Caramel Creek · published
Hello again from the cafe! Today I want to show you something I've been building for a while. Anastasia and Sergei can now redo the furniture of your cafe in new styles. You pick the blueprints, they plan the day in a chat, drive over in Sergei's van, and rebuild your kitchen and your tables in front of your eyes. Board by board. 🪚
Once Anastasia has visited your cafe as a guest, the whole kitchen is repaired and her workshop has reached level 4, she phones with news: she's been inspired and drew layouts in several styles. Come by her workshop, her desk in the top right corner is open now. It's a little online shop of blueprints in a carpenter's style: the parts of your cafe hang as wooden tags on the left, the designs lie as blue blueprints in the middle, and your order waits on a clipboard on the right.
11 parts to redo: chairs (seen from the front and from behind), tables, the table for two, the counter, the kitchen counter with the sink, coffee machine and grinder, the fridge, the stove, the hood, the wall cupboard and the tall cupboard
one style per part: every piece of that kind changes together, so the chairs all match
every blueprint shows its price and the hours of work: a chair is 1.5 hours, a table 3, the counter 4
an order has to fit into about ten working hours of one day, so the cart won't take more. Plan your day!
Every style is drawn from scratch with different shapes, not just a different paint, so a chair from one style is a different chair from another:
Mint Diner: a retro diner of the fifties, with mint paint, chrome and coral
Modern Minimal: white matte fronts, light oak, graphite and a dusty blue accent
Farmhouse Rustic: milk paint, aged oak, wrought iron and red gingham
Industrial Loft: black iron, brushed steel, dark wood, brick and brass
And of course your cafe's own warm wooden look stays as the classic. Every style has its own dirty and worn phases for the tables too, so a rustic table looks rustic even when a guest spills a coffee on it.
There's a new chat on your phone, with the three of you. Anastasia asks Sergei when he's free, Sergei checks his calendar ("For you, always"), and the day lands in your phone's calendar. First comes a day when she prepares the materials, then the day of the trip. She doesn't work on Sundays, by the way, and Sergei won't fix anything else that day, so don't be surprised if the plan shifts a little. If you call either of them, they'll answer in character: "we're on the road, nearly there!"
In the morning Sergei drives to the workshop, picks up Anastasia and they come to the cafe in the van, overtaking the cars on the road. They walk in, say hello and ask you to close the cafe. If you're busy, they'll wait an hour and then close it for you. While they work the cafe is closed and the decorating mode is locked, so nobody gets in the way of a saw. And then they get to work, and I tried to make that part something you can simply sit and watch:
they look around, count the pieces and split the job between them
the coffee machine and the grinder are carried off the counter. A big coffee machine is carried by the two of them together, face to face, exactly cell by cell, with the machine hanging between them. Smaller ones go one each. They're set on free spots of the floor, and the cells they stand on are closed, so nobody walks through them
whatever stands on the counters is moved to the floor first: figurines, the tip jar, the poster on the fridge, even the things from the tall cabinet
then every piece is taken apart into flying boards with sawdust, hammered, sawn, and built up again in the new look, growing from the floor
they chat to each other with real little dialogues ("Is this board straight, or is it my eye?" "It's your eye. Hold the level on it.")
they run to the van for boards and tools, pet Ostin, and twice ask you for a cup of coffee (a cup makes them happy and gives you some reputation)
at the end they tidy up the planks and plans they scattered, put everything back exactly where it was, and Sergei drives Anastasia home. If they finish early, they leave early
The looks you've ordered are yours for good. In the decorating mode (press B) a new button appears on the side. Right click a piece and a panel shows its picture and all the looks you own for it. Pick one and it changes instantly, for free. There's also an Apply to all button to restyle every piece of that part at once. A chair you put away in your bag even keeps its look.
One more thing arrived along the way: a small table for two with two chairs, perfect for a cosy corner. Anastasia makes it to order (100 gold and 5 wood), Sergei repairs it like any other table, and the cafe now starts with one big table and one small. It has its own looks in every style, too.
Anastasia and Sergei have their own lines for everything, and Russian ones too
The group chat has avatars, and new messages that come in while you read old ones don't push the chat away from where you are. A small "new messages" button appears at the bottom, like in real messengers
Calling Sergei or Anastasia on those days makes them answer in character
Julia doesn't paint on the day of the trip, so the studio and the workshop never get in each other's way
Tuning the prices, playtesting every corner, and polishing what's still rough. Early Access starts on November 12. Wishlist Caramel Creek so Steam tells you the moment the doors open. Thank you for being here. It really means the world. 💛
- Biruk Okami