Greetings Arctic Survivors! Today we are proud to announce that Update 0.7 of Northern Lights is now LIVE on STEAM!
This version aims to address and improve a lot of the issues and feedback reported by the community over the past months. The overall feel of the game and user experience was also polished in this update!
To celebrate this update, we are also running a limited-time sale for the game! So, if you didn’t already do it, now it’s a great time to pick it up at a lower price!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1090800/Northern_Lights/
What is new?
Loot Spawning Revisited
We've received a lot of feedback regarding the loot system. Items used to spawn in the wrong places (bow in the fridge), and the looting interface was clunky. We decided it's worth taking our time and revisiting the loot spawning system. After this update, every item should have its specific place - and furniture, crates, and containers can now be opened to look for items inside!
With this change, we've also added the ability to open the trunks and doors of cars, to find and collect loot.
We consider this to be the biggest change of this update and something we will still work on polishing in future updates to perfectly balance the resources you can find in the world of Northern Lights!
P.S. We know some of you were using loot containers as a way to store your items in your base, and we are looking into ways to make that possible again for the next update. We also advise taking out any loot from containers before updating to avoid losing any progress. Sorry for any inconvenience caused!
Cooking on Fires
Starting with this version, the cooking interface is now unified with the fire interface, which means no more switching between interactions when working with fires!
We have also gone through redesigning the perks of different kinds of fires, and now crafting better fires will result in better cooking times and more slots to put raw food on! Building recipes for fires have also been balanced to make more sense.
Another important feature we’ve added with this update is the ability to harvest burnt fires! Depending on the type of fire, harvesting a burnt fire will now yield some of the materials back as well as a certain amount of charcoal.
Shelters and Sleeping
The shelter mechanism has also got a touch-up with this update! We have improved the way crafted shelters look, as well as the requirements to craft them.
Shelters now have a decay mechanic, and when they break, it is possible to harvest their remains and take some of the materials back.
We also added perks to the different kinds of shelters, some of them offering cold protection while others have better durability!
Take note that the kind of bed or shelter you are using now also affects how well you rest!
Traps and Baiting
Baiting in traps now works on a per animal basis. That means that different kind of bait is required for different kind of animals! Bear in mind that some animals can be herbivorous, some omnivorous, while others will only be attracted by meat! The same applies to fish.
Carcass ravaging has also been added. Leaving carcasses into traps for too long or using bait that attracts big game will result in the trap being destroyed!
Destroyed traps can also be harvested to recover some of the initial materials.
Clothing and Pelts
The stats for the various clothing sets available in-game have been balanced to make more sense.
Along with this, we have also added the ability to craft boots from boar pelt. The resource requirement for some of the other pelt-based crafted clothing has been tweaked, and the recipes will now unlock as new pelt kinds are discovered rather than by leveling up.
Starting gear has also been tweaked, and the appearance of some clothing items has been improved.
P.s. We are also working on a clothing repair mechanic as promised, but unfortunately it is not ready for this update and will be released with the next version!
Water Carrying
The water bidon mechanic has been improved, and the bidon now has a decay system such that the player is no longer allowed to use a single bidon throughout the whole playthrough.
The bidon will now decay every time water is gathered, and the condition of the bidon is now visible in the inventory.
We will continue to improve this mechanic, and we will consider adding more containers and the ability to carry other liquids in the future.
Parli Italiano?
As promised and with the help of our Italian translators, we have managed to fully translate Northern Lights to Italian!
For new players, the Italian language should now be autodetected. For existing users, the setting should be available in the gameplay settings panel.
And much more!
Along with the changes above, we also improved a lot of the existing things in the game! Full changelog below:
- First aid items now display "used" notification rather than "consumed"
- Loot containers are now in form of openables rather than storages
- Vehicles now have openable doors and loot inside
- The advanced shelters now require a blueprint to be found in order to be crafted
- Built shelters now have different perks and penalties based on their kind
- Built shelters now have decay. Some resources can be reclaimed from damaged shelters
- Camp Fire now has 3 cooking spots instead of 4
- Camp Fire and Bonfire now has cooking speed bonuses
- It is now possible to extinguish fires by pouring at least half a litre of water on them
- Standing next to a fire now gives a sanity bonus
- Standing next to a fire now gives an energy bonus
- Being over encumbered now has a sanity penalty
- Harvesting objects with tools now has an energy penalty
- Cooking spot mechanics and fire mechanics are now a single interaction
- Baits left in traps now have decay
- Baits now influence the type of animal that will be caught in trap
- Traps now have decay and ravaging mechanics
- Added Italian language
- Added fire starting count left for fire starting items when hovering over items in inventory
- Added salted status of meats when hovering over items in inventory
- Added warming up effect from warm food
- Added character death animation
- Added decay mechanic to water bidon
- Added boar pelt item and new craft for boar pelt boots
- Improved inventory context menu button highlighting
- Improved cooking spot UX
- Improved warmth balancing in mine location
- Improved water bidon logic
- Improved graphics of certain clothing items
- Improved balance of item requirements for built shelters
- Improved balance of item requirements for fires
- Improved balance of item requirements for traps
- Improved balance of healing per hour of all afflictions
- Improved balance of burns treatment rates
- Improved balance of starting gear
- Major improvements to weather system balancing
- Major improvements to weather system VFX
- Major improvements to warmth values for every weather condition
- Major improvements to researchable books placement
- Major improvements to crafted clothing and pelts usage
- Major improvements to clothing stats
- Major improvements to water bidon logic
- Major improvements to stick bed graphics
- Major improvements to sanity dialogue threshold
- Fixed issue causing bow to not zoom when aiming
- Fixed issue causing player to get stuck in certain places of weather station
- Fixed issue causing clothing to not respawn on load
- Fixed issue causing hand drill to have no decay and matches to have wrong decay
- Fixed issue causing dried plants to not be accepted in infusion recipes
- Fixed issue causing fire fuel status to not update while in interaction
- Fixed issue causing cooking spots to be available while fire is not lit yet
- Fixed issue causing fire to not get destroyed after taking cooking elements back
- Fixed issue causing traps to not be interactable with bait inside
- Fixed issue causing some pickables bounds to be outside container bounds
- Fixed issue causing weather condition to not start correctly on new game (always clear)
- Fixed issue causing fire starting items to be consumed fully from one start
- Fixed issue causing lighter item being placed in wrong position
- Fixed issue causing drying rack to not work correctly with cured pelts
- Fixed issue causing some interactions to lose items when inputting in slots that are already populated
- Fixed issue causing a certain snow buried house to be accessible
- Fixed various small issues with level design
What's next?
We want to remind everyone that Northern Lights is in an Early Access state so there might still be a lot of bugs to be ironed out and a lot of balancing to be done.
We will continue fixing reported bugs and issues for 0.7.x while working on the next feature update v0.8 as per our Development Roadmap Available HERE
Because of this, we encourage everyone to use the Report A Bug button found in the Game Menus in order to reach out to us about possible issues! Also, don't forget to join our Community and Discord Server where we have chats dedicated to feedback and new ideas!
Thank you for reading and for all your support and understanding!