Full rewrite incoming

Hi,

During the past few months I've been reworking Text Fortress entirely. There are a few things in the current version that needed to change, but one thing leading to another I ended up rebuilding the game from the ground up. The two main points I want to change are:

Gameplay:

When I started writing Text Fortress, I wanted a game that embraces the feel of Bay12 Dwarf Fortress, and I think I succeeded in that goal, as the current game is way too complex for its own good. The buildings and jobs are a fun mechanic IMO, but they are extremely tedious to keep track of. Increase the season counter, immigration counter, farms, buildings, food, beer, skill points... I wanted a game of storytelling, and didn't realize I wrote a game about accounting.

In the next version of Text Fortress, the story will have the spotlight, with minimal number tracking. During actual playtests I spent about 5-10% of playtime writing down numbers, 5-10% rolling dice, and the rest was spent actually writing an exciting story, so I'm quite happy with how the game plays right now. Having lighter rules also has the nice side-effect to make it more welcoming for people that are new to solo rpg and journaling games.

Art and layout:

Text Fortress currently uses AI-generated images as a base for the pixel pictures in the book. Since the publishing of the game I've learned a few things about AI-generated content that I don't endorse. So the new edition will be entirely hand-drawn by me. Certainly less beautiful, but at the same time, it will be something I can be proud of. Also, since I started this journey, I've learned the basics of Scribus, which allows for much wilder layouts than LibreOffice that I used previously, so you can expect more interesting layouts, 2-page spreads and such.

Release date:

Most of the text is done, but I have quite a bit of work to do on the layout and art. I'd like to release the printer-friendly / full text version of Text Fortress: Legends by the start of fall. The complete version will need to wait till winter at the very least.

I hope you'll enjoy playing Text Fortress: Legends as much as I do! That being said, if you enjoy Text Fortress as it is currently played, by all means keep it up! :)

Magui