Hi everybody! As a part of alpha 6 now focusing on biome/fishing work, I managed to get some new mechanics working on the weekend to make the fishing experience start feeling better. This isn't the end and I'll definitely be tweaking these mechanics in the future, but I'd like to roll them out now so people on the demo can try it out!
New - Bubbles Mechanic! Bubbles will spawn at bodies of water randomly, and will last for 1-4 hours. They increase bite rate by 3X - A little sound and particle effect will happen if you successfully land the lure in bubbles. We will play around with the balance of this!
New - Bait Digging Mechanic! Dirt Mounds now spawn in the ocean and pond biomes! Dirt Mounds are dug up by hitting E, you need to wait until digging is done - If you look away or move away, it will get cancelled
New Fish - Gold Shiner! Its a very cheap fish, that will be very common in parliament biome. Still need to make a garbage item.
New - Gaining bait now shows up as a small alert on the right screen, telling you how many bait you gained. This will be handy for digging for bait.
New - Fishing Rod power bar now has animations and a MAX POWER! that will pop off if you get near maximum power. I still want to replace the bar with some better art later!
Change - All the remaining water systems are now all updated to the new catch-rate system. You guys won't notice any major changes hopefully, this is a huge win on the backend for me since its a lot more automated now.
Change - Fishing rod casting animation is twice as fast, to feel snappier
Change - The lure/fishing rod will no longer allow the right-click-cancel to happen when a fish is biting/fighting. I was told by several players they've accidentally cancelled during this process, hopefully this feels better now!
Bubbles! If you see them, try to get your lure inside - Bite rate is 3X, you will see a 'Sparkle' effect if your lure hits the bubbles.
Bait Digging: If you see dirt mounds, hit E to dig up some bait -
Gold Shiner Fish - Added in Parliament Biome (Not accessible in beta but like to keep you guys posted)
The alert system letting you know about bait gained -