Miau, 🐈👋
We hope you enjoyed the last few days of the demo. As we explained, the last demo didn’t match the current game mechanics, so it was time to take it offline. Many of you were wondering what changed, so here’s our Monthly Dev Log, which explains the new challenge system and more:
What has happened since the last time
✨New Challenge System✨
As we mentioned in our last post, we have changed the challenge system. Our primary aim was to respond to feedback that crossroads could be overwhelming with information, and the frustration when you needed to choose a path due to the lack of resources. It’s a bit abstract if you haven’t played the new system, but we’ve tried to break it down:
When you enter a crossroads, you can still choose between two events (e.g. ambush, safe camp). Every path may include a challenge (e.g. stronger rabbit) which adds some difficulty. So why should you choose a path with a challenge? For every challenge you take, you will earn points, which can be exchanged for rewards in the safe camp. Once you have traded them in at the safe camp, the challenges will end. For example, no more annoying rain disturbing your fire! 🙅♀️🌧️
As a result, we don't have to pay as much attention to how challenges influence each other and therefore are freer in the design of new ones. Therefore, more challenges for you to overcome! In addition, as challenges may end in the next safe camp, we can really go wild with this: double the strength of enemies, invisible health bar, torrential rain, and so on.
With a wide variety of challenges, every run you take becomes more different from the last one. In the long term, this influences the replay value of Wild Woods.
Performance improvements🎮
We have improved the games performance. As a result, Wild Woods now runs at 60fps almost all the time, even on the Steam Deck 🥳
Second biome🌊
Back in March, we gave you a sneak peek at the second biome. Even though it looks really nice, there are still some things missing. So we expanded the level and added a boss. Can you guess which animal the second boss might be?
More support for the team🤗
Valeria from Osmotic Studio has joined our visual effects department. Among other things, she has been working on the visual effects of the totems. The additional visual effects should make the totem’s buff more obvious at first glance.
Emotes System😃👍🔥
This was one of the most popular requests from the Playtest: a communication system. We already implemented the basic structure of an emote system, and now we need to polish the aesthetic. Do you have important emotes for communication in mind? 🤔
What happens next
- Steam Achievements
- Challenge system iterations
- Update the tutorial with the new challenge system
- Preparation of the next translations
- Improve readability and comprehension of game mechanics
Last but not least, we'd love to hear your ideas for challenges. As mentioned before, you can go wild with these. They can also be fun challenges (e.g. Rosie changing color every time you throw something in the wagon). Head over to Discord to share your thoughts.
We look forward to your feedback on the new challenge system. It changes some of the gameplay, but we think it will make Wild Woods even better! 🔥💯🥳
We wish you a great start to the week 🥰😺