We continue fixing bugs ???? and smoothing things out for the full game's launch. We still see a few reports of the demo crashing at startup, but we've hopefully just fixed one of the causes! ????????????????
TL;DR:
* Improved video memory management (less VRAM use, by around 700MB)
* Render scale now goes > 1.0 (higher quality image if you have GPU power to spare)
* Render scale is automatically clamped by your video memory (hopefully no more out-of-memory startup crashes)
* Optional image sharpening
Improved video memory management
We've reduced the video memory requirement by around 700MB (around 370MB of that is moved to system memory instead). This should help the game launch on systems with low VRAM, such as GeForce GTX 1050.
On older systems, this may also have a positive impact on performance. In particular, the framerate on our test machine with a Radeon R9 270 has doubled. It's an outlier for sure, but a nice bonus nonetheless.
Automatic render scale clamp
The primary means of controlling performance vs quality in Tiny Glade is the "Render scale" video setting. It changes the internal resolution that the game draws at, making the graphics cheaper at the cost of visual quality.
You could previously set it the [0.1 - 1.0] range. We've now unlocked the top end, so you can set it as high as your video memory allows. If you have the GPU power to spare, you can improve image quality this way. If your screen resolution is 1920x1080, and you set render scale to 2.0, the game will internally render at 3840x2160, and then shrink it down to 1920x1080. In the end you'll see the same number of pixels, but the image will be cleaner.
This automatic render scale clamp also means that if you have very little video memory but high screen resolution, the game will automatically reduce its internal resolution instead of crashing.
Optional image sharpening
Tiny Glade's visual presentation is intentionally soft, but whether you like the softness or not is a matter of personal taste, display device, and visual ability. We've now added a simple contrast-adaptive sharpening filter to the game. It's disabled by default, but you'll find the tweaker in video settings.
Other stuff
* Added sliders for path & garden brush size. Gone are the three separate buttons for path size.
* Tweaked music mix & instruments
* Fixed slightly excessive aliasing & flicker at low resolution scales
* Fixed a crash when splitting windows/doors while mashing clicks
* Fixed a crash when trying to split a floor hatch
* Fixed a crash when previewing a window placement, and then switching to bulldozer/hammer via the keybind, and using the tool in the very next frame
* Tweaked logic of tree canopy see-through (to make the full game's tree tool function better)
Love,
Tom & Ana
