Meowllo! How are you? Fine, thank you! I wish I were a bird...!
Or, at least, a bird with a better heart event than pre-patch Mack!
Before I get into that, and into my enralis ramble-y patch note, let's do the "I'm not reading that" patch note!
Patch Rundown
💖 Better Heart Events
Heart events now no longer require guessing on where and when. All events start from a quest from the board, a letter, or by talking. Regardless of how it starts, you will always have a quest answering the "where" and "when"!
Heart events were rewritten for better character development and interactions with you!
🦊 More Dialogue Flair
Some villagers will now react to things that happen or have happened. Finished an obelisk? Mikan will comment on it!
...And more to be added
Triggers for these unique, play-once lines include quests, achievements, and more!
Additional dialogue lines for five flowers; becoming best friends with someone should feel a bit more rewarding, no?
Based on quest completion and certain events, characters will leave a note in the guestbook at the Cultural Center
🐛 Better Stability
Fixes to prevent crashing and sudden performance drops
Improvements for gamepad behaviors while in UI
Better crash reporting for us so we can fix them faster!
Patch Walkdown (Long Ver.)
💝 Heart Events
So, it's not just Mack I'm throwing under the bus. I'm not throwing anybody under the bus. However, I had to face it: these old heart events.....
Man.
"Good morning. Let's go on a date 🤖"
"Wow, excellent day 🤖 Thank you for the date."
As an avid lover of romance in life sims and visual novels, it just wasn't cutting it. So, I went through every single romanceable character and rewrote all the cutscenes and events.
Some of them are now more "interactable" - they will be quests where you might have them join you and do a few tasks, or you may have to deliver something to a guild on their behalf.
Whatever it is, each one now includes some juicy ✨character development✨.
So, in addition to being longer, there's also added substance. Building on top of each character's already existing traits and their personal struggles or life events, the heart events continue to build onto their stories and give a (hopefully) satisfying ending. That way, romancing and getting to know someone feels like you got somewhere with them.
I didn't want each rewrite to just be "haha, I wrote more words. Word count go brr and the community localizers are going to hate me forever". In fact, I would rather them not hate me at all. However. With how lacking in substance some of the older cutscene dialogues were, I needed that extra bit of yapping to fit in the story I wished to tell for each one of them.
So, I truly, deeply, from the bottom of my heart, hope you will enjoy each villager and their journeys with you.
🔎 Finding Said Heart Events
Okay, great. The heart events are better. But...do I have to run around the map and pray that I trigger one?
Nope. Letter, quest board quest marked with [HE]. Whatever it is, you'll get a quest with where to go, who to talk to, and when to do it (if there is a time frame). I wanted to make sure if you just reallyyyyy love someone, you didn't have the game fighting against your true love.
Not all letters that trigger the events for your darling will be sent by them! So make sure to read them carefully! I didn't ramble in them! Unless it was OOC if I didn't!!
✒️ Guestbook
I wanted a cute little way for the world to feel alive, outside of talking to NPCs and watching cutscenes and doing quests. So, the Cultural Center set up a guestbook! From quests you complete, and sometimes choices you make during heart events, some villagers or tourists will leave a message in your guestbook.
Check it every once in a while and see if anything new comes up!
✏️ Additional Dialogue Lines
There are already a lot of dialogue lines in the pool, but I wanted the "tiers" for higher relationships to feel more rewarding. This isn't just for those who want to romance everyone, though. Best Friend, or, 5 Flowers, also got additional lines.
And, for the ones who just really don't care that much, the characters will still react to major events like...getting rid of the miasma in the plains.
Once per day per character, if certain requirements are met, a villager may say a unique line. This could be a comment about a quest you just finished, an event you just completed, or if you befriended someone.
There's more of these unique dialogue lines coming soon, so please look forward to it!
One of the challenges I had writing dialogue pool lines was you were more or less a silent protagonist. Talking to myself in a room is already difficult, it's even harder when said characters couldn't take with each other, just at each other.
In addition to the protagonist having a few more internal reactions from time to time, or certain actions taken by characters being described, they also are more integrated into the world around you.
I've organized (in a spreadsheet this time not just in my head) friendships that I imagine the villagers to have. For example, everyone knows Jun and Hanna get along with Nobu Jr. Or, Mikan and Kimchi would be fast friends with how dedicated they are to perfecting recipes. With that in mind, befriending other characters, meeting them, or dating them...all of these can trigger reactions from those around you who care, and those around them that care.
There are also fun little things, like completing achievements or reaching a stat (jump 1,000 times?) will have certain characters comment on it. After all, wouldn't your neighbors notice if you caught 500 fish? Surely, they are going somewhere, right?
There are also more of these lines to come, so I hope you'll enjoy!
And, you got to the end of the patch notes! ⭐
Good job! I'm not even sorry it was long, I put a summary in the beginning! Take that!!
🐾 Now, please enjoy Snacko Island, I will see you in the next patch note!