Cloud Meadow News

Welcome back again farmers, for another round of news coming-up in Cloud Meadow's world

We've expanded our team - two more developers!

• The last couple of months have honestly been hectic, and hopefully this will be remembered as the darkest point in the project's development
  
  • Between core staff leaving unexpectedly, illness & overwork, we have persevered to bring you the next major update - in full - albeit later than expected

• However the silver lining to lapsing on our short-term goals is that we've achieved the best outcome for mid- and long-term goals!
  
  • We welcome two new full-time developers to Team Nimbus; Norimoo & Neuropa!
    
    • Both developers are experienced professional Unity3D/C# game programmers with a solid history and real commercial experience bringing Unity games through to completion
      
    • We hope you can welcome them on their journey with Team Nimbus and bringing Cloud Meadow to full release by our early 2025 launch target
      
      • If you missed the launch date memo, please revisit our previous announcement for details

So where's the update?

• The Brownie Caravan update is staged & ready to go - it's just around the corner for the Steam public to enjoy
  
  • We're just waiting to coincide the update launch with some other events between ourselves & our publisher

Steam Beta branch

• Thank you all who joined the early development branch AND assisted with bug reporting!
  
  • The popularity of Steam users on this branch is at it's peak - 1.3% of all players - which means potentially thousands have played the latest 0140a build
    
  • This has allowed us to receive better-quality and earlier bug reports from players who are on-the-ball, allowing a faster turnaround in producing qualitative updates to keep the game stable - especially after a significant update
    
  • Soon the normal branch will catch up with the beta branch and all Steam players will receive the same update version
    
  • If you're interested in switching to beta, check the steam forums

What else are you working on? How about...
Here's what you can expect in the upcoming Monster Migration update:

• New enemy combat units
  
  • 8 new wild enemy monsters will roam the wild lands outside of town
    
    • The next major update after Brownie Caravan new enemy Wolf & Holstaur units
• Monster migration system
  
  • Introducing a bit more variation & replayability to the Savannah - instead of the dungeon 'resetting' unexpectedly, wild enemy monsters will migrate in and out based on a calendar cycle
    
    • This will allow the new enemy types to be found in the existing dungeons from time to time, also offering different loot drops and a way to gather different essences & eggs
      
    • Will be used to introduce new enemy monsters when those are integrated later
      
    • Enables us to extend this system in the future, with more ways to change the dungeon between migration cycles
• Combat ability ranks
  
  • One of the benefits to leveling-up characters is not just the permanent stats gain, but also the option to rank-up the unit's skills
    
    • This content will allow the player to max out each ability at 15 ranks for combat NPCs and party Monsters
      
    • Each rank permanently adds extra power, duration or special extra effects to an ability's behavior
• Dungeon Fast travel
  
  • No more need to painfully revisit every floor en route to a specific part of the Savannah - we will be adding curios to some dungeon floors that thorough explorers can use as a quick-travel point

• Overhaul for dungeon visuals
  
  • Most players have definitely noticed some issues with sprite layering in the dungeons
    
    • We know - this is something we've known about basically since they were created, but has been a pretty low priority to revise until now
      
    • Tro's Lab, Savannah F1, F2 & F3 will receive some visual updates to bring them up to standard for our newer dungeon floors
      
    • These floors and others may revise the level flow to improve navigation

More work behind-the-scenes:

• Integrating HD sex scenes & their questlines
  
  Town NPCs Minerva & Kellam have new HD sex scenes, with the animations for these are in various stages of near-completion
  
  • We're in the process of designing a series of quest objectives leading to matchmaker-style date sequences
    
  • The goal of these is to enable the player to get to know these characters more, gain their trust, take them out on a date, romance and bed them!

• Way more town NPC dialogue
  
  • You ever noticed how one of the first things you can do after arriving in Cloverton is talk to almost everyone - once and only once?
    
    • It's been our biggest shame that the Cloverton area is filled with NPCs who offer almost nothing - so we're going to bring the town to life
      
    • Town NPCs will have a wealth of dialogue, commenting on everything from the player's storyline progress, seasonal events, weather and more
      
    • This plus more plans are slated for Katarina station; we aim to turn this walk-through town into a bustling quest hub for dungeoneers in the future. Stay tuned

• Way more emotive dialogue
  
  • One of the dialogue improvements showcased in the Brownie Caravan update is the addition of player & NPC expressions
    
    • Characters in dialogue will show joy, fear, sadness, arousal and more
      
      • Since this is a new feature, we will be adding it to newer dialogue sequences going forward
        
        • Revising existing dialogue to include these expressions will take a lot longer and is lower-priority task for now
          
        • We hope this makes reading dialogue more enjoyable for casual players & loremasters alike

If you have any questions we are always readily available in the following places:

Introduce yourself, discuss the game or send bug reports directly under the eyes of developers - in our very own Discord [ https://discord.gg/cloudmeadow ]
Drop in on our Livestream where Artists, animators & programmers work daily on Piczel [ https://piczel.tv/watch/Spurple ]

Next Update News from lead programmer Ursa Senior

Welcome back again farmers, for my first (albeit late) post of 2023 - we have some announcements to make

We're opening a Steam Beta branch

• We want to keep the game as stable as possible - meaning no crashes, bugs, quirks or unexpected behaviour - by fixing reported issues as fast as possible
  
• We've been getting a lot of feedback and vital bug report info primarily from Steam players - thank you!
  
