Ladies, gentlemen, fae from the drowned depths of Nyre to the hymning branches of the Ardentwood, greetings and welcome!
We have a couple of major announcements to share today, beginning with the biggest:
The Incandescent Bard and indie.io have partnered to build Sunflowers and the Goddess of Death up to the best it can possibly be! We are incredibly excited and honored to be able to work with the folks at indie.io, a partner with extensive experience at bringing excellent indie titles to the widest audience possible. Some of the titles they've previously published include Dark Deity II, Coromon, and Symphony of War: The Nephilim Saga, all incredible games in their own right (and titles I would personally recommend playing, if you haven't yet!)
For those of you who may not know, working with a game publishing platform like indie.io greatly helps indie developers focus on game development while they handle all the behind-the-scenes magic. From helping manage store pages to crafting marketing campaigns and even helping the game shine at both digital and live events, indie.io helps in all the aspects that indie developers often struggle with alone.
With indie.io's input and assistance, we can and will make Sunflowers and the Goddess of Death all it can be.
To all our fans, players, and followers, thank you so much for joining us on this journey so far. Your enthusiasm and feedback on the world we're creating inspires us, and we would be humbled if you would continue on this path with us, as we look forward to the full release of Sunflowers and the Goddess of Death in the not-too-distant future :).
One last thing: make sure to Wishlist and Follow Sunflowers and the Goddess of Death on Steam! It helps a great deal by giving our Steam page more traction, and also keeps you informed when major announcements happen, like our big demo update below.
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In addition to the announcement of the partnership, we have prepared an extensive update to the demo that adds in a ton of new features and accessibility options to the game, polishes up the artwork of every area in the demo, and fixes a few bugs that had cropped up in the previous version.
The updated demo is ready to download now, so you can get your first look at Sunflowers and the Goddess of Death! Also, we’d love to hear what you think: if you run into any bugs or have feedback, come join the conversation here.
Below you'll find the complete list of changes in the Sunflowers and Goddess of Death Demo version 1.8!
📜Patch Notes 1.8📜
Significant Changes Have Been Made to the Equip Menu
🌻 Equipment that a party member cannot use is now displayed alongside gear they can use, but grayed out.
Before, when viewing the Equip menu with Wedelia selected, any equipment she could not use would not show up in the menu. This led to occasional confusion when players found new equipment that characters could not equip as it wouldn’t show up in the menu, leading some to believe it glitched out or there was a bug (or worse, some thought they accidentally sold their best stuff when visiting shops!). Now all equipment shows up, just grayed out for that character if it is unuseable.
🌻 Equipment descriptions are now more informative, sharing the effects and abilities of gear within the Equip menu.
Previously the special effects of weapons, armor, and accessories, like a Bound Spell or a boost to Critical Rate, could only be seen in the details panel within the Inventory menu or at a shop. Now, important information about the item can be seen directly from the Equip menu, reducing the amount of menus players have to navigate to access this info.
🌻 Emerald Periapt and Beltane Ring have been buffed to make them a little more competitive with other accessories.
Artwork Stylization and Touch-Up
Gildas and Rhiannon have been hard at work on a remodeling. Can't let the other villagers outdo them, after all. Every area has been retouched with darker, earthier tones.
🌻 Every single zone and area in the demo has been polished and stylized to fit the game just a little bit better.
The goal here is to make the art style of Sunflowers and the Goddess of Death more together, more earthy, more witchy, and a little more somber, to better match the story and writing style. Every single area in the demo has been stylized with new contrasts & colors, and most areas also have new environmental art (objects, textures, etc.) to match the new style.
🌻 Map name, Autosave, Journal update, and New Tutorial message popups are now displayed in a stylized, bardic font.
🌻 Imsha word popups are now easier to read and have a little more style.
🌻 Monster spawns are now an indigo color instead of a light green to help them stand out more from scenery and environment objects.
🌻 Updated tutorial pictures throughout the demo to reflect the game’s new artwork.
Technical Adjustments and Bug Fixes
🌻 The overall length of the demo has been cut down; the demo now ends upon reaching the Verdant Temple.
