After the previous content update, this patch has been centered on polishing the building and interaction aspect of the game. For the next update - we’ll return to working on the villager AI! Based on the Discord poll results, the most requested AI features are Villager Chronicles and Unravelling Tales, so we’ll be making a start on the former next week! For now, here are the changes in this patch 🚀
⛰️ Proper support for building on hilly terrain
Previously, building on very hilly terrain was a problem because the bases of the buildings were not low enough. This meant that they could sometimes appear half-floating in certain situations. In this patch, we’ve added much deeper bases for all structures to fully enable these harsher conditions. Each building now also slightly terraforms the terrain so it doesn’t appear half-embedded inside it. Mountain-side towns are something that’s rather unique to this game and we want to fully support!
But not only that, we’ve gone a step beyond and actually offered multiple base types for the bigger buildings to allow extra customisation! A lot of them now support two options: adapting to the current surface, or terraforming the entire building zone for a flatter usuable area.
Additionally, the bakery and smithy also have a 3rd option: platformed terraces. These allow you to have a flat floor and stairs up to the buildings instead. If it’s something you enjoy, we can also make this option available to other buildings too.
🏡 Building configuration screen
Some players found it difficult to tell exactly how a building would look (especially at different angles) when it’s finished. To fix this and support the ability to easily choose between building base options, we’ve added a new configuration screen for the more complex buildings that need it: the workshop, tavern, smithy, bakery, cattle barn, and tailor.
In this new architecture screen, you can:
- Choose between available base types
- Rotate the camera to see how a building will look at any angle
- Easily reposition and re-rotate to find that exact right fit.
👆 Revamped interactions
We’ve improved the item and UI interactions in a few great ways this patch! First, we implemented a drag and drop feature - which also means that items will no longer occasionally re-order themselves in your inventories.
Then, we finally added a toolbar which will allow you to easily switch between different items and tools to more easily focus down your interactions and speed up decoration. To go along with the new toolbar and additional space, we increased the inventory size from 12 -> 17.
Due to this change, we’ve naturally had to alter a number of hotkeys to fit the new interaction paradigm. To summarise, the focus is now on left-click for destructive actions (such as gathering items) and right-click for interactions or destructive actions - plus a few key-binding changes. Overall, it’s a fairly big adjustment to interactions, so we’re open to hearing what you think about it.
Then, we’ve updated the cursor with a custom design which changes depending on whether you are hovering over an item, dragging, or about to contribute it to a building.
As we evolve the game, we are improving in our artistic ability to produce new content. The tooltips and context menus have far fallen behind our current quality threshold. As such, we’ve given them a visual refresh whilst giving more context options to accompany the drag’n’drop functionality.
🪰 Bug fixes and smaller improvements
- Added a scythe hint when trying to cut a field without one
- Updated the look of boulders and fixed the hitboxes on them
- Updated the look of doors to be more rounded and have a wooden base so they won’t look floating on hilly terrain
- Changed tavern, smithy, and bakery to require waiting until the next day to fully open
- Finally fixed some items being visible through tooltips and other overlaying UI elements
- Updated the look of the settings key configuration menu into a tabbed view in order to be able to hold all the new controls
- Fixed a small subset of players potentially having issues starting the game
- Fixed some small items being harder to interact with when other items are nearby
- Fixed villagers being able to use the mine before while it’s still blocked
- Fixed some small UI scaling issues
- Fixed being able to clip the camera inside the tavern if you are standing too close to it
- Fixed mountain rocks having weird visual appearances when far away
- Fixed tutorials sometimes being underneath UI elements