Update: Emergency Medicine
June 23, 2018
This week's update ushers in a major change to the core of the game: wounds are no longer guaranteed to be fatal.
But hold on a second, don't equip that health pack just yet. Performing emergency surgery on yourself is harder than it sounds. Better done with the help of a friend.
And this is why wound recovery does not immediately aid a lone griefer. There is safety in numbers.
If you're dreaming of armor and a backpack full of medical syringes as a means of solo self defense, you might want to consider what happens when a griefer gets their hands on the same load-out.
On a completely unrelated note: there are now pigs.
Next week, I'll be working on a much-needed tutorial to explain some of the more subtle features to new players.
And before I hear any grumbling about war crimes and my use of a red cross, this is an artistic work of fiction. The Geneva Conventions were never intended to apply.
| Update: Good Eating
June 15, 2018
There's now a good reason to eat all sorts of delicious foods, instead of just mono-gorging the most efficient and convenient food. Omelettes and tacos and kraut and stew. And even more reason to share food and meals than there ever was before, and hopefully a good reason to have a village chef that might coordinate all of this for you. Tuesday is taco night.
This update adds a YUM mechanic, which gives you a bonus for feasting with a long chain of food variety. The more variety you eat, the better you feel. So let's eat beans for every meal! Er... yeah, so plain bean tacos do get a little boring. Future updates will add some toppings to spice things up, and maybe even some slow-cooked carnitas. Get your limed corn ready, people.
Some of the more fiddly and plentiful seeds can now be stored in bowls, and a new domesticated animal sneaked in there too.
| Update: Big Farm
June 9, 2018
With most of the post-launch growing pains behind us, I was freed up this week to spend all most all of my time on content. There's a lot of new stuff in there, mostly concerning expanded gardening and things you can make with the products of that gardening.
A few of the end-products are personally meaningful to me---things that my family has been making every year for many years, with all most all of the real-life steps in place. In fact, I just ate some of our red-cabbage sauerkraut during my lunch break today.
Oh, and if you've ever tried to cut up a hubbard squash, you know that a kitchen knife isn't going to do the job. The first time I saw one of these monsters in person, many years ago, I felt like I was looking at something straight out of Star Wars. One of the strangest looking edible fruits around.
If you're paying close attention, you will also notice that the days of berry farm utopia are coming to an end, with berries now requiring soil, just like every other crop. However, soil has become both more plentiful and easier to move around. I'm still trying to design new foods in the game so that everything has its niche, but that approach will only take us so far. I envision 100s of unique foods in this game eventually, and I'm currently tinkering with new mechanics that will motivate a varied diet in a simple, straight-forward way (no, it's not a tedious nutrition system, don't worry).
| Update: Small Farm
June 1, 2018
This week's update lays the groundwork for the Big Farm update that is coming next week.
The biggest content additions this week are corn farming, a straw hat, and a high-capacity source of sewing thread from wool.
But the underlying resource systems have been given a complete overhaul.
Water sources now have a fixed, low refill rate, and emptying any source to the bottom is inconsequential, but higher and higher tech water sources have larger and larger capacity. With a deep well and a bucket, water can now be moved 10 units at a time. Moving large quantities of water around is way more efficient, if you reach that level of technology. Wells must be built on top of natural water sources, making cisterns much more useful for on-site water storage far away from a well site. Wells now have a visual indication of how full they are, so you know when you need to start building a new one.
Soil is now a necessary, consumed ingredient for all farming activities, which means it's easier to balance the value of various foods now and in the future (carrots no longer have a huge leg up, because they consume soil too). This has been balanced by making natural soil much more plentiful, and compost much more productive. Tilling is now needed to work soil into the ground instead of to re-work a hardened carrot row.
These changes pave the way for even more advanced water sources and soil fertility technology in the distant future, but also for farming of other, balanced food types in the immediate future.
As promised, blue roses are in there too.
| Update: Families and Funerals
May 26, 2018
Four new characters, for a total of six in each skin tone now. The family code has been fixed so that your kids and grand kids are more likely to look like you.
Graves have had mouse-over names for a while now, but this update pushes further with labeled grave stones that last forever. And of course, you can't have grave stones without roses. But it turns out that roses are a bit of a pain to grow from seed. Welcome to the world of seed stratification, folks.
If you see a white rose in-game, you're looking at something pretty special. Blue roses are coming in the next update.
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