Release 0.5.0.5

It seems like things are going well with the Enchanting update so far. I do need more feedback on it though so I still plan to tweak it over time as I see how people interact with it.

For example I've been told the Energy Drain enchantment feels underwhelming, which is fair. However there is a big difference with it applied to an Iron vs a Gold sword as well as once its levelled up a few times. As a result, its a bit tricky to balance so it still feels useful at first but has room to grow without being overpowered. I have also been busy making a new trailer that is live on the store page, so now that its done I'm plannng the next update.

Roadmap

This is mainly why I'm making this post. I've done my usual and posted a few patch notes at the end of the last one and its made me realise I did spend a decent amount of time on bugs/improvents lately so its probably time to plan for a bigger update.

I've fixed some of the worst combat scenarios such as always jumping on enemies as you fight and they struggled to hurt you so hopefully things are feeling better there as well.

To plan the next update I was going to tackle world file sizes so I took a look over the situation to begin but I quickly realised its not worth working on (bear with me...).

World File Sizes

To help understand why I think this first I need to outline the problem which is that as you explore, world files grow in size. This is unavoidable for games in this genre so the aim is for it to grow as little as possible. In Aiyana the main source of the growth is water.

As you explore, water needs to spread so you don't see sheer vertical walls of water (something you could still occasionally see as the sytems fail to spread properly and I've attempted to address with this update). This spread then triggers the chunks to save since it has recognised the blocks are different. At first I was going to look into not saving a chunk in this specific scenario where the only thing that changed is water but this could lead to bugs.

E.G if you see an area like this:

This is how you have seen the world and that lake just so happens to have a single block preventing water from flooding this cave. Now, if you break this block, currently nothing spreads. But if that block just so happens to be on a chunk edge then when the chunk to the left regenerates, it will check to see if water needs to spread and fill itself with water. So in one run that cave would be empty, you destroy one block, reload the world and then the cave is suddenly flooded. If you are inside that cave at the same time, that is a pretty horrible bug! Basically, I Have to save water changes as the world generates for consistency.

Save Data Format

The next change I considered to improve the situation is to change from saving the entire chunks data to only save changes to a chunk. So instead of saving the entire chunk, I only save blocks you have added/removed. Now for your base and large structures this could save a decent amount of space. As you explore the world and accidently destroy a block in combat, only the fact there is air in 1 spot is saved instead of the entire chunk. Sounds good, doesn't work.... The problem is again water. Water is already the source of bloated world files and as water spreads it would still generate a lot of data. I think in theory this approach could reduce the size of world files, but the key word here is theory and to find out would take reworking a significant amount of the core logic. From a rough guess, I can't see this huge change to the code actually saving that much space for save files so it doesn't seem worth it. I then made a point of comparing the save file to other popular games in this genre and it turns out I'm already doing things in a really efficient way so its starting to feel a bit like chasing a unicorn.

Next Update Considerations

One change that has been requested is to be able to manually save so its been bumped higher up my list. On this same vein, Steam cloud has turned out to be more of a mess than I expected. Its pretty annoying if you relaunch quickly (say after a crash) and have to wait for it to sync. So I'm considering disabling Steam Cloud as being on as a default and to instead add options to manually upload to the cloud for each world/character, or possibly a setting to turn on auto uploads etc. Controller support is also always on my mind. I have tackled a decent amount of it recently (as part of this patch) but I'll be honest its fiddly work I don't enjoy so I'm going to continue my usual of tackling it in bits and pieces to spread out the monotomy.

World generation is building up into a task I want to tackle soon. Too often in worlds you have to explore a ridiculous distance to find a desert. Ore veins are currently "hard-ish to find, but large once you do" and I want to see how "easier to find, but far smaller" feels instead. Changing world generation means you would need to regenerate your world though and its something I want to do as little as possible so with this in mind I should also add new biomes.

New biomes is a Lot of work since it involves a lot of art and things like redistributing or adding new crop types, which means new cooking recipes. They are also better with unique animals and various terrain shapes....

