Echo of the Wilds News

Hey echo strands, fresh and old. I managed to catchup with some Let's Plays recently which always gets those creative almonds activating. Not a huge content update this one, but some nice new bits and bobs and changes to make the wilds more wildly but agreeable to explore.

[h3]More Time To Die[/h3]
The biggest change is perhaps there's now a bit more time to play around with each day. Previously you had 4 time slots which has now been extended to 5, though you'll need to pack your torch as the extra time takes place at twilight. Previously I felt the smaller areas were under-used as they tend to have to compete against the larger areas brimming with resources, but now each day you can squeeze in an extra visit to one of these smaller areas.

[h3]Funky Tunes[/h3]
In the Homely Oddity you can now find a Radio to take home or carry around if you wish. When switched on it will randomly play from 11 new funky music tracks made by the talented Antti Luode. Drop it off at your camp for a nice little welcome when traveling back to your wildly home. And if you fancy listening to more of Antti's music you can check them out here: https://www.soundclick.com/artist/default.cfm?bandid=1277008

[h3]Status Doc[/h3]
A Status Screen has been added from your docket which offers your current run stats to hand, such as days, map complete percentage, etc. The main reason for adding it though was to add descriptions for all the various status effects, which previously you could only guess what they did. Carryable items that have some sort of effect will now also show as a status effect (eg when carrying Fragranced Flowers or an Amulet).

[h3]New Areas[/h3]
Some new small areas to explore.
- Restless Marker: Two of these exist, one that increases your maximum Stamina and another to increase your maximum Thirst.
- Chestly Cave: Two extra storage chests you can teleport to to keep your camp nicely decluttered.
- Endly Outgrowth: Has some very special wood that temporarily at least removes the burden of firing up your camp fire each night.

[h3]New Furniture[/h3]
I mainly just wanted to add some new visual ways of making your camp feel a little more comfily homely.
- Raised Bed: Provides extra storage and prevents some stamina loss when sleeping.
- Bed Shelter: Prevents some stamina loss when sleeping in rain/snow.
- Fire Pit: Replaces the old Leaf Hood, and increases the burn worth of items chucked on the fire.
- Flower Pots: Prevents and cures any overnight illnesses.
- Viney Lights: Provides some light to your camp at night.

[h3]Camp Furniture Changes[/h3]
- Mixery Bowl: Added Con Carne and Vindaloo recipes. Bloodied Hearts now require two Purity Flowers.
- Mulchery Bin: The chance of rotten items becoming Flawless Fertiliser is now based on how many worms/maggots are in the bin.
- Growy Patch: You can now plant the crop items (eg a potato/carrot/flower which will turn into a mature root). You can no longer plant or use fertiliser during Winter.

[h3]Area Changes[/h3]
- Each of the four talisman altar areas now hide a new secret amulet which each do some useful things (eg the Sunlit Amulet allows you to travel to an extra Explore area each morning).
- Ashy Altar: The secret amulet effect now instead allows you to learn bushcraft recipes without bestowing anything.
- Rocky Gateway: Tweaked the design of the pedestal so it's easy to see the counter markings. Added a hint when viewing the colossus statue. Adding a bird to the Forests map icon, and a frog to the Marshes map icon to give a further hint.
- Plains Gateway: Tweaked the bestowith text to reference "foodling" so you don't waste your time fetching non-food items.
- Jungly Altar: Extended the intro story scene to emphasise the importance of the area (since it will probably be the first altar area you find). Added extra hint descriptions to the orb and floor holes based on the puzzle progression. Added examinables to the sunrise decorations so it's clear they have meaning.
- Rocky Altar: Extended the intro story scene. The tablet pieces no longer behave like items to pick up, instead you just view them by examining their mantle. Added examinables to the wall diagrams so it's clear they have meaning. The right-side of the path has it's room horizontally flipped so it's easier to navigate. Added some spooky foreground spectres.
- Cavern Altar: The maze rooms closest to the maze's entrance now have the tentacle effect to help discern the route.
- Plains Altar: Added a hint when examining the constellation referencing where you may see the completed version.
- Highlands: Added an extra sign post message hinting using a spade may be useful.
- Growy Allotments: Added a Rootly Storage box (can store 12 roots). Same changes as the Growy Patch.
- Orchard Shrubbery: You can now bestow Gold Sprinkles, Engolden Hunk and goldy Astral Orbs to the altar which each affect the berry regrowth chance differently.
- Astral Sanctum: A few of the pedestals can no longer be interacted with (the types of Astral Orbs available are randomised based on the day and time).
- Foresty Sculpture: Rotated the orientation of the dots so it's rather less confusing.
- Appley Tree: Added a message hinting at its fertilising desires. Fertilising the tree without it having a heart will no longer have an effect.
- Treasure Cove: Added chance of the booty having Engolden Hunk items, which can be bashed to give 3 Golden Nuggets.
- Homely Oddity: Reduced the chance of Junk Meals respawning. Using the doorway will now invoke black spirits in the area you appear in.

