Prehistoric Kingdom News

[p][/p][p][/p][p]Welcome, Park Managers![/p][p]This newest patch resolves a number of issues in addition to adding basic threaten/fleeing behaviors, look targets and grazing fidgets for when herbivores idle.[/p][p]The team has now fully moved on to developing Update 16 which you stay up to date with by checking out our development blog at the end of every month. [/p][p][/p][p][/p][h2]Basic Threaten/Fleeing[/h2][p]Depending on the animal group, species will try to flee, chase off or threaten animals. Some highlights include herbivores becoming more defensive if they have a family, animals fleeing from predators, or large theropods threatening each other if they get too close. Some animals like adolescent and adult ceratopsians will even threaten other species when it's their breeding season![/p][p]These behaviors have been brought over from the nest defense previously included in Update 15 so keep in mind that it'll be massively improved once combat releases next year in Update 17![/p][p][/p][p][/p][h2]Look Targets[/h2][p]Animals will now look at other creatures around them! Adults will prioritize immediate relatives and their own species, while babies will look at their parents and other species more commonly. They'll also now watch the head or tail of their partner during courtship.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][h2]Graze Fidgets[/h2][p]We've also added new idle grazing fidgets for when herbivores are standing around. As this isn't a dedicated grazing behavior, the animation can still play regardless of an animal's underlying terrain. This might be something we look at in a future update.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][h3]Additional Notes[/h3][p][/p]

• [p]Look targets and threatens are relatively experimental additions to the game that will be evolved through updates[/p]

• [p]Head IK can be a bit jittery, especially when transitioning out into an extreme animation (e.g. Gallimimus preen) - we'll be looking to improve this as much as we can in the future[/p]
• [p]The head IK is currently enabled when animals are spawned, making them look up[/p]
• [p]Defensive animals may get stuck in a threaten loop for a while but one should eventually emerge victorious[/p]
• [p]When fleeing, animals can sometimes walk away instead of running, making them seem very chill![/p]

[p]
[/p][p][/p][h2]Features[/h2]

• [p]NEW FEATURE: Animal Look Targets
  Animals will now look at other creatures around them! Adults will prioritize immediate relatives and their own species, while babies will look at their parents and other species more commonly.[/p]
• [p]NEW FEATURE: Basic Threats & Fleeing
  Animals will be able to threaten and run away from threats if they get too close. Highlights include some species becoming more defensive if they have a family, while others will run away from predators as much as possible. This is an area we will be overhauling for Update 17 in the future![/p]

[h2]Additions[/h2]

• [p]Animals[/p]
  • [p]Added idle grazing animations:[/p]
    • [p]Ankylosaurus[/p]
    • [p]Coelodonta[/p]
    • [p]Dryosaurus[/p]
    • [p]Elasmotherium[/p]
    • [p]Gallimimus[/p]
    • [p]Leaellynasaura[/p]
    • [p]Mammoth[/p]
    • [p]Muttaburrasaurus[/p]
    • [p]Nasutoceratops[/p]
    • [p]Ouranosaurus[/p]
    • [p]Oviraptor[/p]
    • [p]Pachyrhinosaurus[/p]
    • [p]Paraceratherium[/p]
    • [p]Protoceratops[/p]
    • [p]Psittacosaurus[/p]
    • [p]Scelidosaurus[/p]
    • [p]Styracosaurus[/p]
    • [p]Triceratops[/p]
  • [p]Added courtship to Ouranosaurus[/p]

[h2]Changes[/h2]

• [p]Animals[/p]
  • [p]Animals have been given new awareness parameters, like vision range and hearing distance[/p]
  • [p]Awareness now scales with animal maturity[/p]
  • [p]Animals “Sexual Maturity” is now based on being a certain size as well as being in the last third of their maturity[/p]
  • [p]In Family Groups, Eat/Drink priority is now driven by the infants rather than the adults[/p]
  • [p]Young animals should now have boosted need fulfilling gains[/p]
• [p]Buildings & Scenery[/p]
  • [p]Color-corrected topiary pieces so they’re less neon green[/p]
• [p]Foliage[/p]
  • [p]Redwood bark is now darker in the shade[/p]

