It's been a long while since the last update. My freelance work required more attention, and I also made a pretty massive blog post comparing the cinematic tools of Unity and UE, which took most of the time I would've otherwise spent on the game this year. If anyone's interested in the topic, here it is.

However, the last couple of weeks I've had ample time to focus on a new update.

The first mission used to be also the tutorial. This forced me to steer the player in a certain direction with some artificial triggers and indicators, although the mission is pretty open sandbox-like in nature. Now there's a wholly new tutorial level explaining the basic things. Though it still continues a bit into the first actual mission, the tutorial elements there are much less disruptive.

I was using a pretty outdated version of Unity, so I updated to the newest big release a couple of months ago. It should have some improvements for lighting and rendering performance at least. While getting acquainted with some of the new features (and working on the blog post about cinematics), I also tried out the realtime global illumination called Enlighten in Unity. It's not new, but I only just learned about it. It's a good way to add some convincing indirect lighting, which you can see from for example the shadows on the left side cast by the pillars on the screenshot above having a teeny bit of light. It has quite little effect on performance, but still, I had to be selective about which parts to bake to keep it playable on Steam Deck. Educated by a comment on the cinematic blog post, I also found better shadow settings, enabling soft shadows as well, which I put to use with the quality set on High.

• I finally added leaning left and right, useful for spying on guards. While the head is still a target they can see, it's a smaller target at least.

• There's an outline now as an indicator when you can knock out an enemy

• I did a few rounds of playing through the campaign and fixing bugs and problems I listed during the playthrough. So without going into detail, there are lots of bugfixes.

Since the Unity update changed my settings, I also reworked the skies, now using the cloud layer in addition to volumetric clouds (with a cloud map provided by Unity). Better or worse than before, I guess it's up to the viewer to decide.

Now I'll move on to making new content. Pace has been slower than I've anticipated, but it's all coming together slowly but surely.

Wishing everyone a good day. Work is in full swing, and I don’t have time for a detailed report — there’s a ton of small tasks related to quests and polish. I’m going through all one hundred quests for the upcoming update, and it’s quite a grind. Once that’s done, things should move much faster.

So yes, I’m hard at work. There’s still a lot to do, but everything is coming together very well. I’m starting to suspect that too many news updates without a game update might get annoying, so I may post less frequently for a while.

After the final boss, homunculi will appear that trade instead of characters

Every time you find Josephine with coins, the amount of gold that is lying around increases

New red spider has a lot of health and protection

The jumping spider is now bigger and stronger, and it always drops a tiny emerald.

The red barrel can now be moved

Fixed the rotation in shooting spiders

Now when the player picks up a torch, it will automatically equip it in the active hand if it is empty.

Rebalanced damage in the tutorial

Fixed a glitch after loading the player has little health in the tutorial

Fixed a bug with Pickaxe leveling

Just a small update today. A new build of the game has been uploaded with a new feature that will hopefully make life easier. I was noticing that a lot of players are missing messages from Erica, so I added a message history menu where you can see the last 10 messages she has said to you along with the helper icons:

This menu can be accessed by the lower left button on the main UI next to Erica's portrait:

Clicking on it will bring up the menu, then you can either hover over the up and down arrows to scroll the menu, or use the mousewheel.

A full list of changes is below:

0.4.01

⦁ Created a notification history menu to show previous notification messages. The notification message history is accessible by clicking the Notification History button on the bottom left of the main UI. The notification menu is scrollable by hovering over the up and down scroll buttons on the notification history UI, or by using the mousewheel.

⦁ Corrected the size of the capacity icon when it's tutorial notification was being shown.

⦁ Notification messages will now continue to show while the game is paused

⦁ Added some additional tutorial messages

Thanks builders!

-Joel

Dear players,

A new Open Beta patch for Pro Cycling Manager 25 (version 01.02.03) is now available! This update fixes a crash introduced in version 01.02.02.457, which could occur when in the game setting.

• Open Steam > Go to your Library

• Right-click on Pro Cycling Manager 25 > Click Properties

• Go to the Betas tab and select open-beta from the dropdown

If you encounter any bugs or want to share feedback, please add \[OPEN BETA] in your message title so we can track it more easily!

• Fixed a crash occurring during game setting (parameters screen).

Note: Saved games remain compatible, and no action is required on your part to apply the fix, simply update via the open-beta branch. Thanks for your feedback and vigilance, keep it coming!

Thank you for your continued feedback and support! 💬🚴

You can report bugs or share suggestions on the game Discord server:

https://discord.gg/bKz7CU2gWu

>> https://linktr.ee/cyclinggames <<

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This week we're mainly working to improve some UX/UI aspects.

While we're working on that, we already give you a small post-weekend patch.

Changes

• Vastly improved load time of complex house layouts.

• Prevent the Crypt Card from showing up after the Crypt was already built.

Fixed Bugs

• Fixed End Building button being interactable without the entrance room built when starting a Nightmare.

• Fixed the Card Upgrade SFX not being effected by the volume settings.

• Fixed unlocking of the Crypt as a Legendary Room after completing a run below Nightmare 13.

If you've encountered any other bugs or crashes, you're always welcome to log them in the Steam Discussions, we'll have a look at them.

If you like the game and the direction we're headed in, feel free to leave a review, as this helps us more than you think!👻

And again, a big thank you for playing and all your feedback ❤️

Wow – we’re absolutely overwhelmed by the number of players who checked out the Star Birds demo and the heartwarming feedback you’ve shared! Seeing so many of you dive into our game and enjoy what we’ve built means the world to us.

Beyond the kind words and excitement, we’ve also received a lot of valuable, constructive feedback. You’ve pointed out what worked, what didn’t, and what could be better – and we’re listening closely. Now, we’re hard at work integrating these insights into the game as we prepare for the Early Access launch.

