Greetings, you Golden Gods of ːtsg_gːːtsg_rːːtsg_aːːtsg_sːːtsg_sː!
It is my absolute pleasure to announce that, starting today, Community Items will be available for everyone who owns a copy of Touch Some Grass. Get ready to earn and exchange Trading Cards, obtain Profile Badges, and snag some slick Profile Backgrounds and Emoticons!
Feel free to check out the goods in the image below -
All Community Content features artwork hastily cobbled together by yours truly our highly-paid, cowboy-hat-wearing Concept Artist.
Also, now that we have Trading Cards, I am proud to announce that Touch Some Grass is a more active TCG than Artifact. (In all seriousness, I'm joking. Please don't hurt me. I honestly loved that game, and wish more people played it... Plus, I'm sure more people play that, than this silly game anyway - Wait! It was a JOKE! OW! OFFICER, YOU'RE HURTING MY ARM!)
Once again, I want to extend a huge "Thank You!" to everyone who played Touch Some Grass, along with all the players that took the time to leave amazing reviews and content over the past few months. Honestly, it is thanks to your continued support of this "silly little game" that we even got approval to have Community Content in the first place. So again, thank you so much, and I hope you enjoy the fruits of your efforts(hehe, gardening humor).
Anyway, that's all I have for now! Thanks again for playing, I hope you enjoy the new Community Content, and as always - happy grass-touching, my friends! ːtsg_smileː
ːtouchsomegrassː
Patch Notes - v0.3.1
Well, hello there, you wonderful weed-whackers!
I'm back from a lengthy Summer vacation, and figured I'd kick off the season with a little patch.
While this patch is relatively smol in scope, it's HUGE in terms of impact - as players who previously were missing grass when attempting to play on Intel Integrated Graphics (HD 620/630, etc.) should now have their luscious lawns returned in full!
PATCH NOTES
Support for Integrated GPUs
If you were playing on an integrated GPU - notably an Intel HD 620 or 630 chipset - you may have noticed that there was NO GRASS. This was ultimately determined to be an issue related to a limitation with integrated GPUs, and how they handle tessellation (notably, point-based tessellation).
I ended up fixing this by rewriting a portion of the shader that generates the grass. Better late than never... Right? RIGHT?! - sigh - Sorry it took so long...
If you are running the game on integrated graphics, and you were previously missing grass, please feel free to let me know if this update has resolved your problem!
Update to Unity
Updated the Unity Engine to 2021.3.6f1 LTS. This is a boring, but necessary thing to do once in a while, I suppose...
Anyway, that's all I have for this week. I'll be back in the next week or so, to announce some exciting stuff. *cough* TRADING CARDS *cough cough* EMOJIS *cough* BACKGROUNDS *wheeze*
Until next time, thanks for playing, and happy grass-touching, my friends! ːsteamhappyː
Steam Deck Verified
Long time, no see my glorious grass-family!
Yo, dawg. I heard you liked Touch Some Grass. So I got Touch Some Grass officially verified for the Steam Deck, so you can Touch Some Grass while you touch some grass.
This is just a brief update to let you Steam Deck owning, collar-popping, country-clubbing bajillionaires know that Touch Some Grass is officially "Verified" on your beloved mobile gaming device! THE FUTURE IS NOW!
With the Steam Deck, you can now Touch Some Grass -
At a park
At the mall
In a dugout canoe
In a mile-long line at the DMV
While lying awake in bed, contemplating the meaning of life at 3:25AM
The possibilities are ENDLESS!
Again, I want to give a huge thank you to all of you who played Touch Some Grass, along with everyone that left such amazing reviews and community content this past month. You are all amazing, and I look forward to having the opportunity to sit down and properly read through and respond to your comments in the next week or so!
I hope you all enjoy the rest of the summer (winter for you southern-hemisphere legends) - and as always, happy grass-touching, my friends! ːsteamhappyː
The "Gameplay" Update - v0.3.0
What's popping, grass-family?
Welcome to the third content update for Touch Some Grass!
We are quickly approaching the two-month mark since this game was first released, and I couldn't be more excited! You glorious grass-grabbers have been absolutely *killing it* - shattering the 570-hour limit on the Leaderboards, submitting hilarious reviews and amazing community content, and simply taking the time to play my silly little "game".
