Greetings, Adventurers! This update brings the remaining chapters of Season of Duets, plus a suite of events and features. Days of Sunlight, Days of Moonlight, Days of Style, plus improvements for your gameplay experience—it’s a big update with something for everyone!
Season of Duets
The music of the Season continues as we finally learn more about the Compassionate Cellist and the memories they hold. Be sure to check in with the Duets Guide as the last two Seasonal Quests become available in this update!
Completing the 4th quest will bring you one step closer to revealing the Season’s full story—and it will also reveal the Cellist’s Friendship Tree, which contains items that can be unlocked with regular Candles. These will continue to be available after the Season ends, just like the IGC (in-game currency) items and expressions in the Duets Guide’s tree.
What won’t be available after the Season ends, though, are the Ultimate instrument and prop that the Duets Guide offers. Season Pass holders can complete Daily Quests and gather golden Seasonal Candles to unlock your way to the Seasonal Hearts that these Ultimate Gifts require!
Season of Duets continues until 23:59 on September 29th (all times PDT, UTC -7).
By the way, related to that—
Double Light Event!
From September 9th through 15th, the realms might seem a little brighter! Keep an eye out for four extra Seasonal Candle locations in the realms, and you’ll be able to gather an additional Seasonal Candle each day.
There will also be double Treasure Candles scattered across two realms each day. Find all eight for a boost to your Candle run!
Kick Back During Days of Sunlight
Days of Sunlight is back from August 26th through September 8th (that is, starting at 00:00 on the first day and going through 23:59 on the last day—the usual start and end times for events in the game)! For two weeks, escape to the Elevated Clearing and make new memories with friends and Spirits!
Gather with the scouts or with fellow Sky kids around a cozy campfire to enjoy some toasty Light snacks (which will also feed your Candle count), or to make music with the event Spirits. If you’re looking to spend a little energy, the Elevated Clearing is practically a playground with diving boards, waterslides, and more. Plus, if you look around, you might find some baby jellyfish who could use some help to make their way through the world.
As you roam through the area, you can gather up to six event currency every day:
- 4 placed around the event space
- 2 from taking part in event activities
New Event Items
- Sunlight Manta Float: 20 event currency
- Sunlight Beach Shorts outfit: 30 event currency
- Sunlight Helios Hoops earrings: $2.99 (all prices USD)
- Sunlight Woven Wrap cape: $14.99
And yes, all items from past years will return too! It’s a pretty long list at this point, so for all details on older items, please check out our patch notes for the event from previous years. As for the beach towel capes that were event currency last year, they’ll be available for regular in-game currency (110 Candles for the yellow one, 140 Candles for the blue one, and 30 Hearts for the pink one).
Items are available in the in-game shop in the settings menu, the Aviary Village event shop, and of course from the Event Guide. Keep an eye out for trial spells in the Elevated Clearing and in the event shop, too!
New Event: Days of Moonlight
Revel in the beauty of a full moon and the light of glowing lanterns. From September 16th through 29th, a new event opens in the Crescent Oasis for Sky kids to enjoy.
Special mediation pads in Home and the Aviary Village event shop will transport you to the starry skies of the event area. There you can find a spot for hanging lanterns, where you can also try your hand at answering riddles.
You can also stop by a nearby table with snacks that will provide you with Light, too!
Five event currency are available each day:
- 3 from participating in the riddles activity
- 2 placed around the Crescent Oasis
Event items:
- Moonlight Blossom Accessory: 17 event currency
- Moonlight Lantern Decoration: 32 event currency
- Moonlight Earrings: $2.99
- Moonlight Frock and Updo: $14.99 - Includes an outfit and a hairstyle
Items can be found in the in-game shop or unlocked from the Event Guide Spirit. Don’t forget about the free trial spells for all items, which can be found in the event shop and in the Crescent Oasis.
Coming Down the Runway: Days of Style!
From September 30th through October 13th, your avatar is your canvas! The Style Guide is back, and they’re inviting you to create a unique ensemble that captures special themes to share on runways located throughout the realms.
Check with the Style Guide each day to teleport you to a fashion runway placed in one of Sky’s levels. Locations will rotate regularly, and this year will include four new locations too!