[h2]Bug Fixes[/h2]

• [p]Crashes[/p]
  • [p]Fixed some crashing related to animal nav updating[/p]
  • [p]Fixed a rare crash that can occur when alt-tabbing in/out of the game[/p]
• [p]Critical[/p]
  • [p]Fixed staff skill and training research loading[/p]
  • [p]Fixed animal excavation progress doubling up when loading games[/p]
  • [p]Fixed user actions not deactivating completely when opening the management menu while an action was active[/p]
• [p]Animals[/p]
  • [p]Fixed animals slowly speeding up to normal speed when first placed in the world[/p]
  • [p]Fixed animals using IK and grounding effects when they shouldn’t[/p]
  • [p]Fixed animals being able to leave their navmesh if another navmesh was available above or below the point of exit[/p]
  • [p]Fixed Mating Display state being too picky about a minimum initiation distance[/p]
  • [p]Fixed Play Chase state to ensure line-of-sight between path nodes, which should prevent animals from getting stuck on geometry while chasing[/p]
  • [p]“Sexual Maturity” feature fixes animals trying to mate and find nests when they are still too small to occupy the size of navmesh their preferred nest is accessible from[/p]
  • [p]Flee State should be a bit more varied in where it chooses to end at[/p]
• [p]UI/UX[/p]
  • [p]Fix for the 'Open Research' button in the Staff Training menu linking to the Security tree instead of the Management tree within the Research Menu[/p]
  • [p]Fixed staff menu summary refresh when opening the Staff Menu[/p]
• [p]Audio[/p]
  • [p]Fixed a spatialization issue for dromaeosaur threaten sounds[/p]

[p][/p][p][/p][p][/p][h2]Additions[/h2]

• [p]Audio[/p]
  • [p]Added missing sounds to ceratopsian grazing and Gallimimus animations[/p]

[h2]Changes[/h2]

• [p]Animals[/p]
  • [p]Threat displays and fleeing for herbivores will now be primarily triggered by predators that pose a larger threat to them. They can still threaten each other if it is nesting season, however, with adolescent ceratopsians also becoming spicy towards other species![/p]
  • [p]Sped up ceratopsian idle graze animation[/p]
  • [p]Young animals should now have boosted need fulfilling gains[/p]

[h2]Bug Fixes[/h2]

• [p]Crashes[/p]
  • [p]Fixed a rare crash that can occur when alt-tabbing in/out of the game[/p]
• [p]Animals[/p]
  • [p]Fixed Ugrunaaluk neck compression[/p]
  • [p]Fixed an issue that caused some herbivores to not tolerate males of their own species[/p]
  • [p]Fixed Nasutoceratops not playing its idle graze animation[/p]
  • [p]Fixed animals improperly using IKs in the nursery screen[/p]
• [p]UI/UX[/p]
  • [p]Dramatically improved camera jitter when tracking moving objects[/p]

[p][/p][p][/p][p]Welcome, Park Testers![/p][p]This PTB release resolves a number of issues in addition to adding basic threaten/fleeing behaviors, look targets and grazing fidgets for when herbivores idle.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][h2]Basic Threaten/Fleeing[/h2][p]Depending on the animal group, species will try to flee, chase off or threaten animals. Some highlights include looking at courtships, herbivores becoming more defensive if they have a family, animals fleeing from predators or large theropods threatening each other if they get too close.[/p][p]These behaviors have been brought over from the nest defense previously included in Update 15 so keep in mind that it'll be massively improved once combat releases next year in Update 17![/p][p][/p][p][/p][h2]Look Targets[/h2][p]Animals will now look at other creatures around them! Adults will prioritize immediate relatives and their own species, while babies will look at their parents and other species more commonly.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][h2]Graze Fidgets[/h2][p]We've also added new idle grazing fidgets for when herbivores are standing around. As this isn't a dedicated grazing behavior, the animation can still play regardless of an animal's underlying terrain. This might be something we look at in a future update.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][h3]How to Access the Public Testing Branch (Experimental!)[/h3][p]The Public Testing Branch (PTB) is a version of Prehistoric Kingdom that can be opted-into on Steam, containing experimental and potentially breaking changes. With the help of the community, we're able to hunt down various issues and gather feedback before pushing a an update to the public version of Prehistoric Kingdom.
[/p]