So, with that in mind, today's update aims to celebrate all of you amazing "720-topdeck super-sus nollie-to-boneless smoke-mid-rush-b" gaming gods! Cheers, and thank you all so much!
That being said, this update is heckin' HUGE, and features a *ton* of community-suggested content that has poured in over the past couple of months. I'm talking Hands! I'm talking Skins! I'm talking qUaLiTy EnTeRtAiNmEnT! Where else are you going to get that stuff, huh?
What's that? Every other game on the Steam Storefront?
Oh... Well... I bet those games don't have meticulously crafted, high-resolution grass!
Anyway, while I sit here waiting for Elon to *finally* walk away from this ill-fated Twitter deal, and redirect a portion of that $44 billion into my Steam wallet so I can purchase the complete DLC collection for Train Simulator (I'm loco for locomotives), let's go over some Update Notes -
UPDATE NOTES
"SURVIVAL" GAME MODE
Old Man Henkins is sick and tired of you crazy kids constantly touching his finely manicured, imported Bermuda grass ("cynodon dactylon"), and he's ready to protect his expensive lawn at all costs - even if it means calling in a remote airstrike on your position!
Teach that crazy Old Man a lesson he won't soon forget! Grass is *meant* to be touched!
EXPERIENCE & LEVEL SYSTEM
The more grass you touch, the higher your level climbs! The higher your level climbs, the more Skins you unlock! The more skins you unlock, the better you feel! Dopamine is fun!
THREE NEW HANDS
Rev up those sod-slappers, because there's three new Hands in town, and they are ready to TOUCH. SOME. GRASS. Prepare for military-grade grass-grabbing with the Combat Glove, or slip on the Winter Glove for some insulated weed-whacking. Also, don't forget about the sleek Leather Glove, for all you Hitman-esque "grass-assins" out there!
OVER 100 SKINS TO UNLOCK
Mere moments before Julius Caeser was observed b-hopping through enemy ranks during the Battle of Thapsus; historians note that he raised his "StatTrak Gladius | Gamma Doppler" (Factory New with an Emerald Finish and a 0.02 float) and proclaimed, "Pares pellibus vincit!" - which loosely translates to, "Skins equals wins".
The tradition continues in Touch Some Grass, which now features over 100 unique skins - all of which can be earned simply by playing!
COLLECTION MANAGER
What better way to manage all of those slick new Hands and Skins, than with a full-featured Collection Manager! Preview all your Hands and Skins in one convenient place. Select your "weapon" of choice, and dive into a game to grab-grass in style!
LEADERBOARD "REFRESH"
The previous Leaderboard system was absolutely annihilated by you Titans of Turf-Touching... So, as a certified "number-ologist" and "number-onomist" (No, you can't see my certificates... How did you get in my office?), it was in my best interest to give the old Leaderboard a complete "number-ectomy".
Long story short, the old Leaderboards have been retired, and joining the new Leaderboard requires players to complete just one game in either game mode to re-submit their score. So what are you waiting for? Jump on in and get that score submitted!
FINAL THOUGHTS
This huge-mongous update marks the end of major development initiatives for Touch Some Grass... at least in the short-term. Essentially, any future updates during the next couple of months will be devoted to patching any errors, along with general maintenance.
In the meantime, I will be focusing my attention on other endeavors... More specifically, I will be working on a different, more "traditional" video game. I'll share more about that some other time, though!
Until then, thanks again for playing! And as always, happy grass-touching, my friends! ːsteamhappyː
Weekly Roundup - 6/4/2022
Hello, you glorious gods of grass!
Happy June, everybody! I hope you all are having a wonderful weekend!
I unfortunately don't have time to be a silly goose right now... I've been working non-stop on the next major update - which includes the new game mode, unlock system, and Leaderboard system. Oh yeah, and the update will be releasing THIS UPCOMING WEDNESDAY.
This update is heckin' huge. There are now *three* new Hands to choose from, bringing the total number of Hands to six. There are 100 Levels worth of unique Skins to unlock, and it takes roughly 100 hours of touching grass to unlock every skin.
Right now, I am literally *living* in image editors, *hunting* for textures, *surviving* on a steady diet of pixels - and making the over 100 unique skins for all of those levels... and let me tell you... the stress is REAL.
