Howdy, partners!
The July update has left the unstable branch and is now live for everyone on the default branch. The bridge, the trappers' lands, and horses. All yours, no beta opt-in required.
A big thank-you to everyone who rode ahead on the unstable branch these past weeks. Your reports are the reason this build is solid enough to open to the whole town. We spent the last three weeks fixing what you found, and the full list is waiting for you below.
What's in it (in case you missed the last devlog)
The bridge. Rebuild the one that's been taunting you since day one, then cross into a brand new stretch of the map: the trappers' lands, with a settlement to explore, a missing trapper to track down, Sly Fox chores, and a puzzle tucked deep in the woods.
Horses. Ride them, breed them, name them. Saddles, saddlebags, stables small and big, and a new horse trader in the new lands. Every horse comes with its own mix of traits, so no two are quite the same.
Plus the Cow-O-Mat, stack and sort buttons, experimental gamepad controls, and a hefty performance pass.
Now, some straight talk.
We told you "a week or two." It took almost four. We're sorry. Again.
Here's what happened: we're one team, and for the past month that team was pulling in two directions at once. One half was fixing and testing this update so it could safely land on the default branch. The other half was already deep in the next wave of content: farm workers, full gamepad support, fishing, and the ending of the story. We thought we could ride both trails at full speed. We couldn't, and both went slower than promised. Lesson taken.
About fishing
Fishing is still not in this build. It grew into its own dedicated update, and it's rolling out on the unstable branch within the coming month. Same drill as this time: the brave folk off the unstable branch first, then the whole town.
The road to 1.0
This update was supposed to be the last one before 1.0. Since we didn't manage to fit everything in, there will be one more update before the final game: fishing.
And one more thing, because we're a little tired of constantly missing deadlines we set for ourselves and then being sorry. And we reckon you're tired of it too. We're moving the 1.0 release to late November. Late November gives us the room to land the story's ending, female character, farm workers, and gamepad support properly, not half made. It also means Cowboy Life Simulator hits 1.0 almost exactly one year after we rode into Early Access. That feels right to us.
Thanks for hanging in there with us, partners. You're the best community in the West. 🤠
Questions? Drop them in the comments or on our Discord channel!
Happy trails! Odd Qubit team
Full Changelog
Everything from the July update changelog is now stable on the default branch, plus three weeks of fixes based on your unstable-branch reports:
New & Improved
You can breed horses!
Bridge reconstruction
New area
Cow-o-mat
Bug Fixes
Horses
Fixed a crash in the horse riding component.
Fixed the player being teleported while mounted.
Animals & AI
Fixed the wrong animal showing on the assign-animals panel.
Fixed door handling for farm animal buildings.
Further stability work on farm animal management.
Quests & Story
Fixed a quest that could go missing entirely.
Bridge collision fixes.
Fixed a blocker in the spooky mine.
Saves & Stability
Fixed a calendar bug where an invalid date in a save file (like February 29) could corrupt time progression. The game now falls back safely instead.
Environment
Removed a stray train.
Lamp light and scene exposure fixes.
Barn fixes, including the crate in the small barn.
Landscape, building, and door fixes.
Detonation zone fix.
Train track fix.
Two general level-polish passes.
Items & UI
Fixed occasional failures when moving items between containers.
Fixed the seeder, weapon reloading, and hammers when recultivating.
Fixed the dreamcatcher slot, ghost damage, and the hat icon.
Optimization & Graphics
A sustained cleanup run: removed duplicate and unused assets that were loading into memory.
Further HLOD and performance passes.