Update v0.96.0 released!
This update is NOT compatible with old savegames!
Savegames are automatically deleted due to the different way the new version handles some core mechanics.
If you have a current game you don't want to lose, don't update now, but finish your game first.
---> FULL CHANGELOG
It's 3 parts, apparently Steam doesn't conceive a changelog can be that long.
Yeah, last update is dated September 2021, crazy huh?
There are many forum topics asking if the project is still alive, and even few reviews suggesting that the game is "abandoned" or even a "scam". My lack of communication is the main reason for this, alongside the indisputable fact that I'm really slow when it comes to game dev.
It's often said that the last 10% of the work needed to finish a game is equal to the first 90%, and I can say with the utmost confidence that it's true, especially when it comes to a game like DinoSystem, with many complex systems interacting with each other, always creating unexpected and emergent scenarios, along with shiny bugs and balance issues.
On top of that, imagine having to migrate the game to a new engine! Construct 2 was obsolete and I planned to move to Construct 3 as soon as it was mature enough, but I've underestimated the work required to do that, and it took many months to fully stabilize it. The result? A much more fluid game, less stuttering, a much bigger map and new features! (plus 1.5 years to complete an update).
To summary, I'm sorry for taking that long! But no, the game is not abandoned, is not a scam, and its future is brighter than ever, especially after moving to Construct 3!
[h2]Here's a highlight of the features/changes in update v0.96:[/h2]
...... Island maximum size is now 3x times bigger!
...... Default size reduced to 25% (which is slightly bigger then the previous 50%).
...... Performance are considerably better on most systems, due to Construct 3.
- Increased resolution (up to 3x) and quality of ALL game textures:
...... Improved terrain resolution, including the fixed "background" terrain under the land "patches".
...... Improved vegetation resolution.
...... Improved animals resolution.
...... Improved character resolution, especially hair.
...... Improved mountains and boulders resolution.
...... Improved structures resolution.
...... Improved items and objects resolution.
...... Improved some decals resolution (blood, vomit, splash).
...... Many assets style (especially items) have been improved and inconsistencies fixed.
...... Greatly improved main menu background resolution and detail, and is now animated.
...... Remade all loading screenshots using the improved game graphics.
- Added a bunch of new effects (enabled at setting Quality = High):
...... Added snow effect to trees, ferns, mountains and boulders depending on snow level.
...... Added wetness effect to mountains and boulders, depending on humidity/rain level.
...... Added a global normal mapping effect, increasing sharpness and details, especially at closer zoom.
...... Added a screen bloom effect increasing from sun exposure.
- Water reflection and wave effects reworked:
...... Water is now much more realistic and vivid.
...... Water waves intensity scales correctly with zoom level.
...... Water waves intensity scales with wind power.
- Mist/fog effects revamped:
...... Mist effects visually improved.
...... Mist impact on atmospheric brightness improved to produce a more realistic ambient illumination, also reducing the "glowing clouds" issue happening with high sunlight.
...... High mist is less dense, giving better the idea it's on high altitude.
...... Low altitude mist/fog is now lower than most objects (like vegetation, mountains, boulders).
...... Low altitude mist/fog intensity now fluctuates based on several variables, and is visible especially in early morning.
...... Low altitude mist is slower without wind, but much faster with it.
...... Low altitude mist is not visible inside cave or shelter.
...... Added a brand new bird singing sound to complement with the others.
...... Cicade, cricket and owl sounds can vary in playback, depending on some variables.
...... Bird sounds are now tied to the actual bird population of each tree: if the population is 0 (because they flew away scared by a Triceratops) there is no bird sound coming from that tree.
- ALL game buttons graphic and logic improved:
...... Buttons are now nicer, with a vignette effect and glow with mouse hover.
...... +/- buttons can be hold to quickly increase/decrease the related value (showing a small loading circle).
...... Several smaller button glitches fixed, since they work with a different logic.
- Additional info in tooltips no longer start with "NOTE:", and are now coloured:
...... Yellow if it's a suggestion/hint.
