Really nice setting and atmosphere. Kinda reminds me of OSRS in a way.
The first thing I did after the intro was cut some grass with a scythe. It would've been nice if there was some sort of feedback besides just the number at the top of the screen going up (maybe the grass disappears or becomes shorter). If you stay in one spot while cutting grass, the number at the top of the screen goes up much slower, but since there's not much feedback, it's hard to tell that you're supposed to move around.
Fishing is fun. Personally, I would say that S to reel in would make more sense than W, since you're bringing the fish towards yourself. But that's just me.
Scrolling the mouse wheel in the tutorial windows also moved the camera back and forth. Maybe if the mouse is over the tutorial window, disable forward and backward camera movement.
Are you playing without a dedicated GPU? The grass should be cutting properly, but since it is a custom shader it will not work properly without a dedicated GPU.
Played for roughly 1h, I didn't really find anything new Gameplay wise to try out. Glad to see you haven't given up.
The new Town "lineart" felt a bit too stark in the beginning, but I got used to it rather quickly. It's really nice that you have some defiinition to your Shapes through that, and that you have some new Signs around Town, makes finding your Way a lot lot easier.
I don't know if you changed anything with the furthest Tree Lods on the low Areas, but I think they look better then last Time I played. The ones on the top Floors don't tho. You also have some Pink showing when looking at the topmost Tree above Town from below, probably some missing Transparency on the Lod of the Fences there. Could also be the Flowers being visible from the Bottom, but either Way it looks buggy, even if it isn't. If its the Flowers, consider sinking the Terrain in very slightly, so they aren't as visible from below. Or give them a LOD for far away that hides the Purple.
At least when nearly fully maxed on Nutrients sleeping for 8 hours restores my entire Stamina. Still feels too unforgiving at lower Nutrients tho.
Overall the Game feels lighter in visuals, but I don't know if thats just from not having played for a long Time.
Ocean Floor is still empty, Town is still missing a lot of movement, NPCs, Pets, or something, and especially small Doodads around to make it feel more alive. Some Stuff like the Rocks outside of Town could also be placed better.
There are some big Trees in the Distance I want to go but couldn't, shame.
When looking at the Bamboo Forest from below right at the Cliff Corner, you can get the LODs to very visibly pop, due to having vastly different Heights/Starting further towards you on higher Distance LODs.
The Cliff itself also still is to flat and repetitive I think, it could use some big Rocks at the Bottom, some Shape to itself.
The Big Rocks, big Trees and Birches(?) look different from the Town textures, a lot more color variations and depth to them, would like to see that on your Wood Beams, Plastered Walls, etc.
I got quite a bit of Lag throughout playing, but thats very likely on me, my PC didn't survive the Move all to well, frequently crashing on its own, so don't assume its from your Game. Just something to maybe keep in mind.
One Big Source of additional Lag however was whenever the Town was mostly in View. When I looked towards Cliffs or Away from Town it was fine, so something in there is rendering really slowly I'm assuming.
The Street Lights don't really look like they're lighting anything at Night. Making Night overall darker, giving them a bigger Radius and some actual Light, alongside some Moths or something in the warmer Times of Year could add a lot to the Towns Night-Time Atmosphere.
Noticed your big Clock is actually working, nice.
Horizon could blend in more with the Ocean I think. It looks like a bit too stark of a Contrast. Some fake long Distance Fog maybe.
Town Architekture looks a bit all over the Place. You have Armaments on the Walls, clearly ment for Protection, but then connect that seamlessly with smooth walkway Ramps to some Parks, either with Pillars and Dragonheads on Smooth Rock Pavillons, more modern looking Arches, Wood, Iron and Stone Fences all over the Place, nice dark mustered Walls on the Canals, and the Top of them, which then don't have a Top, but just the generic Cobblestone from all the other Areas. Should have a bit of a Trim I think.
You have some Exceptions in your Bug Report, one with Adams Weapons or something, with no further Information, and a few with your Autosave failng to find a Key in your Dictionary. Maybe because I just loaded my old Save.
Music dampening when entering Water feels too harsh, maybe just a quarter or half second Transition Time instead of instant.