We’re absolutely thrilled to see how many of you are already bringing the world of Star Birds to life with your own passions and creativity. Whether it’s taking part in the very first Star Birds Community Event (results coming soon!), unlocking the first hidden items in the main menu, or even diving into early speedruns — it’s been amazing to watch.

Now we want to take a moment to recap what we’ve learned from the demo, and share a bit about what’s coming next.

• Over 100,000 players have already played the Star Birds demo since its launch during Steam Next Fest on June 9.

• The demo reached over 40,000 players on the very first day.

• Star Birds climbed into the Top 10 most-played demos of the Steam Next Fest, peaking at over 3,000 concurrent players.

• The demo reached #13 on the Steam Next Fest leaderboard for most-played demos.

• It earned more than 1,000 user reviews with a 95% “Overwhelmingly Positive” rating during the event.

And that is also to your credit! 🙏

"This feels like a game tailor made for my brain, calming and chill music, fun graphics, and resource management, it ticks all the right boxes." - redtailia

"Absolutely love the relaxed and simple structure that becomes step by step a little more complex over time, without getting too insane :D" - Artsuad

"It has birds in it" - Rick (... after over 3h of playing <3)

Providing a well-liked demo, has propelled Star Birds into the Top 100 of Steam global Wishlist ranking.

👉 Right now Star Birds is #95 on the global Steam wishlist charts with over 350,000 wishlists. 🥳

As an indie project, Star Birds relies heavily on word of mouth and YOU – and that’s where Wishlists come in. For you as a player, they don’t cost you anything, but for us, Wishlists are a powerful tool to gain more visibility. Your Wishlist has been a tiny click for you, but a rocket booster for us. We have Lift-Off! 🚀

Yes, we read all your feedback. We really do. Thank you so much for the constructive response — we’ve received over 3,000 messages filled with reports, ideas, and suggestions. We feel incredibly lucky to have such a thoughtful and engaged community that not only supports the game, but actively helps shape its future with smart, detailed input.

As we go through everything you've shared with us, our first priority has been to ask: What’s preventing players from actually getting into the game? Whether it's hardware compatibility issues or frustrating softlocks, we want to make sure everyone can start playing without roadblocks. We're also looking closely at which quality-of-life improvements we can realistically implement before the Early Access launch — especially as a small team.

Here’s an overview of improvements and iterations that are currently sitting at the top of our to-do list for the Early Access version of Star Birds.

• Performance issues, especially during cutscenes or certain UI interactions - performance & stability improvement high on our list!

• Widescreen & hardware support - we're working on supporting wide screens and resolving incompatibility issues with certain graphics hardware (esp. noticeable when cutscenes aren't working on some devices)

• Tutorial break points and softlocks causing frustration - we're aiming to get rid of all of them and have a smooth onboarding experience in our release version

• Sometimes asteroids are generated in a way that they are frustrating to play on - we plan to improve the generation algorithms to have better control about the different kinds of asteroids that can appear

• "Demo nice but short" - we're working hard on lots of additional content coming in our release version. Campaign levels progressing the story, expedition levels with high replayability and achievements for special challenges

• Pipe handling finicky - we want to improve this to make drawing pipes more satisfying

• Desire for additional hotkeys and keybinding support - super helpful to hear your suggestions and expectations so we can make the controls as intuitive as we can

• Wish for concrete numbers to understand requirements & optimize production - we want to keep the UI clean but also want to find places to provide all the necessary information to play optimally

• Star system map readability - this becomes more of an issue the bigger the level gets, so definitely on our list!

With all the amazing community engagement over the past days, we’ve decided to keep the demo online for a while before the Early Access Release. That way, you can keep jumping in for a relaxing round after work, shave a few seconds off your speedrun time, or finally check it out if you haven’t had the chance yet.

Thank you again for being such an engaged, supportive, and kind community. Please keep being the thoughtful, constructive, and collaborative crew you’ve shown yourselves to be — you’re truly fantastic.

Honestly, we’d go to space with you. 🪐🧡

Star Birds is an indie project by Toukana Interactive and kurzgesagt. We are over the moon to have such an amazing community. You are the reason why this project exists. If you want to support us, Wishlist the game here on Steam, and tell your friends about it. If you would like to be the first to read content like this and are looking for more in-depth insights, we recommend our newsletter – sign up athttp://star-birds.com/nl.

Vic (VR Designs) is hard at work completing Republica DLC for Shadow Empire, an expansion that focuses on politics. With this DLC, we’re introducing a completely new layer of depth to how regimes are governed, and how political systems can evolve over time. 

To showcase the themes of Republica as development continues, we’re presenting a series of narrative sketches and designer notes that explore all nine political systems featured in the DLC.

Today’s spotlight: Meritocracy.

The essence of meritocracy is in selecting the best candidate for the job. Not one of your friends. 

Please note that these images and ideas are conceptual representations of the Republica DLC, meant to illustrate the narrative and thematic tone of the DLC. In-game footage and visual assets will be revealed later in development. 

The Supreme Leader strode through the vast expanse of the newly completed Level IV industrial complex, his presence flanked by the Zone Governor, the Foreign Affairs Council Leader, and a retinue of silent apparatchiks. The air hummed with the thrum of the heavy machinery.

“This is remarkable,” the Supreme Leader remarked, his voice reverberating in the huge factory space. “And all of this… made possible by the technology shared with us by the Atlantean Federation?”

The Council Leader, a man of few words but great gravitas, nodded with a grunt. “Yes, Supreme Leader. Though, it’s worth noting they’ll be significantly enhancing their tank armor thanks to our research pact. That’s the price we pay.”

