The Ranch of Rivershine News

Howdy Ranchers! 🐴☀️ We’re starting 2025 strong with our seventh content update! It's time to ride along the Azure Coast trail… and discover a ton of new content in it! Catch wild rabicano horses, train your horse’s trust, participate in coastal competitions, equip new tack and learn new recipes!

[h2]Azure Coast Trail[/h2]
Ride along vast beaches, listen to the sounds of waves and shelter under palm trees in this final region expansion! Collect new forage, such as watermelon and sand, and discover six new hidden chests scattered across Azure Coast.

You might even see some shoals of fish swimming in the ocean!


[h2]New Competitions[/h2]
Participate in four new competitions, from beginner to expert, set on the sandy shores of Azure Coast. Once the trail is open, you’ll soon receive an invitation to compete in these new courses!



[h2]Rabicano Horses[/h2]
Herds of wild rabicano horses will be roaming around Azure Coast… Be sure to build the wild horse pen, and get ready to catch them! The rabicano pattern comes in 8 new variations.


[h2]New Music[/h2]
Get into the beachy vibes by listening to the new Azure Coast track!


[h2]Trust Training[/h2]
Walk with your horse through shallow waters, navigating around large rocks and shoals of fish to increase their trust for you. The trainer will help you get the new trust arena set up on the coast!



[h2]New Tack[/h2]
Visit the saddler’s shop to see what new inventory is available! Equip your horse with a bitless knit bridle, a lantern accessory, or with new sheepskin saddle pad colors. Remember that some of the new pieces will be hidden throughout Azure Coast!



[h2]Loading Screens[/h2]
Travelling to a new area has never been prettier! The loading screen now features unique illustrations for each area and useful gameplay tips.

Thank you to our community members who shared their gameplay tips!


[h2]General Changes[/h2]

• Added flags on the sides of cross country jumps.
  
• Added an option in the settings menu to change the camera's vertical height while on horseback.
  
• Fixed the green square saddle pad not being available for sale in the saddler’s shop.
  
• Fixed collision issues with the flowers.
  
• Fixed issues with horses disappearing out of the retirement pasture.
  
• Fixed an issue that caused the player to fall through the map when using travel stones.
  
• Fixed the competition outfit becoming permanent due to restarting a race.
  
• Forageable items now have a chance to give seeds again.
  

[h2]What's Next?[/h2]

Following the roadmap, the next update will focus on caring for your horse’s health, gathering new ingredients, crafting remedies, and meeting the last villager… The veterinarian! She’ll be moving into the long abandoned clinic in Rivershine Town.

Here’s an early look at your new neighbour!


Thank you all for your support and I'll be back with more news soon! ❤️

Howdy Ranchers! 🐴🎁 We’re wrapping up 2024 with our sixth content update for The Ranch of Rivershine. This update brings you a whole new wardrobe to customize your character, a new villager to meet, and new breeding exclusive coat colors!

I hope you’ll all have some time to cozy up and take a look at the new features over the holidays. ❄️❤️

[h2]New Outfits & Hats[/h2]
Classic, western or casual? Your choice! Mix and match pieces from each type for a unique look, and be sure to collect all of the colors available to be ready for every occasion! In addition to the new outfits, you can now wear a hat! Wear a helmet to stay safe while taming wild horses… or just for the style!

Make sure to save your favorite outfits to quickly swap between them, and to pick your competition outfit. This outfit will be automatically equipped when you enter into a competition!


Here are some inspirations for your outfits! You could have a classic aesthetic...


Or sport a good old western fit...


Or try a more casual look for visiting the town!

No need to start a new game to update your player’s look, simply visit the wardrobe in your house to browse through the new clothes. Your old outfit and hairstyle will be reset with the new options, so make sure to refresh your fit!

[h2]New Hairstyles & Hair Colors[/h2]
New hairstyles are now available for a total of 16 different hairstyles! In addition, you'll be able to dye your hair in new colors, including pastel tones!




