Dear Time Travelers, the time has finally come:
Wishing Well is here!
Today we are releasing the 2.0.0 patch of Chronos Builder, which will implement all of the base features of Wishing Well. Most notably, the Multi-level grid system and new Norse Setting asset pack! And, as if that wasn't enough, we included a ton of improvements in system performance, map export and the Autobuilder!
Join us as we go over what's new in the most revolutionary Chronos Builder patch to date!
1.- New Norse Setting asset pack
This new pack with 100+ assets comes with everything you need to create Coastal Villages and Meadhall Interiors! Check out these maps we made using the pack alongside the new features:
As a reminder, backers who participated in the Wishing Well pledge,Supreme God Pledge or any level above Supreme God Pledge already paid for this DLC.We will soon begin sending out keys to all of you!
Alternatively those who didn't back the project at said pledge levels will be able to purchase the Norse Asset pack on Steam. As we have mentioned in the past, this asset pack is the only exclusive feature we wanted to keep apart from the base game. The rest of Wishing Well features in this patch will be available to all Chronos Builder players!
2.- Multi-Level grid system
This one is a total game changer!
You can now use the menu to create new grid levels and choose at which height you want to place your objects. Everything else works the same way you are already familiar with.
Here you can see us using the menu to move through the different levels of our map.
Individual level visibility will change as you select them so that you can always see the assets in layers below the current one. Additionally, you can manually change the visibility of different levels, duplicate and even swap them!
When you are ready to export your map, the export menu will remain visible for you to select the different layers and save them as separate files.
3.- Autobuilder Improvements
A new option has been added that lets you generate random rooms! It's up to you to decide how far to take it: Do you wish for a random room type within a specific environment? Maybe a random environment and room within a specific Setting? Randomize everything and get your creative juices flowing??? It's all an option!
A new feature has also been implemented to re-roll randomly generated rooms. After creating a room, you can use the command Shift + R to regenerate the room with the same dimensions any number of times.
4.- Snow Biome and Weather effects
The new snow biome has been added, including a total of 4 unique terrain textures and new nature props to paint with your brush tool.
Additionally, 2 New weather effects: have been added: Snow and Blizzard!
5.- Much faster loading times
This isn't the first patch that addresses the loading times but it's by far the one that has reduced them the most. To be more specific, a new map file will take ~7 seconds to load and a huge 100x100 map ~18 seconds. These loading times would be up to 3 times longer in the previous patch so this is a big time saver!
Save data files have been updated to allow for this load optimization. This means that older maps will take longer to load the first time, but saving afterwards will make it so that performance is improved in subsequent reloads.
6.- Custom asset groups overhaul
A lot of improvements have been made in order to improve usability of custom folders and saved asset groups. For starters, you can now name Custom asset groups after saving them to a user folder. You can also drag multiple ungrouped assets into a folder to create a preset without the need for them to be grouped beforehand.
Many bugs related to these have also been solved, you can read about those at the end of this update.
7.- What's next?
We plan to continue releasing the content from the unlocked Stretch Goals the same way we did in the past with the original Kickstarter campaign. This means that some features will be segmented and released ahead of other content that might have been bundled in the same Stretch Goal.
Our priority is getting the new features to you as fast as possible. So this means new mechanics might be released before asset packs do.
Additionally, work on the Linux version of the game will resume now that the Wishing Well patch is out.
8.- Patch Notes
Version 2.0.0
Additions:
• Added new Norse Setting pack with 100+ assets for the Wishing Well Expansion. A Steam download code will be sent to all Kickstarter backers who participated in the Wishing Well pledge, Supreme God Pledge or any level above Supreme God Pledge. Alternatively, the Wishing Well Expansion will be available for purchase on Steam.
• Added two new procedural environments for the Norse Setting, for a total of three new procedural rooms.
• Added the Multi-Level grid system! You can now easily create maps at different heights and export all of the different layers in separate files.
• Added the new Snow terrain biome.
• Added 2 new weather effects: Snow and Blizzard.
• Added new nature props.
• Added an option to name custom asset groups as they are created.
• Added new random room generation option, so that you can generate a room that is from any setting, environment, or completely random.
• Implemented a feature to re-roll randomly generated rooms. After creating a room, when clicking Shift + R it will regenerate the same room with the same dimensions any number of times.
• Added quality output options for video exporting. You can now export at increased resolutions.
Fixes:
• Dramatically improved loading times of new maps and 2.0.0 save files. Older maps will take longer to load the first time, but saving afterwards will make it so that performance is improved in subsequent reloads.
• Fixed an issue that would cause certain nature assets to be duplicated when a map is reloaded. Additionally, whenever a save file from a version older than 2.0 is loaded, the system will now look for duplicated assets and remove them.
• Improved performance when loading nature assets.
• Fixed the textures for the Urban terrain biome.
• Fixed an issue that prevented terrain and nature props from updating when undoing an Autobuild command.
• Fixed an issue that would cause the pop-up notification to not be scaled correctly to fit all of the text it would display.
• Fixed an issue that would cause all sub-menu commands (for example, shift + P) to work whenever an input field is selected.
• Fixed multiple issues with Custom Asset Groups (those saved in user folders):
◦ Fixed CAGs colliders not fitting the assets correctly.
◦ Fixed CAGs not having a spawn effect.
◦ Improved performance when creating CAGs.
◦ Fixed an issue that would cause CAG thumbnails in the library to stack on top of each other.
◦ Fixed a bug that would duplicate assets if they were part of a CAG and said asset group was also present in the map. Additionally, whenever a save file from a version older than 2.0 is loaded, the system will look for and remove such cases of duplicated overlapping assets.
◦ Whenever a map is uploaded to the community, all CAGs placed on the map will be disbanded to prevent issues with other users not owning said groups.
◦ Whenever multiple assets are selected and dragged into a user folder, a new CAG will be created composed by all of them, even if they are not grouped themselves.
◦ All placed CAGs on the map will be disbanded if the CAG is removed from its parent folder.
• Improved procedural generation so that there would be no internal windows.
• Improved window and door generation in general. Some rooms will utilize window patterns.
• Improved the graphic quality of several UI icons.
• Fixed Autobuilder advanced UI overflowing on 19:10 resolutions.
• Fixed .webm and .mp4 videos exporting with increased reproduction speed.
• Fixed VTT files including repeated references to lights.
• Fixed camera failure after closing the Export menu using Ctrl + E.
• Fixed video files not fitting with VTT data when using VTT export.
• Fixed VTT export not calculating the pixel per tile parameter automatically the first time.
