Hi, Toons! I'm Sheriff Cranky, Technical and Community Lead for Toontown: Corporate Clash. It has been a while since we've had a Backstage Corporate Clash blogpost. As we close out on 2024, I'd like to use to blogpost to update you on our progress for the past year, and explain what's in store for Corporate Clash's future in 2025.

Hammerspace - A Primer

As a quick reminder of what the Hammerspace update is, here's a TL;DR (if you want more information, click here for the original blog post!)

The Hammerspace Update contains a major rewrite of the game internals to create a unified Toon Inventory System. This means the code handling things that a Toon may own (Accessories, Karts, Gumballs, etc.) are simplified, and will make development of future game updates much easier. Meanwhile, we are also using this opportunity to overhaul the Estates system, bringing Creative Mode to Toontown!

Estates Development

Estates are being re-made from the ground up! We are significantly expanding the capabilities of Toon Estates, making them the best hangout spot in Toontown! Toons will be able to purchase interior or exterior areas as they wish, and they can be connected together via doors or hallways. Connect them together to form a giant play area with nooks and crannies to explore, or have a single room to showcase your 99 Lamps - the choice is yours!

We've also created thematic bundles called Estate Kits (working title) that you can buy, which includes an Exterior area and an Interior area. Some will also come with furniture and decorations so you can get your dream home started quickly! Toons will receive a default Estate Kit to start with (the same one as what's currently in the game) and we will be releasing additional content as part of a post-2.0 update.

One of the pain points of the current Furniture Placement UI is that it's really hard to use. We're making the furniture placement UI more intuitive to use, plus improving camera and placement controls, so that you can decorate absolutely everywhere in your Estate with ease! (Did I mention that you can place furniture anywhere in your Estate?)

For the more social Toons, you will also have the option to make your Estate public! Toons from all over the town can visit your estate and admire your style and taste! Toons will also be able to link their Estates with other Toons' Estates by buying Gateway Tickets, which allows two Doors or Hallways to be linked. When a Toon uses the Door, they will then be transported to another Toon's Estate. Magic, ain't it?

General Stores

"But," I hear you say, "what about the Cattlelog and the phone that I totally did not use to get out-of-bounds"? We think the Cattlelog, while convenient, is missing a little bit of that Toony touch... but don't fret, for we have the best replacement for it ever: introducing General Stores!

General Stores are brand new storefronts in playgrounds, replacing both the Clothing Store and the Cattlelog. General Store vendors sell everything from clothing to furniture to SpeedChat phrases. They do more than just sell stuff though - our vendors are hand-picked for their wonderful (some may even say wacky) personalities, and they for sure have their own stories to tell. We hope you'll enjoy what they have in store!

We are bringing in a brand new store UI to make shopping easier, and all items bought in the General Store will be immediately available to use in your inventory. Existing stores such as the Tell Tale Carp will also receive the new store UI. General Stores might run discounts for certain items on certain holidays (or if the vendor feels like it!), so be sure to check the stores often to snag some great deals!

We will also be opening a couple new Specialist Stores, where the vendor only sells specific types of items. For one of the stores, we have invited a well-loved character to reprise their role as a vendor; let's hope they'll accept our offer...

Internal Tooling and Databases 

With all of the new things coming to the game, the more technical-minded players might ask: How do you manage all these data?

With thousands of inventory items and store configuration, we realized early on that it would be nigh impossible to manage by hand. We are currently creating new internal tooling that would allow other departments to create, tweak, and test new Items and General Store configurations, without the Technical team needing to be involved in every step of the way. This means new clothing, accessories, and other items can land in the store much quicker than before!

We are also working on new systems that allow our Support and Moderation team to have better insights into the Toons database so diagnosing issues becomes much easier. These may all be behind-the-scenes, but they're important for all of the development that goes on for the future of the game.

So, Where is Hammerspace?

Here is where I have bad news: We will not be releasing the Hammerspace Update in 2024.

We have been working really hard to make the release happen this year, and I would like to thank the entire team for their efforts. Running an all-volunteer game team means our volunteers' time is sometimes volatile, as they have to prioritize real-life duties. This meant the planning estimates we had at the start of the project were no longer tenable. On the upside, we have made massive strides into improving the quality checks and organization of our projects, making sure future update development will be smoother and higher-quality. Applying these to an ongoing project is like performing heart surgery on a patient running a marathon, and our timeline did suffer because of it, but it's made us into a much better-run organization. We're proud of being a game studio where up-and-coming talent can come and gain experience by working in a large-scale team setting; the process improvements we've made in the past year will make us an even better place to volunteer.

As part of the reorganization, we have chosen to downscale or delay some of the features that we have previously shown off, such as the HUD concept that we showed off before. Some of the work (such as the new Options UI) have already landed in the 1.10 Update, and there will be minor UI tweaks in the Hammerspace update. We've also found some hard-to-solve issues with some of the other minor teasers that we've shown off (such as better building loading animations and battle speed-ups), so we will not be focusing on them for the time being.

I know this is disappointing news to many of you and I regret that we couldn't get the news out earlier. The team's main focus is now on the Hammerspace Update, which means updates between now and the update's release will be limited to bugfixes and minor tweaks only. We are currently working towards a first wide-scale playtest / stress-test by Q2, 2025, with a confirmed release date some time after the playtesting session concludes. 

Even though we don't quite have a finished update yet, we have made a lot of progress during the year, and will continue to work hard throughout the next few months to make Toontown more social than ever.

Conclusion 

The Hammerspace Update is a huge update for both our players and the team. Revamping Estates will make socializing in-game a lot more fun, and all the internal updates will set up the game for more exciting updates down the line. An update as big as Hammerspace will need a lot of work, and I thank each and every one of you for sticking with us and continuing your support.