In this update, the game gets a new quest line including an extensive cave system called "The Monster Hell", which is suited for players in the last third of the main game. The fights in it are and should be very challenging and the whole area is for players who love such challenges. I have created 6 new unique bosses for the Monster Hell. There are exciting rewards for those who make it through, but everything is optional and not required for the main story. You have to try different strategies for the battles and each of the caves is different. There is no option to save or teleport in the caves. Above all, you should ensure that you always have high resistance values and other buffs active. The start of the quest series begins with Sophie towards the end of chapter 3 at the earliest. Talk to her again and again. There are numerous tips for mastering the Monster Hell in the in-game manual section V3.xx (F1 in the game).
If you can't get any further with one of the caves in Monster Hell, you can watch one of the WalkTrough videos on my YouTube channel (F2 to open the link in the game). There you will find a way to defeat the enemies in the cave. The difficulty for these recordings was "normal".
Patch notes V3.4
Game:
The magnifying glass The magnifying glass can be used to find out which plants or raw materials are growing or are available on a field. When the mouse button is held down, a window for the field under the mouse pointer is displayed. For ground cover, plants and trees, the name and the respective product are displayed. The window also shows whether the plant is ready for harvesting, in the germination stage, dead or growing. This makes it easier, especially at the beginning of the game, to find out which plant produces what and when it is ready to harvest. The magnifying glass is now available right at the start of a new game. Advanced players can purchase the magnifying glass from Tiberius for a few coins.
The snow cover on paths no longer closes completely in winter so that the path can still be recognised. In addition, the snow on paths thaws much faster in spring than on other fields.
The flood and drought are now more balanced in their chances, which should mean that there will no longer be years of flooding!
After sleeping, all buffs/debuffs and all magical temporal effects are switched off again.
Pigs now slowly remove the existing snow cover when digging.
Horses and donkeys now only improve the soil if there is no solid snow cover. Just like the pigs, they gradually remove smaller amounts of snow from a field.
In the farm overview (CTRL) and in the info window for seeds and plants, the duration until cooling is displayed for lava soil fields.
The plague of locusts and voles is now only announced when the locusts or voles are actually present. These plagues always start during the day to give the player a chance to react.
Extended the duration of the spell Increase Resistance and the spell Attack Buff.
Elemental damage on monster portals is now significantly reduced. The reason for this is that portals could be destroyed very quickly with advanced battle magic, which was not intended.
Attack and damage values and the energy costs of many weapons have been changed slightly to improve the balance in the game.
The temporary increase in elemental resistances is now also displayed in the status bar together with the attack buff. This means you can see at a glance whether the effect is still active and no longer have to open the character window.
Introduction of two powerful new spells that can be purchased from Niall (the charged and overcharged version of the spell is available as rewards in the Monster Hell)
New items (rewards in new caves):
Sabre of Protection A sabre that has a chance to build up a shield or strengthen an existing one every time you kill a monster (up to a maximum)
Spear of Earth A spear with a chance to throw an earth nova in all directions after successfully killing a monster.
Sword of the Elements A sword that sends an elemental beam into your line of sight every time you kill a monster. In the path of the beam, all monsters are injured by elemental explosions.
The shield amulet The shield amulet protects you once from certain death and gives you back some of your life essence. You also receive a shield. The amulet is consumed in the process. There is a recipe with which you can recharge it.
Manual:
In section V3.xx the monster hell was integrated
Bugs:
Calculation error in the daily average of light and heat during storms has been fixed. This error could cause the daily average of these values to be far above or below the actual value.
Elimination of a "stuck" chest in the add-on The Sky Fortress.
Correction of some errors in texts (English and German)
Liam's dungeon door was once again open, which was not the way it should be!
The lava plant could evolve the lava into rock before it had cooled down. This has been fixed so that the lava now remains lava until it cools down as specified. How long and how often you plant the lava no longer matters.
Jadawin plays Behind the Horizon - LIVE
Behind the Horizon LIVE
On the occasion of the Steam Festival for farming games, I have decided to broadcast some live streams for you, in which I play my game and thus give you a better overall impression of the gameplay.
