New Release: The Test ZONE (v0.157)

Hi everyone, excited to report that I'm doing a final super thorough start-to-finish run through now to polish things up before the official release.

Consequently, there are a LOT of small tweaks and changes and revisions and bug-fixes in the list this week, but don't be daunted. Many of them are relatively minor changes, and there shouldn't be any issues with save compatibility.

The majority of these changes are to phrasing, line-breaks for clearer readability, minor battle positioning, things like that. Some of the "larger" changes come in the form of changed scene dialogue and a fancy new battle cursor. 

I'm only about halfway done the sweep now, so expect a similarly long list of changes next week. Then it mostly comes down to waiting for art, maybe adding a few little bonus features here and there!

If you have any bugs or issues to report, please don't hesitate to pop into the public Discord and drop us a line!

Enjoy,
Nym

Version 0.157 - 12-11-2020 

• Added some new dialogue and cutscene visuals to create more foreshadowing about Mercy’s fate
• Added battle selection cursors to more clearly indicate targets
• Updated some maps for better quality and tile diversity
• Fixed a portrait-related crash in Mar’Liore
• Fixed some typos
• Fixed an issue where Fishmaster Luca incorrectly reports the Goofer record as 0 cm.
• Fixed an issue where there was some incontinuity between the base Marlan stats and the Rematched Marlan stats
• Fixed an issue where losing the Marlan fight and being transported home leaves the window tinted for the outside
• Adjusted lots of dialogue for quality, continuity and improved line-breaks
• Adjusted various screen transitions and choice menus for better quality and continuity
• Made various lighting adjustments for better performance and continuity
• Adjusted minimum ATB rubberband speed to 0.4, down from 0.5. This allows for a broader range of variable ATB speeds and also better matches the maximum speed of 2.5.
• More images are now preloaded to help limit delayed parallax pop-in on larger maps
• Fixed an issue where interacting with the statue in the cove extension before the timer expired would disable the timer without disabling the switch, leaving all the gates open on the way out
• The Health Rune’s item description has been corrected to reflect a gain of 90 HP
• The Mana Rune has been buffed from +15 to +24 MP, and the Staff Rune has been buffed from +12 to +20 MP
• Target Rate bonus has been increased from 3% to 5% when spending Skill Points
• Fixed an issue where the ship lighting persisted into Carvannah, resulting in exterior lighting appearing indoors
• Fixed an issue where Ralph’s tent plays the wrong music after fading back in on the first cutscene
• Defeating Hallie now yields 275 XP, up from 125
• Adjusted the Disarm animation
• Fixed some repeating animation issues
• Mercy can now rest in the Crows’ hideout after defeating Silas
• Madame Remora now correctly takes her 15 gold as payment for the fortune reading
• Fixed an issue where a few items couldn’t be looted as they incorrectly required the player to be facing upwards (including a Silver Card)
• Fixed some wall-crevice events which required talking to the wall twice to climb inside
• Fixed some bedroll events
• Fixed an issue where entering a building while riding Orus, then attempting to ride Orus while in the building, would fadeout the screen for a moment
• Re-fixed an old issue where Mercy could mention fishing on the Carvannah execution platform while absent
• Fixed an issue where Moon could skip a phase of dialogue after chapter 2
• Fixed an issue where a number of enemy animated sprites were affected by the “breathing” plugin, causing pixel issues
• Mercy now fishes up unrefined essence of the sea instead of refined, ranging from 1-4
• Fixed an issue where cooking fires were no longer extinguishing after 3 uses since the cooking system update
• When lit, cooking fires now also provide illumination in dark areas
• Fixed an issue where cooking fires were no longer providing the Warm status since the cooking system update
• Replaced some outdated cooking fires
• Adjusted the cooking fire sprite slightly to avoid pixel shifting when going from unlit to lit
• Fixed some passability issues
• Fixed an issue where Mercy could ride Orus into several Danforth Crook homes
• Fixed an issue where Mercy could ride Orus into the Nestmother’s home during a cutscene
• Fixed an issue with encounters not properly updating in Witchdale
• Adjusted some item descriptions to contain more information