1. [p] Right click Prehistoric Kingdom in your Steam Library[/p]
2. [p] Go to Properties[/p]
3. [p] Betas[/p]
4. [p] Select 'ptb_public_testing'[/p]

[p]Please note that it is not recommended to play Public Testing Branch parks on earlier versions of the game. Please send feedback and bug reports to our Discord server's appropriate channel.

[/p][h3]Known Issues & Additional Notes[/h3][p][/p]

• [p]THIS IS A DEVELOPMENT BUILD WHICH MAY RUN WORSE FOR SOME USERS! THIS ALLOWS US TO GATHER MORE DATA FROM BUG REPORTS![/p]
• [p]Look targets and threatens are relatively experimental additions to the game that will be evolved through updates[/p]

• [p]Head IK can be a bit jittery, especially when transitioning out into an extreme animation (e.g. Gallimimus preen) - we'll be looking to improve this as much as we can in the future[/p]
• [p]The camera can be jittery when tracking an animal due to head IKs[/p]
• [p]The head IK is currently enabled when animals are spawned, making them look up[/p]
• [p]Defensive animals may get stuck in a threaten loop for a while but one should eventually emerge victorious[/p]
• [p]When fleeing, animals can sometimes walk away instead of running, making them seem very chill![/p]

[p]
[/p][p][/p][h2]Features[/h2]

• [p]NEW FEATURE: Animal Look Targets
  Animals will now look at other creatures around them! Adults will prioritize immediate relatives and their own species, while babies will look at their parents and other species more commonly.[/p]
• [p]NEW FEATURE: Basic Threats & Fleeing
  Animals will be able to threaten and run away from threats if they get too close. Highlights include some species becoming more defensive if they have a family, while others will run away from predators as much as possible. This is an area we will be overhauling for Update 17 in the future![/p]

[h2]Additions[/h2]

• [p]Animals[/p]
  • [p]Added idle grazing animations:[/p]
    • [p]Ankylosaurus[/p]
    • [p]Coelodonta[/p]
    • [p]Dryosaurus[/p]
    • [p]Elasmotherium[/p]
    • [p]Gallimimus[/p]
    • [p]Leaellynasaura[/p]
    • [p]Mammoth[/p]
    • [p]Muttaburrasaurus[/p]
    • [p]Nasutoceratops[/p]
    • [p]Ouranosaurus[/p]
    • [p]Oviraptor[/p]
    • [p]Pachyrhinosaurus[/p]
    • [p]Paraceratherium[/p]
    • [p]Protoceratops[/p]
    • [p]Psittacosaurus[/p]
    • [p]Scelidosaurus[/p]
    • [p]Styracosaurus[/p]
    • [p]Triceratops[/p]
  • [p]Added courtship to Ouranosaurus[/p]

[h2]Changes[/h2]

• [p]Animals[/p]
  • [p]Animals have been given new awareness parameters, like vision range and hearing distance[/p]
  • [p]Awareness now scales with animal maturity[/p]
  • [p]Animals “Sexual Maturity” is now based on being a certain size as well as being in the last third of their maturity[/p]
  • [p]In Family Groups, Eat/Drink priority is now driven by the infants rather than the adults[/p]
• [p]Buildings & Scenery[/p]
  • [p]Color-corrected topiary pieces so they’re less neon green[/p]
• [p]Foliage[/p]
  • [p]Redwood bark is now darker in the shade[/p]

[h2]Bug Fixes[/h2]