At each one, use a Shared Memory Shrine to express yourself and share your interpretation of the theme (you’ll get some Light in the process of making those Shared Memories too).
And don’t worry—each location includes a range of cosmetics you can temporarily borrow if you feel like your own closet selection doesn’t get the theme quite right.
New Event Items
- Style Darkness Fascinator: 15 event currency
- Style Dazzling Dress: 34 event currency
- Style Dapper Trio: $14.99 - This set includes a dapper-looking outfit, a tie styled after one of the realms’ creatures, and a stylish monocle.
These can be found in the Style Guide’s Friendship Tree and in the in-game shop.
As for last year’s items, they’ll all be back too—find them in the Aviary Village event shop! For extra details on those, please refer to the patch notes for Days of Style from last year.
Meanwhile, items introduced for event currency last year will be available for Candles and Hearts (72 Candles for the Style Star Sunglasses, 30 Candles for the Style Runway Mask, 13 Hearts for the Style Silk Ballet Slippers, and 12 Ascended Candles for the Style Top Hat). These can also be unlocked in the Style Guide’s Friendship Tree!
And yes, here too you’ll find free trial spells for all new and returning Days of Style items in the event shop.
New with Days of Style: event currency Light
Beginning with Days of Style, event currency can be earned incrementally, similar to how currency like regular Candles and Seasonal Candles are typically gathered.
In Days of Style this year, all event currency will be available as event currency Light. It will appear as blue orbs that are quite a bit larger than Light from Candles. It will fill up your event currency meter the way that regular Light fills your Candle meter, and you can forge a unit of currency once the meter is full.
We’re keeping it simple for this event: All event currency will be available as event currency Light, which you can find around the stage area and by viewing other player’s recordings at the event’s Shared Memories Shrine, for up to 5 event currency each day.
Meanwhile, event currency Light creates new possibilities for future events, so the team is brainstorming all kinds of ideas that we hope to share in events to come!
Season of Shattering Spirits Return for a Special Visit
The Memories of Ancient Light and Ancient Darkness will be paying a special visit to the realms!
From September 16th through 29th, the Guide from Season of Shattering will appear in Home and the Aviary Village event shop. Check with this Spirit to access the two ancient memories and unlock items originally from this Season!
Through the Void of Shattering, you'll also be able to check your progress on Season of Shattering Quests. To complete those quests, clear the Darkness that appears when Shard Eruptions of varying strength fall in the realms.
Updates to Daily Quests
During SkyFest in July, you may have seen our blog post about plans over time to update Daily Quests and other types of quests in Sky. 0.26.5 includes the first round of updates that bring Spirits back into the Daily Quests, introduce new quest activities, and add some quality of life improvements too.
0.26.5 will introduce 18 brand new Daily Quests. As you look out for them, you might notice that some of them are connected to each other...
For these new quests, even if you forget to unlock them in Aviary Village or Home, if you interact with the Spirit in the realms who the quest is connected to, it will add the quest to your list. There will also be a popup asking if you want to start the quest now.
Some of the other changes you’ll see:
- In Aviary Village, you can get Daily Quests by talking to Spirits waiting for you at the archway counter, who will ask for your help with something that they care about. This will replace the use of the Daily Quest statue in Aviary, which will still remain to represent the Return Shrine. (There’s no change to how you’ll get Daily Quests in Home.)
- If a quest needs you to go somewhere in the realms, the location of that quest will be shown on map shrines after you pick up the quest.
- If you haven’t “met” a Daily Quest Spirit yet, it will be stationary and blue until you relive their memories out in the realms.
- For the new quests, to get your Candle you can either return to the Spirits in Aviary, the quest statue in Home, or by interacting with the Spirit in the quest level after you finish their quest.
Note that for the new quests, if you haven’t already seen the memory of the Spirit offering it, the Spirit will ask you to relive their memory before unlocking its Daily Quest. In that case, the map shrine will show you where you can do that!
Like we mentioned in the blog post, our longer term plan is to revamp and improve the entire quest system. Daily Quests will be a way to experience miniature stories and relationships with the Spirits, and ultimately connect you more closely with the world of Sky.
This is just the very first step, so we’ll have more to share in future patch notes!
