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Flotsam News

Quality of life Update 3.1 now ready for testing!

Ahoy drifters!

The last weeks we've taken the time to rework a lot of the behind-the-scenes project code and optimize the art assets even more. While you won't immediately see a change from this, it does mean that it will be easier to track down bugs and implement fixes for us in the long run.
The art optimization should reduce the memory impact and improve the game performance slightly.
Any help tracking down issues that this rework might cause is really appreciated.

When bugs occur, provide as much information as possible to help us resolve these faster!Read here how to submit and track the current bugs in the game.

Additionally we've added some build improvements as well. Snapping to walkways is now disabled and constructions show their boundaries when placing them for easier placement. A new type of wooden walkway is now also availabe.

This patch is still in development, but can be tested on the experimental branch to give feedback.

This is how you can enable the experimental branch of Flotsam. This will only work when you're not in a game:
1. Open Steam Library
2. Right click Flotsam
3. Select Properties
4. Go to tab 'Betas' at the top.
5. Select 'Experimental' in the drop-down.

Enjoy the new update!

[h2]Change Notes[/h2]
We've internally changed the way projects (IE Salvaging a building, using a producer, etc) are handled. This may come with a few bugfixes, but it will allow us to fix things faster in the future. While it may not have a direct effect right away, it will stabilize the game a lot more in the long run.

General
  • Constructions will now display their boundary with a dotted line when placing a new building.


Gameplay
  • Split walkways into wood & plastic walkways.


Visuals
  • Updated the visuals of walkway segment to reflect their required resource.
  • Updated wood walkway visual to be more readable.


Performance
  • Decreased material count on walkways, increasing performance.


Fixes
  • Fixed issue where constructions would often snap to pontons.
  • Fixed issue where 2 walkways could not be placed directly opposed to each other.
  • Fixed issue where going back to the main menu and starting a new game could cause selection outlines to stop working.

Hotfix 0.3.0p4 Released

Hi all!

We got some reports of issues with boat mooring. This hotfix should fix those.
Have a good week!

[h2]Patch notes[/h2]
Fixes
  • Fixed issue where boats could not be deconstructed.
  • Fixed issue where salvaging a mooring point would freeze a drifter.

Hotfix 0.3.0p3 Released

Hi all!

We hope you're doing well. Before starting the weekend we wanted to post a small hotfix for some lingering issues.
Let us know if it resolves things and enjoy the game!

[h2]Patch notes[/h2]
UI
  • You can now scroll back to previous patch notes.
  • Updated main menu buttons and background.


Performance
  • Improved performance in bigger towns where drifters were looking for new projects.


Fixes
  • Fixed issue where 2 boats would try to moor at the same mooring point.
  • Fixed issue where fishing spots would show on the map, but would not be in the world.

Hotfix 0.3.0p2 Released

Hi all!

After releasing the newest update we've gotten lots of feedback. This has helped us to resolve some performance issues and bugs.
This build is live now and your game will update automatically.

[h2]Patch notes[/h2]
Performance
  • Heavily reduced the length of a lagspike when a drifter could not find a path.
  • Improved pathfinding to generate less lagspikes overall.


Fixes
  • Fixed issue where drifters would get stuck navigating to a landmark or piece of flotsam.
  • Fixed issue where boats could get stuck at landmarks when moving.
  • Fixed issue where the map compass would not point in the right direction.
  • Fixed issue where the clearance of an obstacle would not update correctly, causing drifters to navigate in odd ways.
  • Fixed issue where you couldn't save after a boat got stuck at a landmark.
  • Fixed issue where a mooring point would become unusable when moving to a new location on the map.

World Update OUT NOW!

Ahoy fellow sailors of the seas!

We have the pleasure of announcing the release of our newest big patch, the World Update!

The world update reworks the town-traveling in a major way to open up the game.
Take to the seas with your new townheart, move to any location, grow your own seaweed and more!
If you want to see what all is new, take a peek at the update overview below.

The full patch notes can be found below as well.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Thanks to everybody who tested this update on the experimental branch. You helped us shape and tweak the game to its current state, huzza!

We're still working on translating the new parts of the game so some elements might remain untranslated.

[h2]Old Savegames[/h2]
We try to minimize disruptions to existing save-games. Unfortunately that's sometimes inevitable when actively developing the game. In an effort to reduce further disruptions we've reworked the save-system behind the scenes. This means that your old save-games won't work anymore.
As an upside newer save-games will be less prone to breaking. To that end we've updated the warning when loading a save-game to more correctly indicate if the save will still work.

If you want to keep playing with your old save on the older version of the game, you can still do that on a Steam branch with the previous version.

This is how you can enable the previous version of Flotsam. This will only work when you're not in a game:
1. Open Steam Library
2. Right click Flotsam
3. Select Properties
4. Go to tab 'Betas' at the top.
5. Select 'early_access_0.2' in the drop-down.

