The Sapling
Patch v12.21
Finishing up individual (new) body parts:
* Improved hitboxes for all attractive body parts, so you can move and scale them (way) more easily
* Changed 2D icon to be closer to 3D models:
* plate
* attractive fins
* Added folded version for various body parts when put on the side
* Large attractive feathers
* Spine sail
* Other color display
* Other color crest
Fixes to the animal editor UI:
* You can now also remove sexes with the right mouse button
* Fixed a problem where a white joint dot in the animal editor incorrectly remained solid (hovered) until the cursor touched it again
* The 'hanging baby' toggle now only shows for the adults, and only when the JUVENILE form has hands (whether the adult has hands is irrelevant)
* The animal editor now shows the correct default tab when you click 'behavior'
* Fixed animals becoming glitchy/invisible when you put a mouth on the back of an animal
Various fixes for animals with shells:
* making swimming animals with the shell skin types (the turtle ones) no longer crashes the game
* Reworked skintype shells so they could part of the animation system, and thus move more naturally as the animal walks
* Skintype shells no dissapear in the distance
* Body part shells (the slug ones) now also work with the hiding action
Completed the animal noise feature (rattle, cicada tymbals, etc)
* Increased the visualization size, and added a short delay so the sound matches up better
* You now actually hear the sound in the world
* You now hear the sound when looking at the species detail view
* Noise sounds are no longer created every day
Fixed animals that could crash the game:
* Aquatic hanging babies no longer cause game breaking errors
* Fixed problem where animal with >4 legs became so slow they didn't move at all
Small UI fixes for the planet editor:
* Fixed tooltip that was too eager in the planet editor
* 'Randomize all' button no longer leads to a corrupt sandbox
Misc smaller touches:
* Added screenshake for fungi
* Fixed the disclaimer text when you start the game (wasn't showing before)
I often forget to read comments below release notes, so if you have questions or bug reports, feel free to reach out via the Steam forums or thesaplinggame@gmail.com.
The first experimental build of the Scary & Sexy update is out!
For an idea of what this update contains:
* A Youtube playlist of 6 devlogs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQQCZ0BbgSc&list=PLLKMinLKRdXxSFGcKxGSRh_hMQMIjp4fK&index=6
* Overview on the player maintained wiki: https://the-sapling-encyclopedia.fandom.com/wiki/The_Scary_%26_Sexy_Update
The name of the next big update, releasing October 31, has been revealed!
The update will be available on the beta branch on October 31. It usually takes about 2 months before it's stable enough to be released to everyone on the main branch.
v11.31 hotfix
Reason: I forgot the game tried to fetch some information from an old website, which now has another function. I've removed this behavior.
Patch v11.30
* For animals, it now shows what they are eating, but also what they are eaten by.
* For both 'eaten' and 'eaten by', it now shows the food type (meat? eggs? blood?). This is not saved yet, so you will lose this information if you save/load.
* The stats tab is now always the first one.
Balancing evolving ecosystems:
* Before, after turning on random mutations, most aquatic ecosystems lost all biodversity because 1 strong omnivore predator ate all young of the others, and relied on algae for the rest of its calories. The size restrictions (how much smaller does a young animal need to be before you can eat it) are now much stricter so eating young is less OP.
* Decreased the energy carnivore mouths could get from eating eggs.
* Mothers that are ready to give birth, but cannot find a good place (in crowded environments), will now continue to move instead of standing still, waiting for a place to free up.
* Plants evolving from the grass shape to the 'single plant' shape now have the matching seed (as opposed to always the primitive seed).
UI fixes:
* Fixed the question mark tooltip for light reaching the soil
* When pressing 'm' in the editors, to work with user generated body parts, a rudimentary mod panel now appears
Misc:
* Fixed an error, caused by the animal species name generator, that often appeared with high animal mutation rates
* Fixed a problem where the game could get into creature placement mode after reloading for memory reasons
Overviewed of tweaked body parts:
* https://the-sapling-encyclopedia.fandom.com/wiki/Jawless_Mouth
* https://the-sapling-encyclopedia.fandom.com/wiki/Facultative_Aquatic_Carnivore_Mouth
I often forget to read comments below release notes, so if you have questions or bug reports, feel free to reach out via the Steam forums or thesaplinggame@gmail.com.
Patch v11.29
Algae optimizations:
* Algae that get born out of the visible range of the camera are no longer even created (as opposed to created but hidden). If the camera moves closer, they are created 'just in time'. In worlds full of algae, this can lead to framerate increases of ~30FPS (!)
* When moving the camera in and out of the water, no longer all plankton is turned on/off... instead, only the ones close to the camera, decreasing the lag spike.