The Governor, eager to direct the Supreme Leader’s attention, placed a hand on his shoulder and pointed towards a distant section of the factory. There, four conveyor belts converged into a complex, robotized assembly. “Do you see that, Supreme Leader?” he said, his voice tinged with awe. “I’ve never witnessed such efficiency. Ammunition production has tripled in the past year alone. It’s astonishing!”

They continued their tour, eventually arriving at the foundries, where steam and noise blended into a general mayhem  that overwhelmed the senses. Molten metal flowed like a river, cascading into leaden molds. The Governor’s Vidcom device buzzed, pulling him away from the group. He excused himself, retreating to a quieter corner to take the call.

Seizing the moment, the Council Leader leaned in closer to the Supreme Leader, raising his voice to be heard over the machinery. “We need to replace our easily impressed Governor, and soon. His awe is endearing, but he’s failing in his managerial duties.”

The Supreme Leader nodded thoughtfully. “I trust your judgment,” he replied, his gaze following the Governor, who, oblivious to the conversation, waved back with an ingratiating smile, gesturing that he needed more time.

The Supreme Leader turned back to the Council Leader. “Moreover,” he continued, “wasn’t Governor Zarko something of a brute in the old days?”

The Council Leader chuckled, a dark sound barely audible above the industrial din. “Indeed. He was notorious for personally overseeing the most brutal tortures. He still clings to the immense wealth he accumulated during the oligarchy. It’s clear—his time is up, not just for the sake of efficiency.”

The Supreme Leader’s expression remained inscrutable as he nodded once more. “Your concerns are duly noted, Council Leader.”

As the Governor returned, the Council Leader greeted him with a thin smile. “Ah, Zarko the Terrible,” he muttered under his breath. “Not so terrible now, are we?”

Out loud, he said, “Welcome back, Governor. No bad news, I trust?”

Meritocracy is one of the better systems that provides the player with plenty of bonuses and good Regime Feats. On top of that having a Senate instead of a Parliament means there will be less Laws voted and no danger of overburdening the Nation with legislation. A Senate will also pay much more head to any desires of the Supreme Leader. But it is also one of the more fragile systems because there is both a lack of checks and balances as well as a lack of absolute authority of the Supreme Leader.

Meritocracy means the rule of those with the most merit. Now there are many definitions of merit possible. Any definition would really be quite subjective. Who decides what merit is after all? The best for whom? In the Shadow Empire Universe the ideal form of Meritocracy is the rule of the most capable: those most skilled, most wise, those best at their job. This is exactly what we see happening in the story above, the Zone governor is not very suitable for his job, and voices will go up to replace him. 

However once the Virtus Score of the nation goes down the definition will change and will shift towards the rule of those that have the most Social Standing. Lower Virtus Meritocracy will thuswise slowly devolve into an Oligarchy. 

Be careful to not be too complacent with an Oligarchy as it has a tendency to entrench itself. Atrophy in your ranks will set in as your Senate will start to substitute Social Standing for Suitability and Capability. It will get harder to get new Leaders to important positions. 

Once things turn sour for the Populace due to exploitation by the Oligarchs they might rise up in revolt to dispose of the hated Oligarchs and install a democracy so everybody gets equal power. After all, why would only a small percentage of the Populace have the power? Especially when using it in their own naked interest only? 

Obviously the more a Meritocracy turns into an Oligarchy the more hated the Senatorial elite will be. At high Virtus Meritocracy the elite tries to strive to get the best man on the job and that helps in commanding respect for the system… In an Oligarchy it becomes clear that the elite only has its own interests at heart.

Wishlist Shadow Empire: Republica DLC
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Hey Civ fans,

Update 1.2.2 is rolling out now!

We’ve been heads-down at Firaxis putting together a hefty update for you this June, packed with long-awaited features like Large and Huge Maps, expanded Advanced Game Options, and a community favorite: Steam Workshop support. This update also brings new Town Specializations, City-State Bonuses, Beliefs, balance changes, UI improvements, and yes – a very pettable Scout dog.

For more context on what’s in this update, and what’s still being worked on beyond it, check out our recently released Update Check-In.

We’re also trying something new with this update. You’ll notice a \[★] icon next to select notes: our way of showing that a feature or change was influenced by the community. If you don’t see this community icon next to something you’ve mentioned, know that it’s not a reflection on your feedback, it’s just a way to highlight some of the broader conversations we’re listening in on. Thanks for being part of the journey, and there’s more to come!

And lastly, a few quick notes before you dive in:

• While we aim to maintain backwards compatibility for existing saves as much as possible, some new abilities or effects may not appear until you start a new game or advance to the next Age in your current campaign. For the best experience, we recommend starting a new game, or continuing your current game into the next Age.

• If you encounter any new bugs or issues, try disabling any mods, as some may not yet be compatible with the latest update.

• Are you playing on Steam and want to finish your current save under a previous version? You can do so using our legacy Steam beta branch.

Read on for the full notes below!

We wanted to take some time to get this feature right, and with 1.2.2, we’re happy to add support for Large and Huge map sizes on all of our map types – for when you really want to explore an epic world. 

Both map sizes default to 10 players, but multiplayer campaigns still max out at 8 total players, including AI and humans. Though 12 total players is still our goal for Huge maps, we need a bit more time to make sure increased player counts won’t compromise game stability or performance.

On maps this big, you’ll find yourself encountering new leaders and civs playing out their own local rivalries deep into the Exploration Age, and even the largest of empires will often find themselves struggling with other emerging superpowers in the Modern Age.

Because these maps are so large, we’ve added exciting new Pantheons, Religious Beliefs, Discoveries, and City-State bonuses to ensure there’s enough content for all the players in a game. More on those below. 