• [p]Crashes[/p]
  • [p]Fixed some crashing related to animal nav updating[/p]
• [p]Critical[/p]
  • [p]Fixed staff skill and training research loading[/p]
  • [p]Fixed animal excavation progress doubling up when loading games[/p]
  • [p]Fixed user actions not deactivating completely when opening the management menu while an action was active[/p]
• [p]Animals[/p]
  • [p]Fixed animals slowly speeding up to normal speed when first placed in the world[/p]
  • [p]Fixed animals using IK and grounding effects when they shouldn’t[/p]
  • [p]Fixed animals being able to leave their navmesh if another navmesh was available above or below the point of exit[/p]
  • [p]Fixed Mating Display state being too picky about a minimum initiation distance[/p]
  • [p]Fixed Play Chase state to ensure line-of-sight between path nodes, which should prevent animals from getting stuck on geometry while chasing[/p]
  • [p]“Sexual Maturity” feature fixes animals trying to mate and find nests when they are still too small to occupy the size of navmesh their preferred nest is accessible from[/p]
  • [p]Flee State should be a bit more varied in where it chooses to end at[/p]
• [p]UI/UX[/p]
  • [p]Fix for the 'Open Research' button in the Staff Training menu linking to the Security tree instead of the Management tree within the Research Menu[/p]
  • [p]Fixed staff menu summary refresh when opening the Staff Menu[/p]
• [p]Audio[/p]
  • [p]Fixed a spatialization issue for dromaeosaur threaten sounds [/p]

[p][/p][p] [/p][p]Welcome to the September Development Update![/p][p]This month’s blog post will primarily focus on providing a work-in-progress look at the upcoming Vivarium exhibits coming in Update 16. We also have news on Update 15.1, as well as an announcement that PK is currently part of the Steam Autumn sale![/p][p]Make sure to grab the game for 30% off before the sale ends October 6th.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]In September, the team found themselves working on two updates at once - the U15 support patch and U16. This was an interesting act to juggle since a few of us had to continually jump back and forth throughout the month depending on what other team members needed.[/p][p]While this did lead to the support patch taking a bit longer to cook, the good news is that we’re already making steady progress on U16! Once 15.1 goes out, it’ll be our sole focus for the next few months. Speaking of…[/p][h2]Update 15.1 Release[/h2][p]Update 15.1 will be coming to the PTB this Thursday on the 2nd of October! If there are no major issues with the build, we’ll be releasing it to the main branch on Steam and Epic as soon as possible.[/p][p]The ‘headlining’ feature for this update is the long-awaited head-IK or “look target” system, allowing animals to finally look at each other while roaming, resting or idling. To work across all of our animals and seamless growth, this has been a massive engineering project requiring months of iteration.[/p][p]We will continue to improve this feature as time goes on, but it certainly makes the animals feel more lively seeing them glance at one another.[/p][p]Next up, we’ve managed to sneak in grazing animations for most herbivores in the game! Like other idle fidgets, these animations have a chance to play when the animals come to a stop or are simply standing around. Delicious![/p][p][/p][p]Finally, the threaten behaviors seen during nesting have now been made into a regular AI state. This means that as animals encounter potential threats, they’ll try to roar at them, scare them off or run away if they’ve been threatened themselves.[/p][p]This is an area of the game that we’re really looking forward to expanding once we get to combat in Update 17.[/p][p][/p][p]As detailed last month, U16 will be another massive release focused on fleshing out your park and management opportunities. [/p][p]To start off development, we’ve been laying the foundation for vivariums and replacing all of the outdated code that relates to the Mini-Aviary. Though still very early in development, we’re pleased to have a functioning prototype that broadly outlines their customization and revised animal movement system.[/p][p]As new assets and components are finished over the next few months, these modules are going to start looking really, really nice! So with that said, you’re about to see a lot of early development imagery.[/p][p][/p][h2]Vivariums[/h2][h3]A New Home[/h3][p]Vivarium species will be found in the Animal Nursery alongside the rest of the roster. Here, players can filter specifically for vivarium animals or even make use of the customization tools to override their variation and random mutations. There’s also a handy dropdown you can use to see how many animals will fit into a certain vivarium size.[/p][p][/p][previewyoutube][/previewyoutube][p]Once created, they’ll have to be dropped into their habitat from the Animal Holder. Keepers will need to stock and clean their vivarium by interacting with the hatch in the back.[/p][previewyoutube][/previewyoutube][h3]Vivariums O’ Plenty[/h3][p]Currently, there are 4 different sizes to choose from:[/p]

