Playtest Beta v1.1 - the store builds itself in front of you now

Three weeks, 340 changes

Last update was the big catch-up post. This one is the opposite - a short cycle, aimed almost entirely at how the game feels minute to minute.

Furniture goes exactly where you put it

Placement is free-form by default. No grid unless you want one.

• Pieces snap flush to each other when you push them together, so a run of shelves lines up without fighting a grid.
• Things stack properly on surfaces - put a rack on a counter.
• When the game refuses a spot it now names the rule you hit instead of flashing a generic warning.

This was the most-reported friction in the last build, and the single most common complaint in this genre generally.

Your store stays exactly how you left it

Three separate save bugs were quietly rearranging your shop between sessions.

• Shelf rows were restored by position instead of identity. A shelf could come back holding the previous shelf's stock. The saved data was intact the whole time - only the labels got crossed, which is why it never looked broken enough to report.
• Card racks lost their contents and re-randomised on every load.
• If you'd been robbed, re-buying a display case brought it back empty - every card wiped.

All three are fixed and verified end to end. If you've been re-tidying your store after every load: you weren't imagining it.

Shelves that behave like shelves

• One-press restock from backstock
• A sale now leaves a visible hole instead of instantly re-facing
• Closing the last sold-out gap on a shelf tells you so
• Per-title auto-reorder thresholds
• An emptied glass case shows the restock cue like every other row

The main menu is a television

The menu is a CRT set sitting on the store counter. It tunes in from static when you boot, and Settings and the save-slot picker are drawn as on-screen display, inside the glass.

The loading screen is the same television finding its channel - and it animates now. The store used to build itself inside a single frame, which meant nothing on screen could move while it did.

There are people outside

• The far pavement was dead - every route through it ran into a building, so walkers were binned before anyone saw them. Both sides are populated now.
• Customers walk in off the street instead of appearing at the door.
• Cars sweep through turns with their wheels actually steering, and no longer freeze solid a few centimetres short of a stop line.

The building behaves like a building

• The exterior ghosts out when you step inside, so the shop reads as a shop
• A full lighting pass - the store has real pools of light again instead of a flat wash
• The entrance threshold and apron are modelled properly
• No more floating text labels stuck to things. The game stopped shouting.

Half the download, better art

Every stocked item now shows genuine box art, and the art got re-encoded: 1,359 MB down to 375 MB, for a better-looking result. That's on top of the size cut in the last update.

The Vault takes your standees

Cardboard standees are now collectable stock with a book value. Condition decays on the shop floor, value tracks how hot the game is, and you have four ways to play one:

• List it on the collector marketplace and let the bids run
• Take a phone offer from a collector - fast cash, under book
• Take an offer from a customer at your counter
• Keep it on the floor for the merchandising boost, or put it in a Standee Vitrine, which stops the decay entirely

No offer ever tells you what the thing is actually worth. Go and look it up.

More room, and a reason to want it

• Backroom cells are buyable - the first claim tears the room down into an annex you can build into
• Expanding north did nothing at all before, because the expansion board was being drawn upside-down. Fixed.
• A level ladder: furniture unlocks L1-10, skill waves, upgrade milestones, and toasts that name what you just earned
• The furniture catalog is ordered by unlock level now, and the seven ceiling hangers collapse into one entry instead of eating a screen

The repair bench got physical

• The real tools live in the rack, and the one you pick leaves it for your hand
• A proper bench mat and tool stand
• Live chip counters and idle target pings, so you're never hunting for what's next
• Removed screws settle on the mat beside the cart

Economy

• Wages were the bleed. Payroll is on 1997 rates now.
• Employee-answered customers weren't buying at all - a straight $0 conversion leak. Fixed.
• Staff actually work the launch counter during midnight releases
• A live trends layer: weekend rush, trending-today, genre waves
• Continuous saves with throttled Steam Cloud sync - no pause menu needed
• Locked consoles collapse into unlock banners in ORDERS, so the list stops pretending you can buy things you can't

Thank you

Thanks to everyone playing the build and sending things in. Keep it coming - if something feels wrong, tell me or post in the community hub. Even the small things help.

More soon.