• We'd like to get that info earlier, so we can put out important bug fixes faster and keep the game stable
  
• Players can opt-in to get 'Beta' branch updates instead of regular updates:
  

✅ The Pros:

• Steam Beta updates will be delivered more frequently than non-Beta updates
  

🔻 The Cons:

• Steam Beta updates will consist mostly of mechanical changes & small updates
  
• Almost guaranteed to include more bugs
  
• You will also not be able to switch back to the non-Beta branch easily
  

• I repeat - this is for hardcore players who are engaged and actively contribute bug reports & feedback!
  
• If this interests you, we'll put Beta branch access - and more vital info - in the forums
  

We've updated our project roadmap and settled on a new launch date
You can view our plans here: [ https://www.cloudmeadowgame.com/road-map/ ]

• After a lot of discussion, argument, planning, plans falling through, team members joining and leaving, we've finally put our heads together to produce this game plan
  
• This is our content roadmap* from now until the full release we want to see - we aim to launch Cloud Meadow v1.0 in early 2025

*⁽ᵃⁿ ᵃᶜᵗᵘᵃˡ ʳᵒᵃᵈᵐᵃᵖ ᵗʰᶦˢ ᵗᶦᵐᵉ⁾



❓ What happens if we're behind schedule?

• To put it simply; no matter how carefully a project is planned, something may still go wrong with it
  
• The roadmap features we've listed later in the timeline will be scaled-down, pushed back to post-launch, or dropped entirely in order to pursue our deadline
  

❓ What about after v1.0? What does the future hold?

• We can guarantee we'll keep maintaining Cloud Meadow after v1.0 to polish it to be a stable game for the future and fill out some of the features that were long-since set into motion but never fully realised
  
• After that - we don't know!
  
• We have an abundance of ideas for everything from romance partners, to lore, new zones, plenty of scrapped monster species and more
  
• However what we don't have is infinite time, nor infinite revenue nor the will to continue working on Cloud Meadow forever. Only time will tell, as things unfold post-launch
  

❓You're wrong about everything!

• I hope not! What we really want is to deliver on what we promised
  
• Cloud Meadow is our flagship game - it would be pretty difficult for Team Nimbus to continue to exist without the ongoing goodwill of our fans and followers
  
• Ultimately we have aspirations to produce more new & different, high-quality adult games with a strong balance of gameplay and erotic content - this cannot begin without a satisfying delivery of a fully completed Cloud Meadow.
  
• Hence, actualizing the completion of the game remains our singular goal at this point in time
  

What else are you working on? How about...

• Within the month we aim to push another major content update 0.1.3.2.
  
• As a quick recap of contents from previous announcements, this includes;
  
  • Kaleida Companion as a playable combat character
    
  • Brownie Caravan event - a seasonal event taking place in the Faire Grounds
    
  • Updated skies & weather, putting the 'cloud' in Cloud Meadow
• And after that:
  
  • New high-definition sex scene content; Minerva's sex scenes are nearing completion, while Kellam's scenes are progressing through planning phases
    
  • Monster & NPC skill ranks; leveling skills will soon have an effect
    
  • More quality-of-life improvements such as dungeon fast travel

More work behind-the-scenes:

• Forest Dungeon designing is in full swing
  
  • This dungeon is going to have a radically different layout to the previous dungeon, neutral NPCs, merchants and at least one tavern!
    
  • Home to wild enemy Holstaur & Wolf varieties, as well as several key story bosses
    
  • A more sprawling, interconnected layout spanning multiple sub-regions - including connection to the Savannah - that gradually expands in access as you progress
    
  • Multiple paths to encourage exploration and repeated visits - hello, sidequests!
• Necessary design and documentation for the next big update - if you want to peek ahead - just look at our development roadmap!
  

If you have any questions we are always readily available in the following places:

• Introduce yourself, discuss the game or send bug reports directly under the eyes of developers - in our very own Discord [ https://discord.gg/cloudmeadow ]
  
• Drop in on our Livestream where Artists, animators & programmers work daily on Piczel [ https://piczel.tv/watch/Spurple ]
  

Changes

• Added 10x and 100x modifier keys to the Essence Market UI
  

Fixes

• Fixed a crash when trying to feed monsters with unassigned or 0-quantity food item
  
• Fixed a crash when Crab’s counterattack is invoked in the same turn that the counterattack buff was removed by an enemy
  
• Fixed image distortion affecting a lot of HD sex scenes
  
• Fixed timing issues in Evan x Brontide sex scene
  
• Corrected colour of fluids in Eve x Kreyton sex scene
  

Changes

• Equipment items will now stack in inventory
  
• Significantly reduced memory usage for combat FX - offering better performance for low-end PC hardware
  