• [p]Box (4x4x4)[/p]
• [p]Small (4x8x4)[/p]
• [p]Medium (8x12x6)[/p]
• [p]Large (12x16x8)[/p]

[p]Each of these can be configured to use an amphibious, arboreal, or terrestrial layout, meaning there are 12 total modules to pick from! They work just like the feeders, so if you don’t currently have an animal inside, you can change the configuration to something else.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]All vivariums will have detailed terrain, rocks and foliage when they’re finished! They’re using placeholder art and layouts for now.[/p][p]Speaking of animals, you’ll be happy to hear that they only have a minimum exhibit size! This means that while you might not be able to put Compsognathus into the 4x4 box, they’ll be more than happy in the small, medium or large versions. The bigger the vivarium is, the more individuals you’ll be able to keep inside.[/p][h3]Exterior Customization[/h3][p]Players can quickly change the front, sides and roof of a vivarium through their modular widget. There are options to use glass, mesh, facades, cladding, half cladding and even a null setting for those who want to go totally custom or sink it into the ground.[/p][p]If you want even more customization, you can also edit ALL the sides independently by enabling a toggle in the menu.[/p][p][/p][previewyoutube][/previewyoutube][p]As for things like the terrain textures, cladding and facades, those will change depending on what environment you’ve set the vivarium to: arid, forest or rainforest. We’ll talk about this in more detail once the art is ready for a future dev diary![/p][p][/p][h3]Walking With Tiny Dinosaurs[/h3][p]When setting out to create vivariums, we knew we had to evolve the movement system previously seen in our Mini-Aviary. It relied entirely on a long, premade animation loop which made it difficult to transfer to new species or to simply make more animals move at the same time.[/p][p]For the new system, we’re essentially building a network of points that the animals can randomly move between. They’re able to take diverging paths, backtrack and play a variety of adorable fidgets when they stop at a destination. How long they walk for is also random![/p][p]There’s quite a lot we need to do before the locomotion is polished, but hopefully you can see the potential of this new system in the video below. We’ll be aiming to reduce sliding as much as possible and dynamically bend the neck/tails as they turn![/p][p][/p][previewyoutube][/previewyoutube][p]Animals within a vivarium will either be placed onto the movement network or in isolated spots where they’ll permanently rest, sleep or fidget until the player moves away. All the animals will be randomly shuffled into new positions once the player comes back.[/p][p][/p][previewyoutube][/previewyoutube][p]For something more active like the Microraptor, we can determine what paths should make them walk, glide or climb! All that information can instantly be reused by something like the Archaeopteryx or Yi as long as they have the required animations. It’s a much easier solution for us to work with and means we can:[/p]

• [p]Have more animals moving around at once[/p]
• [p]Add or remove paths depending on what enrichment is enabled[/p]
• [p]Develop vivarium species faster by sharing spline paths[/p]

[p]We are incredibly excited to keep working on this system and use it to its full potential. It’ll only look better and better as we go![/p][h3]More To Come![/h3][p]In a future Dev Diary, we’ll be exploring some of the enrichment and interior customization options coming to vivariums in U16.[/p][p][/p][h2]Roadmap Change[/h2][p]Since the last blog post, we’ve decided to move Staff Progression 2.0 into Update 17. While this will not only ease some of the short term development workload, there are other changes and improvements we’d like to make to the experience surrounding staff and logistics as a whole.[/p][p]Some notable examples include adding breakrooms and new management views to see the park resource usage and where various staff members are located throughout the park.[/p][p]
[/p][p][/p][p]Created by B3n

Created by Beezy14

Created by Wither[/p][p]Created by Khaidu
[/p][p]Thank you for reading September’s dev diary![/p][p]We appreciate your patience for U15.1 and hope that you’re excited to try it out once it hits the PTB on Thursday. U16 is shaping up to be a really exciting update and we can’t wait to share more as it develops!