Developer Note: There are so many Spirits in Sky with unique stories to tell. We’re excited to start exploring their interests, relationships, goals, and lives with some new daily quests coming out this patch. Each quest is small, to fit into the quick pace of dailies, but all together we hope to paint a fuller picture of who these characters are and what they care about. :)
Many more of these quests will be coming your way in the coming months, focusing on Spirits from other Seasons and on the core Spirits. But in the longer term beyond that, we’re taking the opportunity to make the daily quests more personal, and also to make them easier to find and play with friends. This patch has our first steps in that direction. Thank you for playing! <3
New Feature: Favoriting Emotes
There are dozens of emotes you can use to express yourself in Sky, and in 0.26.5 we’re excited to introduce a feature to make it easier to use the ones you like best!
Access this new favorites menu in a few different ways:
- In the main Expression menu for a one-time tutorial (more on that in a second)
- By pressing and holding on the cape meter
- Pressing Z on your keyboard or pressing the middle mouse button
- Pressing L2 on your controller
This will display a wheel with slots for eight actions from the expression menu, and you’ll be able to add or remove any expression (or more) that you want for a slot.
When you first log into Sky after downloading this update, a star button will appear in the Expression menu. Tap it for a quick explanation of how to use the feature. It will disappear after finishing the tutorial. (For brand new players, this will appear once they reach Vault of Knowledge.)
This feature should make it easier to spam your favorite emotes, prepare your best dance moves, or even choreograph your next Shared Memory!
New Feature: Unfriending in the Friendship Constellation
The Friendship Constellation is a record of all the connections we’ve made in Sky. Sometimes though, it’s helpful to be able to adjust our Constellations, particularly if we play with some Sky kids less often than we used to, or if we want to be able to welcome new friends into a crowded Constellation.
This update introduces a function that allows players to unfriend someone while viewing their avatar in the Friendship Constellation. This works differently from blocking, which prevents the blocked player from interacting with the person who blocked them, for example.
With unfriending:
- The unfriended player is removed from your Constellation.
- All relationship abilities between you and the other person are disabled (including chat).
- It’s possible to meet someone you unfriended. If that happens, you and the unfriended player will appear as strangers to each other if you meet again in-game.
- If you light their avatar, there will be an icon over their head to indicate that they are someone you unfriended.
If you meet someone you unfriended, both of you have the option of rekindling your friendship at no additional Candle cost. All previously unlocked relationship abilities will be restored.
Other Updates
- Cutscene autoskip toggle: This option to automatically skip cutscenes has been added to the settings menu under the graphics option. When it's enabled, skippable cutscenes will automatically be skipped as long as the player has watched them at least once before.
- Cutscenes that can’t be automatically skipped are typically the kind that lead to a physical change in the world—for example, a door opening. In that case, players will keep control of the camera while the door opens according to the normal laws of physics instead of flashing open from one frame to the next.
- If you have feedback about the cutscene autoskip toggle, please share it with us in our feedback channel on Discord or comments in our feedback threads in our official Facebook group!
- The team recently began working on a project that will ultimately allow us to get updates and fixes to players more quickly. This is still a work in progress, but in some cases, it may result in this message when starting the game: “Downloading latest content.” That’s related to the project that the team is working on, so it isn’t a bug.
Improvements and Bug Fixes in this update include:
Highlights
- As part of the Daily Quest updates, quest progress updates will now show up during cutscenes, if applicable. The full list of all daily quests will remain hidden.
- The rest of the Light treats that the Spirit gives in the Elevated Clearing have come back down to earth so that Sky Children can easily gather them again.
- When using a controller, now the Friendship Menu and the prompts to hold a friend’s hand or to follow them take priority over other interaction prompts.
- Opening an umbrella while being carried should now protect both the carried player and the person carrying them from rain damage.
- Using the Wind Paths to reach Hermit Valley should no longer bounce you back into the level you came from.
Gameplay
- Fixed a bug that was draining the breath meter and energy from AFK players being carried by piggyback while underwater.
- Spamming handhold in Vault of Knowledge should no longer cause players to sink below the floor.
- Fixed a crash that could occur in Harmony Hall when initiating a jam session.
