I hope you are all doing well this morning, afternoon, or evening, wherever you may be. I’ve been working on new Dinkum content for quite some time, and I am now happy to announce that the second major Dinkum update is ready for you to play! With the Bloomin’ Spring update a new resident is joining our community, some new wildflowers will spring up on the Island, you can build a new building in your town, dive deeper into the deep min, and many more surprises that I left here and there for you to find. If you want to know more details about what’s coming to Dinkum, keep on reading. But if you don’t want to spoil the fun of discovery, you can jump into your Dinkum island and find the surprises yourself. Whatever option you choose, I hope you enjoy all the new content. Ok, I’m just about to get into more details, so if you don’t want spoilers, now is the time to go!! But before you do, thank you for your support!
You’re still here? In that case, let me tell you more about the Bloomin’ Spring update. From today you can say hello and become friends with Sheila, our new villager on Dinkum Island. You can find her at your local Visitor Site. Sheila loves food and her hobby is cooking. She is known to make some tasty tucker. If you want her to move permanently to your town, you’re going to have to cook up some treats for her. Sheila is the owner of Tuckerbox, a local tuckshop. And if you collect all the necessary materials to build it, she will happily run it for you and all the other residents so that everyone on the island can enjoy her treats.
Sheila and her Tuckerbox have a lot of comfort to offer.
When spring starts, some new wildflowers will start appearing all over the island. Keep your eyes open for Jackaroo Paw, the Flannel Flower, River Daisies and a bunch of Paper Daisies Rayne has started selling Jacaranda saplings in her greenhouse. These are available all year, but blossom into a bright purple colour in spring. What can be better than the back garden full of flowering plants. And that smell!
Is there a better way to relax than taking a nap in your garden?
From now on you can also add a Band Stand to your town! This is a place to host events, parties, gatherings, and celebrations. If you want to build one, just talk to Fletch and you will build it in no time.
Can’t wait to see what events we can have here!
Are you looking for a way to organize your town a little bit better? Perhaps making it easier to navigate? Or perhaps you would like to commemorate some special places? Well from now on you can place signs which you can use to mark directions, highlight spots, or just to upgrade the look of the town’s street. Before you can place them, speak to Fletch first and get a Sign Writing Licence – thanks to that licence you will get The Sign Writing Table, a pen, and a few sign recipes. With these, you can start putting signs anywhere you like!
Is it possible to have too many signs?
Well, there's a sneak peek, but I’ll leave you with the fun of discovering all the other new additions. There’s plenty of new stuff that isn’t mentioned here, but if you really, really, really want to know more, check out the changelog below. And before I go, I just want to thank you all for all your help, your comments, feedback, and support. You have no idea how much it means to me to get such positivity from all of you. So once again, thank you and I really hope you like the new update!
Speak to you all soon, James
Patch Notes
New
- Spring has sprung with new wild flowers appearing in the season. - A special Town event will occur on the last day of spring. - A new villager can move to the island. - A new building can be built. - Travel deeper into the Deep Mines. - New enemies can be encountered in the deeper mines. - There is a new Signwriting Licence. - Added several new sign related craftable recipes. - There is a new Brewing licence to unlock new recipes. - There is a new Water Scaping licence to unlock. - Water Beds can be crafted to create decorative waterfalls around your island. - A new visitor will visit the island in Autumn and Spring to hold a competition. - Each season now has its own sunset time. - The bulletin board now contains a calendar. - Villagers will now visit other buildings on their days off. - Each villager now has a birthday. - Pleep are now bought as babies. - Saddled Mus are alive now! - There is a new whistle that can call saddled Mus to you from anywhere. - Added a Tripod Camera used for taking selfies. - There is a new vehicle to discover. - Added several new plants. - Added several new milestones. - Added an auto stack button for storage containers. - Added a collect and delete all button to the mailbox. - Added “save” button to letters you want to protect from the collect all button. - Motorbikes now have boost for cool and extreme jumps. - A shady visitor has some new items for sale. - Each villager now has their own shop music. - All furniture and clothing has a icon now.
Changes
- The Cheese maker and Spinning wheel are now unlocked through the animal processing licence. - You can now donate multiple items to the museum all at once. - You can now buy up to 999 seeds at once. - Magpies no longer eat crops. - Villagers with high friendship will slowly lose some friendship if they aren’t talked to for a while. - Changed the texture of fertilised soil. - Mail in the mailbox is now sorted newest to oldest. - Lowered the value of flour and sugar a bit. - Decreased the likelihood of villagers rewarding players with clothing and increased likelihood of rewarding with Dinks. - John’s Goods rotates his eatable stock. - Queen bees are more likely to spawn from hives. - Cooked meats now have additional buffs. - Hammer weapons swing a bit faster. - Bush Devils are now immune to fire. - Players will move to the position they were standing before they sat down instead of always moving forward. - Hovering over buff icon will show it’s name. - Dinking Rich milestone now only grants 1000 Permit Points per level instead of 3000. - Increased the sell value of fossils. - Fullness effect was increased after late. - NPCs offer new items when offering to sell things. - Fish are more common on rainy days. - Bugs are more common in spring. - Some brew recipes have changed.
