This is a copy of our v016 release post for early adopters over on Itch.
Hello explorers! As the development team breathes a sigh of relief at the final build of v016 has been completed the task now turns to me to write this - what will likely be a massive - release post.
So three and a half months of development time, what exactly did we accomplish? The game you all knew as Sapphire Safari has drastically changed. Gone are the small islands, the core loop map building, and the tiny user flow. In its place is a fully-fledged open-world photography game!
The Island
Floating in a currently unannounced area of remote ocean is Sapphire Island, home to a whopping 6 surface-level biomes that the player can (in the entire completed version of the game that is) explore at their leisure. Our focus from now, until our Early Access launch on Steam is the first area—the Plains. Rolling green hills, broken up with a spattering of rocky cairns, home to 9 total species of Monster Girl. The Plains are roughly 1km x .5km in size, offering a decent variety of landscapes and backdrops for photo opportunities.
Some notable areas within the plains are:
The flower fields - primarily this will be a spawn location for Monster Girl known as the Bee (released in a future patch). Flowers dominate this area, offering a very colorful backdrop for photos and the like.
The marshlands - another primary area for a water-based predator known as the Crocodile (released in a future patch). The marsh offers a unique place for plains creatures of all sizes to play in the water and bathe.
The wading pools - tucked away in a corner of the Plains biome is the wading pools, a cool and relaxing place to offer a chance of relaxation for the locals.
With a lot more to discover, the basics for the Plains are all in. Future patches will see content growing out of what we’ve already built, and those looking closely at the environment will be able to spot some “exciting” developments for the game.
The Locals
As mentioned above the first biome will be home to a total of 9 species of Monster Girl, v016 however will only feature 6 with three more coming in future updates.
Fox (medium classification)
A generally sly predator found within the plains biome, they are most active during the night where they use the night as a cover to find their targets.
Snake (medium classification)
A predator known for devouring their Prey found within the plains biome. They are most active during the day when the sun's rays warm their blood making them more active.
Deer (medium classification)
A species found plentiful in the plains biome of Sapphire Island, normally roaming around other deer, they are easy to startle but tend to be less weary of repeated human contact.
Sheep (medium classification)
A unique species, which can be found sporting a large variety of fur designs and colors. They have a herd mentality, sticking close to other sheep to protect themselves from predators.
Bat (small classification)
Found primarily at night feasting on fruits. The bat can be found all over the island, while winged, they cannot sustain flight.
Rabbit (small classification)
A creature of boundless energy, curiosity, and lust. The rabbit can be seen in many varieties across the island.
The Systems
Photo Submission
This is our biggest change from the previous system, now you will need to submit your photos for judging as you fill-up the photo inventory. Just hit “X” at any time you’re within range of a Radio Beacon and the submission process will begin.
Each photo that qualifies for the Species Encyclopedia, Bounties, Main/Side Quests, or Events will be shown with the option to submit that photo once for whatever category it fits into. In some cases you’ll need to decide which result better suits your needs. This system will be expanded upon in the next coming patches with the Encyclopedia (formally known as Monpedia) upgrades.
Bounties
For this patch, the AI is quite limited and won’t offer many opportunities for cataloging their behaviors. So for this patch, we have turned off Monpedia and focused our energy on turning on V1 of the bounty system.
Found within one of the tents in the Campsite is the bounty computer which will offer the player a chance to find and take randomly generated photo quests. These can be submitted via the photo submission tool and the rewards claimed back at the same terminal.
Tutorials
A massively requested feature, we have taken the time to enable our tutorial system in Sapphire Safari. Hitting particular zones or doing things in the game will sometimes pop up tutorials. These can always be reread in the Escape Pause Menu.
Radio Beacons
Radio towers are our new gameplay system. The goal here is to extend a network to allow you to upload photos further and further away from your base Campsite. In future versions unmasking new areas of the map will also unveil activities and unexplored sites of interest you’ll be able to visit.
Sex and Observers
Currently, the only way to activate the sex system in Sapphire Safari is to throw the lust bomb into monster girls on the island. To do this, hit “Q” to equip the lust bomb (it looks like a pink ball) and use Mouse 1 to enter aiming mode.
Releasing the button will throw the bomb and instantly activate the sex mode on affected monster girls. Here the new system will be shown, It will take pairings of Futa x Female, Futa x Futa, and Female x Female along with allowing other monster girls to observe the sex happening in front of them. Participants can join and leave as they like, and observers once they are stimulated enough will throw themselves into the orgy happening before them.
The animation loops we are using currently are only a second or two long, and we have more Futa-enabled animations than Female ones, so please keep that in mind. For the best results, you will need to enable a good amount of Futa spawns in your game.
Day/Night Cycle
Sapphire Safari now has a fully functional day and night cycle on the island. The entire process takes 1 real-life hour to go from Dawn to Dusk, however, within the Campsite you will have a tool to help skip to your desired time of day.
Right now, the time has no effect on monster spawns or the events around the island. That will change in future patches.
Early Narrative Tools
There is now a brand new introduction and character selection cutscene, this intro shows the player being dropped off on the island and shows off the new hologram communication device that will feature in Sapphire Safar along with just a smidge of context for the reasons you’re here right now.
Naturally, more narrative is coming, in fact, the entire script for the first biome is 95% done!
The Fixes
There are so many changes and additions to v016 that it would be pointless to list them all, but for those who don’t wanna read the small novel above here is the TLDR.
Additions:
- New island map: Content locked to plains biome.
- Fox monster girl added
- Sheep monster girl added
- Snake monster girl added
- Tutorial system added
- Holowatch system added
- Bounty system added
- 80+ general actions added to the plains biome.
- Day/Night cycle added
- Fog of War added
- Map system added
- GPS system added
- Radio beacon towers added
- Climbing system added
- Futa physics and growth system added
- Stealth system added
- Sound and noise systems added
- 15+ monster girl reactions added
- Hip-bound camera physics system added
- Fast travel system added
- Save system and respawn system enabled
Changes:
- Rebindings menu bugs fixed
- Throwing animations and camera control fixed
- Player model blurry fov fixed
- Camera ads stutter and shift fixed
- Photo scoring adjusted
- Photo submission v2 added
- Doll system v5 added
- Re-added player hat to 3rd person camera
- Social buttons reconfigured
- ADS screen adjusted
- Research level and familiarity popups added
- Camera autofocus adjusted to fix constant blurriness
- Focus finder attached to monster girl head correctly
Known Issues
A massive patch like v016 won't be without its own issues, Here is a list of currently known bugs that will likely affect some players.
- Player characters have bone alignment issues.
- Monster girls will not react to the player, due to their sight tech being turned off for stability.
- Monster girls will sometimes unload themselves from the world, they will basically pop out of existence.
- The camera focus during sex scenes is hard to control.
Both issues will be fixed in the next few patches.
Conclusion
Man, what a massive patch this ended up being. Going forward we won’t be doing something so ‘intense’ anymore. The strain it put on us, and the wait time all our supporters had to endure was not something we wanted to take on. Since we are getting closer to our eventual Steam Early Access launch the next few patches will throw away the concept of “one a month” Instead we will be launching patches the moment new content is ready. So a lot of them will be small upgrades to things, and some might be the inclusion of one new system.
The results will bring more time to get feedback on the new stuff faster, and you all will get the content on a higher frequency.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1526900/Sapphire_Safari/
Anyway, I hope you all enjoy v016. A lot of sleepless nights went into this one. Please be sure to send us your feedback! We are eager to know what everyone thinks!
Cheers,
Kinky