A quick heads-up that bigger maps have bigger hardware demands. On some systems, you might notice slower turn times or performance drops, especially on lower-end hardware. Lastly, Balanced starts on Large and Huge maps might encounter map generation oddities. We are actively working on improvements. On these map sizes, we recommend you stick to Standard starts instead of Balanced for the time being

One of the best things about Civilization is how many ways there are to play. Some players are happy to peacefully build the biggest, best Cities while others want to ignore all that and go conquer the world ("Yes, your amazing City does look great in my empire"). With 1.2.2, we’ve added several new advanced game setup options to give you even more control over how you play. The below options are currently available only in singleplayer.

The new options include:

• Enable or disable specific Legacy Paths per Age (or turn them all off entirely)

• Disable Score Victory (unlimited turns in final Age)

• Enable or disable specific Crises

• Custom AI Difficulty Options (adjust each AI bonus independently)

• Bypass Civ Unlocks on Age Transition (you’ll be able to pick ANY civ from the next Age during an Age transition, no matter what you’ve unlocked through your gameplay decisions)

• Adjust Independent Power Hostility (all hostile, random, or all friendly)

We’ve had a lot of fun playing with different Legacy Paths on or off in each Age. While Legacy Paths that don’t lead to a Victory are always optional, sometimes it’s nice to just tune them out entirely and focus on playing into the unique strengths of your leader and civ. For a fun sandbox game we’ve been playing in the office, try turning off Legacy Paths for Antiquity and Exploration, and setting the game to Abbreviated Ages. If you want to lean into the sandbox feel even more, try turning off Legacy Paths in Modern and the Score Victory, too. 

This is a step toward giving you more flexibility in how you play, and we know Legacy Paths have more room to grow. Stay tuned for future updates!

Pantheons are first come first serve, so to make sure there’s enough to go around, we’ve added two new Pantheons to Antiquity, and these can be selected by more than one player.

We’ve heard feedback from players that Religion in Civ VII has room to grow. One consistent piece of feedback we’ve seen is that there’s not enough reason to convert your own Settlements, so we’re adding new Beliefs and updating some existing ones that give bonuses for spreading your Religion within your own empire. We’ve got bigger and bolder changes on the horizon for Religion, too, so we’ll keep you updated on how it evolves!

We’re also introducing updates for Town Focus bonuses to help them feel more impactful. Urban Centers in particular have received a glow-up, and now gain access to many of the Buildings that were otherwise only available in Cities (like Libraries and Monuments in Antiquity). Fort Towns gain the ability to purchase multiple walls so they can really lock down strategic chokepoints. We also introduced a new type of Town Focus: the Resort Town. These relaxing scenic retreats gain extra Gold and Happiness on Rural tiles with Happiness and increased Yields on Natural Wonders.

Lastly, we felt massed Hub Towns were overshadowing some of the other options and gave them a slight nerf from +2 Influence per connected Settlement to +1 Influence. We’re going to keep our eye on them to see how they compare against the other newly buffed Towns.

We’ve added a lot of options to customize your experience with this update, but nothing beats the level of personalization you can achieve with the help of our amazing modding community. From UI tweaks to ambitious gameplay overhauls, mods provide a way to really make your gameplay experience unique. So with this update, we're also rolling out Steam Workshop support and an initial version of the Modding SDK.

You'll now be able to find and install mods from the Steam Workshop. Just hit the Subscribe button and your mods will be installed the next time you start up the game! For modders, this of course means your mods will be easier for players to find and download, and you'll be better able to keep the mod up-to-date for your users. Please note that the Civilization VII mods you'll find in the Workshop are created by and for the Civ community, and are not officially supported by Firaxis or 2K. Use them at your own risk!

We’ll also be providing a Modding SDK to help our modding community create, debug, and upload mods to the Steam Workshop. While this initial version of the SDK won't feature art tools, it will include a mod uploader and the (glorious) return of FireTuner. Additionally, we've included some guides and documentation within the tools, if you’d like to learn how to make your own mods.

Last thing – we’ve also uploaded three example mods to the Steam Workshop to show off some of the things you can do with mods, but also as references for both new and more experienced modders on the various ways you can make changes to the game (there are a few neat tricks that weren’t available in Civilization VI)! 

A quick reminder for modders:

When you're creating and sharing mods, please make sure your content follows our User Rules (which you can find in Section 6 of our Terms of Service), for example:

• Don’t use content based on someone else’s IP (like characters, music, or art from other games, movies, etc.) unless you have the rights to use it.

• Keep content safe and respectful, meaning no harmful, offensive, or inappropriate material.

• And of course, no malicious code or anything that could negatively impact the experience for other players.

Did someone say more Gwendoline Christie VO? 

One of the first things you’ll notice when you boot up 1.2.2 is a refreshed Loading Screen, a small but important step in a bigger effort to improve Civilization VII’s UI. We’ve rethought how we develop the UI, and the Loading Screen gave us a great chance to try new workflows without disrupting gameplay. Highlights include leader portraits front and center, new info panels, a Tips & Hints section, and fully rewritten and rerecorded intros narrated by Gwendoline Christie. Want to dive deeper? Check out our latest article from Firaxis Lead Producer Tom Shaw on this change and what’s next for the UI.

• \[★ - Community Influenced Item] Added an option to pick and choose which Legacy Paths are enabled per Age.

  • Dev Note: We wanted to give players options for how they could customize their game by allowing them to turn off Legacy Paths of their choice, and allowing them to disable the Score Victory. Note that if you turn off all Legacy Paths, and disable the Score Victory, you can still win the game with a Domination Victory by eliminating all other leaders. We think this change should allow for a cool sandbox experience through the Ages! (Please note that currently these options are only available in Single-player, but we plan to add these to Multiplayer in the future.)