- Music can be very entrancing, but not so entrancing that it leads to bugs like the one that prevented Dark Crabs from attacking players who were playing instruments while seated—so that bug’s been fixed.
- Festival tech reaction menu won’t show up when a fullscreen menu is visible.
- Fixed a bug that could prevent a player from renaming a recently added friend, or from properly using the handhold, carry, and cradle carry interactions.
- UI for viewing Player Creations should appear when you are viewing them alongside/”over the shoulder” of a friend who’s also viewing them.
- Updated the bass part in the Duets music sheet to be one octave higher to improve the music when being played.
- For new players: The Aviary Village Spell shop should no longer be accessible before the entrance is unblocked.
- When the hint text after the Elder cutscene in Prairie Temple shows how to make a big call, making a regular (small) call will no longer circumvent the tutorial and potentially mislead new players.
- Another bug that could similarly impact new players: Fixed a bug during the big call tutorial that shows new players how butterflies can help them fly, which allowed the player to move if they had the expression menu open.
Cosmetics
- Duet Guide’s suit tailcoat outfit won’t look deformed when you kneel.
- Resolved the SkyFest wireframe cape clipping with avatar’s neck.
- After riding the snowboard to transition out of one area or level, you won’t be standing on an invisible platform when you appear in the next one.
- Nearby players should no longer see the snowboard disconnected from the feet of the player who’s riding the snowboard.
- We reminded the Ultimate Gift lantern from Season of Remembrance that no one’s light is diminished when others—or their candles—are allowed to shine. As a result, we resolved cases where placing and then lighting the Ultimate Gift lantern would temporarily prevent players in the level from being able to take out their candle.
- Fixed the slow slide animation that occurred from a player’s perspective when someone else sat down on a nearby prop.
General Fixes and Improvements:
- If you have set Aviary Village as your loading point and are in Aviary Village, the settings menu will not display the “Return Home” option. The same applies for players in Home who have set that as their loading point.
- The text displaying your Winged Light count is now bold, and the appearance of wedges in the energy meter has been updated.
- Fixed issues with the player’s reflection during a specific sequence during Season of Duets' third quest.
- Sky children will properly walk after using the cello or violin instruments via the instrument rack, instead of gliding oddly over the ground.
- During the first Season of Duets quest, instruments with sustain should no longer hold that sustain when you swap to a different instrument.
- Restored the missing sound effect when interacting with the hammer icon while editing a Shared Space.
- Avatar won’t randomly jitter while using the Candle Trick Spell.
- Players using the carry interaction while under the effects of huge, grow, shrink, or tiny spells should not clip into each other as much as they used to (there may still be a bit of clipping, due to strange bending of the laws of Sky physics that occurs when such powerful magic is used).
- Avatar won’t contort during the “Exhale Inhale” song in the AURORA Concert.
- Reduced particles on the tree in Crescent Oasis to improve frame rate on certain devices.
- When in photo mode, legends should respect the HUD margins better than before.
- After sending a gift of Light to a friend who is online, the icon to send a Light gift will stop displaying.
- Wi-fi symbol should no longer interfere with text hints at the bottom of the screen.
- Fixed a bug with the map shrine where zooming in on the beacon icon on a map and then selecting the beacon would have no effect.
- Haptic feedback will no longer occur when crabs attack another player, and will only occur when you are attacked.
- Fixed cases where the UI buttons for screenshot, record video, and chat would still appear on the screen after signing out on platforms that support signing out of a Sky account.
- Increased the distance that the grand piano can be heard from when someone else is playing it, so that now it can be heard throughout the concert hall if someone’s playing it onstage, appropriately enough.
- Fixed bug that automatically translated all text when viewing Player Creations.
- Updated the placement of the Support icon in the Settings menu.
- [iPad] Addressed a bug that could cause players in Home to get stuck while watching the Season introduction.
- [Mobile] Fixed a bug with the Friendship Constellation that prevented a player from manually creating new favorite friends pages when they moved a friend's star and viewing a non-favorite page.
Please refer to this page for known issues ongoing or introduced with this patch: Known Issues Patch 0.26.5.
As always, we look forward to hearing your feedback, and encourage you to join the community discussion on our official Discord server at discord.gg/thatskygame!