I stil think a bunch of Stuff on the Cooking, Farming etc. UI could be improved or put into additional Information for if you really care about it, instead of just wanting to quickly cook up some Eggs or something.
Thanks for the feedback Tomo, but it is 95% about rocks and trees... did you not get your Fairy? All you have to do is talk to Tiana (the big fairy lady), holding F lets you interact with it. Getting the Fairy also grants you more movement options.
If its mostly about Rocks and Trees, then that's what I can mostly complain about. I didn't look for a changelog or anything, and it's been a long while since I played, so no Idea if you're looking for Feedback on some other Areas, sorry. ( if you do, just let me know and I'll give it a try this Evening).
Didn't realize that you added some new NPC(s?), but found at least one while searching for Tiana, nice. Hope Fredericks research your Towns performance Issues, at this Point at least for me its the single biggest Issue. There is a Ton of rather small pretty high Polycount Meshes scattered around repeatedly, like these Logs, which could be merged into a single much lower Poly version, which might contribute to it.
It may also be a multitude of transparent Windows being rendered behind each other when looking through the Town, since basically every Window has Transparency in it. Also looking through the Center, you can easily line up the Transparent Water with both sides of the Glas Planes for the Central underwater Bar. Both of these are Details I don't think matter too much, and could be reduced or removed, you have Grids on your Windows anyway to make it clear that its a Window, you could just leave the Glass out entirely, at least on the smaller Ones, not on the big full Panels obviously, and merging these Woodstacks or similar Things wouldn't alter any Looks I think. On the Other Hand, you could use that Detail on just building out the Town with Furniture properly.
NPCs should have a bit more of a strict Daily Routine I think. It makes Sense for them to look for their Needs, but it should priority or restrict them to i.e. their own Bed instead of any, or a specific Area to work in, etc. Maybe Someone always goes for a walk on the Town walls in the Evening, maybe a few can be met each Saturday in the general Store refreshing Groceries? Just build in some forced Habits to make it easier to find certain NPCs, I spent over 1h running in circles through the Town and every building trying to find Tiana.
The Fairy Queen Stuff is nice. I firstly noticed the moving Mouths there, nice touch. While I did spent a long Time searching for it, and I am assuming its as a Placeholder for now, I think it'd make more Sense for her to not just wander around Town, but appear on certain Nights/at certain Locations, or generally more wandering outside Town somewhere first. While very Short, it really is nice for a Quest. Could use a bit more proper introduction, and some Fairy Tutorial afterwards, but gives a nice Idea on how the Game could look later, once proper Quests and Things to do are added in. It's really something that's been missing. Also Fairy Animations are cute, I was very pleasantly surprised at her flying up to the Screen when I tabbed out to write this.
After getting some more failed Dictionaries on autosave, I remembered to look at the Help screen recommending some Graphic Options. Turns out a big Issue comes from the Grass in the Town . It's the only one that gets LODed into Planes, and does a lot for Performance, a lot. I'm suggesting to look into that Grass. Also it LODs really terribly in some Areas, which wouldn't be an issue unless you turn down Graphics to minimum and jump onto the Roofs with your Fairy. As that's really the only Place its as visible.
As far as I can tell, new Movement restricts to wall running, wall juming, wall sliding, and with the fairy multijump. I don't know if the Fairy actually does something other then multijump and emote, I'd prefer it if it helped in some other Areas and interact with its environment a bit more, but maybe that's coming. I did not find any use for the Parkouring, apart from climbing up to the Roofs of the City, and I don't think any of that really added anything to the Game. Slding down the Walls, and maybe grabbing the Top and pulling yourself up (wich isn't in the Game as far as I know) when you're near a Ledge would be fine I think, but running along them and jumping off of them just feels like it'd belong in a different kind of Game.
The Fairy Wings dissappear under Water.
I think, apart from the Performance Issue, the biggest Things to do first would still be filling out the Town, which as far as I know is at least beginning a bit, with some new NPCs, adding more Dialogue and better Quests for NPCs, which is showcased with the Fairy Queen already I'm assuming, improving the UI on most Things, and replacing the Gathering Cart with proper Actions to chop Trees for Wood, or Stuff like that. The Fishing was a Step in the right Direction there, and I'm assuming the Rest is going to follow eventually aswell.
