This week's update features some changes to the network and save system, so for now it will only be available for people who opt in to try it. See instructions below.
We've also added a number of new trees, fish, and the gift shop, which allows you to exchange coins for medals (be warned, they are quite expensive!).
Today's Farm Showcase: "An overhead of my garden" by Zithis
Details on the beta update: This update brings a new network protocol, using Steam to connect between peers, that should improve connectivity and reduce the number of connection issues (shouldn't have an impact over connection quality and ping once the connection has been established).
We've done our best to make sure it works, but to be on the safe side, we want to do some public testing before completely replacing the older system.
We've also changed the format used for farm save data. This should help with some data corruptions people were experiencing. This should work fine and be compatible with farms saved in the previous format. Again to be on the safe side, some volunteer testing will be appreciated.
Some Q&A on these changes:
How do I opt in? To try this update, open the game's properties on the Steam client, go to the Betas tab, and select the "beta" branch. The client will download the update. If the "beta" branch is not shown, please try restarting the Steam client.
Will my data be safe? We're rather sure it will. If you experience problems please let us know.
If I opt in, can I go back later to the previous update? You can opt out of the beta, but any farm saved in the new format won't be loaded by previous versions of the game (this has always been the case).
If I opt in, will I be able to join people outside the beta? No, farms with a different version can't be joined. They won't appear on the farm list and will throw an error if you try to join via invites etc.
When will the update become available to everyone? Once we have enough data and feedback to make sure it works as expected and no major bugs arise, we'll make it available to everyone. Depending on how many people test it out and how many issues arise, it can be just a few days, or more.
New features:
Changed networking protocol to use Steam P2P. This should improve overall connectivity.
Changed save format to a different one. This should help with some save data corruption.
New farm items:
Spinach
DragonFruit
Mango
Papaya
Avocado
Angelfish
Discus
Blue Tang
Gift shop
Improvements:
Improved performance of the Shop window when switching categories.
This week's update is small on content, but it features a good number of fixes and improvements.
Today's Farm Showcase: Feature the chickeeeennnnn :D by jinntacc
New items:
Flower Shop - Replaces previous Greenhouse (it's smaller so a few tiles will be available)
Flower Market
Greenhouse is now a decoration (but greenhouses placed prior to this update will be treated as Flower Shops).
Fence "Pennant Banner"
Fence "String Lights"
Fence "Paper Lanterns"
Road: "Pergola Path"
Decoration: "Water" tile.
Improvements:
Players will now exit the house on a fixed position and rotation instead of on the position they had when entering. This also fixes the problem of exiting a house after it was moved.
You can enqueue now up to 50 items while moving them. The cancel key won't cancel the whole move process, just remove the last selected item from the queue.
If there's a job requiring action inside a house, an icon will be shown on the house (it won't be shown if there are not enough resources to continue cooking yet).
Inside the house, if a job is ready for the next step but it's missing resources, an icon will be shown.
Added a key to orientate the character while in photo mode.
Added a button in Farm Settings to clear the whole farm contents (for people who want to redecorate the farm from scratch). Everything but houses should be recycled, and you will get back the full price for the items, not just half.
Adjusted some tutorial values and initial farm settings to make it quicker in the beginning.
Added new sort modes in the Shop Window, depending on the category. Changed the default sort mode to "Availability", which puts Quest items first, and items that can be planted second, sorted by descending Level. It also sorts animals by race.
Bugfixes:
Fixed incorrect tractor colors.
Fixed smoke puffs appearing on the wrong side when placing fences
Fixed butterflies not being destroyed when entering a house on night.
Fixed walls, floors and doors not being marked as "seen" in the Shop window.
Hi! We're releasing a small update today featuring some fixes and minor improvements.
Improvements:
On "Find Farms", favorites and friends are now included in the "All" search, and shown first of the list. Search takes a bit longer because of that.
"Full" text when harvesting is now shown Yellow again instead of Red.
Gameplay changes:
Crops will no longer wither.
Bugfixes:
We're still working on the "Farm stops being saved" issue. This update brings new changes that we hope will help fixing the problem, as well as an error message that will be shown when we detect the farm has stopped saving or updating. If you experience this error message, please send us the log file of the game so we can take a look at it.
Hi! Today's update features the Houses, introducing the biggest addition we've made so far in the game. You can now build houses (they take some time and resources to be built), and once they're built you can enter them and decorate their interior, as well as perform Jobs that will net you Tickets, a new currency that is used to purchase furniture and decorations for the house.
Although we've tried hard to make sure everything works fine from the get go, as expected some issues may arise, so please let us know if you experience any problems.