• Updated the look & feel of Farming & Monster interaction UI:
  
  • Player can now preselect a food item for fast manual feeding of farm monsters
    
  • While planting seeds, the selected seed item quality is now shown
    
• Attacking an invulnerable enemy will now display IMMUNE status text
  
• Numerous improvements for Essence Market UI
  
• Added ‘World’ volume slider for adjustment of all player & environment action sounds
  
• Improved Farming & Monster interaction icons
  
• Slight improvement to interaction targeting after concluding dialogue with an NPC
  
• Some players encountered an exception when moving monsters between groups, or when adding items to an empty Storehouse - some extra information has been added to help in reporting & identifying these issues
  

Fixes

• Using the correct seasonal fertilizer should protect crops from extreme weather, including universal fertilizer
  
• Fixed crash when any combat unit with “Targeted” debuff causes their Evasion to become negative
  
• Fixed crash when equipping Worn Items and Held Items while using a combination of mouse and touch screen
  
• Preview sounds should be audible again when adjusting volume sliders in options
  
• First character to appear in a dialogue interaction could slide in too quickly; max speed has been smoothed
  
• Previously the player had to walk in & out of an NPC’s interaction zone to target them in some situations
  
• Prevented repeat-interaction with Mason on Savannah F5 during fade into his sex scene
  
• Players who have already cleared Savannah F8 will have Sieger’s optional quest removed from their logs, and the quest should no longer reappear when defeating pirate mobs from F8 recurring
  
• Player can repeatedly feed the giant Shettle in Savannah F5, but it will no longer attempt to complete the Mason’s quest
  
• Djinn Merchant colliders modified to remove an area where player could get stuck
  
• Monster farm actions nameplate now updates if monster was renamed while viewing stats
  
• Fixed monster traits occasionally appearing in duplicate
  
• Cooking ingredients with long names should now be displayed in full
  
• Removed additional redundant Game Difficulty slider when starting a new game
  
• Correctly layered shrubbery that was obscuring Dire during his date sequence
  
• Corrected some spelling mistakes in dialogue
  
• Fixed an issue caused by 0-quality crops when opening the Job Board
  
• No longer able to feed a monster with equipped food item if it has 0 quantity remaining
  
• Upon starting dialogue, the first character to appear would often move too quickly
  
• Font text was blurry on some UI
  
• Revised collider on Savannah F6 that players could cause players to become stuck
  

Hello again farmers!

What's been happening since the previous major update?
With 0.1.3.1b as our last update for the year, we've slipped in a fully revised dialogue system - though you may only notice some UI changes or different behaviors - as well as a better, more expansive Jobs Board system on the farm.
Some of our staff are winding down for few days off to stay energized for the next year of pushing Cloud Meadow towards completion.
 
So, what was actually accomplished in 2022?
Summarizing a year's worth of effort and patch notes comprehensively is no simple task!
However, I would like to draw attention to some of the features I feel we're most proud of:

• Savannah dungeon floor 8, our single largest & most complex area yet
  
• Concluding the first story act of Cloud Meadow's multi-act story arc
  
• Greatly expanded the spring Royal Matchmaker Event
  
• UI overhauls & improvements across the board, including; combat, loot rewards, farm jobs management, monster traits & family, farm buildings, cooking & more
  
• Way better resolution scaling, UI readability & reduced memory usage for players on older systems
  
• Combat mechanics overhaul; significant changes to combat stats, scaling, status effects, fundamental mechanics and a full difficulty balance adjustment
  
• Introduced Plankton to the farming ecosystem
  
• Total number of sex scenes up to 332 (40 HD scenes + sprite scenes) with more to come...
  

 
What else are you working on? How about...
Here's a reminder for what the next major content update will entail, while more expansive detail can be found in my previous monthly update posts

• Adding a new recurring monthly event that takes place in a tiny new side-area called the Faire Grounds
  
• At this fairground event, and a traveling troupe of Brownies arrive for you to meet & 'greet', learn their lore & browse their merchandise
  
• You'll be able to recruit Kaleida as a major party NPC at this event
  
• This will include an overhaul to Kaleida's combat, too
  

 
More work behind-the-scenes:

• New HD sex scenes are moving steadily towards completion - Eve/Evan x Minerva & Eve/Evan x Kellam
  
• Revamped quest system, which will enable us to use produce way more quest content & town interactions easily - currently something that's quite lacking)
  
• This quest refactoring is currently the last planned system to be rewritten - once this feature is stable, we will be able to fully focus on content-driven updates for the remainder of development
  
• The Forest dungeon is progressing through the design & planning phase, with early concepts completed
  
• Other calendar events that take place in the new Faire Grounds are being concepted for future updates further along
  
• Tutorial and farm mechanic introduction sequences are planned for rewrite - formalized as a series of farm-based & town-based questlines that can be pursued as the player's choice
  

 
If you have any questions we are always readily available in the following places:

• Introduce yourself in our very own Discord [ https://discord.gg/6ASAxDF ]
  
• Drop in on our Livestream where Artists, animators & programmers work daily on Piczel [ https://piczel.tv/watch/Spurple ]