Hi everyone,
Those of you who have joined the Discord may have seen that, since this next update is taking so long, I was thinking about releasing development builds that showed the current, raw state of the game as I am developing it.
Well, here it is! You can now opt into the "development" branch if you would like to look at and try out all of the new stuff I've been working on. Here's how to opt in:
- Right-click MiniGolf Maker and select Properties.
- Go to the Betas tab.
- Select development - Development Builds from the dropdown.
- Allow the game to update. You'll know you're using the development build if the version in the bottom-left of the startup screen says "Early Access DEV.1"
IMPORTANT: DEVELOPMENT BUILDS MAY BE BUGGY AND UNSTABLE.
Even though this update should be fixing a lot of bugs, since this build is mid-development there may be certain areas where there are bugs, unexpected behaviors, or just missing features that have yet to be implemented or re-implemented.
If you want to try editing your existing courses, I would highly recommend backing them up before saving them, since this new update uses a new save file format that will not be compatible with older versions. To back up your courses, go to Documents/My Games/MiniGolf Maker and copy the Courses folder to some other location. Also, just a quick note that publishing courses in the development builds is disabled because of the new course file format.
Now, let's get to the part where I list all of the stuff you can check out in the development build.
Course Creator:
- Added Arcade objects. The Arcade Course however will not be in the development builds, you will have to be patient for that :)
- Greens will automatically join together when placed adjacent to each other. If Position Snapping is not turned on, green points will snap to existing points.
- Added tutorials. These are not finished.
- Added undo and redo support to a lot of operations. But there are still many more things that need to be made undo-able.
- Fixed pipes and ball traps being triggered when moving the ball around. Also fixed ball going into hole when moving the ball around.
- General visual and audio improvements to UI and editor gizmos.
- General fixes for things that did not work correctly in certain circumstances.
- Converted context menu into radial menu.
- Course creator now loads last saved course automatically.
- Added ability to choose a template when creating a new course. Currently only 'Blank Canvas' is available.
- Improved color picker.
- Behaviors will now run in Screenshot mode.
Gameplay:
- Updated netcode package to much newer version. IMPORTANT: If you wish to play online with others, all players need to be using the Development build.
- Added multiple power control modes. The default can be set in the Controls section of the options menu. You can set the mode individually for each player by selecting their ball in the lobby.
- Added options for mouse and controller sensitivity in the Controls section of the options menu.
- Added game option to disable power ups. Note that disabling power ups may cause some courses to not work as intended.
- Added ability to go into Free Cam mode when aiming. Toggle by pressing 'C'. You can disable free cam in the lobby game options.
- Improved ball physics so that it does not roll back and forth for a long time in certain circumstances.
- Improved ball physics to roll down shallow slopes less slowly.
- Workshop browser now goes ahead and shows results before preview images are fully loaded.
- Began redesigning the main menu background (work in progress)
There is a new forum section for Development Builds where you can post things like feedback about new features or reports for major bugs you encounter. You are also free to talk about development builds in the Discord.
The development build will be regularly updated at least every other week with any new features and bug fixes I was able to work on, and will continue being updated until the official release. There is still much work to do, but after so much time working on this update I believe I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel!
- Kevin