    • Nuclear Fission Tech is added to the Modern Age, so players can still use nukes without completing the Military Legacy Path. 

• \[★] Added an option to disable the Score Victory.

• \[★] Added a new “Custom” AI Difficulty setting that allows the player to choose difficulty options specific for each value.

  • Dev Note: With this update, you can set any of the AI bonuses to any level you want individually. Don’t like the economic bonuses the AI has on Deity, but enjoy the challenge in combat? Now you can set up a game to do exactly that!

• \[★] Added an option to pick and choose which Crises you want on or off in your game.

  • Dev Note: We’ve always allowed for Crises to be entirely on or off, but wanted to give you the added control to pick and choose which Crises you want to see. If you have more than one Crisis enabled for an Age, then the game will randomly choose one from the pool of enabled Crises.

• \[★] Added an option to Bypass Civilization Unlocks, allowing players to choose any civ for the next Age at Age Transition regardless of any unlock requirements.

• \[★] Added an option to control initial Independent Power hostility. Settling within 5 tiles of an Independent Power will still cause them to become hostile.

  • Dev Note: Starting near multiple hostile IPs can make for a challenging early game, but sometimes you just want some space to build out your Capital.

• \[★]  Treasure Fleets are growing legs! These will now be called Treasure Convoys, and you’ll be able to use them over land and not just the sea. Any Distant Lands Settlement with improved Treasure Resources now generates Treasure Convoys and no longer requires Coastal access, a Fishing Quay, or the Shipbuilding Tech.

  • Dev Note: The Treasure Fleet Legacy path, specifically the gameplay around gathering Resources not immediately available to your empire, is a fun collection minigame for players that like to play the map. While we’ve improved Resource placement further, the steps required to progress this Legacy Path were still quite restrictive and often forced linear play patterns instead of asking for interesting decisions when settling. We’ve made some adjustments that should make it much easier to pursue this Legacy Path, while still requiring you to explore and settle Distant Lands. We plan on continuing to observe this Legacy Path as well as the others to find places to inject strategic variety.

• Shipbuilding is no longer required to make Treasure Convoys.

  • Dev Note: With this change, your Treasure Convoys will start their journey home while the Ocean is still dangerous, and your Units can still be damaged by stormy seas.

• Fishing Quays are no longer needed to make Treasure Convoys.

• Updated tutorial and Advisor Quests to remove instances of Fishing Quay being required to spawn Treasure Convoy.

• AI civs now repair damaged Buildings and Improvements over time in gameplay. 

• AI will now have better judgment and make smarter deals when negotiating a peace deal.

• AI players will now activate a Great Person when they create one.

• AI now prioritizes attacking Enemy Treasure Convoys when progressing through a game. 

• AI are no longer as aggressive in declaring war on players who are far away from them.

• AI leaders can no longer build duplicate Buildings when one of their damaged Buildings has a hostile Unit on it.

• AI civs will no longer build multiple Settler Units and not use them when encountered during late Antiquity gameplay.

• Added a brand new Town Focus, Resort Town: +1/2/3 Happiness and +1/2/3 Gold on tiles with Happiness (Natural Appeal). +50% Yields on Natural Wonder tiles in this Town.

• Redesigned Urban Center: +100% Gold and Happiness towards Building maintenance in this Town. You can buy additional Buildings (e.g. Library, Bath, Monuments) in this Town (Was: +1 Science and Culture on Districts with two Buildings in this Town.)

  • Dev Note: You can think of Urban Centers like a mini-City – useful for when you want some additional Buildings, but don't necessarily want another build queue to manage.

• \[★] Adjusted balance on several existing Town Focuses: 

  • Religious site: +1 Happiness on all Buildings and +1 Relic Slot on Temples in this Town. (Was: +2 Happiness and +1 Relic Slot on Temples in this Town.)

  • Factory Town: +100% Gold towards purchasing a Factory in this town. +1 Resource Slots. +5 Trade Range. (From +100% Gold towards purchasing a Factory in this Town. +1 Resource Slots.)

  • Mining Town: +2/3/4 Production on all Camps, Woodcutters, Clay Pits, Mines, and Quarries. (Was: +1/2/3 Production on all Camps, Woodcutters, Clay Pits, Mines, and Quarries.)

  • Hub Town: +1 Influence for every connected Town (Was: +2 Influence for every connected Town.)

    • Dev Note: The only nerf of the bunch, Hub Town has been tuned down slightly to bring it in line with other Towns. We’ll keep an eye on this Focus for further tweaks that may be needed.

  • Fort Town: +5 healing to Units and +25 health to Walls in this Town and can purchase additional Walls.

• \[★] Added 24 new City-State bonuses across the Ages.

  • Dev Note: Bigger maps means more players, and more potential City-State allies. To support this, we added more options for Suzerain bonuses when befriending a City-State. One of these new options is also shareable, so multiple civs can choose it. We felt that having a good baseline option available to all players would be a good quality-of-life consideration. 

  • New Antiquity City-State Bonuses: 

    • Scientific

      • Lingua Franca: +2 Science on displayed Codices.

      • Archimedes’ Screw: +1 Science on Warehouse Buildings. This bonus can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

      • Dev Note: There are a few new bonuses that stack bonuses on Warehouse Buildings. This is part of an approach we're experimenting with to keep infrastructure Buildings like Warehouses relevant and impactful as more of your empire is swallowed up by urban sprawl.

    • Militaristic

      • Hegemon: +1 Settlement Limit.

      • Dev Note: Some players have asked for more ways to increase Settlement Limit. We’re pretty comfortable with the current limits and how they rein in overly-wide strategies, but this seemed like an appropriately-costed way to give those players an option.