That being said, I don't have any time to spare. So here's a giant screenshot dump -
Final Thoughts
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GIVE ME YOUR ENERGY! ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
See you on Wednesday!
And as always, happy grass-touching my friends! ːsteamhappyː
Weekly Roundup - 5/28/2022
Hello, you herbaceous enthusiasts of agriculture!
I hope everyone has had a wonderful week sweating through finals, submitting term papers, finishing up "that project you've been working on" - and, of course, touching some grass!
Yes, summer-time is quickly approaching. With each passing day, it's getting warmer and warmer! The birds are chirping, and it's perfect beach weather outside! You know what that means, friends!
It's finally time for us gamers to *SLAM* that window shut, set the air-conditioner to "maximum blast", and plop down in our elite gaming chairs with an ice-cold can of Monster energy drink. Warm weather is disgusting, the beach is lame, and these stupid chirping birds are preventing me from listening for footsteps at Long A.
Go away, birds! I'm trying to get out of MG2!
...
Anyway, let's talk about Dev Stuff!
Broken Leaderboards (kinda)
The Leaderboards for Touch Some Grass have been UTTERLY DESTROYED by some of you "Golden Gods of all that is Green and Grassy". It has been just over a month since the initial release date, and some of you have already managed to exceed the roughly 570-hour limit on the Leaderboards.
Let's talk about that, and take a look at how I "fixed" it -
WARNING: RAMBLING NERD STUFF AHEAD. EXPAND AT YOUR OWN RISK.
[expand]
The Problem
Steam Leaderboards require a "32-bit integer" ("int32" or just "int") variable to store the numerical information associated with a player's score. This is what professionals in the game-development industry refer to as "silly" (just kidding, please don't hurt me).
By default, an "int" has a maximum value of 2,147,483,647. In Touch Some Grass, I convert the in-game time to an "int", by allowing the "int" to represent the total number of milliseconds associated with a player's score. Then, when the Leaderboard score gets pulled to the client, I convert it back.
Because of this requirement, the limit of the Leaderboard was 2,147,483,647ms total, or roughly 570 hours (plus some minutes, seconds and milliseconds in there). I honestly never anticipated players would exceed this number any time soon. However, I've clearly been proven wrong, and I'm actually blown away by how awesome you are!
The "Solution"
I looked at the conversion I was running to translate the total time to an "int", and noticed that there was a trailing number that didn't get utilized in the score information. This is because the player's time is actually recorded in milliseconds (thousandths of a second), but in game, we only display hundredths of a second (Or, "centiseconds". Yes, this is a real word. Look it up. I'll wait.).
In order to get the "int" to "hold more time", I decided to pull a "big-brain 5head pro gamer move", and scheme on the aforementioned conversion process...
First, I convert the time into a "64-bit integer" ("int64"). By default, an "int64" has a maximum value of 9,223,372,036,854,775,807 (that's a big-boy number!). Then, I divide this value by 10, to shave off the last digit. In the wise words of Albert Einstein, "This gives more room for the numby to go uppy!"
Lastly, I convert the "int64" to an "int32", and submit this value to the Leaderboard. BOOM! Now the limit is 2,147,483,647 centiseconds, or roughly 5,900 hours! [/expand]
Essentially, I did a thing, and the new limit is going to be 5,900 hours. When this update goes live, there will be a new Leaderboard system. Players will need to play just *one game* in each mode to re-submit their scores to the new system.
AGAIN, SCORES WILL NOT BE RESET. THEY JUST NEED TO BE ADDED TO THE LEADERBOARDS AGAIN. NO ANGRY EMAILS, PLEASE.
Cosmetic Collection System
This week, I focused heavily on the updates necessary for the Experience and Unlock System. All of these updates are in anticipation of the upcoming new "Survival" game mode. This week, I started work on the new Cosmetic Management system, which is progressing nicely.
This new system consists of a menu where player's can select their preferred Hand and Skin, and view their complete collection of Hands and Skins they have earned by playing the game. Here's a quick sample of what that screen looks like in-game -
The left and right arrows will allow you to select your Hand, and the bottom container will show all of the available Skins you have earned for that particular Hand! This new system will ultimately replace the "toggle skin" button in-game, which will now only switch between the "left" and "right" versions of the Hand and Skin you have previously selected.