Now, the reason why I was trying to optimise world save files in the first place is because its finally feeling like its time to go back to Multiplayer. I always worried that if it takes X time beat Aiyana, its going to take half as long with a friend so I need to make sure there is enough content before adding multiplayer, and it feels like there is.

What this leads me to think is, "is anything above more important than multiplayer?" and my conclusion leans towards no. I've only just recently hit 1000 sales after being on the store for 2 years. I want Aiyana to be profitable and multiplayer feels like my best chance of spreading the word since it gives you a reason to tell your friends about it.

I've not made a 'final' decision yet so please feel free to post your thoughts below and if you think there are more important things I should be tackling or even if you just agree with my long ramblings! Since I just made that new trailer I've been spending some time trying to market Aiyana by reaching out to streamers etc to see if I can generate some sales that way as well.

Actual Release Notes

• Fixed frog stew having no visuals

• Fixed the large stew visuals rendering too high and not being very visible as a preview for the UI

• Added a border to the creative mode and crafting search bars so its easier to know where to click

• Moved books, scroll, inkwell and scales into the furniture tab of creative mode

• Added the names of the feed types to the tamed animal info screen

• Fixed placing seashells on grass also spawning a pickup, letting you place them infinitely

• Fixed placing seaweed in water would generate a pickup as well

• Fixed single block heights of water not rendering once you place a seashell etc within it

• Changed buckets collisions to let you walk through them (prevents you feeling stuck in dungeons)

• Added the current worlds seed to the Feedback form (this was always sending, I just wanted an in game way to view your seed)

• Updated the crafting benches opening animation to be a bit more graceful when placed beside another block

• Added a description to the long thin wooden tables in the crafting UI

• Bears now run very slightly faster & can swim a bit quicker

• Increased how much enemies keep moving whilst playing attack animations. This means they skate a little more during combat but can hit you much more consistently

• Fixed fish gathering on the edge of a chunk if it failed to spread water properly and resulted in a sheer edge of air

• Fixed some scenarios where water wouldn't spread properly, resulting in walls of missing water (worlds already generated will still have this until you regenerate them)

• Updated the wording of the totem screen to emphasize that blocks need to be placed within its borders

• Attempted to defensively fix portals spawning in the wrong place

• Added some protection around some code that was preventing worlds from loading at odd times

• Fixed dungeon levers not teleporting you to their starting position if you loaded directly into a dungeon

• Added some safety checks for dungeons to ensure the loot doors get removed in scenarios where you load near a lever but the door didn't load due to a small chunk distance + large dungeon

• Updated buttons so they pop a bit more, the UI looks quite different as a result

• Updating the lunging logic for animals so they lunge attack whilst in the water to prevent Walk On Water users being almost immune to attacks (Sorry Awstin!)

• Changed how animals interact with trees so bigger ones like Treants can walk through them easily during combat

• Disabled the water drops on your feet whilst walk on water is active (it made sense with the old visuals but looks a bit weird with the current ones)

• Fixed an issue with dungeon save data that could prevent it from generating properly if you died/quit very quickly after entering a dungeon

• Fixed the Reaper Statue being labelled as the Dungeon Statue

• Fixed snapping blocks like statues from dungeons placing in the utterly wrong place if placed in a position where Z < 0

• Added controller support to the crafting UI (mostly done but still some bugs to solve)

• Added a Rich Presence for exploring a dungeon

• Fixed not being able to click the Dungeons/Portals buttons after discovering a lot of portals and having a long scroll list

• Fixed not being able to reselect a dungeon as a portals target if you set it to go to the lost civ and only had 1 dungeon unlocked

• Fixed spawning too high when entering the Lost Civ if you went to a portal before going to the lost civ for the first time in the same run

Release 0.5.0.6

• Fixed sliding very slightly after being knocked back by an enemy and not jumping

• Fixed not being able to select which potion output to produce properly if you are using two previously uncombined ingredients but already know their properties

• Fixed fertiliser being lost if you fertilised dry soil that later becomes wet

• Doubled the cooldown time of the heal spell, its feeling too generous for how powerful it can become

• Removed a log that would trigger each time you are influenced by an external force (E.G enemies knocking you back)