...... Red/orange if it's a warning.
...... Light blue if it's generic info.
- Character creation/info screen improved:
...... Panel layout is more compact and polished.
...... Added additional info to several tooltips.
...... Some text elements are now coloured, for better clarity.
...... An in-game day can be -> "Short" = 8 min, "Medium" = 16 min, "Long" = 24 min.
...... The default setting is "Medium", which is the value the game is best balanced for.
...... The longer the day, the easier the Survival Mode, as the player has more time to do things.
-[Survival] Control Mode setting removed, leaving a mix of Keyboard and Mouse as the default control system:
...... Character body now follows the movement direction if the mouse is not moved for some time, unless you're in Attack Stance.
...... While sprinting, character body always follows the movement direction.
...... Tweaked some conditions determining when character body follows mouse/mov. direction or other target.
-[Survival] Picking up items with key (default X) changed with LMB click; when LMB is holded, the item is mouse-dragged as normal.
- Skills can now reach lv 110 + Skill Decay changes:
...... Since the calculation for skill increase is (110-skill)/X, 110 is extremely difficult to reach!
...... Each skill point beyond lv 100 reduces the related skill decay by 10%, meaning at 105 Athletics, that skill decay is halved, while at 110 is zero.
...... In the character info screen, skills over 100 are purple coloured.
...... Few notes, tooltips and skill manual page have been updated to reflect the changes.
- Crafting system improved:
...... Crafting/Building skill requirements are no longer "hard" requirements: you can still try to craft/build a specific recipe without meeting the needed skill, but there's a chance to fail depending on the discrepancy between the current skill and the required lvl.
...... Final condition of the crafted recipe is also influenced by the discrepancy between the needed skill and the required lvl, and minimum resulting condition is always 1%.
...... Craft/Build buttons layout improved, and color is Red = no components/materials, Yellow = no skill (chance to fail), Green = all good. Yellow now asks a confirmation before proceeding.
...... Crafting requirements for some recipes rebalanced.
...... Tooltip positioning improved to be less obtrusive and more easy to read.
...... Some new character Presets updated to reflect the changes to che Crafting system.
- Ranged attack improved + Projectiles mechanics improved:
...... When equipping a Bow, ranged attack can be performed also without Aim Mode.
...... Various improvements to the aiming reticle.
...... Projectile spread calculation reworked, and only happens when the character moves (spread is still reduced by Ranged skill).
...... Projectile speed calculation improved, and now is more tied to Strength and Ranged skill.
...... Projectile can miss also when virtually overlapping the target animal (which may still react), miss chance depends on Ranged skill.
...... Projectile damage taken when hitting a target/obstacle reduced.
- First Aid action rebalanced:
...... First Aid action chance of failure decreases as the action approaches completion.
...... First Aid advancement is now even slower when using a Leaf.
...... First Aid maximum Bleeding reduction, when using a Leaf, is capped at -20% (instead of 30%).
...... Interrumpting First Aid when using a Leaf retains 90% of the advancement when you resume it, instead of 50%.
- Muscle Soreness decay reworked:
...... Soreness decay now peaks at 25%, decaying more slowly the more it goes far from that value.
...... When over 25%, Soreness decay is amplified in "Normal" difficulty.
...... When over 25%, Soreness decay is amplified by Toughness skill.
...... Serveral UI elements updated to reflect the aforementioned changes.
- Body Muscle and Fat mechanics rebalanced to allow to gain muscle and lose fat more easily, assuming there's proper workout, diet and rest.
- MAX Calories/Hydration now also varies from character's biological sex.
- Animals will now try to intimidate their opponent (either the player or a predator/rival) before attacking.
- Predators will now seek and eat a carcass also when it has no meat (but still has hide and tendon), this also fixes issues with them guarding a carcass that they cannot eat (since it had no meat).
- Animals will not instantly die of old age after a set age, but their chance of pass away increases as they age over that value.
- Animals will now panic when they feel enclosed, showing a text saying "trapped!".