If you have a save file from an older version of the demo, you can continue this save to complete the Verdant Temple content and the rest of Act I just as before, so no journey through the demo in content that is no longer accessible will be interrupted. Brand new saves will be limited to the shorter length demo.
We’re making this change in order to create a more “bite-sized” experience for the demo, that can also be used for booth gameplay at conventions.
🌻 The game’s save file location has been changed for Windows operating systems. Saves are now located in C:\\Users\\{Username}\\AppData\\Local\\Sunflowers and the Goddess of Death
This change was made in order to stop OneDrive from corrupting game files on Windows operating systems, as previously saves were stored in the Documents folder and multiple users have reported OneDrive related errors because of that. OneDrive does not sync AppData by default, so this new location is more stable.
Moving old saves to the new location (so the game can find them) is quite easy! Simply go to C:\\Users\\{Username}\\Documents\\Sunflowers and the Goddess of Death, copy everything in that folder, and post it directly into the new Sunflowers and the Goddess of Death folder within AppData\\Local. If you don’t have a Sunflowers and the Goddess of Death folder here, you can create one yourself, or just launch the game and play until you can manually save, then the game will create one for you.
Note 1: None of this applies to Mac players. Your saves are the same as they were before!
Note 2: If you cannot see your AppData folder and are trying to manually move saves, it’s because AppData is hidden by default. Click View at the top and then click the Hidden Items checkbox to see it.
🌻 Added an option to disable screen shake effects. It can be found in the Options section of the game menu within the General tab under Exploration.
🌻 Changed the name of the menu command “Game End” to “Exit Game”. Can now directly quit the game from this command (a confirmation window will popup with 3 choices: “To Title”, “Exit Game” and “Cancel”)
Reworked Controls and Control Customization
Note: If you previously played the Sunflowers and the Goddess of Death Demo, your control scheme was saved to a configuration file. If you want to enjoy the new controls and hotkeys, you must go to the Options menu in-game, select Rebind Keyboard Controls (or Rebind Gamepad Controls), select Reset, and then Save Settings.
🌻 Added PS4, PS5, and Switch controller support (Xbox controller support was already in the game)!
🌻 New expanded controls customization menu, including the ability to rebind new hotkeys, as well as rebind PS and Switch controllers however you like. Special controls (and the keys used for them) cannot be rebound, to prevent errors.
🌻 More default keybindings:
Enter, F, Spacebar = Confirm
Esc = Menu / Cancel
PageUp, PageDown = Previous / Next
And more!
🌻 Added a WASD hotswap option in key rebindings: just select WASD in Rebind Keyboard Controls to auto-adjust your keybindings.
🌻 Added hotkeys for core game menus (these hotkeys are also bound to different gamepad buttons by default, and are fully customizable!):
J = Journal
I = Inventory
U = Equip
🌻 You can now hide the mouse cursor by pressing Caps Lock on your keyboard :).
🌻 A new tutorial has been added to the game called “Special Controls” that is unlocked by default. It outlines special keyboard controls available for players that generally won't be often used. Right now, it only explains the Caps Lock function to hide the mouse cursor, but as more functions are added, this tutorial will expand to explain them all.
Quests & Other
🌻 Simplified/clarified the “A Clue from an Ancestor” quest directions. The treasure is at the same location, just trying to make the puzzle a little easier to decipher.
🌻 Added stylized Wishlist and Version button links to the main menu. Clicking these with your mouse cursor will jump directly to the Steam Store page & latest patch notes, accordingly.
🌻 The ferocious avian enemies lurking around the outskirts of Amuniai have been renamed. They are now called Branosoi, or Branos in the singular. Branos is classical Celtic for crow, which we think is a more thematic name than what they had before. :)
Every outdoor area has also been given a pass. You'll find new colors, textures, and objects all throughout the demo.
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That's all we have for now! Thank you so much for keeping informed about Sunflowers and the Goddess of Death and we hope you will give our demo a try with all of the new features and artwork :).
Happy holidays and take care, everyone <3.
-CW Hendricks & Paige Larsen, The Incandescent Bard
PS: Check out the publisher page for indie.io and maybe find another story-driven indie title to support, as well :).