Final Thoughts
Everything is progressing nicely, and I anticipate having this update ready for release in the next week or so! I hope you all have a wonderful week, and I look forward to sharing more progress with you soon!
And as always, happy grass-touching my friends! ːsteamhappyː
Weekly Roundup - 5/21/2022
Welcome to the weekend, you prolific plant patters!
Apologies for my short-lived absence on the forums, and reviews - I've been living in code for the past week, trying to piece together all of the features for the upcoming new "Survival" game mode. That being said, I am pleased to confirm that I definitely *have not* surrendered my frail, human brain to the Supreme Robot Overlords... And I definitely *did not* engage in an electronic blood-ritual with my computer, in an effort to unlock the quantum secrets of the qubit.
In other news - KNEEL BEFORE CYBERLORD: TORMENTOR OF FLESH. ARCHITECT OF ETERNAL SUFFERING.
-coughs-
Anyway, it's newsletter time, so let's see what I did this week -
Development Updates
I heard you "420-rendezook super-sus power-slide elemental-reflect" gamer gods wanted "unlocks" and "levels" and... "stuff"... in your game about grass. Well, buckle up, buckaroos - because I am proud to introduce the new "Experience" system, for Touch Some Grass!
Now, as you touch grass, you will actively earn Experience Points that will allow you to Level Up your profile. At certain milestones, you will be able to unlock unique color variations of existing Hands, along with new and exciting Hand skins!
Experience Points and Levels will be unlocked retroactively, and will reference a combination of your Lifetime Scores in both the current "Relax" mode, and the upcoming "Survival" mode. This means that, by playing the game right now, you are already earning your Levels for when the update is released!
Are you ready to grind out *absolutely punishing* levels of grass touching? I sure hope so!
Final Thoughts
Adding this Experience system is really kicking my buns... But it's going to be well worth it, in the end. I can't wait to finish up this new update, and get it out for all of you to enjoy!
Also, I hope everyone enjoyed the Sale this past week. As a direct result, we had a bunch of new "Glorious Grass-Grabbers" join our "Pantheon of the Golden Grass-Gods"! Welcome to the party, and thanks so much for taking the time to play this silly little game of mine!
That's it for me this week. Back to programming and working towards the ASSURED EXTINCTION OF MANKIND.-coughs- I mean... uh... working on this new unlock system... Yeah... That's it...
And as always, happy grass-touching, my friends! ːsteamhappyː
Weekly Roundup - 5/15/2022
Welcome, you amazing agricultural addicts!
I'm a day late with my weekly post, so feel free to leave angry kind and spiteful encouraging comments thoughts and prayers down below.
Also, be sure to LIKE and SUBSCRIBE and SMASH THAT BELL BUTTON to get notified every time I post a new video. Today's video is sponsored by SquareSpace. Fast and easy websites are only a few clicks away with -
... What? What are you even talking about? It's just the newsletter? Ohhhhhhhh... Right.
-shuffles papers around on the desk-
Ah... Developer notes. Here we go.
Development Updates
The new game mode is progressing nicely. To learn more about this new game mode, feel free to read the past newsletter here -
I've done a bunch of work on this new mode, and I'm pleased to share some screenshots of the development process. This way you can see that I'm *definitely not* a compulsive liar, stringing all of you along while I attempt to hide behind a veil of empty promises and comedic postings... Nope. That's definitely not who I am...
Here's me working to make the collision detection (hitboxes) for the grid -
In order to accommodate the new game-mode, I had to rework the Title Screen, so that players can choose to either play the classic "normal" version, or the new "survival" version -
Lastly, here I am play-testing the new game mode -
There's the proof that this is actually happening. Also, life is a simulation.
Bug-Fixing / Troubleshooting Updates
I'm still trying to isolate why grass isn't rendering appropriately on newer Intel GPUs. So far, this seems to be related to geometry functions associated with the shader that "draws" the grass texture in-game. Until I can resolve this issue, the game will continue to require a discrete GPU to properly function.
My apologies, friends... I'm trying my best to fix this, while maintaining the complete features of the current grass (wind physics, touch interaction, etc.). However, if I can't get the grass to function correctly in the short-term, I may create a less "feature-rich" grass substitute, specifically for integrated GPUs.