Polishing and fixing the planet editor
* There now is a habitability score, indicating the likiness of plants and land animals evolving before you start a world
* When in spherical mode, you can now drag to rotate the planet
* When in flat map mode, the size of the map increases and decreases to indicate to chosen map size (only a visual effect)
* The plant colors now have more explanation and question mark tooltips
* Improved the explanation text for wildfires
* Added a title and subtitle instructions for the season editor
* Added tooltips for the icons in the season editor
* Centered the 'ready' button and made it respond to mouse hover
* Volcano placement mode is now turned off if you switch tabs
Balancing:
* Nectar eaters get a bit more energy from nectar
* Herbivores get a bit less energy from soft plant tissue
* Various omnivore mouths no longer eat eggs
* The strongest ocean currents now require less speedy animals
Disaster fixes:
* Manually changed ocean levels no longer reset after going into an editor
* Moving the camera directly after launching a meteorite no longer leads to meteorites floating in the sky
* Doing a timejump right after a meteorite no longer results in perpetual darkness
* Doing a timejump right after a volcano eruption no longer stops the eruption process
Fixes for the 'locate organism' feature (the magnifying glass)
* Instead of sometimes failing, this feature will now quickly try again until it finds a good example organism
* Locating organisms now also works for plankton
* Clicking before hovering any button in the species list view no longer closes the species list view
Changes to the mutation mechanics:
* The addition of animal body segments is now more likely (so creatures can evolve longer necks or tails)
* Readded changing bark type
Bull dozer circle:
* Now also removes underwater creatures
* Now with the option to 'invert' (so remove everything outside the circle)
Misc fixes:
* The presence of mist no longer prevents the sound effect options from working
* Weather sound effects are now also muted underwater
* In the detail view, plankton in the world is now clickable for more information on the species
* In the detail view, clicking on the family tab multiple times no longer duplicates the rotating models
* Fixed the positioning of the UI in the 'see' dropdown for the lower instinct slots in the instinct editor
* When mixing multiple seed types in one plant, you should now see the correct color for all of them
I often forget to read comments below release notes, so if you have questions or bug reports, feel free to reach out via the Steam forums or thesaplinggame@gmail.com.
Patch v11.28
The terrain now changes after disasters:
* The terrain height around vulcanoes now increases after an eruption. For volcanoes in the middle of the ocean, this means volcanic islands.
* Meteorites now create a crater in the ground.
* Soil around volcanoes now become more rocky (less soft) after an eruption
Other changes related to disasters:
* Made the ground water and temperature changes ater volcanic eruptions and meteorites strong at the center, but gradually weaker further away
* Updated the meteorite notification
* Fixed a crash that occurred when you dropped a meteorite and then skipped time.
The soil now recolors dynamically every 10 years:
* After burning, terrain now becomes scorched for a while.
* Grass no longer has a 'ground plate' of its own, but influences the soil color. This allows for more more gradual transitions, similar to the ones we already had for snow.
Improvements for the mutation mechanics:
* Primitive plants (evolved from algae) can now also have fibrous roots, making it possible for land plants to emerge on wetter planets
* Fins on top are now way more likely to develop
* Animal diets are now way more likely to change
* Instincts are now way more likely to emerge
More food balancing:
* Carnivores are way more aggressive now, so they actually survive and can evolve on their own
* Nerfed grasshopper mouths even further: they will drown faster and get even less energy out of soft plant tissue
Fixes to saving/loading
* When saving a plant evolved from an alga, the seed type now is stored correctly!
* Planet rings are now stored in the savefile
* Fixed a problem where saving during a season with ocean level increase, and then loading again, led to the ocean level being even higher
* Added 'slots' for a number of future ideas in the new save file format
Misc:
* Fixed a problem where getting up the surface to breath took too much time for aquatic animals with blow holes, causing them to drown
I often forget to read comments below release notes, so if you have questions or bug reports, feel free to reach out via the Steam forums or thesaplinggame@gmail.com.
Patch v11.26
* Added the option to add a ring around your planet, making the equator (below the shadow) colder
* Seasonal temperature changes are now way less extreme near the equator, giving plants a 'safe haven' to evolve
Temperature related fixes:
* Fixed that plants using wind pollination weren't aware of the temperature (which allowed them to grow in very cold and hot places)
* Fixed that some seed types (like the ones sticking to fur) weren't aware of their temperature limitions (which allowed them to grow in very cold and hot places)
Instinct fixes:
* In the instinct editor, dropdowns no longer disappear when you move the cursor down too slowly
* In the instinct editor, dropdowns now disappear when you click anywhere next to them
* Prevent mutating animal cries if the animal can't make any sounds
* Prevented instinct mutation from mixing up various instinct options ('if you [feel] food' instead of 'if you see food')
* Slower animals can now also use 'go towards' instincts again
* Fixed a problem where algae 'forgot' their colors in the underlying simulation (still visible), which stopped color seeing instincts from working
* Added a missed mechanic where colors of other animals couldn't be detected underwater
Fixes to statistics:
* I still haven't been able to fix the problem with negative population counts, so I've now added a workaround that counts all organisms from scratch every now and then. Negative species are still possible, but they should be less common now.
