Good day, Traveller!

Here's a surprise update for the demo version of Chronicles of Vaeltaja, which will add some new features and improvements that will be added later to the main game too. Highlight of the update is the new sound system, which adds different ambient sounds to the game. These new effects are not just simple loops playing in the background, they also take the player's position into account; for example, rivers get louder when the player approaches them. In some parts of the Great Forest the birds are louder and in some parts there are loud crickets when it rains. Night sounds different than day; for example owls can be heard only at night, though some of them are quiet when it rains.

But that's not all considering sound effects: Now enemies in the dungeons have their own movement sound effects too; dungeons feel a bit more exciting when the approaching enemies can be heard. Footsteps and other sounds also have echo in dungeons.

The new update also brings some enhancements to daytime lighting by slightly altering the sunlight colour and brings out the shadow properly during the day hours. There have been some performance improvements too, so the game should run smoother now. One of the issues with the game engine is that it doesn't allow proper Vsync, so the Vsync that has been in the Options Menu is actually just a frame cap. There are few different ways to implement the frame cap, and some of them are more optimal than the others. For this reason I renamed the Vsync option and added three best methods (based on test results) for the engine to cap frames. From now on the player can try them personally and choose which ever method feels the smoothest.

One important Quality of Life -feature is that the controller's L3 button opens the outdoor area map, so there is no longer need to reach for the keyboard. I have updated the tutorial section of the codex with all the key bindings.

It will take some time to implement all the ambient and enemy movement sounds to the main game, and I'm still in the middle of the spelling error and grammar corrections, so please be patient. I want to make as good use of these new sound features as I can, so I don't want to rush things. It will be worth the wait; these changes will make Twin Falls feel and sound much more alive.

NEW STUFF:

• Ambient sound effects

• Enemy movement sound effects

• Improved daytime lighting

• Improved daytime shadows

• Three methods to cap frames

• Overworld area maps can be opened with controller

IMPROVEMENTS AND FIXES:

• Performance improvements

• Event optimizations (the big torch in front of the farmer's house is no longer a heavy parallel process, unnecessary blob shadows removed from events such as doors and digging spots)

• Some minor graphical improvements (forest entrance and the Old Tower's window textures are now fixed)

• Changes to couple of enemy events to prevent them using the wrong enemy mobs when the battle starts

• Moon no longer disappears during the darkest hours at night

• Fixed a bug that made the demo version crash if save folder contained saves from the very old demo version

There might be some other small fixes left unmentioned, because I forgot to write notes at some point when I was testing the update and fixing bugs.

I hope you enjoy these changes!

Jani/Witchgrove Games