[h2]New Villager & Boutique[/h2]
Meet your new friendly neighbour! Daphne will move into Crystal Lake and open her boutique, where you’ll be able to purchase all of the new clothing options. Her store will feature a rotating inventory with different pants, shirts, shoes and hats every day so make sure to visit her often!


[h2]Dunalino, Dunskin & Grulla[/h2]
Discover new breeding exclusive coat colors that you’ll be able to create in your own stables! Breed together two horses with a dun coat and a cream coat for a chance to have a dunalino, dunskin or grulla foal. A total of 9 new coat colors are now available!


[h2]Horse Names[/h2]
New random horse names can now be discovered in the auction house, when catching wild horses and when raising foals! Each category now has more than double the amount of names available to create more diversity and uniqueness with the horses you find.

Special thanks to our community members who shared their suggestions to add to the horse names!
[h2]General Changes[/h2]

• Translated all new content to French.
  
• Added five new eye colors.
  
• Added new clothes and hairstyles for the visitors in Rivershine Town.
  
• Fixed an issue where the player would not be visible if entering the wardrobe in first person mode.
  
• Reduced the cost of the wild horse pen upgrades.
  

[h2]What's Next?[/h2]
We’re back on track with the roadmap, which means that the next update will be Azure Coast! In addition to a whole new area to explore, this beachy landscape will also introduce new cross country competitions, a trust training course and rabicano wild horses!

Happy holidays everyone, I’ll see you in 2025! 🎄

Howdy Ranchers! 🐴🎨 The Mane Salon update is here, bringing a ton of new content for your horses in this fifth roadmap milestone! Cut, style and dye your horse's mane and tail, meet the stylist, learn crafting recipes and collect new ingredients for your concoctions.

[h2]Mane & Tail Styles[/h2]
Learn how to style your horse’s mane and tail 20 different ways, from short to very long! Some of the new styles include different types of braids, straight and wavy cuts.

While these are only for your horses, worry not, as the character customization update is coming up soon!


[h2]Hair Dye[/h2]
To further customize your horse’s look, add a pop of color to their mane and tail with dye! Choose from 15 colors to match your horse’s hair to their tack or pick a more neutral look.


[h2]Flower Fields[/h2]
Keep an eye out for the new flower fields! Each trail will now feature a unique flower color that can be transformed into hair dye. Find chests to learn the crafting recipes, and mix the flowers together to create different dye colors!


[h2]Handy Crafting[/h2]
Turn your forage, crops and even manure into useful items! The farmer will help you get started with a few fertilizer recipes that can now be crafted from your inventory.

While only fertilizers and dyes can be crafted for now, I have plans for further recipes and ingredients to be added, especially in the upcoming veterinarian update!


[h2]New Villager[/h2]
Meet Orion, the new villager who just opened the Mane Salon in Rocky Mountain! You’ll be able to learn how to style your horse’s mane and tail from his store. He’ll also help you learn how to craft your own dyes!


[h2]Tovero & Pintaloosa[/h2]
Get ready to breed unique coat patterns on your ranch! Tovero horses can now be bred from a pair of tobiano and overo parents, while pintaloosa horses can be born from a pair of tobiano and appaloosa parents.

What other unique pattern mix would you like to see in Rivershine?


[h2]Eye Colors[/h2]
Take a closer look at the horses you catch in the wild or purchase in the auction house… They’ll now have a whole new range of eye colors! While eye colors were previously limited to specific coats, all horses can now have all eye colors. Mix and match to find your perfect horse!


[h2]General Changes[/h2]

• Added “Farm” category items available for the player to sell, such as seeds and fertilizer.
  
• Removed the compost bin.
  
• Increased the statue's fame gained from stone circles.
  
• Increased the cleaning speed of the brushes.
  
• Improved the brushing particle effects.
  
• Fixed issues with the screen staying black after screen transitions.
  