* You can now click the 'info' button for the species detail view for aquatic animals
* In the species detail view, the death causes now have a smaller font, so you can read the full description
* There now is a 'poisoned' death cause
* There now is a 'ground too soft' death cause
* In the timejump statistics, a species is only counted as 'terrestrial' if it ALSO breathes air (in addition to being able to move on land)
Small UI fixes:
* Made the intro sequence background fitting on larger screens
* Decreased the font size of the time jump notifiction 'prebuilding frequent species', so it fits on one line
Misc:
* Fixed black eyeballs for eyes on stalks
* Fruits can no longer mutate into illegal shapes, causing the game to crash
* Decreased wind strength in mountain level
I often forget to read comments below release notes, so if you have questions or bug reports, feel free to reach out via the Steam forums or thesaplinggame@gmail.com.
Patch v11.23
New performance related settings:
* Alga, plant and animal caps!
* A setting to limit how many species are prebuilt when loading a world: fewer means faster loading, more means more accurate plant and animal models (less reusing other species' models)
Optimizations:
* Removed unused box colliders for plant body parts, adding ~10FPS in situations with many plants
* Simplified check if a growing plant reached its target size, adding ~2FPS in situations with many plants
* Skip checking for gliding and flying animations if the animal cannot glide or fly, adding ~2FPS in situations with many animals
* Added a low poly variant of the stilt root, with the smaller parts disappearing if the camera moves away, adding ~5FPS in situations with many stilt roots
* Preload the stilt root object instead of building it from scratch for each individual plant, adding ~2FPS in situations with many stilt roots
Simple balancing:
* The 'grasshopper' mouth now gets way less energy out of soft plant tissue
* Plankton spreads twice as fast now, so filter feeders don't immediately exhaust their food source
* Blood can only be eaten from animals larger than the predator
Changes to time jumps:
* Redesigned the time jump view, adding a progress bar
* Added an interrupt button (useful for long jumps)
* Added basic information on the number of species, so you have something to keep an eye on during the jump
* Added 15000 and 20000 (that is, longer) duration options
Added rudimentary support for player generated body parts! See https://thesaplinggame.com/ugc
Fixes for animal sounds:
* Made animal calls audible from much further away
* In the instinct editor, disabled the option to 'call' if available mouth cannot make a sound
Improvements for lighting and post processing effects:
* Decreased bottom lighting in the sandbox (mainly used for lighting to rock part of scenario maps), removing a weird nighttime glow on brighter plants and animals
* Removed sun shaft effect at night, also removing a weird glow on brighter plants and animals
* Decreased bloom effect slightly
Misc:
* Fixed sitting in trees
I often forget to read comments below release notes, so if you have questions or bug reports, feel free to reach out via the Steam forums or thesaplinggame@gmail.com.
Patch v11.20
* Hide the UI
* Hide the weather
* Set the time of the day without influencing the simulation
* Change the camera speed
* Set fixed camera positions and rotations, and have the camera animation between tem
Other camera changes:
* Added SHIFT as a camera speed boost button; if you fly the camera in one direction for 2 seconds, a hint will show to teach players about this
* Shortended the delay noticeable when dragging the camera with the mouse; the camera feels more responsive now
* Highlighting organisms is now disabled if you move the camera
* The camera position in the organism detail view is now always as close to the current camera position as possible (no weird camera flips anymore)
* The camera no longer moves slower on smaller maps
* The camera position in the organism detail view no longer is very close to the ground on smaller maps
Main menu changes:
* Added an extra 'game mode' selection view, with a warning the the sandbox will be unlocked after one scenario (lots of new players were confused by this)
* Added icons to the filter buttons in the load view
* Added a button to go to the save file location in your OS
* Also made 'x' to skip the disclaimer work with Caps Lock turned on
* Increased the the text size saying you can use x to skip
* The green background when showing the title during the intro now fills the whole screen
* Made title font during the intro the same as above the main menu
* Put a warning below the ice age level (will be overhauled in the future)
Fixed flowers and the flower level:
* Plants can be pollinated by animals again, and thus the main objective of the flower level triggers again
* All nectar mouths can create wax nests now
* Also unlocked the crab mouth by default, so you can go the 'insect route' if you want
* Changed the ground softness so you don't need mangrove roots everywhere
* Fixed the progress bar not responding for two of the objectives
Misc:
* Made animal color mutations more likely
* Made it possible for animals to also mutate to become brighter or darker
* Made gasfruit animations smoother, so it really looks like they are floating
* Removed high white clouds from the sandbox
* If you click 'redesign' after mutating, you now continue to have access to unlocked bark and roots