There will be at least five live stream events in total and each one will be about an hour long. Some will have a bit of commentary, but the main point is to show the game as it is.
Here is the overview of the times (Central Europe Time) and the topic :
Monday 29.4: --- Tuesday 30.4 -> 8pm Farm life and questing in the early game (after the tutorial) Wednesday 1.5 -> 7 pm Excursions to the mines with everything that goes with it Thursday 2.5 --- Friday 3.5 -> 7 pm Farm life and quests in the middle game (chapter 3) Saturday 4.5 -> 8 pm Excursions to the caves in the late game with boss fight (chapter 4) Sunday 5.5 -> 7 pm start New Game (tutorial) in survival mode with German commentary
In this update, 2 alternative farms and starting areas and the survival mode are added to the game.
All three farms play differently and offer a new gaming experience. Ideal for a second or third playthrough. Details below!
Survival mode can be added and changes the gameplay even more. It can only be selected at the start of the game and only works in connection with the "Volcano Farm". This mode is intended for experienced players and is full of challenges. It should be chosen with care.
Patch notes V3.3
Game:
When starting a new game, you can now choose one of three starting areas.
All three play very differently and invite you to play Behind the Horizon again. The new maps cover the entire area around the farm. The following options are available:
- The Standard Farm: The standard farm offers a balanced landscape with lots of good farmland and enough woodland and water. There are large areas available for stables and pastures. This farm is ideal for a cosy, not too difficult game.
- The river and woodland farm: Here the farmland is divided by rivers. Bridges lead to the various islands. There are fewer large areas, but more forest and water. The land is more varied overall, but the planning of the farm requires more care and there is less space. There are some fertile areas where farm plants grow right at the beginning that can be harvested and there are also many fruit trees in the forests. An interesting alternative to the standard farm.
- The Volcano Farm: The Volcano Farm is dominated by rocky areas. There are two dormant volcanoes to the north and south. There is less space and less fertile soil. To compensate, there are more ore and stone deposits. This farm is a real challenge, especially at the beginning, as it prevents rapid growth because the soil has to be upgraded first. A good choice for a second, more challenging game.
- The survival mode: Survival mode can be activated in connection with the Volcano Farm. There are numerous gameplay changes that greatly alter the game. In survival mode, Behind the Horizon plays like a survival game, especially in the first few years. This should provide a great challenge even for experienced players.
A list of all gameplay changes in survival mode:
1) Inhospitable conditions, poorer soil around the farm and two active volcanoes in the north and south 2) the plantable area around the farm will grow more slowly than usual 3) permanent energy and life essence boni are only half as large 4) using tools and weapons costs more energy 5) Monster portals can control more monsters at the same time 6) Monsters have increased vision 7) The two volcanoes on the farm erupt at irregular intervals and spew lava flows or rocks 8) Storms such as floods, droughts, hail, thunderstorms, etc. cause more changes in the world 9) Positive weather events are less frequent or weaker 10) Buying and selling prices at all traders are increased 11) When harvesting, the player does not get any seeds back 12) There are fewer quarries in the world 13) Extreme weather events can occur immediately after starting the game 14) Trees from the player are as affected by hail and lightning as wild trees 15) Locust and vole infestations occur more frequently 16) There are more locusts and voles in a plague 17) Monsters have increased energy regeneration. This allows them to use their special abilities more often 18) Monsters cause more damage with normal and special attacks (this is independent of the difficulty level set for the battles) 19) The player consumes more food per hour 20) More floods can occur one after another, which can lead to larger inundations 21) Farm animals are less frequently reproducing 22) Reduced frequency of gifts from NPCs
In addition to the new starting areas, the old farm has also been improved in many places.
In the "Start new game" menu you can now also select the difficulty of the battles. This can still be changed in the settings menu during the game.
The cutscene when you first enter the farm has been redesigned to fit all three farms.
An error in a quest description in an early quest of the main game has been corrected.
