by the export for this all to work.
Next was uploading the new trailers. I wasnāt able to just replace the trailers on YouTube, so I just updated the one on Steam. Steam is kind of weird in that, it will confirm youāve uploaded something, but wonāt confirm when the change is ready to be published. Because closing Steamworks (the dev console for steam publishers) can risk losing edits youāve been making, I had to keep the tab open on my computer without turning it off for nearly the entire day while the progress bar did absolutely nothing.
come onā¦
But the worst thing, the thing that Iām actually still grappling with as I simultaneously write this log, is Appleās systems. Cue Lightning effects, evil laughter, and a pipe organ playing in the background
Before I even got to updating everything on Appleās end, I got a notification on App Store Connect, the site that developers use to manage their app store presence, saying that I needed to confirm if Iām a trader or not to comply with EU law and sell there.
Click for a "fun" fact similar to this event
Back when I launched GALACDRIVE to the app stores, Apple mentioned in an alert that I needed to run my app through the Chinese Communist Party in order to distribute in China. Google Play mentioned that my app needed to be verified by the DPRK to distribute in North Korea. Not a single other country was mentioned in these popups.
However, once I got to a certain point in the process, I kept landing on this loading screen that wouldnāt stop.
uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
After a lot of trying, I caved and wrote a support question on Appleās community forum. It turned out that just using my apple laptop instead of my desktop worked.
Apple also wanted me to send a bunch of personal info to comply with the EU law, which I also sent. However, to actually change the developer name, I need to register an entire business behind Appleās system. Part of this forces me to make a website, so you can expect an official website to show up on next weekās log. I also need to create a business through āDun & Bradstreetā a company that helps manage data for businesses and provides lots of analytics.
All in all, Iām clueless as to why all this needs to be done on Appleās end while Google Play just lets me change my name and sends me off. With all that aside, Iām looking forward to making a website for Encabulated Games and sharing it for next week!
Meanwhile on the Discord serverā¦
A poll was hosted earlier today to see if people wanted to add some fun, off-topic emotes to the server. People generally supported it in a landslide vote, and a chat channel for submissions is opening soon there.
However, more notably, one of the discord members, Toucan, submitted some suggestions to add a progress bar to show how much of a song is left, and a button to restart a track rather than going back to the menu. I think this is a very good idea and these ideas will definitely be added to update C. Suggestions matter!!
Parse-O-Rhythm
A LOT of thought has been put into how the new background, one of the main features of update C, will be assembled. One of the key parts of this is making something that scrolls at an angle. Fortunately, Iāve already created some code using some annoying math to get that done, so with everything else mostly done, I can begin working on the new background!
Youāll notice that the rectangle looks a bit jittery when in motion. This is due to flowlabās position behavior being unable to register decimals, leading to movement like this being chunky. Iām confident this can be resolved by Grazer, however.
Thanks for reading this devlog! You can expect construction in Parse-O-Rhythm for some of the following days as new stuff is (finally) added, and Iām looking forward to finally being done dealing with Apple soon!!
-Encabulated Games
