Dev Blog #4 - More Sailing and Ship Equipment

Devblog #4 – Sailing and Ship Equipment

Hello adventurers, welcome back for our fourth Devblog!

It’s now halfway through March and 2026 is off to a cracking start. We gave you a bit of a taste of sailing last month, but we wanted to show it off in more depth now.

Just a reminder that the free Playtest that is still available over on Itch.io. Feel free to check it out if you want to give us some super helpful feedback.

We’re planning on doing an update in the coming month with more content and balancing based on feedback to date.

Sailing

As we highlighted last time, Sailing is fundamental to Distant Isles. You’ll have access to a range of ships, that you can use to sail the seas, engage with traders, or fight pirates and enemy crews.

Fundamental to sailing is the ‘Wind’ mechanic, represented by the wind vane in the top right of the screen.

Sailing with the wind means you will move more quickly, and lose less resilience. However, sailing against the wind will make you slow and consume more resilience. You can see this in the first screenshot above - the wind is blowing South (as shown by the red arrows)

This gives you some tactical options for approaching your enemies. Want to chase down that enemy Xebec? Try approaching perpendicular to make the most of the current wind direction.

Different types of ships will have different features as well. Some ships might only use Oars, meaning they won’t be impacted by wind. Other ships will be fast, at the cost of being weak. You’ll have options to tweak this further with…

Ship Equipment

That’s right, Ship Equipment. Ship equipment and the loadout of your ship will be critical to your survival on the seas.

Ships will can have up to three equipment slots – the Forecastle, Midship and Quarterdeck. Only the best ships will have access to all three slots.

Equipping cannons in particular slots will change which direction you can fire. Want to use your cannons as you chase down enemy ships? Equip your cannon in the Forecastle slot. Want to unleash broadsides? Equip them in the Midship slot.

Wrap Up

Thanks for reading this month’s Devblog. We can’t wait to show you what else we have in store for you.

Just a reminder to Wishlist and Follow on Steam if you want to see more!

Cheerio