We are working right now on better LOD for the furniture, the windows might actually by impacting it more than we thought too.
The NPCs won't change much until we finally have time to do a full overhaul on the AI, we are not happy with the current state, but the overhaul will take months.
Also you could just click on Tiana's map icon to get a guide line to her, it is explained in the tutorial when it tells you to speak to every NPC.
Right now the Fairy points out new critters, shimmering critters and plays with poofah, you can also headpat her by holding F and dragging the cursor over her head gently, the headpats and cheekpinches will influence her behavior based on her last action.
My brother was messing with the grass before we got a deluge of bug reports that needed urgent fix, maybe he left something unfinished there.
The fairy wing is easy to fix, it is probably drawing in the wrong layer I will check it.
The movement will have more use once we open up the map, after the Fairy colony feature we will start expanding the world, we will also remove the placeholder cart and mine to add real trees to cut and rocks to mine.
I'm assuming most of the Stuff with finding Tiana, interacting with the Fairy etc. is or would be explained in some Form of Tutorial then, which either isn't in, or I missed/forgot about, due to just loading an old safe instead of starting over again. Sorry.
the animations seem pretty high quality, but as soon as the game starts you are thrown into the game without really any direction of what to do, so the player essentially ends up going around in the (very nice) large village, in a where the fuck do i go fashion.
jumping in the initial house kind of glitches the camera, maybe the roof should be slightly taller?
it's pretty annoying having to point the mouse directly at the NPCs to talk to them instead of merely being near them.
also, the CLICK sound used by the text in the cutscene is pretty jarring. maybe something softer would be more appropriate.
Comments
Really nice setting and atmosphere. Kinda reminds me of OSRS in a way.
The first thing I did after the intro was cut some grass with a scythe. It would've been nice if there was some sort of feedback besides just the number at the top of the screen going up (maybe the grass disappears or becomes shorter). If you stay in one spot while cutting grass, the number at the top of the screen goes up much slower, but since there's not much feedback, it's hard to tell that you're supposed to move around.
Fishing is fun. Personally, I would say that S to reel in would make more sense than W, since you're bringing the fish towards yourself. But that's just me.
Scrolling the mouse wheel in the tutorial windows also moved the camera back and forth. Maybe if the mouse is over the tutorial window, disable forward and backward camera movement.
Good luck anon!
Are you playing without a dedicated GPU? The grass should be cutting properly, but since it is a custom shader it will not work properly without a dedicated GPU.
Yeah, I have an RX 6900 XT. The grass was still moving with the wind, so I'm not sure why I didn't see it being cut. Might be something on my end.
Played for roughly 1h, I didn't really find anything new Gameplay wise to try out. Glad to see you haven't given up.
The new Town "lineart" felt a bit too stark in the beginning, but I got used to it rather quickly. It's really nice that you have some defiinition to your Shapes through that, and that you have some new Signs around Town, makes finding your Way a lot lot easier.
I don't know if you changed anything with the furthest Tree Lods on the low Areas, but I think they look better then last Time I played. The ones on the top Floors don't tho. You also have some Pink showing when looking at the topmost Tree above Town from below, probably some missing Transparency on the Lod of the Fences there. Could also be the Flowers being visible from the Bottom, but either Way it looks buggy, even if it isn't. If its the Flowers, consider sinking the Terrain in very slightly, so they aren't as visible from below. Or give them a LOD for far away that hides the Purple.
At least when nearly fully maxed on Nutrients sleeping for 8 hours restores my entire Stamina. Still feels too unforgiving at lower Nutrients tho.
Overall the Game feels lighter in visuals, but I don't know if thats just from not having played for a long Time.
Ocean Floor is still empty, Town is still missing a lot of movement, NPCs, Pets, or something, and especially small Doodads around to make it feel more alive. Some Stuff like the Rocks outside of Town could also be placed better.