Today's Farm showcase: Unnamed by Opii
New features:
Houses that can you can build and enter, with a new shop inside featuring plenty of furniture and decorations!
New Items:
3 New Pigs
3 New Chickens
2 New Cows
1 New Flower ( Oleander )
1 New Crop ( Purple Cauliflower )
1 New Fence (light posts)
1 New Decoration (Mailbox)
Improvements:
Now you can flip fences while placing/moving them by pressing the move key, same way as with buildings.
For sufficiently large amounts of items, an outline of their icon will be shown in the map.
On the Map, fuel stations are colored differently. Same with houses.
The resource icon is not shown on feeders if they are not required.
Gameplay changes:
Increased flower level up speed.
Bugfixes:
Fixed rotation for the preview of some decorations not being consistent.
Fixed the Nectarine Tree not becoming transparent when behind it.
Fixed UI getting stuck if you quickly press the map/interaction key after teleporting.
We've been working hard on a big update for some time, and we're really close to completion (just finishing the last touches, polishing and testing out everything to make sure it works as expected), and it's time to show you a couple of screenshots so you can check by yourselves!
You'll be able to build houses, enter them and do a series on jobs (such as cooking or painting) to earn Tickets, that can be used to purchase new furniture and decorations!
If all goes well we should be able to release the update by next week.
Also a reminder that we will increase the game's price along with the new update (this will only affect purchases after it, if you already own the game you don't need to worry), so now it's the perfect time to pick the game!
Today's update features new crops and other minor additions. We know it's a small one, but that's because we're still working hard on the big update, we're sure you'll love it!
Today's Farm showcase: Untitled by OrangiChu
New items:
Yellow Cauliflower
Yellow hydrangea
Black Tulip
2 New sheep
Chard
Date Palm tree
Artichoke
Romanesco
New character skin color: Blue
New character customization item: Cap
Gameplay changes:
Reduced a bit experience required to level up on higher levels (around 10% on 50+ levels)
Changes to weather effects:
Rain: Doubles water input rate (so a crop water level will increase instead of just stay at the level it had)
Drought: Water usage is tripled instead of doubled
Snow: Water level won't increase.
Snow will only occur on Winter, and it will happen more often than rain.
Drought will only occur on Summer, and it will happen more often than rain.
Changed the way level bonuses are applied to animals, so only profits are taken into account (same way it's done with crops). This means animals with high levels will be giving less money as before.
Bugfixes:
Mouse cursor on multimonitor setups on Windows should no longer go to the wrong place (it's a workaround around a bug in the engine, so you never know...)
Should have fixed (or at least reduced) cases where farm wasn't being saved properly.
Today's update features new farm items and upgrades the Unity Engine to its latest version. Hopefully this should help with some crashes people were having. We've done our best to make sure this doesn't introduce any new bugs, but please let us know if you experience anything!
Today's Farm showcase: House/Garden by Sheeps
New features:
New items:
Zucchini, Yellow Zucchini
Peach tree, Nectarine tree, Quince
New sheep
Pink Tulip
New customization item: Black cowboy hat
Gameplay changes:
Noticeably reduced quest item count requirements on high level farms (will only count on new quests).
Bugfixes:
Upgraded Unity Engine to version 2018. Should help with crashes.
Changed the way time is used to progress farm items. Should help with situations where time wasn't advancing/farm data wasn't being saved.
Data saves are now performed asynchronously. Should help with hiccups some people were experiencing every ~30 seconds.
Gamepad/keyboard font icon changes now shouldn't cause a noticeable hiccup.
Fixed issue with keyboard/gamepad navigation in the shop windows.
Should have prevented some errors during load causing the game to softlock in the loading screen.
Today's update features a new animal, the Sheep. We're also adding new fences (reed, handrail & stone wall), as well as lower variations that should come handy to separate areas etc.
Today's Farm showcase: "My new harbor!" by Pepperminty
New features:
New items:
Shallot
Cauliflower
2 New Sheep
New Goat
New Tulip
3 New Fences
Lower variations of most fences
New customization items:
"Brush off" emote
Orange cap
Gameplay changes:
Plenty of changes to XP given so it's a bit more consistent (some will give more XP, others will give less). This is specially noticeable on crops (fewer XP will be obtained when planting them, but more will be earned when harvesting).
Bugfixes:
Prevented fish from swimming on the ground (again!)
Some changes to the save routines that should help with stability.
You'll notice the last few updates have been short on features, that's because we're working hard on big features that will come in the near future!
They're coming up nicely and we're sure you'll love them, but they will still take a few weeks until they're ready, so stay tuned!