Wild West Wednesday - Inside and Outside - Double Feature
"Don't you think Mytree has changed a lot since the spruce fell on his head, John?" "Yes, Eric, but life has odd stories in stock anyway."
Hello cowboys and cowgirls!
Today, by popular demand, we present a double feature. We've visited ghost towns and met creepy people, so it's not far-fetched for us to report on mysteries from the Old West today.
William Wirt Winchester, the son of arms tycoon Oliver Winchester, married Sarah Lockwood Pardee in 1862. A perfect marriage, they could have lived happily ever after, but alas, it turned out differently. Oliver Winchester died in 1880, William less than three months later and Sarah's mother also died during this period. This time could have been called haunted, but the fabulous fortune Sarah inherited, according to legend, held the actual curse. The legend says that the spirits of those who died at the hands of a Winchester rifle would find their way back to those who had brought the evil (the rifle) into the world and haunt them.
In addition, the legend continues that Sarah consulted her deceased husband through a medium as to what she should use the immense fortune for, and in response received a mandate from the deceased to build a home for the dead.
Following the advice of her doctor, Sarah moved from Connecticut to California, where she purchased a farm in San Jose, which was expanded and remodelled in the years to come. Countless rooms, bedrooms, corridors and staircases were added over the next 36 years, and the building grew into a seven-storey maze with nearly 500 rooms by 1900. Doors led directly to the walls, corridors to nowhere. In 1906, however, the spirits must have been somewhat dissatisfied with the unliving conditions, for they caused the earth to shake and the building was badly damaged.
But after the Great Quake, work did not stop and the building continued to be constructed and by Sarah's death in 1922, it had 160 rooms, 2.000 doors and 10.000 windows. Subsequently, the building was supposed to make way for a rollercoaster, but this plan was scrapped after massive protests - presumably the ghosts would have been annoyed by this too. Nevertheless, the Winchester House remains a place for all kinds of spooky things. We recommend a visit there.
From indoors to outdoors, we cycle 1826 kilometres southeast and end up in Marfa, Texas. Never heard of it? Doesn’t matter actually, you don't have to know every ghost personally and have to sublet to them.
In 1883, a young cowhand named Robert Reed Ellison saw a flickering light that he initially thought was a campfire of the local Apache tribe. Investigations revealed, however, that there had never been a camp there. The flickering light was also mentioned by the other settlers.
Between 1945 and 2008, this flickering light was seen 34 times.
But what is behind this mysterious light?
We open the monster manual of a notorious fantasy role-playing game on page 165 and find the will-o'-the-wisp, a creature that, according to folklore, dwells in swamps and graveyards and tempts the curious to their doom. We looked up the area in a search engine but found no swamps or graveyards. The next semi-conclusive explanation would be car lights, but automobiles didn't pass through Texas in 1883.
Then there are atmospheric phenomena, a mirage caused by light passing through a cool layer of air, which then abruptly hits a warm layer of air at a low angle and is sometimes reflected totally. Or Marfa is the gathering place of the super rare ball lightning, but for that you need a thunderstorm.
Whatever the case, which explanation is the best? Have you ever been to Marfa? You want to send us a haunting from the Winchester house? Well, keep 'em coming. Either here or on our social media channels.
Wild West Dynasty – Update to 0.1.7554
Howdy, cowboys and cowgirls!
The first regular update following the hotfixes. This update should eliminate a few issues around saving and loading. The next updates are already being planned.
Fixed
Farm rotation is now stored and restored correctly after save/load.
Fixed characters with broken clothes/pink hairs in the settler camps.
Fixed several NPCs on the map with pink hairs.
Fixed empty dialogue box once talking with an NPC in camp.
Fixed farm state (plant/claim) after load broken.
Fixed issue with picking up items from farms, what could lock input.
Fixed missing potatoes on farms after load.
Fixed double-farms spawner after load.
Fixed quest info overlapped.
Fixed the camera issue after loading the game.
Fixed NPC problem with textures on mid/long range rendering distance.
Fixed Child hair rendering problem with mid/short rendering distance.