There are some big Trees in the Distance I want to go but couldn't, shame.
When looking at the Bamboo Forest from below right at the Cliff Corner, you can get the LODs to very visibly pop, due to having vastly different Heights/Starting further towards you on higher Distance LODs.
The Cliff itself also still is to flat and repetitive I think, it could use some big Rocks at the Bottom, some Shape to itself.
The Big Rocks, big Trees and Birches(?) look different from the Town textures, a lot more color variations and depth to them, would like to see that on your Wood Beams, Plastered Walls, etc.
I got quite a bit of Lag throughout playing, but thats very likely on me, my PC didn't survive the Move all to well, frequently crashing on its own, so don't assume its from your Game. Just something to maybe keep in mind.
One Big Source of additional Lag however was whenever the Town was mostly in View. When I looked towards Cliffs or Away from Town it was fine, so something in there is rendering really slowly I'm assuming.
The Street Lights don't really look like they're lighting anything at Night. Making Night overall darker, giving them a bigger Radius and some actual Light, alongside some Moths or something in the warmer Times of Year could add a lot to the Towns Night-Time Atmosphere.
Noticed your big Clock is actually working, nice.
Horizon could blend in more with the Ocean I think. It looks like a bit too stark of a Contrast. Some fake long Distance Fog maybe.
Town Architekture looks a bit all over the Place. You have Armaments on the Walls, clearly ment for Protection, but then connect that seamlessly with smooth walkway Ramps to some Parks, either with Pillars and Dragonheads on Smooth Rock Pavillons, more modern looking Arches, Wood, Iron and Stone Fences all over the Place, nice dark mustered Walls on the Canals, and the Top of them, which then don't have a Top, but just the generic Cobblestone from all the other Areas. Should have a bit of a Trim I think.
You have some Exceptions in your Bug Report, one with Adams Weapons or something, with no further Information, and a few with your Autosave failng to find a Key in your Dictionary. Maybe because I just loaded my old Save.
Music dampening when entering Water feels too harsh, maybe just a quarter or half second Transition Time instead of instant.
I stil think a bunch of Stuff on the Cooking, Farming etc. UI could be improved or put into additional Information for if you really care about it, instead of just wanting to quickly cook up some Eggs or something.
Thanks for the feedback Tomo, but it is 95% about rocks and trees... did you not get your Fairy? All you have to do is talk to Tiana (the big fairy lady), holding F lets you interact with it. Getting the Fairy also grants you more movement options.
If its mostly about Rocks and Trees, then that's what I can mostly complain about. I didn't look for a changelog or anything, and it's been a long while since I played, so no Idea if you're looking for Feedback on some other Areas, sorry. ( if you do, just let me know and I'll give it a try this Evening).
I'll also go and try out the Fairy later.
Talk to Tiana (the large fairy lady) to get your Fairy, also download the new version, we fixed a load of bugs.
Didn't realize that you added some new NPC(s?), but found at least one while searching for Tiana, nice. Hope Fredericks research your Towns performance Issues, at this Point at least for me its the single biggest Issue. There is a Ton of rather small pretty high Polycount Meshes scattered around repeatedly, like these Logs, which could be merged into a single much lower Poly version, which might contribute to it.
It may also be a multitude of transparent Windows being rendered behind each other when looking through the Town, since basically every Window has Transparency in it. Also looking through the Center, you can easily line up the Transparent Water with both sides of the Glas Planes for the Central underwater Bar. Both of these are Details I don't think matter too much, and could be reduced or removed, you have Grids on your Windows anyway to make it clear that its a Window, you could just leave the Glass out entirely, at least on the smaller Ones, not on the big full Panels obviously, and merging these Woodstacks or similar Things wouldn't alter any Looks I think. On the Other Hand, you could use that Detail on just building out the Town with Furniture properly.
NPCs should have a bit more of a strict Daily Routine I think. It makes Sense for them to look for their Needs, but it should priority or restrict them to i.e. their own Bed instead of any, or a specific Area to work in, etc. Maybe Someone always goes for a walk on the Town walls in the Evening, maybe a few can be met each Saturday in the general Store refreshing Groceries? Just build in some forced Habits to make it easier to find certain NPCs, I spent over 1h running in circles through the Town and every building trying to find Tiana.