The damage to trees during a hailstorm has been reduced
All small iron deposits can now be mined with the copper pickaxe
The recipe for the anvil has been changed slightly so that you can build the forge without having to buy an iron pickaxe first
Lowered some damage values for certain weapons to improve balance
Manual:
New section: Update V3.xx: All changes to the game after the release of the 2nd DLC, the Sky Fortress, are summarised here.
Updated the manual to the latest version
Bugs:
When starting a new game, the temperature and light values of the last few days were not set correctly. This has been fixed.
Fixed a bug on the starting map that could cause the player to be unable to reach the teleporter during a flood.
Update V3.2: Seasonal Events Part 1
Seasonal events
This update integrates the first four seasonal events into the game. I have greatly expanded the scripting language for cutscenes so that interaction within cutscenes is now possible. The first 4 seasons events are 4 auctions that take place once per season, each with a different theme. Different items are offered in the auctions each year and I hope that you will have a lot of fun bidding skilfully in the auctions and getting good prices. There will be more new events in future updates that make use of the new possibilities.
Patch Notes V3.2
Game: - Introduction of the first 4 seasons events. Contact persons for the quests are Tiffany, Alfred, Marco and Nira. The new introductory quests are available early in the main game. Further information on auctions can be found in the in-game guide in the "Trade" section.
- Monster training portals in the Star Forge have been made even more indestructible.
Bugs:
- Fixed a rare bug that can occur in old savegames , causing Star Forge training portals to stop working.
- The English translation of some items from the DLC The Desert was mixed up and has been corrected.
- Minor errors with some German item names have been fixed.
Ingame Manual:
- Added section about auctions (Trade section).
- Added section about the new info window when placing plants (section Plants).
- Various explanations in the sections Clues and Plants and Nature simulation updated.
Patch notes V3.1
Nature simulation
For a better understanding of the nature simulation and the interrelationships in farming, I have integrated some changes and a new window into the game.
The new window opens automatically when you are about to plant seeds or plants in the ground and displays the values of the soil and plants and the local climate in detail and graphically. The game analyses this information and points out possible problems (for example: wrong soil, too few nutrients, temperatures too high, etc.).
An exclamation mark means that it is not advisable to plant this plant here at this time. A question mark indicates possible difficulties (such as a longer growth phase and stagnation over a few days). A cross indicates that the conditions are completely impossible and a green check mark means that everything is fine.
You can usually rely on this assessment. If you want to know more, you can get detailed information about the temperature and light of the last few days on the right-hand side of the window. You can also see what nutrients and water the plant currently needs to continue growing (please note that several plants in the same field add up their requirements). For temperature and light, the plant's comfort zone is shown as a green bar.
Of course, you can also plant a plant if the conditions are not right. As before, the exception is the soil, which must always be suitable.
In addition, the amount of experience the soil has already gained is also displayed. This was previously only visible in the farm overview (CTRL/Control). The exact germination period for the seed, which also depends on the soil type, is also displayed, as is the minimum growth period of the plant.
If you have already read the relevant book on the plant or tree species, you will be rewarded with further information on the flowering time, the possible soil types and the growth period. This information can also be found on the seed packets.
Feeling plants skill
I have removed the large speech bubble that was previously used for the "Feel plants" skill and instead the window with the detailed information is displayed. There are some additional details, such as how long the plant can tolerate the deficiency. If a tree and a farm plant grow together on a field, the tree is displayed on the right and the farm plants on the left.
If you also want to find out about self-planted ground cover plants, you also have to press the ALT key and then open the window as usual with the right mouse button. Since you rarely need this data in the game, I think this is a good way to further simplify operation (previously there were 3 regions on each field to be able to "address" the plants individually). In addition, it was rather annoying to always get the info mouse pointer on the pastures that you have planted with grass when you wanted to deal with the animals ;-) !
Game:
Trees now provide half the shade for the field when they are not yet fully grown.
The plant feeling skill can now also be used on planted seeds. The remaining germination time is always displayed.
The player's awareness requirements have been reduced in order to learn Sophie's Sense Plants skill.
