Howdy Ranchers!
I am happy to announce that the new demo will be available from August 14th onwards for everyone to try.
Big update ahead: two new regions, rituals, the compendium, new crafting and furniture, and a bunch of QoL fixes.
New Region: Silverlake Desert
Once you're far enough into the story you'll head out to Silverlake Desert. Every region beyond Rockhound has its own environmental challenge. Out here the sun sets later and rises earlier, so your working night is shorter. Silver is a natural resource here, which is great for crafting and terrible for you. You'll be weakened while you gather it.
The desert also features an abandoned mine that'll contain more mobs and ore for you to venture. Apart from that, you can grow cactus fruit, spicy pepper, and agave out here.
New Region: Bogsnork Swamp
The swamp is thick with acidic fog, rich in herbs and sulfur, and infested with blood-sucking mosquitoes. You'll want a repellent before you spend much time here. Making one means bringing something you grew back in Rockhound out to the desert first. It’s work in progress, but there will be a swamp-themed mine down here too.
Compendium
A new wiki/codex menu that tracks your boons, buffs, relationships, town status, and collected items. Good news if you like a checklist.
Rituals
With patrons and travellers that are well fed and plethoric, you can perform Rituals. Sacrifice blood, items, gold, in exchange for power.
Some are environmental, like invoking weather, rain for your crops, and lightning for crafting. Practical rituals like Abundance regrows trees and forageables for you to harvest, and perhaps Brainwashing humans to turn a blind eye to your vampiric degeneracy and antics.
Others cost more. Through the Ritual of Greed, you’ll make a deal with the devil and sacrifice some coin. In return, you’ll have a double income modifier for the day. And if you're willing to sacrifice a traveller, you’ll be able to absorb them for highest tier boons and blood.
Livelier Town
Rockhound's quest characters: Arthur, Hana, Chauncey, Kale, Marco, Benjy, and Simon now run their own daily schedules. You'll catch them fishing, cleaning, running errands around town, and generally getting on with their lives whether you're watching or not.
Quality of Life & Additions:
Shared crafting storage: stations now pull resources from nearby chests
Quest map markers: early quests open the map with directions
Clearer building grid for large objects
Status/Conditions: tooltips in Compendium
More furniture, including extra tables and crafting and cooking ranges tiers, birdhouses.
Streamlined quests - better starting/onboarding experience.
New fish, butterflies. squirrels.
That’s all for now!
Borispixel