• Fixed a bug where you could use the fast travel before selecting a location.
  
• Changed how items spawn to create more clusters and more forageable items overall.
  

[h2]What’s Next?[/h2]
While I initially planned on the roadmap to add Azure Coast next, I’ll switch the next two updates around and instead add the Fashion Boutique update first! It will allow you to customize your character better and purchase more outfits from a new cozy villager… You’ll soon be riding your horses in style!

Thank you for following the development of The Ranch of Rivershine!

Éloïse

Hi Ranchers! 🐴🌷 We have a ton of new content packed in our fourth roadmap milestone, including discovering your horse’s personality traits, lungeing foals in the round pen, raising horses of different heights and fast traveling to key locations!

[h2]Round Pen[/h2]
The round pen on your ranch can now be restored! Build it to lunge your foals and wild horses and prepare them for riding. While both foals and adults can use the round pen, foals learn twice as fast while they’re young.



You can train all four skills by changing your horse's gait, adding jumps in the round pen or shortening the lead's length to train your horse's flexibility. If your horse doesn’t respond to your command, make sure to calm them down to improve their tameness!


[h2]Horse Tameness[/h2]
Wild horses and foals aren’t so tame anymore! You’ll now need to train a new skill for your horses: Tameness!

This skill will impact how well a horse responds to your commands. For example, an untamed horse might just rear or buck when you ask them to accelerate, but as they improve, they’ll listen to you more and more often until they are fully tamed.

Tame your horses by lungeing or by riding them and calming them down when they buck. Wild horses are untamed, but luckily, horses bought at the auction house are fully tame, so you won’t have to worry about them!


[h2]Horse Personalities[/h2]
All of your horses will now have three unique personality traits! Each trait falls under a category:

• Training: This trait impacts how fast and where your horse can be better trained, for example by training in speed twice a fast or by losing less energy when training at home.
  
  
• Caring: This trait changes how your horse needs to be cared for, for example by always having a clean coat or being able to eat two treats daily.
  
  
• Earning: This trait allows you to earn gold in various ways with your horse, for example by finding gold while riding on the trails or by earning extra gold from the competitions.
  

Your current horses will all receive personality traits at random when you load up your save file! For future horses, you’ll be able to see their traits in the auction house and your foals will have a chance to inherit their parent’s traits.


[h2]Horse Height[/h2]
Since this feature was highly requested, I decided to include it as a bonus in this update! All of the horses you’ll encounter in Rivershine will now have varying heights, from 14H to 16.2H. Your current horses will stay the same size and stand at 15H tall.



When breeding horses, your foals will have about the average of their parents, and you’ll see their height go up each day as they grow. Young adults will now also grow over time and reach their full height once they become adults!


[h2]Travel Stones[/h2]
Mysterious stones have appeared in key locations across all of Rivershine… It might be useful to take a closer look at them, as they will allow you to fast travel around the trails!

Help the villagers of Rivershine to learn more about the stones and gain the ability to travel through them. The villagers will also shine more light onto the mystery of the town, but there will still be more left to discover…


[h2]Stone Circles[/h2]
Along with the travel stones, you’ll find stone circles around the town and trails. These will reward you for exploring and grant money, potential, energy or statue fame as you pass through them.


[h2]General Changes[/h2]

• Translated all new content to French.
  
• Improved the horse jump animations.
  
• Added four new shades of base black coat colors.
  
• Added more random colors for the NPC’s horses.
  
• Added coat genetic information to the fertility pasture interface.
  
• Fixed a game-breaking bug that caused the player to get stuck when trying to adopt a wild horse.
  
• Changed horse energy to be replenished after spending a night in the fertility pasture.
  
• Fixed a bug where the Rocky Mountain statue would charge up before the quest for it is available.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused the competition start and end gates to stay visible after finishing the race.
  
• Fixed the foal brushing hitbox.
  
• Fixed foals being able to reach 100% care.
  