[h2]Change Log[/h2]
General
  • Overhauled town traveling mechanic completely:
  • Fully zooming out or tapping the map key now brings you to the overworld.
  • The map now shows a view of the greater world where you can search for points of interest and landmarks.
  • Left-clicking on the map view enables you to move to new areas.
  • Townheart is now a ship.
  • Townheart is now equipped with an engine that burns oil to move the town.
  • Townheart engine is damaged at the beginning and must be repaired.
  • Your town now rotates depending on the direction you last moved in.
  • Once you've explored a region, you can move on to the next if you have enough fuel (currently requires 75% of your full fuel capacity). The new area does not have new gameplay associated with it, it is mainly to make the game world infinite.
  • World is now generated procedurally with landmarks grouping in clusters.
  • Updated auto-save interval to be time based. (A new auto-save is made every real-time 10 minutes.)
  • Default graphics quality when starting the game is now 'High'.
  • Drifters with lower health will now prioritize getting food or water, instead of the person on top of the list.


Gameplay
  • Added new constructions:
  • Seaweed Grower: Grows seaweed spores to edible seaweed.
  • Oil Refinery: Converts plastic to oil.
  • Medium Storage Yard: Stores 45 items.
  • Large Drying Rack: Dries 6 items at once.
  • Fish Sticks: Dries 5 fish at once. Fish drying has been removed from the drying rack.
  • Townheart is now a movable ship.
  • Added item:
  • Seaweed Spore: Can be grown in a seaweed grower to edible seaweed.
  • Drifters can now swim to salvage landmarks.
  • Research points can be acquired on salvage landmarks now.
  • Investigating landmarks has a lower priority now
  • You can now cycle through all your drifters with the tab key (adjustable in settings).
  • Showing drifter names has been moved to left alt by default and can now be adjusted in the settings.
  • Workshopping is now below desalinating / cooking assignments by default.
  • The drying rack & fish sticks will automatically queue a recipe.
  • Refined selection on the buildings.


Pathfinding
  • Improved pathfinding thresholds to reduce drifters switching between walking and swimming.


Balancing

    BUILDINGS
    Woodworking shed:
  • FIREWOOD: Increased production time from 14 seconds to 60 seconds.
  • ROPE: Increased production time from 10 seconds to 30 seconds.

  • Increased plastic waste cost from 6 to 12.
  • Decreased dried wood cost from 8 to 6.

    Desalinator:
  • WATER: Increased production time from 23 seconds to 60 seconds.
  • WATER: Decreased produced amount from 4 to 2.
  • WATER: Decreased fuel use from 4 to 1.

  • Increased plastic waste cost from 4 to 14.
  • Increased pipe cost from 6 to 8.
  • Added 16 metal scrap cost.
  • Removed 20 screw cost.

    Distiller:
  • WATER: Increased production time from 30 seconds to 60 seconds.
  • WATER: Decreased fuel use from 2 to 1.

  • Increased plastic waste cost from 10 to 14.
  • Decreased dried wood cost from 8 to 6.

    Small Drying rack:
  • DRIED WOOD: Increased production time from 80 seconds to 180 seconds.
  • DRIED FISH: Increased production time from 100 seconds to 180 seconds..

    Solar still:
  • WATER: Increased production time from 100 seconds to 450 seconds.

  • Increased plastic waste cost from 6 to 14.
  • Added 4 pipe cost.
  • Decreased dried wood cost from 18 to 10.

    Fish Kabob:
  • COOKED FISH: Increased production time from 10 seconds to 60 seconds.

  • Increased dried wood cost from 4 to 12.
  • Added 2 screw cost.
  • Removed 6 plastic waste cost.
  • Removed 14 metal scrap cost.

    Food Truck:
  • COOKED FISH: Increased production time from 10 seconds to 60 seconds.
  • SUSHI: Increased production time from 10 seconds to 60 seconds.
  • SUSHI: Increased production amount from 3 to 5.

  • Increased dried wood cost from 6 to 12.
  • Added 10 screw cost.
  • Removed 6 plastic waste cost.

    Fishing Hut:
  • NIBBLE FISH: Increased fishing time from 29 seconds to 120 seconds.
  • NIBBLE FISH: Increased fish amount from 3 to 5.

    Scrapsmith:
  • PIPE: Increased production time from 10 seconds to 30 seconds.

  • Increased plastic waste cost from 6 to 12.
  • Removed 4 dried wood cost.

    Plastic Recycler:
  • PLASTIC NET: Increased production time from 20 seconds to 30 seconds.

  • Increased plastic waste cost from 8 to 18.
  • Removed 12 screw cost.

    Small Water Container:
  • Increased plastic waste cost from 6 to 8.
  • Decreased pipe cost from 6 to 2.
  • Removed 4 dried wood cost.

