Cradlecrown v1.7: fonts, menus and tax morale

I removed the stock fonts from the game. In v1.7, everything from headings to resource counters uses two fonts I drew for Cradlecrown. Most of this release is menu and interface work. I also fixed how tax morale affects resource gathering.

Fonts

The font in headings and buttons is called Cradlecrown Display. I used wedge-shaped ends and cut corners from stone inscriptions when drawing the letters, to fit the CRADLECROWN lettering in the logo. It includes Turkish characters. I also made sure a lowercase i becomes İ when the interface converts it to uppercase in Turkish.

I drew a separate font for longer text: Cradlecrown Text. Descriptions, interface text and numbers use it, in regular and bold. The digits have equal widths, so changing a resource count doesn’t shift the other digits.

Main menu

I added a day cycle to the town in the menu. Noon, evening, night and dawn pass in about 100 seconds. The snowy mountains change colour with it: white during the day, pink at sunrise and sunset, pale blue at night.

The night sky has around three hundred stars and a slowly rotating Milky Way, with occasional shooting stars. Sunbeams change with the sun’s angle, and mist appears in the valley in the morning and evening. I also added fireflies, campfire sparks, wind in the fields, a boatman on the river, sheep and birds.

Civilization selection and loading

Single player and multiplayer now use the same civilization selection screen. The five starting civilizations are on banners at the top. Below them is a scene for the selected civilization’s region: pyramids and the Nile for Egypt, the Aegean Sea for the Minoans. Its signature unit moves within the scene too.

Changing your selection animates the banner, medallion, name and buildings. I separated the match settings’ scrolling from the selection area, so the civilizations stay in place while you scroll through settings. All five banners fit on a laptop screen.

I used these scenes in the three-way civilization choice when advancing an age during a match as well. The panels show the landmark and signature unit, with abilities, effects and the lasting legacy below. Reduced motion in the settings turns off the selection animations.

I also changed the loading screen. The match map appears on parchment on a war table. As the camera moves across it, pennants flutter at the camps and marching lines are drawn towards the centre. Player cards enter from their respective sides, with crossed swords between them.

Tax morale

I noticed that removing taxes barely changed how much miners gathered. Morale changed chopping and digging time, but wasn’t applied to walking or unloading. That also made the benefit for lumberjacks smaller than expected.

I applied morale to walking and unloading too. Low taxes now increase resource production more, and high taxes reduce it more. That changes the tradeoff when choosing a tax rate.

Villagers also swing their tools at a speed that follows their morale. Happy workers show musical notes; unhappy workers show grumbling clouds.

Other changes

• Books that won’t fit on a narrow screen move to an extra shelf below.
• The Library and Treasury labels now use dark stone plaques with gold frames that light up on hover.
• Browser tabs and phone home screen shortcuts use the game’s crest.
• I replaced the tension and defeat music.

I also removed unused code from the first version: fixed civilization bonuses, the old research building, breakable rocks and the neutral monster camp. None of these were used in current matches. Over a thousand lines were removed, and the tests take a third of the time to run.

This cleanup changed the online match version. If you’ve had the game open in a tab, refresh it once before joining an online match.

The game is at cradlecrown.com. Send bugs or suggestions through r/cradlecrown or to [email protected].