      • Spoils of War: +1 War Support. This bonus can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

    • Economic

      • Stockpiles: +2 Resource Capacity in the Capital.

      • Ganzabara: +1 Gold on Warehouse Buildings. This bonus can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

    • Cultural

      • Ennigaldi-Nanna’s Museum: +2 Culture on displayed Codices.

      • Papermaking: +1 Culture on Warehouse Buildings. This bonus can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

  • New Exploration City-State Bonuses: 

    • Scientific

      • Master Tradesmen: +1 Science on Specialists.

      • Apprenticeship: +1 Science on Warehouse Buildings. This bonus can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

    • Militaristic

      • Staked Claims: +1 Settlement Limit.

      • Casus Belli: +1 War Support. This bonus can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

    • Economic

      • Bullion: +1 Gold on Treasure Resources.

      • Market Right: +1 Gold on Warehouse Buildings. This bonus can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

    • Cultural

      • Sì Mín: +1 Culture on Specialists.

      • Artisans: +1 Culture on Warehouse Buildings. This bonus can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

  • New Modern City-State Bonuses: 

    • Scientific

      • Refineries: +1 Science on slotted Factory Resources.

      • Mechanization: +1 Science on Warehouse Buildings. This bonus can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

    • Militaristic

      • Dependent Territories: +1 Settlement Limit.

      • Home Front: +1 War Support. This bonus can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

    • Economic

      • Factory System: +1 Resource Capacity in Settlements with a Factory.

      • Entrepreneurship: +1 Gold on Warehouse Buildings. This bonus can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

    • Cultural

      • Touring Exhibits: +3 Culture on displayed Artifacts.

      • Textile Industry: +1 Culture on Warehouse Buildings. This bonus can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

• Made several balance adjustments to Specialists, especially in Modern. 

  • Free Speech (Modern Age Civic): +50% Food and Happiness towards maintaining Specialists (Was: +100% Food and Happiness towards maintaining Specialists)

  • Constitution (Exploration Age Civic): 25% Food and Happiness towards maintaining Specialists (Was: 50% Food and Happiness towards maintaining Specialists)

  • Attribute Node: 10% Food and Happiness towards maintaining Specialists, or +20% if you have 3 or fewer Cities (Was: 15% Food and Happiness towards maintaining Specialists, or +30% if you have 3 or fewer Cities)

  • Attribute Node: 15% of Food is refunded when a City grows by adding a Specialist. (Was: 25% of Food is refunded when a City grows by adding a Specialist.)

  • Fascism Ideology:

    • Assembly Line: +2 Production from Specialists. -2 Food in Towns. (Was:  +3 Production from Specialists. -3 Food in Towns)

    • Dirigisme: +4 Gold from Specialists. -3 Happiness in Towns. (Was: +6 Gold from Specialists. -3 Happiness in Towns.)

  • Communism Ideology

    • Proletariat: +4 Food from Specialists. -3 Happiness in Towns (Was: +6 Food from Specialists. -3 Happiness in Towns.)

• Removed Gold Maintenance for Portal de Mercaderes, Steel Mill, and Manigramam. 

• Removed Happiness Maintenance for the Garden, Shiguan, Catedral, and Jardin à la Française.

• The “Suffetes” Tradition now grants the bonus Yields to the specialized Towns when slotting the Policy.

• Tiles in Settlements without a Baray now get pillaged/damaged during floods while playing as Khmer after studying Mousong.

• Aerodrome and Rail Station can no longer be built on top of each other.

• Updated ability and text for Terrace Farm, which now gives adjacent buildings Gold, instead of receiving gold for adjacent Buildings.

• Multiple World Wonders can no longer be built on the same tile when moving the priority on the Production queue.

• The Opera House now counts as a Diplomacy building.

• You can now produce or purchase Buildings after the Jaguar Slayer has placed a Jaguar Trap on an Empty Urban District.

• Salt and Truffles resources now apply 20% Production towards producing Units when slotted into a City.

• Modifiers for City Park, Stock Exchange, Tenement, and Laboratory function correctly.

• \[★] All leader-recommended civs are now unlocked by default during Age transition. 

• Reconciliation is now usable with multiple leaders at the same time.

• Continental System's massive relationship penalty now functions similar to a Denounce sanction.

• Hostile military no longer receives War Support combat bonus when using Kispoko Nena’to to attack with Shawnee Civic Telwatiki Mastery unlocked.

• \[★] All map types now guarantee enough traversable Ocean Tiles near the Poles.

• The water/lake tiles in Homelands no longer appear as Distant Land when using Continents, Terra Incognita, and Pangaea Plus map types.

• Sugar resource is now correctly considered a Bonus resource in Modern instead of an Empire resource.

• Addressed a reported issue where Cocoa would disappear from the map when transitioning to Modern.

• \[★] Added new option to pet the Scout dog. 

• Razing changes made in Update 1.2.1 apply in the Modern Age.

• Sicilian Wars Mastery now grants one Great Work slot on Towns with the Trade Outpost focus when playing as Carthage.

• Addressed a reported issue where the new host in a multiplayer room could not see the kick button or remove players after inheriting host status.

• Sherpa activation lens corrected, and activation tiles are now highlighted correctly.

• Naval focused attacks (Commander orders) should now correctly highlight land or naval Units depending on the type of attack.

• Treasure Convoys are now captured when killed by a Naval Unit.

• Combat Strength bonuses from slotted Traditions now appear and function correctly when defending.

• The Army and Fleet Commander promotions work on respawned Commanders.

• Fleet Commanders "Barrage Land Target" action is no longer available when the only available Naval Units are Submarines.

• Naval Units now have the ability to conduct coastal raids when they have the Movement points and Shipbuilding II Tech is completed.