- The PK Team
[/p]

• [p]Facebook[/p]
• [p]Twitter[/p]
• [p]Discord[/p]
• [p]Reddit[/p]
• [p]YouTube[/p]

[p][/p][p]Welcome, Park Managers![/p][p]This patch aims to fix various issues from Update 15 while adding a few more animations to the animals. This includes new tall feeder animations for the hadrosaurs, also allowing them to browse from short trees. We've also cleaned up their drinking and low eat animations.[/p][p]The team are still working on Update 15.1 so keep your eyes peeled for that in the next few weeks![/p][p] [/p][p][/p][h2]Additions[/h2][p]
Animals[/p]

• [p]Added more additive and idle fidget animations to Gallimimus[/p]
• [p]Added tall feeder and tree-browsing support to hadrosaurs[/p]
• [p]Added grazing idle animation to hadrosaurs[/p]
• [p]Added courtship animation to:[/p]
  • [p]Camarasaurus[/p]
  • [p]Lambeosaurus[/p]
  • [p]Pachyrhinosaurus[/p]
• [p]Added threaten animation to: [/p]
  • [p]Deinocheirus[/p]
  • [p]Ursus[/p]
• [p]Added various missing vocal animations to:[/p]
  • [p]Argentinosaurus, Brachiosaurus[/p]
  • [p]Deinocheirus[/p]
  • [p]Nasutoceratops, Pachyrhinosaurus, Protoceratops and Triceratops[/p]

[p]Audio[/p]

• [p]Added unique growls to Nasutoceratops[/p]
• [p]Added missing sounds to various animations introduced in Update 15 (some threaten sfx still absent!)[/p]

[h2]Changes[/h2][p][/p][p]Balance[/p]

• [p]Increased guest spawning rates across all difficulties[/p]
• [p]Dung degradation has been rebalanced to be much faster, previous tuning was based on incorrect units, causing almost no degradation over time[/p]
• [p]When Dung is disabled in settings, all dung in park will rapidly degrade[/p]

[p]Animals[/p]

• [p]Adjusted exhibit crowding sizes[/p]
  • [p]Coelophysis: 150m² > 250m²[/p]
• [p]Adjusted animal iridescence visuals[/p]
  • [p]Lowered Oviraptor baseline iridescence[/p]
  • [p]Drastically cut iridescence intensity during night time[/p]
• [p]After successfully mating, if parent fertility would result in 0 offspring, a notification is generated[/p]
• [p]Family Group Leaders will now observe the nutrition and hydration levels of infants and prioritize eating and drinking based on group need[/p]
• [p]Updated hadrosaur low eat and drinking animations[/p]

[p]UI/UX[/p]

• [p]Camera track transitions have been improved, with the snap->bounce effect being drastically smoothed out[/p]
• [p]Improved item rotation sensitivity[/p]

[p]Audio[/p]

• [p]Wooden staff gates now have a unique open/close sound[/p]

[h2]Bug Fixes [/h2][p]
Crashes[/p]

• [p]Fixed a crash when terraforming near the edge of the map[/p]

[p]Critical[/p]

• [p]Fixed an invalid memory access when enclosures were up against the far sides of the map[/p]
• [p]Fixed another potential source of animal fuzz explosions[/p]
• [p]Fixed errors in animal skeleton initialization that could destabilize the game[/p]
• [p]Fixed a bug that set the animal limit at 1024 instead of the intended 4096[/p]
• [p]Fixed nav agents being able to pass into illegitimate triangles that are inescapable.[/p]

[p]Animals[/p]

• [p]Strengthened ‘pregnancy’ logic checks, which should be more accurately reported in the animal GUI[/p]
• [p]Added a potential fix to some larger animals not reaching full maturity[/p]
• [p]Fixed clutch and breeding data for Apatosaurus[/p]
• [p]Fixed a rigging issue that caused awkward ankle positioning across all animals when turning[/p]
• [p]Limited the angle at which animals can adapt to the ground[/p]
• [p]BluffCharge state will no longer disrespect line of sight nav boundaries[/p]
• [p]Fixed Animal Groups not loading in under certain circumstances[/p]
• [p]Fixed Flee State being appended at the wrong time causing errors in multithreaded state processing[/p]
• [p]Fixed “Pregnancy Failed” notification missing localization assets[/p]

