Salvete Romans!
Welcome to the first big update for Romestead, and the first milestone on our Roadmap!
We are starting off with some in-depth explanations, then the patch notes for the update, and finally a section about what's ahead!
In this update you can experience nearly everything without having to make a new world, but if you want a better dungeoneering experience, we highly recommend it!
Thank you so much for playing Romestead and supporting us during the months since release! You have inspired many of these changes and we are greatful for all the suggestions, feedback, and comments on our posts that help us make Romestead better every day!
Without further ado, let's get into it. Strap in, this is going to be a long one!
Addressing New World "Requirement"
In this update we're adding many new dungeons, but to experience those you have to create a new world.
This is because in Romestead the entire world is generated when you click "create world". Every dungeon, every exciting location, and every boss is placed in the world once that progress bar finishes. That means that if we want to add new dungeons, there is technically no space to do so without overwriting one that already exists.
We've seen a lot of thoughts and feedback about needing to create a new world to experience new content everytime an update drops, and we hear you! Having to start over every update is something that some games in the same genre do, and can be an exciting chance to re-experience the game or build even bigger and better towns, but it isn't for everyone.
But just to be overly clear: You don't lose worlds from older versions. They just don't get the new dungeons.
We are looking into our options for a solution, as we understand the gravity of this issue, and we want to handle it the right way. We have gotten some good ideas from the community as well as other games, and want to find the solution that works best for Romestead. Especially since there's some pretty big things on the horizon.
Complete Controller Support
You can now play Romestead with a controller!
As this is the first official support for Steam Input, we would love to hear your thoughts and feedback!
We read your messages across all forums and social media, so let us know what you think!
Dungeon Updates
In this update, we're adding over 20+ new unique dungeons, as well as over 70+ new rooms for the challenge dungeons.
As mentioned above, to experience these new dungeons you need to create a new world!
Here's what we're changing in detail:
Challenge Dungeons
We have completely overhauled the challenge dungeons, to offer more engaging battles, strategic encounters and challenging navigation!
The biggest priority was making the level design of the rooms more fun. No longer will you be swarmed by every enemy and bottlenecked at the entrance of the room. This is done partially by the layout around the entrances being larger, and by adding pillars and paths to move around to avoid being trapped. Additionally, if you die the entire room resets meaning that enemies will no longer pile up around the entrance.
Speaking of enemies, they now spawn with greater variety, such as rat packs, rare Gorgon swarms, strategically positioned ranged fallen, and many more! We're aiming for a unique feel for each room, even if you've been inside it three times before. And believe us when we say that the enemies shape the encounter more than you'd think!
Many of the rooms are now filled with deadly traps, some that are completely new to Romestead! While these traps are not necessarily dangerous on their own, when combined with an intense combat encounter it will up the challenge quite a bit!
We've increased the number of rooms per biome significantly and added new biome themes including: forest cavern and crypts, desert crypts, and the volcanic cavern, crypt and foundry.
Unique Dungeons
The unique dungeons have received much love and attention in this update!
As with many other unique dungeons, we are providing unique loot to the bigger ones, and this time, it's not trinkets! We are adding a handful of new options to your weapon loadout, and there should be something for everyone!
In order to really hammer down the uniqueness of these dungeons, we have added many new assets to make for a memorable experience. As you'll be able to see in the screenshot below, this massive tree is only one of many new things you'll be able to see around the world.
Something that is completely new to Romestead is the several rare multi-floor dungeons we are introducing. What this means is that some dungeons will contain a door or stairway leading further down, allowing you to get even more treasures and resources below!
We are also introducing themed loot tables, making the chests feel a little more in sync with the dungeon it's in. Visiting a satyr camp themed dungeon? Chests are now filled with more food and drinks. Delving into a foundry filled with Cyclopelli? Now you'll find more metals and tools!
That being said, while there is new loot we have seen a desire for better droptables, so we will be monitoring this feedback closely.
The intention behind these changes and additions is to provide a short experience that in itself felt like a short adventure.
Change log
Below you'll find the patch notes for this update, including:
Additions
Fixes
balancing
Beta Branch content
Any fix or feature marked with⭐means a change primarily inspired by or requested by the community!
General
Added Steam Input Support (Controller Support)
Fixed parts of the desert not being possible to reach on some worlds.
Fixed decimal points not showing on stats.
Fixed Bronze Cart able to fall through cliffs.
