Hi ranchers! 🐴 Development for The Ranch of Rivershine has been going really well this spring, which means I have a ton of new features to share in this devlog... So let's saddle up!
Rivershine Town
After working on this level for months, I'm happy to finally share a full overlook of the town! This is where you'll begin your adventure, meet your fellow townsfolks, visit shops, bid in the auction house and start competing in cross country!
For now, the buildings are mostly empty indoors. I'll be modeling furniture and decorating the villagers' houses as I add more townsfolks!
If you're curious about the town's ambience, make sure to listen to the music composed by Matthew Harnage for the town! The game will feature a full original soundtrack, with unique tracks for each areas you'll explore!
River & Waterfall
I also took some time to create nice water shaders and particle effects. Considering the name of the town, I figured the river should take a central part of it!
Villagers Behavior & Dialogue
Now we'll need some townsfolks to populate Rivershine! I've created the first villager you'll meet in town... Madelaine Beauchamp, the auctioneer! She'll help you buy your first horse after arriving in town and get you set up for competitions.
The first step to interacting with villagers is a dialogue system, which I've now implemented. There's still a ton of content I'll need to write for tutorials, quests and the storyline, so this will be an ongoing effort. But I'm happy we can get chatting with the villagers!
Additionally, I've also been implementing a schedule for the villagers. This means that they'll change their behavior depending on the season, weekday and hour. Their schedule will impact for example when they sleep, when they open their store and where you can find them. But I want to add even more actions to their daily life, which brings me to our next feature!
Furniture Interaction
To add more depth to the villagers' daily schedule, they'll need to be able to interact with furniture and tools. This will allow them to do a lot of different actions like go to sleep, sweep with a broom, brush a horse or eat a meal at the table. As I've just started implementing this system they can for now sit down, lay down and open doors. A good start, but I'll still have a lot more to add here!
You will also be able to use furniture just as the villagers do, so for example you'll be able to sit down at a table with them. While this doesn't add to the gameplay, I'm hoping that fans of roleplaying will enjoy this detail!
Horse Mane & Tail
Now before the end of this devlog, let's get back to horse business! I've been redesigning the horses' manes and tails to add physics, different lengths of hair, multiple colors and patterns. I'm loving how unique and nicer this makes the horses look!
Thank you everyone for following my work on The Ranch of Rivershine! Please feel free to ask me if you have any questions about the game, or hop on the Discord if you'd like to join the game's community! ❤️