• The Army Commander ability "Scorched Earth" will no longer display while in friendly territory on the borderline of enemy territory.

• French Empire's Unique Unit Garde Imperiale can no longer gain +2 Combat Strength if it’s not within a Command Radius when attacking.

• Nepal’s Sherpas can construct Highland Power Stations on owned and unowned Tiles so long as the requirements are met.

• Naval Commander Movement now acts accordingly when Shipbuilding Mastery is completed.

• Coastal Raid no longer disappears when moving a Naval Unit onto another tile that had a Coastal Raid option.

• \[★] Added two new Pantheons, including:

  • Trickster God: +25% Influence towards Endeavors and Sanctions with an Altar in your Capital. This Pantheon can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

  • God of Revelry: +1 Happiness on Resources in Settlements with an Altar. This Pantheon can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

  • Dev Note: Another consideration for larger maps and player counts was more Pantheon and Religious Beliefs being chosen. We expanded the catalogue of Beliefs and introduced some shareable options here as well. 

• \[★] Added several new Religious Beliefs, including: 

  • New Reliquary Beliefs:

    • Akhlaq: +1 Relic for first-time Conversion of one of your Cities.

    • Anitya: +2 Relics for the first-time Conversion of a Holy City. This Belief can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

    • Sukha: +2 Relics for first-time Conversion of a Settlement with at least 3 Specialists.

    • Barakah: +2 Relics for first-time Conversion of any Settlement with a Natural Wonder.

    • Dev Note: These new Beliefs can all be used on your own Settlements when you use a Missionary to convert them, as long as they meet the other requirements.

  • New Founder Beliefs:

    • Salat: All Buildings receive a +1 Happiness adjacency with the Temple.

    • Chesed: +4 Production in your Settlements following your Religion.

    • Feed the World: +6 Food in your Settlements following your Religion.

    • Tikkun Olam: +2 Influence for every foreign Settlement following your Religion. +1 Influence for each of your Settlements following your Religion.

    • Covenant: +3 Science, Culture, Happiness, Influence, and Gold on the Temple in your Holy City. If you retain this Belief, this bonus transfers to your Palace in Modern. This Belief can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

      • Dev Note: We moved the bonus in Modern to ensure you didn’t lose it if you overbuilt your Temple. We considered starting it on your Palace in Exploration, but wanted to let it count towards the Enlightenment Legacy Path.

    • Pushkaram: +1 Influence for every Navigable River tile in foreign Settlements following your Religion.

  • New Enhancer Beliefs:

    • Divine Inspiration: Gain 2 Missionaries when you build a Wonder. This belief can be chosen by multiple civilizations.

    • Parampara: +1 Relic Slot in Science Buildings in Cities.

    • Inter Caetera: Treasure Convoys gain +1 Movement and +5 Combat when defending.

    • Crusade: +1 free War Support against civilizations who have Founded a Religion.

• \[★] Added capability for shareable Religious Beliefs and City-State bonuses.

• \[★] When a Missionary Unit is selected, Settlements that qualify for your Reliquary Belief are now highlighted. 

  • Dev Note: No more searching tile-by-tile for Settlements that are producing Treasure Convoys or have Wonders!

• Founder Beliefs that provided Yield for each foreign Settlement following your Religion now grant some Yield for domestic Settlements following your Religion.

  • Dev Note: Many of the changes to Religious gameplay in this patch are aimed at providing a benefit for keeping your empire converted to your own Religion. As we continue to look at Religion as a whole, we’ve made some changes to Beliefs to better support having a Religious empire, and not just converting until you have enough Relics.

• Various Founders Beliefs now track and refresh correctly.

  • Desert Faith

  • Reincarnation

  • Holy Waters

  • Sacred Herds

  • Sky Gods

  • Shamanism

• Isabella

  • Seven Cities of Gold Unique Ability updated to +100 Gold per Age when discovering a Wonder (Was: +300 in all Ages) and her extra Yields on Natural Wonders to a stacking +50% per improved Natural Wonder in her empire (Was: a fixed +100%).

    • Dev Note: A strong start is a powerful advantage, and Isabella has been one of the strongest leaders in the game since launch. We didn’t want to remove her power entirely, but instead wanted to spread it out a bit more over the course of a campaign and really give her a reason to seek out and secure as many Natural Wonders as she can.

• Inca

  • Qhapaq Ñan Tradition now allows players to create Homeland Treasure Convoys worth 2 points in Cities with at least 3 Mountains.

• \[Crossroads of the World DLC] Carthage

  • The City Halls now gets +1 Great Work slot after unlocking Sicilian Wars Mastery while playing as Catherine.

• Added Civilopedia entries for Mementos, Legend Paths, and Challenges.

• Updated Civilopedia to reflect new changes to Treasure Convoys.

• Information about Natural Wonder base Yield scaling between Ages is now in the Civilopedia.

• The Civilopedia now gives information on Standard Buildings when searching for more information.

• The Civilopedia now explains what benefits are gained from upgrading a Unique Unit to a higher tier.

• Updated the Civilopedia entry for Villa to reflect that they can be built in Towns during the Revolt Crisis. 

• The Civilopedia now contains information on Discoveries when the player searches Civilopedia.

• Independent Incite Raid ability information and requirements are now present in the Civilopedia when trying to research the ability.

• The "Embark" entry is no longer missing details when attempting to find information about the embarked Movement point.

• The incorrect terminology "Clicking" will no longer appear when viewing the "Antiquity: Great Library" Civilopedia entry.

• The scroll bar no longer loses functionality when viewing another players’ Religion after unlocking new Beliefs.

• Cursor no longer loses focus when placing all Towns with the City cards selected in the Place Effects menu.

