The Kingdom of Rain Update V. 0.8.4

Take shelter, Traveler,

the weather is about to change! Yes, the dynamic weather has arrived with some other enhancements. Before we get to the patch notes, I want to share some details about the new weather system.

The new weather conditions are Clear, Rain and Thunder, from which Rain comes with three different intensities; light, medium and heavy. Rain and Thunder both support sound effects, so you will hear rain pouring and thunder rumbling. Thunder also has four different animated lightning strikes, well, five if you count the mirrored version of one of them. Rain has some effect on the environment too; butterflies will disappear, town torches won't be lit and the streets are pretty much empty. Yes, town folk will mostly stay inside when it rains, so you might have to look for them from the shops, taverns, houses and temples.

Since the daytime changes' visual side is now handled by the new system, I took this opportunity to make some adjustments to the skyboxes, lighting and fog to enhance the atmosphere. Unfortunately the daylight changes are not any smoother than before, and the reason is that changing the lighting, sun position and fog are very heavy on the engine. I tried few different solutions, but each of them caused too much lag, so all the changes happen as before. I highly doubt I can improve it in the future; I would have already done it if I could, but that doesn't mean I stop trying.

Patch Notes

New Stuff:

• RemovedDynamic Weather system with improved daytime changesweather effects can be disabled in the Options menu (at the bottom of the General tab)

• 1440p resolution support (even scan lines scale now correctly)

• Magic Map enhancements: ability to write notes, map markers and legend window to explain them, not to mention that mapping a dungeon floor completely grants an EXP reward

• Turn/Strafe swap can be activated in the Options menu (at the bottom of the General tab)

• Reset Camera button: R on keyboard and R3 on gamepad

• Battle Animation speed adjustment to slow down or speed up the combat

• Enable/Disable Battle Animations

• Phantom Commander: boss of the Temple of the Prophets

• Enhanced sprite for the Condemned Army of Onkalo

• New stair sprites for the Old Tower and the Pramean Lighthouse

• Names to couple of npcs who were missing one

• Some new dialog for rainy days, nothing too important

Changes and Improvements:

• Some adjustment of UI elements, so they scale properly when using 1440p resolution

• Text size has been increased a little bit

• Lots of Optimization

Fixes:

• Mouse turning bug has been finally fixed

• Pramean Silk Quest updates now correctly when bargaining with Kreeta

• Darno's Supplies are now removed when the quest is completed

• Correct Whip added in the tree trunk in the Islands of the Prophets

• Removed Spring Water collect event that prevented searching a dead body in the Great Forest South

• Fog covered Town of Pramea's map no longer misaligns in the minimap and area map

• Teena's dialog in the Pramean Inn now works correctly

• Area name shows now correctly when entering the Pramean Jungle

• Couple of graphical glitches with same fake walls fixed

• Added step sound support to one of the floor tiles in the Well of the Ancients

This is it for now, though there might be some little things that I may have forgotten to mention. Whatever the case, I hope you will enjoy these improvements and fixes.

See you in Twin Falls, just remember to bring your umbrella!

Thank you!

Jani/Witchgrove Games