Bug Fixed
- Fixed a bug that would not let visitors cast their fishing line properly in multiplayer. - Dinks earnt from selling discs now count towards Dink related milestones. - Players can no longer accidentally pick things up in the overworld when inside a building. - Fixed a bug that would cause power tools to charge twice when placed on charge overnight and saving and reloading. - Fixed a bug that would cause problems if the player passed out while riding a vehicle. - Fixed a desync problem with furniture placed on top of other furniture. - Fixed a bug that caused the Torch to stun animals during the day. - Fixed a bug that could very rarely teleport players while sleeping. - Fixed a bug that made the fish pulling speed frame rate dependent. - Fixed a bug that could cause the player to fall through the ground when using a wheelbarrow - Wheelbarrow can jump again. - Fixed a bug that would make objects on certain tiles always drop the same drops. - Fixed a bug that caused Watermelons and Pumpkins to give harvesting XP. - Fixed a bug that caused the sounds from bugs to not use volume settings. - Fixed a bug that destroyed bushes and ferns when planting grass seeds under them. - Fixed a bug that caused gates to rotate incorrectly when being placed on their own. - Fixed a bug that would let animals walk through fences. - Fixed a bug that would softlock players who have been revived in water. - Lots of other smaller fixes.
Dinkum’s second major update - The Bloomin' Spring Update is getting closer to release. To hold you over just a bit longer, I’ll be hosting a live stream Q&A where I will be showing off some of the new features coming to Dinkum.
If you have time and want to hang out, join me on Sunday the 5th of March at 9:30 am AEST | 12:30 am CET | Saturday March 4th 3:30 PM PST on Dinkum's Youtube channel. It’ll be fun to hang out, play a bit of Dinkum, and have a chat with each other.
The Weekend Deal has started and with it a sweet deal on the game. If you want to spend your upcoming weekend in the wild Australian-inspired outback, build your own town, grow some veggies, make friends, and even pet a wombat or two, you can do all that for less!
You can now buy Dinkum with a 20% discount, which will end on Monday, 13th of February. And if you already have the game and you’re enjoying it, perhaps you would like to gift it to someone special this Valentine's Day so that you can explore Dinkum Island together!
I've had my head down working hard on Dinkum's next update. I really wanted to have it ready for everyone to play in early February, but things are taking a little bit longer than expected, so I will need a bit more time.
The Bloomin’ Spring update is the first of many updates where I will be focusing on a specific season. My goal for this update is to make the in-game Spring feel different to the other seasons by offering different events and new things to discover around the island.
I would like to keep some of these things a surprise, but being Spring, you can imagine there will be a lot of wildflowers spawning around your island. Another change I’m happy to share is the sun now sets at different times in each season. Winter being the shortest day with the sun setting around 6pm like usual. Summer and Spring have longer days, with the sun setting around 8pm-9pm.
I have been teasing some of the upcoming items and features through screenshots on Dinkum's Discord. But I have some new pics to show off here as well.
These mines look different…
The Rowboat grew up?
Finally, this update will include a bunch of smaller quality-of-life tweaks. Things like crates and chests now have an auto stack button, for stacking all the items from your inventory straight into the chest’s stack. There is now a "collect and delete all" button for collecting all your mail at once. This will hopefully make trapping rewards a bit less tedious. Oh and Theodore will now accept more than one donation at a time at the museum, so you can get back out there and catch even more fish and bugs for him.
There is a bit more that’s coming in the next update, but I will tell you all about it next time - unless Fletch beats me to it! And I hope you all understand that I want this update to be as good as it can be. I do appreciate your patience and I hope you don't mind waiting just a little bit longer for it. I hope that you will feel the wait was worth it.
That’s all for this post, so I’m going to get back to working on the update.
Can you feel the heat?! It’s scorching, isn't it! It’s time to get out your bathers, hats, and sunscreen from the closets (as they say down here, it’s time to slip, slop, slap!). Summer is officially here - on the island of Dinkum at least. So if you are looking for a little winter escape to a place that’s a bit more warmer, you can hide inside your house and play Dinkum for 20% off.
Dinkum is 20% OFF during the Steam Winter Sale!
The sale starts right now and will end on Thursday the 5th of January 2023 at 10 am PT | 7 pm CET and on Friday, the 6th of January at 5 am AEDT.
Stay cool or warm depending on where you are, and speak to you soon!
This is a small update to fix a bug that was filling some player's log files and preventing steam cloud from uploading their saves.
If you have experienced any troubles with Steam cloud. please launch the game from the last device you played it on and select "use local files". Doing this twice will clear the large log files in your save directory and allow the save to upload to the cloud.
I hope everyone is enjoying the festive update and sorry for any inconvenience!