[h3]Miscellaneous Changes[/h3]
- Gamepad - Analogue Stick: Increased the running threshold so it's easier to walk. Increased the Up/Down deadzone so it's harder to accidentally interact with a world object.
- Re-added the old sleepwalking after each dream to better connect the story scenes and give you a bit of extra free time.
- Daily weather/status effects are a bit more common now, and added 2 more (Bleak Malaise, Blossom Winds).
- Mind Map: Changed how time is visually represented to make it more intuitive. Added a gold lintel to each of the areas that contain a Talisman Piece (otherwise it can be easy to ignore the Humongous Head).
- Parchment has been renamed to Mindly Map so it's more evident it's a very useful item to craft. It's also a bit more involving to craft as you now also need a feather, which you can grab from the new bird nests (alongside a little egg to griddle for breckie).
- Paper messages will always now be added to the Journal after being read, even if you haven't yet found the Homely Oddity area.
- Added Rotting Fruits which is now what fruits rot to, and is a better fertiliser than Rotting Veg.
- Blue Spiny: Can no longer be used on larger trees.
- Powdery Majica: Changed several items to make things more interesting (eg woods change into other woody items instead of just turning into Purity Flowers).
- Astral Orb: Red orbs will now give a selection of meaty delights. Green orbs will now rejuvenate all camp flora.
- Removed the Spiral Stalk and Coconut Flask as the drilling mechanic was rather irrelevant.
- Rather a lot of bug fixes and some other minor bits and bobs.



Note save files from the previous version of the game should work fine if you just fancy having a gander at the new stuff pronto.

Enjoy! :]

- Fixed several issues related to control remapping, notably the gamepad button remapping not working as intended.

Just some bug fixes. :]

- If you exited to the title screen whilst holding a torch then loaded a game it would show a graphical error.
- You could craft camp furniture multiple times.
- When stood in front of a chopped down tree the Fertilise button prompt would still show.
- Astral Orb: You couldn't activate these if they were on the floor.
- Filled Paper: You could wrongly read them from the floor.
- Ashy Altar: Learning a craft whilst the player is on the very edge of the altar collision mask would softlock you.
- Ashy Peddler: You could sometimes wrongly win Paper.
- Plains Gateway: Tweaked the Plant Sweat Orb interaction text so it's a bit less confusing.
- Humongous Head: You couldn't offer items to the Head during Winter. Added Winter-specific graphics.
- Witchy Brewer: When bestowing a mushroom skipping the dialogue too quickly would softlock you.

- Fixed a save bug where saving over an existing slot would retain some of the Crafting recipes from the old slot.

Greetings strands fresh and old, it's been some time since the Wilds welcomed. :]

The previous version of Echo of the Wilds was made in a rather old version of GameMaker, so I spent a bit of time updating it to the new version of GameMaker, and since I had to do a bunch of tinkering under the hood thought I might as well just have a good old rummage through it all.

There's not a huge amount in terms of brand new stuff, but a lot of modernisations to make the game nicer to play. Note there are some big changes so old game save files won't work in this new version. If you want to continue playing the previous version it's now available in the Betas Tab of the game properties.

The biggest change is how the map system works. Previously you just had a small map and had to constantly Forget old places to make room for new Scouted places. An issue with this is it's very difficult for newer players to get a sense of progression and direction through the game, as well as not really knowing if/when areas will become useful. You no longer have to Forget areas, instead you now craft Paper which is then added to your existing Map increasing its size. It gives a very good sense of where you are in the game and is quite nice to look over to see how far you've come. You can also do some more interesting things with it, for example the Gateways now block off entire regions, and the Treasure Cove is more of a true treasure hunt.

The other main change is in the way you learn bushcrafts. Previously it felt pretty random what you were forced to learn, but now you have more control so you can be more strategic with it. The value of bestowed items is now also added together and visually represented so you have a better idea of what's going on. This is especially useful for bestowing high value foods since now excess value is no longer wasted.

And a bunch of other stuff...
- Game now runs at 60 FPS.
- Text resolution size has doubled to make it easier to read.
- Silky smooth sub-pixel camera movements.
- Button prompts show the bound button and can be set to different inputs (e.g. keyboard, Xbox pad, etc).
- Can rebind gamepad controls.
- Can change the game's difficulty mid-run via The Further.
- Separate volume sliders for Music and Sound Effects.
- The amount of save slots has doubled to 6 and you can now save to any slots mid-game.
- Now have the option of auto-saving the game at the start of each day (can be toggled in the Endly Altar).
- Added a Title to text boxes (e.g. showing item names, or the name of whose speaking).
- General menu usability improvements (e.g. when stood in front of a resource the Use Tool prompt will now show the inventory item to be used and instantly use it when pressed).
- Camp upgrades now store more items to keep your home tidy (e.g. storage boxes have twice the capacity).
- Winter can now be survived through (it changes to Spring after the usual Season days), so Endless Mode is now a Hard Mode since the normal game is effectively endless.
- Added a couple of new narrative scenes and extended some others (including the ending).
- Rather a lot of other tweaks and minor bits and bobs to make things more intuitive, better explained, less annoying, etc.
- The Branular Grove area can now be used to change the Season for the day.
- Added a new Fishing Pond area for... fishing.
- New bushcraft - Frog Pockets: Increases your inventory by 2 slots.
- New bushcraft - Workbench: Allows you to see the current durability of tools, as well as repair them and upgrade gear.
- New bushcraft - Leafy Hood: Keeps the rain and snow off your comfy camp fire.
- New bushcraft - Spyglass: Can see unscouted areas on your map and ignore fog.

Enjoy! :]