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Caves Awaken Part I -- Update



Below the Stone's new Caves Awaken Part 1 update is now out!

Delve your way through new structures, enemies, and many community driven additions we've continued to work on to improve the game. The "Mega Map" is a new expandable map which will come in handy at pointing out undiscovered structures. By interacting with Lodestones, you will spot nearby structures and dungeons on your map, which will help in getting to layer 2 of the caves! We plan on expanding this feature more with further updates, adding new ways to sense nearby goodies and objectives to complete.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

We'll soon be working on Part 2 of the update, which will include new missions, saving NPCs, new enemies, treasures, and more things to do while in the caves. Layer 2 will get a heavy focus in the next update, and we want to include new methods of getting to the second layer (such as saving the engineer dwarf and building a drill pod to skip layers).

We will be sending out an updated roadmap soon.

If you hadn't yet, please join our Discord for more game updates, and write in on our Discord/Steam Community page if you have suggestions/ideas/bugs you have found.

Change Log:

[h2]Alpha 0.5 - Caves Awaken Part 1[/h2]

[New Features]
* Added "Caves Awakening" timed event to the caves. After interacting with lodestones, A timer will begin which will spawn new "Shade" enemies, that will begin to thwart your run.
* Added "Megamap" to accompany the Minimap. With a larger map, you can now see much further and get a better sense of places you've explored. And look for good places to explore more. You can also pan around the view with mouse (panning only works for Keyboard at the moment, Controller support for this feature will be added soon).
* Added "map markers" within the Megamap. Most markers will represent interesting/important locations to explore to in the caves. This will reduce the amount of aimless wandering the player has to do to make considerable progress in the caves.
* Lodestones will be visible on your larger map immediately, giving a direction to head toward the moment you finish generating caves.
* Interacting with Lodestones will now show structures on your minimap.
* Added cool dwarf animation to Cave Generating screen (thanks to PixelPigeon)!
* Added settings for screen shake intensity. So yall can now tone it down a bit.
* Added haunted skull enemy.
* Added boom-stone ore to caves.

[Bat Improvements]
* Bats are no longer guaranteed to attack you every time (your muscle memory may take some time to adjust to this, lol). Sometimes bats may fly around and just ignore you.
* Bats now have proper movement when they die (they dynamically fall to the ground). They also move up a bit when perching.
* Bats are now invulnerable when perched.
* Bats may sometimes group up and follow other bats around.

[Improvements]
* Updated music system to change how songs are played. Songs should no longer cut off other songs abruptly. And new songs will be played when moving into a different biome.
* All potion's are now crafted with a new item, "glass shards", which replaces the glass bottle ingredient in any potion recipes.
* Glass bottles are effectively being replaced by glass shards. Any place where you could get glass bottles, you now get glass shards instead. (Glass bottles still exist in your inventory, so you are free too treasure them).
* Updated which songs play in which biomes to more closely reflect theming (Certain songs are meant for specific biomes).

[Fixes]
* Fixed a bug where being too close to some breakable objects would result in the pickaxe hit not registering.
* Flying bats no longer make ripples in water.
* Fixed skull head cosmetic using the wrong data.
* Fixed a bug where the wardrobe dwarf preview would not display properly.

BORE BELOW Bundle! 10% off our new dwarven duo collab!

In the heart of any dwarf is the urge to seek the depths. Dig deep into the pixelart dwarven roguelike duo of BORE BLASTERS & BELOW THE STONE. Find dwarven delights buried deep below the rock and stone, bore your way into the treasure that awaits in this bundle. ːcraftsdwarfː

This dwarven duo have joined forces to provide you with the 'BORE BELOW' bundle! This Bundle includes both BELOW THE STONE by Strollart Studios, and BORE BLASTERS, by 8BitSkull.

Check it out here!: ːsteamthumbsupː
https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/40011/BORE_BELOW_BUNDLE/

20% off Below the Stone!



Below the Stone is now 20% off ahead of the Caves Awaken updates!

Caves Awaken part 1 & 2 are meant to be our Rock and Stone/Bread and Butter when it comes to player feedback and content that we plan on introducing. More to do in the caves and kingdom has always been our plans, and this is the realization of those plans coming to life. If there are any features, fixes, suggestions you look forward to most, please let us know either here on Steam discussions, or in our Discord Channel

Reviews have been incredibly helpful to us reaching more people, improve the team's morale, and improving the game!

Below the Stone -- Our gamedev journey.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

We wanted to put together a video describing the journey of making Below the Stone for everyone who has been interested in our journey. We plan on making uploads about the game more regularly, and posting our efforts to continue improving the game in the future.

Please feel free to leave a comment, give a like, or drop a review on the game to help us out as we continue making the game better and better through Early Access!

- Mike

Below the Stone at PAX EAST 2024!



Below the Stone will be featured at PAX EAST!

PAX East is gaming convention that takes place from the Thurs 21st - Sun 24th in Boston, MD, at the Convention and Exhibition Center. It's always a gem for our team to get to witness people in-person playing Below the Stone, and meeting up with fans who get to tell us their ideas and their experience with the game we created, and have new people discover us. Our Discord will be featuring a "virtual booth", where you can see updates going on, pictures, and what we're up to at the show. We cannot wait to see you there!

Please stop by and say hi if you have a chance!