[p]Environment[/p]

• [p]Fixed grass splatmaps for the starting boreal and coastal maps[/p]

[p]Guests[/p]

• [p]Fixed a bug that made binoculars vision cone narrower than intended[/p]

[p]Staff[/p]

• [p]Staff Breaks are now centrally delegated, preventing too many staff members from going on break at the same time[/p]

[p]Construction[/p]

• [p]All pre-built facilities for starting saves have now been aligned to the grid[/p]
• [p]Fixed modular quick scale resetting object height if it was currently stacking on another object[/p]

[p]UI/UX[/p]

• [p]Potentially fixed a GUI exception causing inability to switch feeders to a different feed type[/p]
• [p]Fixed an issue causing undo/redo buttons on the Main HUD to not properly refresh when using Undo/Redo through the keybinds[/p]

[h2]Performance[/h2]

• [p]Minor CPU Optimizations[/p]
• [p]GPU rendering optimization for animals that didn’t need tessellation[/p]
• [p]Reduced unnecessary logging[/p]
• [p]Heavily optimized the Modular Style menu[/p]

[p][/p][p]https://www.patreon.com/c/BlueMeridian[/p][p][/p][p]Welcome to the August Development Update! [/p][p]In case you somehow missed it, Update 15 released just under a week ago! This monumental update added new behaviors for breeding and courtship alongside many new standout features like paleobotany, foliage browsing and new enrichment feeders.[/p][p]We highly recommend you give the patch notes a read if you haven’t already as they’re formatted like a mini-blog post! There’s lots of great stuff to check out.[/p][p][/p][previewyoutube][/previewyoutube][p]This is also a great time to point out that Prehistoric Kingdom is currently 30% off until September 1st! Be sure to grab it while you can as the sale will end very soon.[/p][p][/p][p]Alright! Due to this update being so recent, the team are currently taking a little break so please forgive us for this Dev Diary being short! We just wanted to quickly touch base before going back to work and refresh the community on our plans for the future. So…[/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]Having now launched U15, the team is very happy with its reception and feedback from the community. At its peak, we almost broke 1,000 concurrent players on Steam which is the highest number we’ve had since launching into Early Access.[/p][p]While there’s always work to be done and pesky bugs to resolve, finally having both breeding and seamless growth in the game has been a real full circle moment for us. We truly mean it when we say thank you for supporting PK! We could not have made it this far without you.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]Comparison by Discord user ASSASSINSPINO![/p][p][/p][h2]An Additional Patch[/h2][p]So, what’s next? Very soon, some team members will be jumping on to Update 15.1.  This extra release will add the remaining features from U15 that were not ready to ship, as well as addressing some reported issues such as pregnancies randomly disappearing. Here’s our original quote from the patch notes:[/p][p][/p][p]“Although this is not how we planned to ship Update 15, unfortunate circumstances over the last few weeks have meant that we have elected to prioritise the wellbeing of our team members and focus on the core breeding mechanics.[/p][p]These features will be arriving in a second update coming in September:[/p][p]• Animal Head IK[/p][p]• Interspecies threat displays and fleeing (however this CAN occur during courtship right now!)[/p][p]We apologise and hope you can respect our decision on this. The team currently expects Update 15.1 to arrive before the end of September - only a few weeks away.”[/p][p][/p][h2]The Road Ahead: Update 16[/h2][p]After working on two major animal-related updates back-to-back, it’s safe to say our team is feeling ready to move onto something that doesn’t relate to growth or breeding! While 15.1 gets worked on, the rest of the team will be entering pre-production for U16. This will be another huge and frankly transformative update, this time focused on expanding the gameplay and park management experience.[/p][p]While we aren’t yet ready to divulge the exact details of everything coming, you’ll start to see more images and info over the next few months. For now, here’s a taste of what we’re looking at:[/p][p][/p][h3]Vivariums[/h3][p][/p][p](previously known as Terrariums or Mini-Exhibits)[/p][p]Vivariums are placable habitat modules used to house small or specialized animals like what you’d find at a real zoo. They will allow players to effectively build customizable reptile houses or aviaries.