Fixed an issue that could cause a Character save data to become invalid.
Added Thai translations and font rendering.
Minor updates to some translations.
Fixed an issue where the game could be accepting input while the game is not focused.
Fixed issues with using Alt+Enter to toggle fullscreen mode.
Fixed issue where the game would lag out for some players when loading some parts of the volcano.
Fixed a crash with the furniture crafting menu.
Updated some icons.
Updated some translations.
Fixed many other rare crashes.
Citizens
⭐Added new Carpenter job - "Repair".
Carpenter will now work better and get stuck less.
Added more variation to the Citizen Requests.
Multiplayer
⭐Improved network code to be more efficient and responsive. Please try it out if you have been having issues and let us know if it has helped!
⭐Improved network code to be more stable and handle connection issues better.
⭐Added Network quality indicator and warning, including the ability to see the quality of other players connections.
⭐Improved Network code to allow for longer periods of bad connection without disconnecting.
Performance
Improved performance of game on processors with few CPU cores.
Buildings & Constructions
⭐Added a "drop-off zone" to the Material Storage that never fills up.
⭐Added a new Farmland removal tool.
⭐The Crop removal tool will now return the seed of the crop.
⭐Fixed demolishing Decorations not returning the materials.
⭐Fixed demolishing upgraded Buildings not returning the materials of previous tiers.
Fixed the furnace of the upgraded Blacksmith sometimes not accepting coal.
Fixed the furnace of the Brick Oven sometimes throwing out logs.
Fixed an issue with a decoration giving happiness directly to citizens instead of building appeal.
Fixed being able to place Beehive indoors.
Fixed a crash after deleting a Carpenter building while using its Workbench.
⭐Fixed not being able to build road construction sites that were placed beneath objects.
Fixed a crash with the Automatic Scorpio.
Fixed a crash with the carpenter job.
Prevented players and citizens from getting stuck when upgrading the blacksmith.
Furniture
Added ability to sleep in more types of beds.
Fixed some rug furniture not being able to be looted from out in the world.
Fixed furtniture search bar being case sensitive.
Dungeons
Dungeon Overhaul (see section above)
Limit wandering of enemies
Updated aggro area of enemies.
New packs of enemy encounters.
Added over 20 new Unique dungeons.
Added over 70 new Challenge Dungeon Rooms.
Fixed the spike puzzle in "Flamines Volcanalis Foundry" sometimes not having a valid path to cross.
⭐Fixed some minor issues with dungeon quests.
Items & Treasure
⭐Added new weapons as dungeon rewards.
⭐Bows can now receive the "Precise" and "Strong" modifiers.
"Pristine" armour modifiers now give Crit Damage instead of melee damage.
⭐Crafted capes can now receive modifiers.
Updated droptables.
⭐Added new spells to some scrolls.
⭐Fixed some broken weapon abilities.
Enemies
⭐Made aggressive fallen spawn rarer near volcano's edge
Added sprite for "Arrow Trap" enemy.
Fixed issues with stunning some enemies.
Fixed Ashmen only taking 1 damage from fire spells.
Satyrs are no longer immune to auras.
Improved Magus spell behaviours.
Fallen Bloat explodes faster.
General Enemy Balancing.
Elite Teleporting enemies will no longer teleport off the map.
Summoned enemies no longer drop loot.
Bosses
New Phoenix Fight Changes.
⭐Fixed Cyclops boss fight sometimes being unable to progress.
Fauna
⭐Small animals picked up by players will no longer despawn.
Snakes are now immune to poison and root.
Scorpions are no longer immune to burning.
Flora
Fixed fruit trees not shaking properly when hit.
Sound and Music
Fixed issue where music would stutter or break.
Fixed issue where sound would keep looping while the game is paused.
Fixed issue where coal trap and braziers would be deafening if you placed a lot close together.
⭐Removed buzzing insect in plains ambience.
On The Horizon
So what next? Well, we will most likely be spending the coming week putting out a few patches and hotfixes to make sure everything runs smoothly. After that however the team starts working on the first Major Update for Romestead!
We will have more info in the future regarding this, but needless to say, anything that involves a new biome, new bosses, and new building tiers can be nothing else but grand!
That being said, we're feeling generous, so here's some concept art by our very own Josh Robbins to get you excited!
Until next time,
Roma Aeterna!
-The Beartwigs Team