- Animal collision system improved to better take into account their and the obstacle's size.
- Predators are now more proactive when it comes to hunt (they are more likely to hunt instead of waiting for a carcass).
- Predators will not steal a carcass if there are other unattended carcasses nearby.
- Young T-Rex are now able to call their bretherns when hunting (if the mother is dead or they're starving).
- Troodon/young T-Rex can now call more allies (hunger threshold to allow allies to join increased).
- Troodons, instead of T-Rex, can now attack Didelphodons lairs:
...... Only medium-sized young T-Rex still can attack a lair, adults can't.
...... Troodons attack a lair only if they're backed by at least one ally.
...... Lair attack event reworked: it now reduces lair energy based on attacker power, and is destroyed when reaching 0 energy.
...... Waterskin requires 3 hides (clean), and 40 Crafting skill.
...... Waterskin can be refilled at ponds.
- Added fern movement and sound effects when walked by by an animal or the player.
- Ferns are visibly consumed as they're eaten or gathered, reducing the number of leaves shown (until they grow back or the fern dies).
- Taxus tree have a visual representation of the number of berries they have.
-[Survival] Added the option to dry up using Hide (clean), Hide Cape or Bandage.
-[Survival] While under cover, droplets/snowflakes in a covered circle nearby the player are hidden (enabled at setting Quality = Medium+).
- Rain chance based on season revisited and rebalanced.
- Map generation logic substantially improved, HALVING island generation loading times!
- Added the ability to hide a fire (on cursor) by pressing the sprint key (default Shift).
- Fire light now updates in a gradual fashion, instead of every sec.
- Added 4 new Manual pages: Metabolism, Body Muscle, Body Fat and Soreness.
- Improved memory management system, unloading several unused textures from memory (like main menu images, loading screen, manual pages), which results in less RAM being used.
- DOZENS of fixes!
Those are just the main changes, for a complete list check the FULL CHANGELOG!
Daniel
It's 3 parts, apparently Steam doesn't conceive a changelog can be that long.
Apology for the long delay and engine update:
Yeah, last update is dated September 2021, crazy huh?
There are many forum topics asking if the project is still alive, and even few reviews suggesting that the game is "abandoned" or even a "scam". My lack of communication is the main reason for this, alongside the indisputable fact that I'm really slow when it comes to game dev.
It's often said that the last 10% of the work needed to finish a game is equal to the first 90%, and I can say with the utmost confidence that it's true, especially when it comes to a game like DinoSystem, with many complex systems interacting with each other, always creating unexpected and emergent scenarios, along with shiny bugs and balance issues.
On top of that, imagine having to migrate the game to a new engine! Construct 2 was obsolete and I planned to move to Construct 3 as soon as it was mature enough, but I've underestimated the work required to do that, and it took many months to fully stabilize it. The result? A much more fluid game, less stuttering, a much bigger map and new features! (plus 1.5 years to complete an update).
To summary, I'm sorry for taking that long! But no, the game is not abandoned, is not a scam, and its future is brighter than ever, especially after moving to Construct 3!
[h2]Here's a highlight of the features/changes in update v0.96:[/h2]
Maximum island size increased:
...... Island maximum size is now 3x times bigger!
...... Default size reduced to 25% (which is slightly bigger then the previous 50%).
...... Performance are considerably better on most systems, due to Construct 3.
Revamped graphics:
- Increased resolution (up to 3x) and quality of ALL game textures:
...... Improved terrain resolution, including the fixed "background" terrain under the land "patches".
...... Improved vegetation resolution.
...... Improved animals resolution.
...... Improved character resolution, especially hair.
...... Improved mountains and boulders resolution.
...... Improved structures resolution.
...... Improved items and objects resolution.
...... Improved some decals resolution (blood, vomit, splash).
...... Many assets style (especially items) have been improved and inconsistencies fixed.
...... Greatly improved main menu background resolution and detail, and is now animated.
...... Remade all loading screenshots using the improved game graphics.