Fixed getting stuck after teleportation from point-to-point.
Fixed a problem with loading state of MyTree NPC.
Fixed a problem with an uncuttable tree after loading (MyTree).
Fixed a problem with players being locked in their own house if they built a prototype and missed the materials to build a door.
Fixed most issues falling down after loading a save game created while on horseback.
“Friend in Need” Quest – fixed an issue with the Treasure Chest being unlockable (without a prompt) when facing it to open.
“Friend in Need” Quest – if the player dies from wolves, the player will be respawned next to Jack.
Fixed several issues with game physics just after save/reload.
Wild West Wednesday - Gold takes a ride...
"Haha, you call that gold?" "Put your hand on the table, Jim!" *plop!* "Ouch!" "If it's heavy, it's gold."
Gold - this strangely shiny transition metal, number 79 on the periodic table - framed by the disdainful mercury and its little brother platinum - has always held a special fascination for human minds and greed.
Today in Wild West Wednesday we focus on a man who struck a fabulous vein of gold in 1877, but only enjoyed it for less than a year. This was partly because the gold was on a train and partly because the man now took a liking for raiding.
Sam Bass originated from Indiana and got around as a young man. He worked in a sawmill, as a carriage driver, briefly as an assistant for a sheriff, as a cowboy, was involved in horse racing and then as a cowhand. The money he earned was spent on women and gambling by Sam and his partner Joel Collins, so new money was needed.
They hired four men and started robbing stagecoaches with limited success until the day a Union Pacific railway and Sam Bass crossed paths. The six robbed the train and captured a staggering 60,000 US dollars (a lot of money by the standards of the time) in freshly minted gold. But because gold also exerts a fascination on its original owners, all levers were set in motion to recover the gold.
Two members of the gang were caught shortly after the robbery, Sam Bass escaped and started a new posse in Texas to continue his series of moderately successful robberies. However, losing streaks wore on his force as Pinkerton detectives, Texas Rangers and sheriffs would not let go. During a raid on a bank in the summer of 1878, Sam Bass was lured into a trap and he died in the firefight where he shot another man for the first and only time.
The train robbery is still the largest train robbery in the US in terms of booty.
While we are not scheduling train or stagecoach robberies, we are planning a series of updates at regular intervals to improve the game piece by piece. Thank you for staying with us!
Wild West Wednesday - Grace under Pressure!
Say, John, you look pretty darned maltreated! What happened to you? I fell off this bloody thing. If I get my hands on Edgar...! Bad, man, bad, I tell you, these new machines are the devil's work!
You must have come across this construct in the game, which was quite unusual in this area at that time. We don't want to spoil too much now, but instead venture into the world of the inventors and engineers of the time.
At the time of the archetypical Wild West, the second industrial revolution was in full swing. Steel was the new mass product. Chemistry, electricity and hydroelectricity and related knowledge were on the rise.
This era of industrialisation began with James Watt's pioneering advancement of Thomas Newcomen's steam engine in 1769, which, contrary to many myths, he did not draw from the contemplation of a boiling kettle. This new steam engine, which was produced from 1776, allowed the use of new equipment such as steam traction engines (from 1841), locomotives (from 1825) or steamships (from 1783).
In the 19th century, as already mentioned, engineering spread: Researchers like James Clerk Maxwell founded electronics, while the research of Alessandro Volta advanced electrical engineering.
While we're on the subject of advancement: Wild West Dynasty has received several hotfixes since the start of Early Access, and there are of course more updates in the pipeline that we'll keep you informed about!
