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Crossing The Sands News

A Small Update

This is a quick fix for a quest that I broke in the last update, and two recent changes from Navigating The Labyrinth are coming along for the ride.

  • Warriors now gain an extra attack every five levels instead of six. Thanks to JCServant for this suggestion (and others)
  • If a character has more than one status effect, hovering over their portrait on the character sheet will show all of them.
  • The last update broke getting the Ratkin Letter of Passage from the Nomad Chieftain after finishing the plateau tunnels. This has been fixed.

Crossing The Sands Updated

  • Added French, Italian, Japanese, Polish, and Turkish translations. These are machine-translated, so could probably be improved. Please share any observations in the discussions area.
  • Added some new quests. There are a few in the Grand Oasis plus one in the Grand City and one in the City of Assassins. Some of them drop items that may be useful in the final battles.
  • Fixed a problem with using items in combat.
  • When using an item, the target select buttons will now show more info, just like when casting a spell.
  • A sound effect will now play when a battle begins.
  • Characters with the hide skill will now attempt to remain hidden after a backstab. This will make a skilled thief or assassin much harder to kill.
  • An image will now be shown on characters or monster groups when a hit is scored to give a visual indication of who's taking damage.
  • Healing a character who has taken enough damage to put them into negative hitpoints will no longer require healing the negative damage before they regain consciousness. Instead, they will be treated as if they have 0 hitpoints. This should make it easier to get fallen allies back into the fight.
  • The large overview map can now be shifted up, down, left, and right with new arrow buttons or the arrow keys so you can view the far areas of larger maps.
  • Added a couple hints to the main line quest flow so it might be a bit easier to get back on track if you miss a step.
  • Added some tooltips to the character creation window so you can see how your hitpoints, armor class, or mana is being affected by your ability score rolls. Thanks to Bumpy McSquigums for the suggestion.
  • When all members of a monster group are killed in combat, its image will dim to indicate that it's been defeated.
  • You can now hover the mouse over the hitpoint and mana bars of your characters to see the exact values.
  • Shops, healers, rechargers, and curse removers will now show character names on the numerical selection buttons.
  • Hidden characters now have a bonus to flee from combat.
  • The game intro no longer auto-advances. You'll need to click the arrow (or hit enter/space or a controller "select" button) to advance the text. You can also skip the intro by hitting "escape".
  • Increased the shadow render distance so that shadows will no longer weirdly appear as you approach objects.
  • Improved the speed of the mouse scroll wheel for the quest log and message log windows.
  • Made some improvements to the UI for non-16:9 screen resolutions.
  • Improved button focus behavior for the spellcasting window.
  • Fixed an issue that could cause shop items to be displayed incorrectly.
  • Items that cannot be sold will have the sell button grayed out in shops.
  • Shop transactions will now play a coin sound effect. It's a minor thing, but it makes me happy to hear it.
  • Fixed an issue where it was possible to get stuck at in the southeast corner of the Forgotten City.
  • Translation improvements for all languages, including tooltip text on the character sheet, monster names, using items, and chest trap effects. Also translated the achievements into all available languages.

Crossing The Sands Updated

  • Fixed an issue where the Windrider quest could not be completed because his location could not be entered (because I overdid blocking locations off in the last update).
  • The empty building in the Western Desert crossroads has been converted into a new inn.
  • Undead and golems are no longer affected by the Sleep spell. In addition, some monsters with natural resistances will have a chance to save vs. sleep. Most monsters still fall asleep easily.
  • Warriors now gain a permanent +1 to strength and slightly more hitpoints per level (+1 extra HP every 2 levels on average).
  • Warriors will now have 15% faster natural base hitpoint regen (fewer steps per hitpoint healed) and monks will have a 7% faster base hitpoint regen.
  • Wizards will now have 2.5% faster natural mana regen (fewer steps per point of mana regained).
  • Fixed an issue where loading a game with the music turned off but sound effects on would also cause sound effects to be disabled.
  • Fixed an issue with the sky that could cause clouds/stars to fail to render.

Crossing The Sands Updated

Adds combat sounds, more spell sounds, and directional building entry.

  • Changed the towns (Grand City, City of Assassins, Arcane City, Ratkin Stronghold) so that buildings can only be entered from the street-facing or door side. Previously if a location could be entered, it could be entered from all directions. That was a limitation of the map design code that has been overcome.
  • All spells now have sound effects, and the spell sound effects have more variety.
  • Combat now has hit and miss sounds. Sound effects can be enabled or disabled via the settings menu (escape key -> settings).
  • Fixed an issue that could cause the game to freeze in some cases.

Crossing The Sands Update

  • Custom portraits have been implemented. You can change a character's portrait by clicking on their portrait on the character sheet. That will let you browse for a file to use. Note that these portraits are NOT saved in the cloud and won't transfer across PCs (though if you have images with the same exact file path for the same image on both machines, they will still load). If a character's image is not found, it will pick a random one from the available character images. Be sure to save your game after selecting character portraits so they're remembered.
  • The amount of hitpoints and mana that a character has gained will now be shown in the level up notification message.
  • Improved the Thief class's ability to identify and disarm chest traps.
  • Saving the game (resting) at an inn will now cure sleep on any characters affected by it.
  • Immobilized (sleeping, paralyzed, etc) characters can no longer identify items.
  • Fixed an issue with quests being duplicated on the quest log window. Also made some formatting improvements.
  • Fixed an issue with losing focus while typing in the feedback form.
  • Fixed an issue where quitting to the menu and then starting a new game could start the new party in an incorrect location.
  • Some translation improvements.