Hey there, fellow Ylanders!
We're working hard on update 1.10 and since update 1.5 it's always been about Exploration first. This is not going to change, but we understand that the ones who like to create cool contraptions or worlds in the Editor might feel neglected, which is why the past few updates brought a lot of Editor and scripting improvements as well.
So today we would like to let the Creators know, what the near future holds for them.
We are currently working on something we internally call "Custom Exploration". We've already mentioned it in our Dev Diaries, but let us remind you what it's all about.
We want to let Creators build ylands in the Editor (or in the Sandbox mode) that players will be able to visit with their ships from the Exploration world. This will result in much more than the ability to create a cool "home" for you with the help of cool things that only the Editor offers. We are going to add incentives for Creators to come up with cool experiences for players who want something more than what Exploration currently offers. At the same time, it will be something that is based on the core Exploration gameplay. You can think of it as Mystery Ylands... created by players for players, friends or strangers alike.
We will reward Explorers for sailing to these worlds and leaving notes and ratings for others if what they found is worth experiencing.
This feature was originally planned for 1.10, but we now see that the first version would be too rough around the edges and missing some of the cool things that make it interesting. So we decided to take more time working on it and will release it in 1.11 in a better shape and with more tools and documentation ready for the Creators. We will also be giving the Creators enough information in advance so that their creations can be available to players as soon as 1.11 is released.
The Editor and content creation will get much more love not just thanks to "Custom Exploration", but also thanks to Ylands EDU version, which is doing surprisingly well and which, in the end, seems to be something that the Ylands game will profit from even more than we expected. But that's a story for a different time :).
We're looking forward to talking to you the next week. Until then - stay classy!