• Placeholder “?” button prompts no longer appear during the Advanced Start settlement placement screen when using an Xbox-layout controller.

• R-Stick now has scroll functionality in the Archive box in the Great Works menu.

• Players are no longer able to access the diplomatic menu of a leader that has not been met when opening it from the radial menu.

• \[★] Added clarity and quality-of-life improvements to several UI menus and interactions:

  • Celebration info is now displayed in the HUD instead of just the Government screen.

  • Added option in Settings to allow the City panel to remain open after choosing something to produce.

  • The player can now scroll to view all items in the Production queue.

  • Changed instances of checkboxes to selectors in Advanced Options for UI consistency.

  • The color of a Memento’s icon now aligns with the color of its effect for easier readability. 

  • Project Research Objectives now visually mark as complete when a step is finished while in the Legacy Paths menu.

• \[★] Improved menu behavior and visual feedback across multiple screens: 

  • Global Yields now update immediately when adding a Yield from a select attribute.

  • The attribute number icon now disappears after distributing points in the leader menu.

  • Cursor no longer remains as the Melee/Ranged attack icon when moving from an enemy Unit to an owned Settlement.

• "Accept" and "Support" options are no longer swapped when viewing the "Denounce Military Presence" Diplomatic Action.

• Improved game performance and stability on the War Support screen, and when scrolling on the Tech and Civic tree menus.

• Addressed a reported issue where a small black square could appear above the lower left corner's overlay where the leader, civ, and Age selection displays.

• Addressed a reported issue where a redundant "Support Yourself" button would appear after adding War Support to any AI leader for their war against other AI leaders.

• Adjusted the name of Inquisition Crisis policy to Schism.

• Incorrect text “Convert to an urban tile” no longer appears when placing a Unique Improvement.

• Updated Terrace Farm description and functionality text when playing as Inca.

• The Buganda Social Policies Ng’oma and Interlacustrine now display “(Coastal)” text for Kabaka’s Lake, when viewing the Government menu.

• Incorrect Treasure Convoy information has been removed from Distant Town’s detail page.

• Resolved several localization and display issues affecting text clarity:

• \[★] Production cost description for Buildings and Wonders now appears in the tooltip in the City production panel.

• Added 17 new Discovery events in Antiquity and 17 new Discovery events in Exploration.

• \[★] Enhanced Civilopedia entries with historical accuracy and new character quotes:

  • Ada Lovelace and Simón Bolívar now have quotes on their Civilopedia pages.

  • Corrected a historical inaccuracy in the Xerxes Civilopedia page.

  • Golden Age Academy and Golden Age Amphitheater pages now share historic context with their regular versions.

  • Great Britain’s Financial Centre Civilopedia page now has historical context information.

• Improved reward clarity for several Events and Discoveries. 

• The first step in the Geographic Society Legacy Path can no longer be completed prematurely from being granted a free Explorer Unit.

• Improved consistency and logic of Event triggers, including: 

• An Incorrect Answer: Event now triggers correctly after answering Papyrus Problems incorrectly and then building an Academy.

• Exploding Earth: Event now triggers when a Settlement tile is damaged by a volcanic eruption.

• It’s not a Phase, it’s a Lifestyle: The Event is no longer blocked from triggering if the Social Class Social Policy is active.

• Literary Deluge: Event is no longer blocked from triggering if the Literature Social Policy is active.

• The Palapa Oath: The Capital now counts as a founded Settlement and contributes towards triggering this event.

• The Palapa Oath: Event will now trigger on Advanced Start mode in Exploration.

• Shared Practices: Event is no longer blocked from triggering if the Vassalage Social Policy is active.

• Shrouded in Mystery: The Event can no longer be incorrectly triggered when the player founds a Religion in the Homeland Continent.

• The Sacrilegious Rider: Event now grants Gold at the cost of Culture.

• Press Gangs: Event now displays a negative Production icon for the second option.

• Added new Civilization VII Narrator English voiceover lines for the new Loading Screen.

  • Dev note: We are currently working on recording and adding in new voiceovers for other languages. We’ll keep you in the loop as these roll out! 

• Added sound effects for new “Pet the Dog” Unit ability. 

• Various fixes to missing base game sound effects and improvements to audio feedback.

• Added bespoke UI sound design across multiple interface elements.

• Updated SFX for controller interactions.

• Updated default audio level settings.

• Improved controller functionality when changing bindings in the Options menu.

• Improved update slider UI for HDR calibration. 

It’s happening again.  That summer slowdown is here.  Unfortunately, because of time constraints and other responsibilities over the summer months, the game progress is slowing to less than a snail’s pace.

I’m still working on it, just very……. very……… slowly.

Without getting into too much detail, things get, let’s say, difficult for me during the summer months.  So for the next few months, you’ll see fewer updates both here and on Discord.

Also, I had a big problem where almost all of my recent art assets were corrupted in an update and so a lot of time was spent recovering those and trying to make sure the issue doesn’t happen again.

Don’t worry too much, though.  I know I missed releasing demo last month, and it’s looking like it won’t happen over the summer either, but I am still chipping away at it.

Most of what I’ve been doing lately is polishing some art, squashing bugs, and retooling and refactoring some systems so they can support ideas that the extremely lovely and helpful people who playtest for me have suggested to make the game more engaging, fun, and top-notch quality for everyone.

One boss is in the game, but still needs a couple animations.  One boss is conceptualized, but not coded or animated yet.  I also need to add biome-specific enemies for you to find a way to deal with, change the way a couple of weapons work, and add some accessibility items so that anyone can play comfortably.

Thank you all for your patience.  It’s turning into a much longer road than I wanted it to be, but life gets in the way, and we work around it as best we can, ya know?