I won’t take too much of your time, as I feel you will want to investigate this ASAP! Now that the weather has warmed up, there’s been some strange sightings occurring around the island. Franklin has alerted me that while he was stargazing the outback sky last night, he saw some flying Jackaroos dashing through the sky! At first, I doubted him, but he reassured me that he saw it with his own two eyes. Well, one to be exact, because he did have to close one of them to use his telescope, ha ha ha! It seems these sightings are becoming more common, as townsfolk have been leaving more investigation quests on the bulletin board. Please take a look when you’re in town.
There have also been sightings of a strange burly gentleman wandering around the island’s beaches. He looks a bit lost, so if you see a strange marker on your map, maybe try to track him down to help him out?
Ok, I will leave you to it already. I’ve been blabbing on for too long anyway, ha ha ha! I’ll leave you with a message I’ve received from James.
Happy Holidays!
Fletch - Head of Island Exploration
Hi everyone! It's nearly the end of the year and I just want to thank everyone for playing Dinkum this year. I can't believe how lucky I am to have a wholesome community and so many people play my little game.
The next big update is still a little bit away, but to hold you over until it's ready, I thought it would be nice to give you guys a small festive update, as a gift for the holidays.
This event will only be available in December, but anything you find or craft during the event will remain in your world after that. I hope you have fun tracking down the new festive items.
Regards,
James
Patch Notes:
New Added a new visitor who will hang out on the beach on sunny days during December Check your bulletin board often during December to hunt down strange new things that fall from the sky Added a new fruit to find Added new festive furniture, clothing and tools Added a festive creature that appears only during December Added experimental refresh rate button for people with high refresh rate monitors
Changes There is now a visual notification for special visitors that make a sound when they appear Item catalogues are now sorted alphabetically Fixed a certain visitor’s boat’s collider so vehicles don’t pass through it Changed the way farm animals look for food Changed the way farm animals look for available housing Increased the size of the Vombat interact hit box Lowered motorbike turning sensitivity a bit Doubled the bank’s interest Bridges can no longer be placed over objects the player has placed
Bug Fixes Fixed a bug that would cause wild animals in a pen to disappear after a few in game days. Fixed a bug where Alpha animals would despawn before the quest time ran out Fixed a bug where the item selected on the toolbelt would not always be the item inserted into chargers Fixed a bug that caused drops from kegs, furnaces etc to disappear after saving and reloading Fixed a bug where the mine elevator would sometimes not detect players inside, trapping them at the bottom of the mines Fixed a bug where beds inside guests houses would sometimes lock after sleeping Fixed a bug where visitor’s bank accounts would not accrue interest Fixed a bug that prevented some save files from loading Fixed a bug where multiple screen resolutions would appear in the options menu Fixed a bunch of furniture collision and sleeping positions problems Fixed a bug that showed “too full” when visitors in the world would eat Fixed a bug that caused sharks to disappear when swapping from rod midway though catching them Fixed a bug where furniture would disappear and reappear quickly inside the player’s house after waking up Fixed a bug where the recycling bin could be destroyed with items still inside it Fixed an issue where food health buffs were sometimes doubled for host players. Fixed a bug that caused the tractor to consume more fertiliser than it placed Fixed a bug that made farm animals harvestable again after renaming them Fixed a bug that would sometimes lock the camera preventing players from taking photos Fixed a bug that caused character profile pics to always have blue eyes Fixed a bug that caused characters piloting vehicles to not sit in their seat properly on visitors screens Flowers no longer have the “bury” tag on them Tiki Torches no longer float above the ground The pause button is now available after receiving the journal when starting a new game
During this year’s Steam Autumn Sale, voting for the coveted Steam Awards will also take place. They are really prestigious awards, and although my game might not have the most intense graphics or the highest budget, there is one category that I feel it might be worth entering. And it’s the ‘Sit Back and Relax’.
I’ve spent the last four years of my life creating a game that I hoped would share a bit of my childhood with everyone. Experiencing nature, the outback, tin roofs, and the people around me. I hope that Dinkum did just that and that you have a chilled, carefree time while playing it. If you’ve enjoyed playing Dinkum this year, and it gave you a relaxing escape from everyday life, it would be an honour if you would give it your vote.
Voting will last as long as the Steam Autumn Sale, meaning votes close on Tuesday the 29th of November 2022 at 10 am PT | 7 pm CET, and on Wednesday, the 30th of November at 5 am AEDT.
Thank you for all your support and enjoy the Autumn Sale as well!
Autumn is now officially upon us. The leaves are falling down, the pumpkin spice lattes are being poured and it’s getting much cozier. Well, that‘s what I imagine, as here in Australia, we’re getting ready for summer! But regardless of which part of the world you’re from, we can all enjoy The Steam Autumn Sale. And to celebrate this huge sales event, Dinkum is now 20% off!
Don’t wait too long though, as the Autumn Sale will last for only 7 days. The event starts today and will end on Tuesday the 29th of November 2022 at 10 am PT | 7 pm CET and on Wednesday, the 30th of November at 5 am AEDT.
So if you’ve been waiting to play with a friend, or maybe start a new fair Dinkum life on your own, now is the time to start building your new home out in the bush! Hope to see you on the island soon!