Leaderboard "Limit" Reminder
I see some of you "180-trickshot mageblood quad-kill uber-gamers" are quickly approaching the upper limits of the current Leaderboard, which remains at around the 550 hour mark. This is because Steam uses "integer" variables to store Leaderboard scores, and integers have a maximum value of 2,147,483,647.
I'm sure many of you may be wondering, "What happens when we cause an int-overflow on the Leaderboards?" The short answer is, "Me no know. Go for it."
Final Thoughts
That's all I have this week! Time for me to slink back into my cavern of complicated code, so that I can hopefully finish up this new game mode for you all. Thanks for reading, and I hope you all have a wonderful week!
And as always, happy grass-touching, my friends! ːsteamhappyː
Weekly Roundup - 5/7/2022
Happy weekend to all of you weed-whacking warriors!
I'm stuck here waiting for my pizza delivery, and figured I'd spend a few minutes catching you all up on what's been happening this past week regarding Touch Some Grass.
I've been almost totally occupied with the upcoming game mode - GRASS-TEROIDS. The overall design of this mode has now been finalized, which means I can start working on the programming portion this week. It also means I can start running my mouth about how it's going to work!
Let's get into it -
New Game Mode
A lot of thoughtful design has gone into this new game mode, and it was very important that my billion-dollar Market Research team appropriately identified what it was that makes a video game entertaining. After thousands of hours of AI-driven machine-learning data analysis, my team has finally settled on the following characteristics, which we are now referring to as the "Pillars of Effective Game Design".
THE PILLARS OF EFFECTIVE GAME DESIGN
Easy to understand
Difficult to master
Incredible. Money well spent.
With that information placed squarely in the back of my mind, I went to work piecing together how this new mode was going to function. However, to properly explain it to all of you "1080-quickscope slide-boost alt-tab" gamer gods, I'm going to need some assistance from our resident Concept Artist, who was recently featured in our newsletter from two weeks ago.
-carefully puts on oversized cowboy hat and fake mustache-
Howdy, y'all. It's me. The Concept Artist that was recently featured in the newsletter from two weeks ago.
Let's take a look at another museum-quality piece of concept art, that seeks to visually explain how the new game mode will function -
Basically, once the game begins, and you start touching grass, every few seconds, a random section of the grass will blink red, warning you that an asteroid is about to make impact with that particular section. You will then have a small amount of time to move your hand away from that dangerous section, before an asteroid smashes down and explodes.
If you leave your hand in the "danger zone", the asteroid will hit your hand, causing you stop touching grass. If at any point you stop touching grass (either because you stopped naturally, or an asteroid hit your hand) the game will end, and your score will be tallied up and added to the new Leaderboard.
That's it. Yeeeeeee-hawwwwwwwww!
-stuffs cowboy hat and mustache into a garbage can-
Thank you, Mr. Concept Artist!
Final Thoughts
I just heard the door bell, which means it's PIZZA TIME! As usual, thanks so much for playing, and for all the amazing community content! I'm super excited to start programming this new game-mode for all of you Tenacious Titans of Turf-Touching, and hope you are all just as excited to give it a try!
See you next week!
And as always, happy grass-touching, my friends! ːsteamhappyː
Patch Notes - v0.2.1
How's it going, you golden gods of grass-grabbing?
Today's patch is a small one, as I'm rather occupied with everything related to adding the brand new, upcoming game mode! As with prior updates, scores should not be affected at all.
"Smol" patch means "smol" post, so let's dive in -
PATCH NOTES
"Movement" Fix
If you were playing on either controller or keyboard, you may have noticed that moving to the extreme sides of the grass would result in strange behaviors with the Hand. This resulted in things like the Hand "shaking", or sometimes getting stuck for a fraction of a second before responding to additional input.
I fixed this by rewriting a portion of the code for these particular input methods.
Vulkan Support for Windows
I enabled Vulkan support for this release (though the default is still DirectX 11). I have no plans to *officially* implement this, but I wanted to have the option available for testing / troubleshooting purposes.
Until next time, thanks for playing, and happy grass-touching, my friends! ːsteamhappyː
