More Taskforce work now but I am nearing the end of this. Here's a top-down screenshot for a change:
I discovered a bug yesterday in the save games, something that has probably been there since the first version. I'm rather amazed that saves ever worked, and amazed that I had not spotted this bug before; it was all about pointers. Many of the game structures; units, blocks, equipment, include pointers to other units, blocks, or equipment (a unit might point to the items held, for example). Those are memory pointers and so change every time the game is run. The saved games needs to convert them to another reference before saving (in this case an array index) and then convert these references back to the correct pointers upon loading. Somehow lots of pointers were not converted or saved at all, and trying to reference a pointer that wasn't one would cause an instant crash. Anyway, all fixed now. This took most of yesterday to fix and check carefully. I identified the problem early on but had to be sure that every pointer was converted correctly.
The graphics are complete I think, and I've done most of the Steam store set-up (in English and German). I might need to program something into the demo specifically linked to Steam, to make it overlay the store page in the game (this isn't needed, I try to avoid all Steam coding anyway, it's a pain to learn something new unless it's necessary). The release date is set for June 26th.
I need to complete the manual and get the demo in Steam working today... a playable demo in Steam is not something I've done before and any Steam things are very complicated and worrysome, but in this case it will allow me to enter The Steam Game Festival. I'd like to do that but it means that I have to have the store page up and running in a week, which means making the game trailer video very soon and getting the store approved. This is difficult because I can't make game videos here and need to use Deb's computer, so will visit her house this weekend for this. She won't be there. It's a work-necessary trip during this lockdown.
