One Month, Four Games and One Engine

The last post in this diary went out on October 8, and since then the workshop has not stopped: it changed size. Castle Arena is still the game that gives this site its name, but today it shares the bench with three other games and with an engine that serves all four. This series of posts is the diary of that whole month, October 2 to 25, told game by game.

The four games

All of them come from the same source: the Warcraft III custom maps we played for years. Each is a faithful reconstruction of one of those maps, with the original's rules and numbers, made as a game of its own for Steam, with no Blizzard material in it.

• Castle Arena (since October 2). Castle Fight's tug of war: you build, the buildings train troops on their own, the troops march. Everything this devlog told up to post 14, plus what came after.
• Castle Survivors (since October 6). A castle on an island, armies wading out of the sea from every side, and a castle that fires every weapon you buy by itself. The reconstruction of Tower Survivors 1.91.
• Line Tower (since October 9). Line Tower Wars: every builder holds a lane, mazes it with towers and sends creeps into the neighbour's lane. Up to twelve players.
• Custom Hero Survival (since October 10). You build your own hero by buying abilities and survive level after level of creeps. The reconstruction of Custom Hero Survival Z2.6.

And the engine

The first three games each started from scratch, and within days it was clear we were writing the same thing three times: the 3D world and its effects, the creatures, the sound, the HUD and menus, Steam, saves and lockstep multiplayer. On October 9 that core left Castle Survivors and became Kastle, the house engine. Line Tower was the first game built on it, Custom Hero Survival came the next day, and Castle Survivors now draws with it. Castle Arena keeps its own code, but already talks to the tool that comes with the engine, Kastle Studio, where the numbers of every game can be seen and tuned in one place.

The map of the series

1. Castle Arena: a map editor, the 15th arena and the Arena HUD
2. Castle Survivors: a castle, an island and ninety weapons
3. Castle Survivors: seventeen worlds, co-op and the road to Steam
4. Line Tower: the maze that gave birth to the engine
5. Custom Hero Survival: 122 abilities, a ledger and a tavern
6. Kastle: the engine the four games share
7. Kastle Studio: the bench where the numbers live
8. Where we are: the month in numbers and what comes next

For now the diary of the four games lives here, on Castle Arena's site. If it ever gets a home of its own, we will say so right here.

— The team