Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders News

[h3]Hello Riders,[/h3][p][/p][p]First, thank you all for the positive feedback on our new alternative Third Person camera. We are very happy to see that a lot of you enjoy it and that all our work wasn’t in vain.  [/p][p]
We have one last big surprise in store to wrap up the year...

We have just released our in-game Level Editor on Steam![/p][p]
You can access the game version that includes the level editor by right-clicking on your game in the Steam library, going to properties -> betas, and selecting the leveleditor beta branch in the beta participation drop-down. When you start the game now, you should see an editor button in the start menu as well as a new button in the trail selection called “User Trails”. [/p][p]
Why beta?[/p][p]Some words about the current state of the level editor. [/p][p]This is a very early release of the level editor. Think of it more as an Early Access Alpha version. In this first release, you can only make levels, play them in single player, and share them with the community via Steam Workshop. There is no multiplayer support yet, but it is high on our list for next year. [/p][p]This editor itself is pretty much the same editor we are using ourselves to build all the trails in the game. We spent a lot of time this year cleaning it up, improving the UI, and smoothing some of the workflows to make it more user-friendly, but it is a full real game development tool, and so it might look a little complicated on first glance. [/p][p]This is where you come in. We would love to get feedback from you on the current state of the editor. Do you understand and enjoy the tools, UIs, and workflows? Do you feel comfortable working in it? What can we improve, what features are missing, etc? [/p][p]You can find a manual for the editor here: [/p][p]https://docs.google.com/document/d/16DQP4ZKNTaGuZz8Xp8gKlaew3uWCCZyxFc6gjDKpicg/edit?usp=sharing[/p][p]and we're also working on a small video tutorial series that we will release over the coming weeks. [/p][p][/p][p]We feel like the holidays are the perfect time for the community to play around with the editor and let us know how you feel. The best way to give us your feedback is on our Discord [/p][p](https://www.discord.gg/lonelymountains), but we will also monitor the forums. As we are all on vacation, please forgive us if it takes a while for us to answer.  [/p][p]We hope you enjoy creating your own levels. We are all super excited to see what crazy, fun, challenging, or beautiful trails you all will come up with. [/p][p][/p][p]We wish you a lot of fun and happy holidays![/p][p]Your Megagons[/p][p][/p][p]PS: We have also taken some time to update the roadmap. We didn't manage to do everything we wanted this year but overall we are pretty happy.[/p][p][/p][p][/p]

[h3]Hello Riders,[/h3][p]We have a big Snow Riders surprise update for you today! After ten years of reading the same feedback we decided to try and do something about it. [/p][h3]Please say hello to our new ALTERNATIVE THIRD PERSON CAMERA MODE![/h3][previewyoutube][/previewyoutube][p]As you all know, we are big fans of the way we handled the camera in our Lonely Mountains games. But as it is the absolute number one complaint of players, we decided a few months ago to give it another try and to see if we can implement a good alternative camera.[/p][p]And - to our own surprise - the game is actually a lot of fun with a third-person camera. This is unfortunate for us because it means that we also had to update all the mountains and trails in the game to ensure they are now working properly from every camera angle. [/p][p]But we are happy to say that this work is done now (thanks to our amazing team of artists!) and the update went live this morning. [/p][p]So please try out the new camera mode. You can super easily switch cameras by pressing the right stick on the gamepad or TAB on the keyboard.  Please let us know what you think and if you prefer the new camera over the old one. We feel like both versions have their pros and cons, but we would love to hear what you think and if there is anything we could further improve. [/p][p][/p][p]Much love![/p][p]Your Megagons
[/p][p]PS: Thanks to everyone who bravely defended us and our camera in the Steam Forums, in Discord discussions, and on social media the past few years. It meant a lot to us![/p]

[h2]Hey Riders,[/h2][p][/p][p]We just released a patch for the game that addresses quite some heavy although on PC mostly rare bugs. Here's what has changed for the Steam version:[/p][h3][/h3][h3]Fixes [/h3]

• [p]Major: Fixed crash bug in host migration scenarios.[/p]
• [p]Major: Fixed rare bug that blocked users from joining a multiplayer sessions.[/p]
• [p]Major: Fixed rare crash bug caused by multiple achievements being granted at once.[/p]
• [p]Minor: Partially fixed the “ready state” synchronization in private multiplayer lobbies[/p]

[p][/p][p]While none of these fixes by themself are super exciting this patch under the hood also lays the foundation for another update we hope to be able to release soon![/p][p][/p][p]All the best,[/p][p]- your Megagons[/p][p][/p]

[h2]Hello Riders,
[/h2][p]We have just released an update to Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders on Steam and Xbox. The main purpose of the update is to prepare all platforms for crossplay with the upcoming PS5 version. As you might have seen today we unfortunately had to push the PS5 release but we are hopeful that you can finally play with your Playstation friends soon. [/p][p]Besides the cross-play update there are also a bunch of other things that got fixed or improved, most importantly the crashes on Xbox. [/p][p][/p][h3]New Features[/h3]

• [p]Major: Cross-Play with PS5 support (SOON!)[/p]

[h3]Changes[/h3]

• [p]Major: Reduced level at which Free Ride is unlocked to level 30[/p]

[h3]Improvements & Polishing[/h3]

• [p]Minor: Some localization improvements[/p]
• [p]Minor: Fixed UI to show longer names properly in multiplayer[/p]

[h3]Fixes[/h3]

• [p]Critical: Switched to RenderTextures for reflection rendering to fix frequent crashes during level loading[/p]
• [p]Major: Made parts of the level loading asynchronous to fix intermittent application hangs[/p]
• [p]Major: Fixed bug that causes multiplayer connection issues in connection with unstable internet connections[/p]
• [p]Minor: Fixed exceptions in tracking service[/p]
• [p]Minor: Fixed customization validation[/p]
• [p]Minor: Fixed news display showing gray box instead of image in some cases[/p]
• [p]Minor: Fixed a rare bug in error handling during ghost saving[/p]
• [p]Minor: Player name on leaderboards is now updated on login
  [/p]

[p]Please let us know if this patch improves your playing experience. We would be especially interested in hearing whether you still experience black screens, as we haven’t been able to reproduce that reliably. [/p][p][/p][p]All the best,[/p][p]Your Megagons[/p][p]
[/p]

[h2]Hey Riders,[/h2][p][/p][p]We just released another hotfix addressing some issues reported by players.[/p][h3]
Improvements & Polishing[/h3]

• [p]Minor: Some menus now support looping from bottom to top and vice versa[/p]
• [p]Minor: Reduced memory usage by skipping unnecessary mipmap generation[/p]

[h3]Fixes[/h3]

• [p]Major: Fix crash at the end of the level loading sequence caused by too skybox generation[/p]
• [p]Minor: Fix a specific pop-up dialog not reacting to controller input[/p]
• [p]Minor: Shading fixes for ice props and ice on ground[/p]

[p][/p][p]As always thanks for reporting & see you on the mountains![/p][p] - your Megagon[/p]