Hotfix 0.1.7488
Added
Sense ability -> set as unlocked from the beginning of the game
New variant of sticks -> should be more visible in various areas
Door sounds added in some areas
Fixed
Warehouse storage & chests -> fixed problem with restoring seeds after load
Jack (Just) horse should now work for all (as a reward for finish the quest)
Hotbar buttons can now be changed in key-bindings
Hide UI button can now be bound to another key
Jack (Just) will no longer get up in a dialogue
Chapter 3 - added handler to fulfill the entry "finish site-quests"
Fixed issue where Chapter 3 was locked
Fixed issue when player died after load close to the treasure
Weight in the inventory not updated after item was destroyed - fixed
Pantry not saved - fixed
Pantry interaction before fully built - fixed
Politic character fixed hair
Resources shop hope - fixes
Weapons shop - fixes
Free carts panel in management menu fixed
Drop item (Q) and Hotbar (Q) keybinding conflict resolved. MIGHT REQUIRE REASSIGNING IN SETTINGS
Updated
Q is no longer closing the menu panel (unified - ESC button)
Quest items are not visible in general category in inventory now. They are visible in Quest Items category (filter)
Disabled bandit attacks event for now
Quest task entries scale now on UI (no more overlapping)
Hotfix 0.1.7463
Added
Added amount panel for interaction with chest
Added amount panel for interaction with storage
Fixed
Chris Yorke - fixed pink beard
NPCs in Hope - fixed some pink hairs
NPCs in Hope - fixed eyes
Loading state of Buildings and Inventory for advanced saves (you will get back your buildings and inventory - right now we are fixing loading issues with the production queues)
(WIP) Lost Treasure - fixing quest progression. Test for older saves
Updated
Bow - started to refactor usage of bow (should be much more "intuitive"). Player can also right now use bow during walking
Journal - started to refactor UI for Quest Panel
Animal respawn limiter. Full animal herd will respawn only one per day
Shop and Storage-panels can now be filtered
Loca updates
UI updates
Reduced music volume in Taxation
Wild West Wednesday - Agave Caesar!
Hello Cowboys and Cowgirls!
You probably already came across the Agave in the game. It is a versatile plant that grows in the hot and dry deserts and semi-deserts of North America, Central America and the north of South America.
There are about 270 species of this plant, which belong to the asparagus family. An agave is also called century plant, they bloom only once and until they bloom, time to pass can be very long.
This plant is useful in several ways (and that pleases Karen). It serves as a supplier of fibre, sisal is probably well known, ixtle fibre is another type of fibre, it is used in brooms, brushes, mats, and ropes.
In addition (and this pleases other inhabitants of the region) agaves contain a lot of sugar. The fermentation of this sugar is used to manufacture tequila or mezcal.
Agave syrup is also used in cooking as a substitute for honey.
Researchers are working on the extraction of fructans, which is a similar starch that is extracted from potatoes and wheat, except that these fructans could prove to be better tolerated by diabetics. In addition, agaves are interesting for food security and the production of bioethanol because of their resilience in their habitat.
Hotfix 0.1.7429
Added
Saving of the selected language
Saving of chest content in players houses
Fixed
Loading of quest markers and progression (to prevent other unpredictable problems we strongy suggenst to start a bew game)
Shed interactable after load
Workshop interactable after load
Issue with warehouse inventory display bug
Issue with restoring items in inventory
Updated
Decimals for prices adjusted
Further improved Key-Binding
Improved running-animation with bow
Improved light/shadow settings at night (should affect performance)
Reworked parts of the menus / UI
Some more French loca
Some more Italian loca
Hotfix 0.1.7166
Added
Colt in chest as a quest objective to "A Friend in Need"
Another saver for money
Saving of the menu/game settings
Fixed
NPCs were in some cases not visible after loading
Branches should be again spawning while cutting trees
Issue with locking unfinished buildings after loading. Now you should be able to continue building.
Updated
Code for saving / loading the inventory
Code for saving / loading for warehouse items
Hotfix 0.1.7404
Added
Basic key-bind menu added (still under development, therefore you may encounter issues).
Vegetation render distance (in meters) setting added in the main and pause menu.
Added parts of Spanish loca.
Added parts of Turkish loca.
Added further parts for questline "A Friend in Need".
Fixed
A lot of popping rocks were fixed.
Fixed Chapter III where money spent was not accounted.
Sold material remained for crafting – fixed.
"A Friend in Need" Taxation quest marker fixed.
City Slicker quest marker fixed (after loading).
Fixed tree collision with colliders (trees in the air).
