Hi everyone!
Next patch will be slightly delayed (by a day or two), working on something interesting to implement in to the daily miner's routine. It's a bit of a sneak peak.
Clutter and Foliage
Currently game has somewhat of an acceptable code to generate underground ores and it was used literally for every object that is not well... basic dirt. While it serves a good purpose as a "controllable way to generate ores" it quickly started to be not acceptable once you'll try to generate something that is not supposed to be in the wall (seriously, who placed land mines right inside of a rock formation). Besides that - whole cave systems, albeit simplistic in their nature, became slightly bland because of it. So I'm currently working on fixing that. By the time writing this, I've already implemented the clutter system, now I just need to beautify it for each biome.
In the screenshots below you can see a direct comparison (Of course amount of clutter is cranked to the maximum for preview purposes):
Example 1: Clutter Off
Example 1: Clutter On
Example 2: Clutter Off
Example 2: Clutter On
What will it mean
Better and more complex visuals.
Cave systems that are worth exploring.
Generation of "forgotten backpacks" containing valuable loot.
Proper generation of land mines and other threats (They will no longer be inside of the walls).
More distinct content for each biome.
Additional upcoming things
Apart from bug fixes, next update will also have:
Ability to reset your world through PC in the save room (Items and earned credits will remain).
Considering that I will be messing with a generation for quite a bit - this feature is an absolute must. My main goal is to not reset the player's progress as much as possible, so technically you can avoid pressing this button and the world should work just fine (or almost fine), but it will be highly recommended to do that in order to see the changes.
Minor increase in length for each biome (Total depth will be 350 instead of 300).
While it's an odd thing to do, it is necessary since each biome will contain slightly more content and features.
Reworked item progression.
While it seems somewhat reasonable that new items are unlocked through "Total amount of collected credits", it kind of caused an issue where a lot of items are visible and obtainable way sooner (Which is kinda... meh). New system will use "Lowest depth" as the main anchor. It should work slightly better.
Increased prices in the shop.
Prices will be higher, but I'm planning to add a lot more items and features that will make the collection of credits easier. Both things should even each other out.
Other additions that will be revealed in the update.
That is pretty much it, stay tuned, I'll try to get this update as quickly as possible (And not break anything in the process).