The Fairy Queen Stuff is nice. I firstly noticed the moving Mouths there, nice touch. While I did spent a long Time searching for it, and I am assuming its as a Placeholder for now, I think it'd make more Sense for her to not just wander around Town, but appear on certain Nights/at certain Locations, or generally more wandering outside Town somewhere first. While very Short, it really is nice for a Quest. Could use a bit more proper introduction, and some Fairy Tutorial afterwards, but gives a nice Idea on how the Game could look later, once proper Quests and Things to do are added in. It's really something that's been missing. Also Fairy Animations are cute, I was very pleasantly surprised at her flying up to the Screen when I tabbed out to write this.
After getting some more failed Dictionaries on autosave, I remembered to look at the Help screen recommending some Graphic Options. Turns out a big Issue comes from the Grass in the Town . It's the only one that gets LODed into Planes, and does a lot for Performance, a lot. I'm suggesting to look into that Grass. Also it LODs really terribly in some Areas, which wouldn't be an issue unless you turn down Graphics to minimum and jump onto the Roofs with your Fairy. As that's really the only Place its as visible.
As far as I can tell, new Movement restricts to wall running, wall juming, wall sliding, and with the fairy multijump. I don't know if the Fairy actually does something other then multijump and emote, I'd prefer it if it helped in some other Areas and interact with its environment a bit more, but maybe that's coming. I did not find any use for the Parkouring, apart from climbing up to the Roofs of the City, and I don't think any of that really added anything to the Game. Slding down the Walls, and maybe grabbing the Top and pulling yourself up (wich isn't in the Game as far as I know) when you're near a Ledge would be fine I think, but running along them and jumping off of them just feels like it'd belong in a different kind of Game.
The Fairy Wings dissappear under Water.
I think, apart from the Performance Issue, the biggest Things to do first would still be filling out the Town, which as far as I know is at least beginning a bit, with some new NPCs, adding more Dialogue and better Quests for NPCs, which is showcased with the Fairy Queen already I'm assuming, improving the UI on most Things, and replacing the Gathering Cart with proper Actions to chop Trees for Wood, or Stuff like that. The Fishing was a Step in the right Direction there, and I'm assuming the Rest is going to follow eventually aswell.
We are working right now on better LOD for the furniture, the windows might actually by impacting it more than we thought too.
The NPCs won't change much until we finally have time to do a full overhaul on the AI, we are not happy with the current state, but the overhaul will take months.
Also you could just click on Tiana's map icon to get a guide line to her, it is explained in the tutorial when it tells you to speak to every NPC.
Right now the Fairy points out new critters, shimmering critters and plays with poofah, you can also headpat her by holding F and dragging the cursor over her head gently, the headpats and cheekpinches will influence her behavior based on her last action.
My brother was messing with the grass before we got a deluge of bug reports that needed urgent fix, maybe he left something unfinished there.
The fairy wing is easy to fix, it is probably drawing in the wrong layer I will check it.
The movement will have more use once we open up the map, after the Fairy colony feature we will start expanding the world, we will also remove the placeholder cart and mine to add real trees to cut and rocks to mine.
Thank you again for checking out our game Tomo!
I'm assuming most of the Stuff with finding Tiana, interacting with the Fairy etc. is or would be explained in some Form of Tutorial then, which either isn't in, or I missed/forgot about, due to just loading an old safe instead of starting over again. Sorry.
We still haven't finished the fairy feature, so yes, there will be a tutorial
the animations seem pretty high quality, but as soon as the game starts you are thrown into the game without really any direction of what to do, so the player essentially ends up going around in the (very nice) large village, in a where the fuck do i go fashion.
jumping in the initial house kind of glitches the camera, maybe the roof should be slightly taller?
it's pretty annoying having to point the mouse directly at the NPCs to talk to them instead of merely being near them.
also, the CLICK sound used by the text in the cutscene is pretty jarring. maybe something softer would be more appropriate.
I will change that click sound