In spring, the snow cover now melts faster or slower depending on the temperature and weather.
The plant overview (automatically displayed after the farm overview is shown) no longer uses the current values for heat and light, but instead displays the current deficiencies (from the previous day). The reason for this is that the display in the plant info window and the overview should match. During the day, the temperature and light can fluctuate greatly due to different weather conditions. It is therefore clearer to use the values from the previous day.
Tutorial
I decided to use the window in full even in the tutorial, although you don't have the skills to analyse water and nutrients precisely at the very beginning. However, I think it is important to understand how farming works in the game right from the start. This may save some people a lot of frustration :-) ! The Plant Feeling skill still has to be learnt in-game.
Remark:
The average values of the last few days in the new plant info window are set to the current climate values at the first start after the update. A progression therefore only develops after a few days.
Patch Notes V3.07
Remark:
In this update I've addressed a lot of small bugs and details that have piled up on my notes during my playthrough. Except for one bug, everything is not game-blocking and I can say that everything worked fine during my complete playthrough (main game + both DLCs). If you notice any bugs, please let me know in the community forum :-) ! In the next update I will once again try to improve the clarity of farming, as I still see that many players take a long time to understand the simulation on which the game is based. The plan is to show the important data summarised graphically at central points during the game. Of course, farming will never be as simple as in most other farming games, but it shouldn't be. Let yourself be surprised :-) !
Patch notes 3.07
Game:
Farm animals are now more intelligent in their search for water and automatically avoid salty sea water. They also prefer the water troughs placed by the player if they are in sight. After some consideration, I have decided to reintegrate the option of caging large animals and pets. This is a bit unrealistic in the case of a full-grown cow, but let´s not forget it's a game ;-) ! In the case of pets, a note is also displayed that the animal must be re-tamed and possibly re-enchanted after being released again.
Unfortunately, there was no other way of doing this with the existing system. I don't think it would be worth changing the system for this one reason. In any case, this change means that you can sell all the animals that you have in excess so that you don't have to choose between killing your animals or spending the whole day feeding them ;-) !
During a cutscene in the sky fortress, the player is now placed in a new position so that the action feels more coherent.
During the day, the game now analyses exactly what is growing on each soil field every hour and will show which plants or trees are still suffering from a lack of water in the overview (CTRL/Control on the keyboard) when it rains, or whether the remaining amount of water in the soil is sufficient for the respective plants and trees on the field to grow. This does not take into account any magic water crystals or water channels that may be in place, as these release their water into the soil at night.
Fixed small logic errors in various places in the dialogues
In the intro of the DLC The Sky Fortress the picnic in the forest was forgotten :-) ! Fixed an umlaut error in one of Willi's speech bubbles
Wood's quest for more squirrels was not ended when handing in the materials. This has been fixed. The purple mushroom could not grow on stone soil because it needed too much water. This has been fixed.
The display of the mature purple mushroom was incorrect. A seed was displayed instead. This has been fixed.
Melinda mistakenly had pots of purple mushrooms in her assortment, even though she doesn't know them (questline).
Maurice questlines from the DLC The Desert are now finished at the start of the DLC The Sky Fortress and the dialogues are skipped.
After the conversation with Liam in Sandheim, the quest hint regarding the magic mushroom spores is now deleted, as Liam no longer offers magic mushroom spores.
Voles and locusts will now appear in more locations in the world at the same time during a plague. Dandelions should not be able to grow in pond water. This has been fixed.
The lupine had too strong an urge to reproduce, which has now been curbed.
A player chest has been added to the southern island in the DLC The Sky Fortress.
Starting map (these changes are only available in a new game):
In the DLC The Sky Fortress, a few ground fields in houses have been changed.
In the DLC The Sky Fortress, a small area of the southern fertile forest island has also been freed from the desert climate.
In the Sky Fortress DLC, an area around the NPC Drystan has been created on the northern island where no trees can grow so that he always remains visible.
