Ylands News

Hey there fellow ylanders,

The 0.12 update, aka. "Smooth Sailing" is right around the corner (as promised, you'll be running 0.12 by the time you are reading the next Dev Diary;) ) and we thought it would be a good time to look back on all the teasers we've released. This is the perfect opportunity to make sure you are all up to date and aware of what is changing and how. It's been a long ride, but it's closer than ever - we promise.

So without further ado, the complete list of teasers you (could) have seen for the 0.12 update:

• the one where Ales teased 0.12 features even before 0.11 was released - Dev Diary #54
• the one where 0.12 is just a whisper from the future, with unformed ideas - Dev Diary #63
• the one where we talk about improvements to the Editor and Visual Scripting - Dev Diary #64
• the one where we show you some of the changes coming with the new UI - Dev Diary #67
• the one where we talk about fixes and improvements coming to ships - Dev Diary #68
• the one where we introduce costumes - Dev Diary #69
• the one where we talk about improvements coming to the third person camera - Dev Diary #70
• the one where we talk about the changes coming to combat - Dev Diary #71
• the one where we talk about the quality of life changes coming with 0.12 - Dev Diary #72

• the one where you got a behind the scenes look from a combat update meeting - Weekly sneaky WiP #5
• the one where we've shown the first screenshot of an upcoming costume - Weekly sneaky WiP #7
• the one where new combat animations are being tested - Weekly sneaky WiP #8
• the one where the artists brainstorm upcoming costume ideas while hungry - Weekly sneaky WiP #9
• the one where the cast of the upcoming video Dev Diary had a pirate boat party and invited too many horses and sharks - Weekly sneaky WiP #10

• A tweet featuring a costume
• A tweet with a behind the scenes look at the Dev Diary
  
• Ane tweeting about cats that has nothing to do with the update 😸
  

As you can see, we have written quite a bit about the update - and these do not even come close to the amount of work, energy and dedication that the rest of the team has poured into the code. We are super excited to get this update into your hands and we sincerely hope you'll like what you see.

Until then... stay tuned and stay classy!

Have a great weekend everyone.

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With the implementation for "explorer like maps". Will we be able to import logic, compositions and objects with scripts inside it?

Yes. You just start to create your game on a land created similar to explore. Consisting 9-12/13? ylands of different biomes with caves but without random encounters.

What are these "random encounters"?


Random encounters are interesting places that you can run into when playing Explore. They can be anything from previous settlements to puzzles or weird objects.

With all this postponing, is it still imaginable to hit version 1.0 this year?


Yes, that is definitely still planned.

How's the update coming along?

Very nicely, the data has been locked, most of the testing is finished. 

Hey there fellow ylanders!

Let’s start with the most obvious question on your minds – the state of the update 0.12. The data has been locked, meaning that no further changes are being made and everything is being thoroughly tested. It’s possible that you will get to read one more Dev Diary before the update is released, but this beast of an update is getting so hard to get out that we won’t be able to hold it in any longer. Every update we release is bigger than the preceding one… and this one is definitely no exception :)

Because we’ve already covered most of the large features coming your way, I would l like to use this opportunity to name some smaller ones, that will make your time spent playing Ylands more pleasant.

Let's get into it!

Overall, in this update we're not only adding brand new features, but we’ve also adjusted A LOT of the existing ones, adding many QOL (quality of life) changes to the game. For instance, you can now pick up objects much quicker one after another, fly faster with a propeller pack, and spot and identify resource veins based on resource chunks lying around (no more looking for flint like crazy ;)). We also made a lot of changes based on your feedback, so focused objects are now easier to spot and objects on the ground are harder to miss.

In the past we’ve talked about the changes made to the 3rd person camera. We were able to put in the game a new way how camera works with ships (it even supports zoom) and because of that, the movement feels more fluent. But on top of that, we managed to vastly improve the way characters move over smaller obstacles or walk up or down stairs. We can’t wait for you to let us know what you think!

