What's up, Buds!
Over a thousand new Buds joined us in our Closed Beta, and we welcomed back players from our original Next Fest demo. It’s been a pleasure to watch you all wibble and wobble around the Island, building, growing, exploring… and getting up to all kinds of physics-based mischief.
We’ve also been absolutely blown away by the positivity and support of our growing community. Our devs worked hard to deliver four separate hotfixes during the beta, and that was made possible due to the dedication of our community, and the high quality detail of their bug reports.
If you visited Southfield in our Closed Beta and want to leave your feedback, please do fill out our form. We appreciate all your thoughts, suggestions, and constructive criticisms. It’s how we make our game grow into something great! You can also share your thoughts with us by joining our community Discord.
Team Frog VS Team Axolotl
During our Closed Beta, we challenged our VIBs (that’s our Very Important Buds) to compete for points, building, growing, automating and exploring. As our first ever Creator Cohort, we were so excited to see what they’d get up to, and they did not disappoint!
Creator Cohort #1: (Team Frog) Chaos_n_Order, WaddlesToddles, RhapsPerhaps, BillieTrixx, GeekyN8, (Team Axolotl) lofiLondy, JaneDash, Mistantics, Mama_Lumi, AzureBay
🌈 Rainbow Farm
We asked our VIBs to colour coordinate their crops, creating a rainbow farm, featuring as many of Southfield’s various vegetation as possible. We had some amazing submissions, and our team whittled it down to two positively perfect veggie patches.
Rhaps delivered a truly spectacular farm plot, organised by crop colour! They even included some vibrant trees, all crowned in a perfectly timed rainbow arching over Southfield. We took that as a sign that this submission was a true shiny!
Despite having a few setbacks during beta, Mama_Lumi bounced back like a Boinger crop to create a wonderfully vibrant Rainbow Farm. Lumi was very proud of her accomplishments, and for good reason! Just look at these cute little plots. Such variety and colour, a fantastic effort!
We asked our dev team to vote, and we have a winner...
🏆 RhapsPerhaps wins the Rainbow Farm challenge!
🏡 Till & Turf
We challenged our VIBs to build their Buds a brand new crib during the beta. We loved seeing all the different uses of building materials, and the care our creators took in finding great locations with good views!
Chaos_n_Order opted for a stone and glass combination, with a large glass wall opening out onto the Pleasant Plains – bringing the outside inside! We also loved their use of arched pieces to do something a little different with the upstairs windows (and improve ventilation). The whole build was framed with a quaint little fence, carving out a place to call their own.
JaneDash blew our team away with her elevated home, using the Island’s natural landscape to add height and creating an impressive staircase entrance. Jane also included diamond shaped windows for epic views, balconies and a sky view when Bud needs to snooze under the stars!
And the votes are in...
🏆 JaneDash wins the Till & Turf challenge!
🍆 Hurl Your Harvest
We wanted to see how far our VIBs could send their Squapples on the longest conveyor belt Southfield has ever seen… and one submission was stand out, hands down, the best and longest conveyor belt ever build in our game!
RhapsPerhaps sent their Squapples, boinged their Boingers, and even bounced their Bud for miles. An astounding feat of engineering, 10/10.
🏆 RhapsPerhaps wins the Hurl Your Harvest challenge!
🖼️ Picture This
Our fourth challenge was called “Picture This”, where we asked our VIBs to capture a funny moment from their time playing Southfield in closed beta. Chaos_n_Order delivered with their screenshot aptly named “Praise C4 Tower”, showing their Bud raising their arms in the air while a great towering structure behind them looms.
Meanwhile, Mistie was having a very relatable “This Is Fine” moment, with her Axolotl Bud passed out on the floor, on fire, refusing to move. We’ve all been there, right? But there can only be one winner…
🏆 Chaos_n_Order wins the Picture This challenge!
🎬 GIF That Keeps On Giving
And finally, we asked our VIBs for a GIF That Keeps On Giving. The challenge? Capture a moment from the beta that best reflects your experience.
Lofi_Londy came in strong with a pride-perfect Axolotl stretch beneath a vibrant rainbow, making us feel all warm and fuzzy. Then the explosive submission from WaddlesToddles gave our whole dev team a laugh. Gotta be careful around those Kabume crops!
🏆 WaddlesToddles wins the GIF That Keeps On Giving challenge!
⭐ Honourable Mentions
There were so many great submissions that didn't make it into this recap, and some great clips that might not have been part of our five challenges, but gave the whole dev team a good giggle regardless. From Mistie's community creating a compilation of her talking about her Boingers, to BillieTrixx noticing that the seedmaker sounds eerily similar to the Thomas the Tank Engine theme tune!
Also literally any time one of our VIBs set themselves on fire... Here we have AzureBay accepting her fate having clearly eaten some very spicy vegetables.
🏆And the winner is... Team Frog! 🐸
Congratulations, Chaos_n_Order, WaddlesToddles, RhapsPerhaps, BillieTrixx, and GeekyN8 - with the most amount of points won, Team Frog is taking it home this time!
And a huge well done to lofiLondy, JaneDash, Mistantics, Mama_Lumi, and AzureBay of Team Axolotl. In the end, the votes came very close. We enjoyed every stream and every silly clip... And can't wait to see what you get up to next! Both teams will be receiving an in-game medal for their Bud to wear with pride.
🌱 What's next?
We'd love for you to go check out other content from our VIBs, who have been the life force behind our Closed Beta! You can also join in the conversation on our Discord, and be the first to hear about any news and updates.
If you're interested in applying to be in the next Creator Cohort, and join our VIBs in future challenges, you can apply via the Southfield website (currently accepting applications).
Thank you again to everyone who joined us for our Closed Beta. As a token of our appreciation, we've created some Southfield wallpapers for you to download (these will be shared in our Discord). We've also added Dancing Bud (see top of post) as a sticker everyone in Discord can use!
We'll also be giving the community a sparkly star sprout to jazz up their Bud come early access, as another little way of saying thank you for playing, and for all your feedback. If you enjoyed our game, please do consider adding us to your wishlist. And as always...
Stay wibbly,
Flop 💙
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