In the Sky Fortress DLC, a few keys have been replaced due to poor visibility on the ground. Some blocked passages in the southern fortress of the DLC The Sky Fortress were passable from the side. This has been fixed
A potion has been removed from a cave in The Sky Fortress DLC.
Some stables had a strip of rock on the side that was copied during construction. This has been removed.
Bugs:
A bug in a dialogue script of the Sky Fortress DLC could block the main storyline under certain circumstances. This has been fixed.
Battle companions could freeze in motion under certain conditions and were then useless until they were addressed or, in the case of the Dino, summoned again. This should be fixed.
Fixed a bug in the dialogues that caused Drystan to continue swapping with the player after the end of the Desert DLC.
Fixed a bug that caused the game to forget that Eleyne and Nira were already placed in Sandheim. This meant that you could not buy the incredible stables and the lion cub from Nira or Eleyne.
Lava was not cooled by frost crystals as intended in some cases. This now works as meant.
In the Sky Fortress DLC, an event trigger was "slipping" and you could unintentionally trigger it by walking close to the wall. This has been fixed (requires restarting the DLC)
The spell "Ice Mine" did physical damage in addition to ice damage, which was not intended. Now the spell only does ice damage.
Patch Notes V3.06
Game:
The area of the lion's special attack has been slightly reduced.
The effect of the wolf's special attack was increased,
In the DLC The Desert, a key in the labyrinth was made more visible because it was hard to spot on the floor (if you had destroyed the table the key was on).
The food dispenser from the 1st DLC can now hold more food to withstand the hunger of lion and wolf.
All stone walls now have a damage bar when they are damaged, which is shown whenever the player has a pickaxe equipped. In addition, stone walls can no longer be destroyed with normal weapons (except with ice spells).
Magic Fragment and Consciousness Fragment deposits have also received a damage bar
Sound:
Some sound effects in the DLC The Desert were still in stereo format. This resulted in strange noises when something happened far away, because stereo sound does not allow positioning in space.
Bugs:
When dismounting from the llama and calling battle companions, it could happen that you crossed walls. This has been fixed and the game displays a message if no valid position is found.
Lion and wolf would remain motionless within element fields until the effect disappeared. This has been fixed.
By adding the auto-save function in the new start map before hard boss fights, the switch for the appearance of the dragons was unfortunately deleted in the final fight of the main game. This has been fixed and should now work again everywhere.
In the quest to rebuild Wood Home, Hagen promised the player coins, which he then preferred to keep himself ;-) ! This has been fixed.
In the DLC The Desert, an ash eruption could not be ended properly beforehand during large volcanic eruptions, which led to incorrect light values in entire areas. This has now been fixed.
Dialogues:
Fixed a bug when delivering the 2nd orb in Gertrude's dialogues.
Some minor bugs in various lines of dialogue in the Desert DLC have been fixed.
SteamDeck
Further improvements for SteamOS compatibility have been integrated into the game.
Patch Notes V3.05
Game:
The link for the new German video tutorials has been added.
Bugs:
When copying areas of the world, it was sometimes incorrectly displayed for a short time that you can grow something there. This has been fixed.
Liam was not locked in his cell and the door was open. The cell is now locked as intended and must first be opened.
In Sandhome the roof was not hidden when entering a house. This has been fixed.
Patch Notes V3.04
Game:
Battle companions could damage the player with their ranged attacks. This has been changed and the player is now immune to the area attacks of the companions.
The game now automatically detects if it was started from the Steam Deck and activates Controller Mode by default.
Patchnotes V3.03
Game:
The info of battle companions now shows exactly whether the animal is hungry and / or injured.
When feeding with normal animal food, the injured animal is not healed, but is no longer hungry afterwards and will be able to heal itself in the following day. Hungry animals do not heal themselves and will starve to death if deprived of food for a long time.
Wolf and lion now have more armour and more life essence. They also deal more damage. In battle mode in the caves, they also regenerate their life essence very slowly.
During a plague of voles or locusts, more positions where voles or locusts can appear have been added. The number of voles and grasshoppers has also been increased.