- Added a bunch of new effects (enabled at setting Quality = High):
...... Added snow effect to trees, ferns, mountains and boulders depending on snow level.
...... Added wetness effect to mountains and boulders, depending on humidity/rain level.
...... Added a global normal mapping effect, increasing sharpness and details, especially at closer zoom.
...... Added a screen bloom effect increasing from sun exposure.
- Water reflection and wave effects reworked:
...... Water is now much more realistic and vivid.
...... Water waves intensity scales correctly with zoom level.
...... Water waves intensity scales with wind power.
- Mist/fog effects revamped:
...... Mist effects visually improved.
...... Mist impact on atmospheric brightness improved to produce a more realistic ambient illumination, also reducing the "glowing clouds" issue happening with high sunlight.
...... High mist is less dense, giving better the idea it's on high altitude.
...... Low altitude mist/fog is now lower than most objects (like vegetation, mountains, boulders).
...... Low altitude mist/fog intensity now fluctuates based on several variables, and is visible especially in early morning.
...... Low altitude mist is slower without wind, but much faster with it.
...... Low altitude mist is not visible inside cave or shelter.
More variation to ambience sounds:
...... Added a brand new bird singing sound to complement with the others.
...... Cicade, cricket and owl sounds can vary in playback, depending on some variables.
...... Bird sounds are now tied to the actual bird population of each tree: if the population is 0 (because they flew away scared by a Triceratops) there is no bird sound coming from that tree.
Tons of interface improvements:
- ALL game buttons graphic and logic improved:
...... Buttons are now nicer, with a vignette effect and glow with mouse hover.
...... +/- buttons can be hold to quickly increase/decrease the related value (showing a small loading circle).
...... Several smaller button glitches fixed, since they work with a different logic.
- Additional info in tooltips no longer start with "NOTE:", and are now coloured:
...... Yellow if it's a suggestion/hint.
...... Red/orange if it's a warning.
...... Light blue if it's generic info.
- Character creation/info screen improved:
...... Panel layout is more compact and polished.
...... Added additional info to several tooltips.
...... Some text elements are now coloured, for better clarity.
New setting "Day Length", which changes the game's timescale:
...... An in-game day can be -> "Short" = 8 min, "Medium" = 16 min, "Long" = 24 min.
...... The default setting is "Medium", which is the value the game is best balanced for.
...... The longer the day, the easier the Survival Mode, as the player has more time to do things.
Controls main improvements:
-[Survival] Control Mode setting removed, leaving a mix of Keyboard and Mouse as the default control system:
...... Character body now follows the movement direction if the mouse is not moved for some time, unless you're in Attack Stance.
...... While sprinting, character body always follows the movement direction.
...... Tweaked some conditions determining when character body follows mouse/mov. direction or other target.
-[Survival] Picking up items with key (default X) changed with LMB click; when LMB is holded, the item is mouse-dragged as normal.
Survival Mode system main additions and changes:
- Skills can now reach lv 110 + Skill Decay changes:
...... Since the calculation for skill increase is (110-skill)/X, 110 is extremely difficult to reach!
...... Each skill point beyond lv 100 reduces the related skill decay by 10%, meaning at 105 Athletics, that skill decay is halved, while at 110 is zero.
...... In the character info screen, skills over 100 are purple coloured.
...... Few notes, tooltips and skill manual page have been updated to reflect the changes.
- Crafting system improved:
...... Crafting/Building skill requirements are no longer "hard" requirements: you can still try to craft/build a specific recipe without meeting the needed skill, but there's a chance to fail depending on the discrepancy between the current skill and the required lvl.
...... Final condition of the crafted recipe is also influenced by the discrepancy between the needed skill and the required lvl, and minimum resulting condition is always 1%.
...... Craft/Build buttons layout improved, and color is Red = no components/materials, Yellow = no skill (chance to fail), Green = all good. Yellow now asks a confirmation before proceeding.
...... Crafting requirements for some recipes rebalanced.
