Devlog #5: The Sea of Tranquility and Beyond

Hi, it's Shibuya from Studio Snowblind, developers of the game. It’s been a while since our last Devlog, and a lot has happened with the project since then.

First off, a big thank you to everyone who played the latest demo and shared feedback. Your comments were, as always, detailed and constructive, and they’ve been a huge help. I went through all of them carefully, and I've made a lot of improvements to the full version based on your feedback.

I’d like to share some of those in this Devlog.

We also had a surprise announcement: the Switch 2 console version was revealed!

A playable demo was shown at Gamescom, and we were grateful and happy to hear that many people stopped by to try it out. Surrounded by so many other indie titles and AAA titles, it was great to see our booth stay busy throughout the event.

Some of you have asked whether this console release might slow down PC development but don't worry! The console port is being handled by the publisher’s special team at PLAYISM. I’m fully focused on the PC version, and this Devlog will include several PC specific improvements.

TOW 2025 Canada Tour

The musical duo group TOW, who composed the soundtrack for this game, will be touring Canada from November 6th to 9th! Each show may feature live performances along with footage and music from Glaciered.

TOW’s unique, atmospheric sound is a core part of this post-human world. If you’re in North America, definitely check them out. Tickets are available here!

Sea of Tranquility

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The first open area you’ll explore is called the Sea of Tranquility, a vast space roughly eight times the size of the demo map.

You can collect minerals, plants, and other resources, then bring them back to your base to upgrade your character and equipment. Hidden around the area are the “Tuai Murals.” Finding them grants points that can be exchanged for new upgrades.

There are several open areas like this in the full game, giving you plenty of freedom to explore, hunt, and gather resources at your own pace.

Revised Food Buff System

You can now take meals at save points without returning to the base. This makes it easier to recover and retry after tough losses.

Introducing the Inspiration System

The full version introduces a new Inspiration system, which adds a fresh layer to the game’s hack-and-slash loop.

Players can earn Inspiration Points by defeating enemies, collecting resources, or making discoveries while exploring. Once you have enough points, you’ll gain a new Inspiration. When you rest at a hideout, these Inspirations turn into wings or mutations.

Each time you acquire an Inspiration, your Inspiration Level increases, and higher levels mean better potential gear. But all Inspirations are lost upon defeat. Since resting slightly lowers your Inspiration Level, you’ll need to decide carefully when to head back and turn Inspirations into new equipment.

Revised Mutation System

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Mutations, essentially passive skills of the game, now function more like equipment. Each has its own rarity and traits, and you can farm for better and more rare ones.

For example, if “Crystal Edge: Double Blades” has the “Poison Inducing” trait, its attacks will inflict poison. You can also swap traits through crafting.

There are over 60 mutations in the full version, each with unique traits. With all the possible combinations of Mutations, Wings, and special traits, you’ll have a deep and flexible build system to explore.

Unique Wings

Unique Wings are special weapons with fixed traits that set them apart from standard wings.

For instance, the Eversounder boosts stamina and draws in nearby enemies with each swing, great for escort missions.

The Unyielding Blade consumes health instead of stamina when attacking. It boasts high base ATK, making it a real powerhouse for skilled players who can manage its risk.

The self-inflicted damage won’t kill you, which means it pairs well with Mutations and Traits that activate at low health, creating some strong synergies for those who like to play on the edge.

There are dozens of these Unique Wings in the full version, waiting to be discovered throughout the world. Adding them into your loadout will open up even more possibilities for creative builds.

Wing Enhancement Improvements

Many players enjoyed crafting and customizing their wings in the demo, so we’ve expanded this feature.

You can now lock traits using a “Stable Crystal,” preventing them from being overwritten when using Brightstones and giving you more control over RNG.

The full version has a lot of new wing traits too!

Dominant Individuals

In areas beyond the Sea of Tranquility, you may encounter Dominant Individuals, elite versions of regular creatures. They’re larger, stronger, and marked by a red fang icon above their health bar.

These are tough opponents but yield great rewards: valuable drops, XP, and Inspiration Points. Whether to challenge them or not is up to you.

Pui’s Progression System

Pui’s progression system has been reworked. Instead of automatically scaling with your level, Pui’s stats now improve based on the abilities you teach. Offensive abilities increase attack power, defensive ones boost health and resistance.

You can expand Pui’s Memory Slots through Memory Trading. Compare the usefulness of abilities and stats to raise Pui in a way that fits your style.

Achievements

The full version includes 50 achievements, covering exploration, combat, and collection. You can track your progress directly in-game.

Difficulty Options

The full release adds multiple difficulty settings: Mild Winter (Easy), Cold Winter (Normal), and Deep Winter (Hard), with possible hidden ones beyond that.

Higher difficulty not only strengthens enemies but also affects other elements, like Dominant Creature spawn rates and the boss stun duration.

The tougher the challenge, the greater the rewards, you’ll earn more XP, better Inspirations, and higher-quality loot.

You can change difficulty anytime at save points or hideouts. Just note that switching mid-playthrough disables difficulty-specific achievements.

Action Cancelling Improvements

All melee attacks can now be canceled by dodging whenever their hitboxes are inactive. This change makes combat feel smoother, more responsive, and more dynamic overall.

Revised Default Keyboard and Mouse Key Mappings

In the demo, the mouse wheel was used for ascending and descending, but that setup didn’t work well for quick or precise actions, the responsiveness varied too much depending on the device.

In the full version, these actions are now assigned to separate keys. The mouse wheel has been reassigned to switch ranged wings (weapons), similar to a typical TPS or FPS control scheme.

We’ve also simplified the left-wing melee attack: instead of clicking while holding the F key, you can now perform the attack directly with F.

And of course, all of these can still be remapped to your preference.

QoL Improvements

QoL improvements are something I work on almost daily. Here are some highlights:

• AMD FSR support has been added, allowing higher frame rates on Radeon graphics cards.

• Spatial Temporal Post-Processing (STP), the new upscaler introduced in Unity 6, has also been implemented. It works even on setups that don’t support DLSS or FSR. We tested it on a GTX 1050Ti Mobile laptop, and it boosted frame rates by around 50%.

• Detailed DLSS / FSR / STP settings are now available. You can fine-tune the balance between image quality and performance, and also adjust sharpening.

• The distance between the player and the camera can now be adjusted in the options menu. This setting is independent from the FOV setting.

• Mouse buttons can now be used in key bindings as well. Previously, only keyboard keys could be assigned, but now you can map mouse buttons too. For mice with four or more extra buttons, those can also be assigned to in-game actions.

  (Note: some devices may not be supported.)

• The camera system has been further refined. I’ve spent a lot of time fine-tuning it, and I finally feel it’s reached a point where I can say, “This is it.”

• Item dismantling has been completely overhauled. Almost every item except nutrients can now be broken down into enhancement materials, so you won’t have to deal with piles of useless items anymore.

• You can now dismantle items directly from the stash screen as well.

• Added support for PlayStation controller glyphs, connecting a PlayStation controller will automatically change in-game button glyphs to match.

• Enemy AI and pathfinding have been improved, making enemies behave more smarter.

• Optimization has also reduced loading times, and the save system has been rewritten to minimize frame rate drops.

About the Release Date

The updated release window of “this winter”, announced alongside the Switch 2 version, applies to all platforms. We made this decision to allow more time for polishing and implementing the many changes introduced here.

Thank you so much for your patience and continued support. We’re working hard to deliver a game worthy of your expectations.

PLAYISM

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