    Water Container:
  • Increased plastic waste cost from 10 to 14.
  • Decreased pipe cost from 6 to 3.
  • Removed 6 metal scrap cost.

    Medium Storage Yard:
  • Increased dried wood cost from 8 to 10.

    Large Storage Yard:
  • Increased dried wood cost from 4 to 10.
  • Added 2 rope cost.
  • Decreased metal scrap cost from 14 to 10.
  • Removed 8 plastic waste cost.

    Bed:
  • Increased dried wood cost from 6 to 12.
  • Removed 8 plastic waste cost.

    House:
  • Increased dried wood cost from 6 to 12.
  • Increased metal scrap cost from 8 to 10.
  • Removed 8 plastic waste cost.

    Townheart:
  • Decreased liquid storage from 60 to 40.

    RESOURCES
  • Increased boat radius from 300 to 500.

    Seaweed landmarks:
  • Mainly contains seaweed spores now.
  • Contain significantly less seaweed.

    Factory:
  • Added 10 metal scrap.

    Fish shack:
  • Added 10 metal scrap.
  • Removed 20 raw fish.
  • Added 20 dried fish.

    Wood shacks (01):
  • Added 10 metal scrap.
  • Added 5 canned food.

    Wood shacks (02):
  • Added 5 metal scrap.
  • Added 5 canned food.

    Wood shacks (03):
  • Added 5 metal scrap.
  • Added 5 canned food.

    Fishing spot:
  • Reduced fish amount from 25 to 10.

    Starting supplies:
  • Increased water amount from 15 to 20.
  • Decreased food amount from 25 to 20..

    VITALS
  • Removed "New World" condition.
  • Drifters will now sleep, drink & eat when they're at 10% of their respective vitals, instead of at 30%.
  • Thirst will reduce to 0% in 300 seconds instead of 235 seconds.
  • Hunger will reduce to 0% in 600 seconds instead of 333 seconds.
  • Tiredness will reduce to 0% in 600 seconds instead of 600 seconds.
  • Damage from thirst has been reduced by 33%.
  • Damage from hunger has been reduced by 33%.
  • Healing will apply as long as you're not hungry or thirsty (
  • Health will go to 100% in 4 seconds instead of 50 seconds.


Visuals
  • Adjusted the size of buildings to be more uniform.
  • Adjusted the water visuals of stored water.
  • Added small cloud effect when items are finished drying.
  • Placing a marker will now only show the relevant range. Showing the swimming range while placing a boat range caused confusion.


Audio
  • Added sounds for townheart engine and movement.
  • Added sounds for hovering over landmarks.
  • Added sounds for map interactions.


UI
  • Map:
  • Map is now in a 3D view and shows miniature versions of landmarks and point of interest.
  • The town is now represented by a miniature townheart.
  • Shows engine state and fuel contents.
  • Town route is now shown when hovering over destinations.
  • Showing interaction radius for the town as a subtle circle.
  • Added capacity bar under inventory button.
  • Added firewood to resources at the top.
  • Added clear amounts for storage in descriptions of constructions.
  • Added border around the screen when the game is paused.
  • Added engine section in the townheart construction panel.
  • Updated inventory full warning above inventory button.
  • Updated farm recipe panel.
  • Updated inventory full warning icon.
  • Inventory full warning now shows only when the inventory is completely full.
  • Updated UI Icon for nourished to be clearer.
  • Added production time to passive producer UI.
  • Updated UI icon for the landmark interaction assignment.
  • Updated UI icon for wood dryer.
  • Updated UI icon for woodworking shed.
  • Replaced loading screen.
  • Tweaked some icons.
  • Added highlight on the research button when something new is available for research.
  • Added compass arrow pointing to townheart when townheart is not in range. Clicking the arrow will center on the townheart.


Performance
  • Greatly improved physics performance of flotsam in the world.
  • Reduced memory footprint of drifter portraits.


Persistence
  • Updated persistence to support new map mechanic.
  • Reworked large part of the saving and loading system to be more future-proof.


Fixes
  • Fixed issue where load save panel had wrong title.
  • Fixed issue where a stuck seagull or drifter might cause loading to fail.
  • Fixed issue where healing would quickly reduce thirst & hunger.
  • Fixed issue where some audio sources didn't resume playing after being paused.
  • Fixed issue where audio settings weren't properly set in the map view.
  • Fixed issue where character portrait would be white square when your inventory was full.
  • Fixed issue where drifters would not show the proper warning when they couldn't salvage a landmark due to storage being full.
  • Fixed issue where items would get stuck in a producer when deconstructed, causing it to never deconstruct.
  • Fixed issue where passive producers would not be deconstructable when it was marked for deconstruction at the wrong time.
  • Fixed issue where boats would flip upside down and stay turned over. They will now automatically start floating upright.
  • Fixed drifters colliding with landmarks and getting stuck.