• Fixed horses losing their dapple coat color when they are placed in retirement. This won’t restore dapples for previous horses but it won’t happen again with future horses.
  
• Fixed the jump training arena in Crystal Lake not unlocking correctly after purchase.
  
• Changed the indoor arena and grain descriptions to clarify how they impact training.
  
• Increased the foragable item spawn chance.
  
• Changed where grains spawn to match the trail’s training bonus.
  
• Fixed the Rocky Mountain music stopping abruptly.
  
• Reduced all tack cost by half.
  
• Increased the time required to break quickly to reduce instances of stopping by accident.
  
• Change the questline so that the Lupine Meadow and Rocky Mountain expert races don’t unlock at the same time.
  
• Fixed an issue where the horse’s energy bar wouldn’t visually increase after feeding a treat or resting at a hitching post.
  
• Added sound effects for the foal’s footsteps.
  
• Fixed the horses and foals not being led correctly out of the stable.
  
• Fixed issues with horses being duplicated when loading a save.
  
• Removed the ability to “ride” foals by resetting to the map’s entrance.
  

[h2]What’s Next[/h2]
The next content update will be focused on opening the stylist’s boutique! Along with meeting a new villager, you’ll learn how to cut your horse’s hair in new styles… And more ways to make your herd look pretty!

Thank you for following the development of The Ranch of Rivershine!

Éloïse

Hi Ranchers! 🐴🌻 We’ve now reached the third milestone on The Ranch of Rivershine’s roadmap: The Rocky Mountain trail! This area opens up a ton of new content including new competitions, wild dapple horses, new tack colors, a flexibility training arena, and a new horse statue!

Additionally, The Ranch of Rivershine is currently on sale! It’s a perfect time to grab the game and head onto the mountain trails!

[h2]New Trail[/h2]
The Rocky Mountain trail features steep inclines, hanging bridges, and herds of wild goats! You’ll be able to ride around this new area and upgrade it with cross country obstacles, a wild horse pen, and a flexibility arena... And don't forget to look for the three hidden tack chests!


A new lively track will also be playing on this trail... Give it a listen here!


[h2]New Competitions[/h2]
After opening the Rocky Mountain trail, you'll have access to four new cross country competitions. If you've already unlocked all the competitions, these will all become available instantly. If not, you'll unlock them as you progress through the questline!



I've also created two new obstacle sets to decorate these new courses!


[h2]Flexibility Arena[/h2]
The flexibility arena is finally here! Wave around a line of barrels to pass through the flexibility checkpoints and quickly train your horse.



Purchase this arena from River and upgrade it twice after that to use it multiple times per day.


[h2]Dapple Coats[/h2]
The wild horses sighted in Rocky Mountain have interesting coat colors… It's dapples! After building the Rocky Mountain wild horse pen, you'll be able to catch these horses and add them to your stables.

Dapples are a new type of coat modifier and can be mixed with all coat colors and patterns. This results in a ton of new coat color combinations to discover! Dapples are available in five different strengths, from minimum to maximum.

Here’s an example of how the different dapples look on a black horse!


[h2]Tack Colors[/h2]
All the tack is available in new colors at the saddlery! The fabric tack has four new shades: pink, purple, teal and orange! The leather tack also has two additional shades: light brown and dark brown.

Here's a preview of the new fabric color range!


Since the horse interface was getting a bit too cluttered with all the equipment, I’ve also reworked it to make it easier to find the color you want!


[h2]Balance Changes[/h2]

• Reduced the cost of early upgrades and tack items.
  
• Changed all competition times to be a little easier.

[h2]What's Next?[/h2]

For the next content update, I'll be tackling the foal training! This will allow you to interact with your foal in new ways and do more activities with them. Alongside that, I'll also implement horse personalities to make each of your horse more unique!

If you'd like to see more development news and participate in beta testing for upcoming updates, be sure to join the official The Ranch of Rivershine Discord!

Thank you for reading and happy trail riding everyone!
Éloïse