[/p][p]We consider an animal to be a vivarium species if their size or movement style does not mesh well with the dynamic nature of regular animals. Without vivariums, we would not consider including animals like Microraptor, Archaeopteryx and Yi in the game.[/p][p][/p][p]To keep their dev cost low, these species do not have ontogeny, multiple skin designs or a true AI brain. They are an expansion to the Mini-Aviary idea currently in the game, adding new options for a terrestrial and amphibious tank alongside the usual arboreal housing for climbers and gliders. They’ll play animations at preset points around the habitat and sometimes even traverse it depending on where they spawn each time you look at a vivarium.[/p][p]A key part of the vivarium upgrade is to overhaul the animation system and make it much easier for us to setup new species. This is actually why no new animals have been added to the current Mini-Aviary since beta! It’s old, rigid and not as nice to use as our updated pipeline.[/p][p]In terms of management, players will need to make sure staff can access the back of a vivarium in order to feed, clean and treat the animals for diseases. We’ve included some pictures below to show what we’d like players to be able to build when they combine our modular building pieces with the vivarium modules.[/p][p]Creative Commons Reference Photos (with authors): Image 1, Image 2[/p][p][/p][p][/p][h3]Vets, Diseases & Death[/h3][p][/p][p]Vets will monitor habitats, tend to nests and alert the player to any disease that they find along the way. Depending on the severity, animals can be treated in the field directly. If it’s a serious or contagious issue, players should move their animal into the upcoming Quarantine Bay module.[/p][p]This module must be stocked with a new medicine resource that vets use to cure and restore your animals. There will be a range of Quarantine Bay sizes available, with the largest versions supporting sauropods.[/p][p]With all that said, however, in the worst case scenario it’ll still be possible for animals to die if they become too sick or old. :-([/p][p][/p][h3]Flat Rides[/h3][p][/p][p]Flat rides are a new type of attraction that can provide guests with entertainment or a better look at your animals! As mentioned in the January Dev Diary, flat rides include things like a ferris wheel, theater or a tethered balloon ride that goes straight up to provide a vantage point.[/p][p]We would love to eventually include track or tour rides, but obviously those have a significantly higher dev cost. We’ll have to see how things go![/p][p][/p][h3]Staff Progression 2.0[/h3][p][/p][p]To make things more cohesive, staff training and salary management will be merged into a unified system, letting players individually train staff. As the skill level of a staff member goes up, so does their salary! If they become too expensive, the player may have to demote them and lose access to their skills until promoting them again.[/p][p]We have a few other ideas cooking on how to improve the staff experience, but we’d like to wait a bit longer before announcing any specifics.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]Since all of the remaining updates until full release are equally large, we estimate the minimum development window between releases to be around 3-4 months (basically what you’re already used to). As always, you can check out our roadmap to see what’s on the way and we’ll keep you in the loop if things change![/p][p][/p][p][/p][p][/p][h2]Update 16[/h2][h2]New Vivarium Species[/h2][p]There’s something chirping in the bushes and it’s not a bird! This must be the tiny Jurassic theropod, Compsognathus. Our little finger-biter here will be one of the smallest animals in Prehistoric Kingdom, ending up a little shorter than a baby Velociraptor.[/p][p][/p][p]Compies and similarly-sized land critters will be housed in the terrestrial vivarium, making it easy to keep track of them. We can’t wait to show more pictures once we’ve started properly developing their habitats! They’re going to be so much fun.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]And that’s all for the moment! We’ll see you again next month for September’s diary as we move deeper into working on Update 16. In the meantime, there’s quite a lot to play with in Update 15, so we hope you enjoy everything we just added.[/p][p] [/p][p][/p][p]Created by gemini98[/p][p][/p][p]Created by Unga[/p][p][/p][p]Created by SammyChan14[/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]Created by Khaidu[/p][p]Thank you for reading August's dev diary![/p][p]Don’t forget to keep your eyes peeled for U15.1 and keep posting all those gorgeous screenshots on our Discord server![/p][p]- The PK Team [/p]

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