...... Tooltip positioning improved to be less obtrusive and more easy to read.
...... Some new character Presets updated to reflect the changes to che Crafting system.
- Ranged attack improved + Projectiles mechanics improved:
...... When equipping a Bow, ranged attack can be performed also without Aim Mode.
...... Various improvements to the aiming reticle.
...... Projectile spread calculation reworked, and only happens when the character moves (spread is still reduced by Ranged skill).
...... Projectile speed calculation improved, and now is more tied to Strength and Ranged skill.
...... Projectile can miss also when virtually overlapping the target animal (which may still react), miss chance depends on Ranged skill.
...... Projectile damage taken when hitting a target/obstacle reduced.
- First Aid action rebalanced:
...... First Aid action chance of failure decreases as the action approaches completion.
...... First Aid advancement is now even slower when using a Leaf.
...... First Aid maximum Bleeding reduction, when using a Leaf, is capped at -20% (instead of 30%).
...... Interrumpting First Aid when using a Leaf retains 90% of the advancement when you resume it, instead of 50%.
- Muscle Soreness decay reworked:
...... Soreness decay now peaks at 25%, decaying more slowly the more it goes far from that value.
...... When over 25%, Soreness decay is amplified in "Normal" difficulty.
...... When over 25%, Soreness decay is amplified by Toughness skill.
...... Serveral UI elements updated to reflect the aforementioned changes.
- Body Muscle and Fat mechanics rebalanced to allow to gain muscle and lose fat more easily, assuming there's proper workout, diet and rest.
- MAX Calories/Hydration now also varies from character's biological sex.
Animal AI main improvements:
- Animals will now try to intimidate their opponent (either the player or a predator/rival) before attacking.
- Predators will now seek and eat a carcass also when it has no meat (but still has hide and tendon), this also fixes issues with them guarding a carcass that they cannot eat (since it had no meat).
- Animals will not instantly die of old age after a set age, but their chance of pass away increases as they age over that value.
- Animals will now panic when they feel enclosed, showing a text saying "trapped!".
- Animal collision system improved to better take into account their and the obstacle's size.
- Predators are now more proactive when it comes to hunt (they are more likely to hunt instead of waiting for a carcass).
- Predators will not steal a carcass if there are other unattended carcasses nearby.
- Young T-Rex are now able to call their bretherns when hunting (if the mother is dead or they're starving).
- Troodon/young T-Rex can now call more allies (hunger threshold to allow allies to join increased).
- Troodons, instead of T-Rex, can now attack Didelphodons lairs:
...... Only medium-sized young T-Rex still can attack a lair, adults can't.
...... Troodons attack a lair only if they're backed by at least one ally.
...... Lair attack event reworked: it now reduces lair energy based on attacker power, and is destroyed when reaching 0 energy.
Added craftable Waterskin:
...... Waterskin requires 3 hides (clean), and 40 Crafting skill.
...... Waterskin can be refilled at ponds.
Additional changes/other:
- Added fern movement and sound effects when walked by by an animal or the player.
- Ferns are visibly consumed as they're eaten or gathered, reducing the number of leaves shown (until they grow back or the fern dies).
- Taxus tree have a visual representation of the number of berries they have.
-[Survival] Added the option to dry up using Hide (clean), Hide Cape or Bandage.
-[Survival] While under cover, droplets/snowflakes in a covered circle nearby the player are hidden (enabled at setting Quality = Medium+).
- Rain chance based on season revisited and rebalanced.
- Map generation logic substantially improved, HALVING island generation loading times!
- Added the ability to hide a fire (on cursor) by pressing the sprint key (default Shift).
- Fire light now updates in a gradual fashion, instead of every sec.
- Added 4 new Manual pages: Metabolism, Body Muscle, Body Fat and Soreness.
- Improved memory management system, unloading several unused textures from memory (like main menu images, loading screen, manual pages), which results in less RAM being used.
- DOZENS of fixes!
Those are just the main changes, for a complete list check the FULL CHANGELOG!
Daniel