While sailing, the camera shouldn't get in the way anymore. Sailing exploration realness by [5thSC(A)]Pvt Bushi Neko!

As you know, another aspect of the game that has been largely refined is the GUI. We took your comments into consideration, and based on that, in 0.12 you’ll see that your hotbar gets way less cluttered by useless resources and several buttons have been replaced. Also, with this new system in place, all the annoying issues from the past should be gone.


Due to all of these changes, there are a couple of things that you should take into account when it comes to this update:

• All old non-visual scripts will cease to work, so several official games/compositions will be taken down from the Workshop (bear it in mind also if you have games/compositions of your own)
  
• In order to play your locally created game outside the Editor, you will first have to export it so that it appears in the main menu
  
• As part of the optimization process and GUI overhaul, the last three slots in the inventory have been removed. If your character has any objects in those slots, as soon as the updated game starts, the items found in those no longer existing slots will be dropped next to the character (even if your character is offline in a MP game). So make sure you store these soon to be dropped items, to avoid losing them.
  

In any case, these things will be mentioned in the Changelog as well, but we wanted to give you a heads up :)

Now let's take a look at the questions you've posted during the week!



No. What we do is that for every feature we put in the game, we try to think of possible scenarios where it could be exploited, and we try to fix those. It is, however, only during the real gaming sessions that most of the harmful behavior is found - we've already fixed a lot of those based on your feedback. We're planning to devote enough time to look specifically for these patterns before the game leaves Early Access.



We've done some changes to what and how you focus things in combat. Please give it a try and let us know if things got better for you!



Learning to code in C++ can be somewhat difficult if you don't have any previous experience with "easier" languages like C# or with scripting languages like Lua or Python. If you find that it is too difficult to start with, I suggest you switch to C# and play around a bit with Unity.



That's a very good point. To be honest we're still thinking about what role should saws play after this update - it's quite likely that we will do something about them, but it will have to wait till 0.13.



Yes. We need to resolve this issue especially since in the future (post 1.0) players will need even more resources like iron in order to build more advanced machinery.


And that is all for today! We will see you again in a week – until then have a great time and stay classy! 

Hey there fellow ylanders, it's time for another Dev Diary - this time about: combat!

As you might recall, with update 0.11 we have introduced combat 2.0 to the game. This updated combat engine introduced light and heavy attacks, the ability to dodge and parry, and a generally more involved and exciting combat.

With update 0.12 we are turning the volume even louder: make way for combat 3.0!



Within the latest (and greatest) version of the combat engine, you will find the following changes:

• Attacks and recovery are now significantly faster than before: we felt that the addition of heavy and light attacks together with your defensive options (parrying or evading) was a huge step in the right direction... yet they didn't feel perfect. We thought the flow of the combat could be better, so we've sped up every action and interaction that can happen during combat.
  
  
• Blocking is the new parrying: while we enjoy the challenge of executing a well timed parry, we have decided (probably because Sekiro ruined (it for) us) to replace parrying with a blocking stance. When in this stance, you can block light attacks indefinitely, but heavy attacks will break through your defenses. We felt this change not only gives you a better defensive tool that you can rely on more often, but also offers a better tactical experience when you weigh your options and decide when to block and when to go for a heavy strike.
  
  
• Super cool new feature: the jump attack. There is really nothing I can / want to tell you about this - you'll have to see it for yourself (just make sure you don't jump from too high).
  
  
• Heavy attacks and jump attacks now stun opponents: again, giving you more options (and rewards for well timed and executed attacks) with the added benefit of tactical advantage.
  

Now you might be wondering how exactly did we manage to make combat even cooler. To answer that, our very own Khan (designer extraordinaire) and Xeniya (of the dev diary 0.11 fame) had the following hot takes:

• Better speed: transitioning into a heavy attack mid-combo is now much faster and smoother than before
  
  
• Better feel: heavy attacks are now executed on letting go of the left mouse button instead of holding it, which means you can for example hide behind a corner and surprise unsuspecting enemies with a proper punch
  
  
• Better verticality of combat: previously, you had a hard time hitting anything that was too low on the ground, which was now made easier by expanding the vertical range of each attack
  
  
• Better flow: when you attack while running, you don't stop immediately in place, but slide on the terrain for a split second, to avoid that bad feeling of the hard transition
  
  
• Better lumberjacks: trees can be cut down much easier now to avoid unnecessarily long harvest times
  
  
• Better look: we've added visual representation of how "charged" your attack is - the closer you are to the heavy attack, the more visible the particle effect on your weapon is
  

So as you can see, while there is nothing radical in these changes, they truly do alter (for the better) the flow and feel of the combat, and we are super happy with how this aspect of the game is coming along.

I hope you've enjoyed this little insider look into something awesome that's coming soon(tm) to an yland near you - and until then, shoot us your questions and stay classy!

Have a great weekend everyone!

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Last week's questions:


In one of the future updates we want to focus on adding more machines that utilize energy. Even though you can already do some nice things with it, we would like to go much further in this direction. So yes, in the future we may indeed include more sources of energy and ways to store it.


Definitely. You will see some changes to the game search in the upcoming update, and more improvements are planned.


It's true that the water simulation has been temporarily disabled. When it returns (after 1.0) it will be faster, better looking, and along with it we would like to introduce (among other things) ways of carrying water around and placing it.


Sure. The removal of the first person camera was just temporary. We would like to put it back in the game when we have time to work on all the things that need reworking, so that the camera feels finished (mostly animations, combat design issues etc.). That however, won't be before Ylands 1.0.

Sharks now have new victims to chase! 🦈🐴

Hey there fellow ylanders,

We're almost there with the update (actually we've managed to sneak in some more goodies as you will see quite soon in the changelog) - in the meantime we can discuss another very important feature of the upcoming update 0.12 “Smooth Sailing” - the camera.

We have implemented a brand new system (yes, we’ve implemented a completely new system, all the original code was removed), and as a result, a lot of issues have been fixed and many features now work much better - from the overall "feeling", to solving various situations where the camera behaved in a less than ideal way.

There are tons of small improvements, which you may not notice right away, but we're sure that after playing for a bit you'll realize that you don't have to "fight" the camera anymore. Moving your character around now feels much more smooth due to better camera dynamics, and you should no longer experience camera stuttering while quickly moving (usually falling) the avatar. Also, the camera now doesn’t clip through terrain and objects.

We have also done improvements to vehicle cameras, so controlling ships and (especially) cars now feels better. We have some plans to improve the ship camera even further, but it will have to wait at least till 0.13.

Standing in the corner while looking into the room in 0.11 (left) and 0.12 (right)


One of the biggest problems with the 3rd person camera is moving around in tight spaces, where your character can obstruct what you see, especially when standing close to walls with your back. You'll see that this has been improved substantially.

There are obviously many things where the first person camera works better, and we’ve promised you a special mode that would help you in situations where you used to rely on the said first person camera (that we removed temporarily). Well, you will find this mode present in the update 0.12. We call it "Interaction Camera Mode". You can turn it on and off at any point by pressing the Camera mode change (default C).

This mode will stay active as long as you don’t move around (turning around is obviously fine) or start attacking. You will see everything from the first person perspective and have a cursor visible in the middle of the screen, which lets you easily interact with even tiny objects in the scene. You can also activate this mode even during building or while driving a car or sailing a ship, which is very handy.

While we understand that this can’t fully replace the first person camera mode, our tests have shown this mode to be very useful - and we believe you will see it the same way. :)

And now for your questions:



Not before 1.0. A lot of new clothing will be released in post 1.0 along with certain updates.



Being able to scale (at least non-animated objects) is among one of the most wanted features. We are already discussing all possible options.



That is a very good point, we can surely do that. Or, if you have any idea about what you'd like to see in the game, just let us know right away (be aware, though, that we have to respect existing IPs :) )


That’s it for now. Have a great weekend, ylanders, and stay classy!