This patch focuses on polishing gameplay, improving controller feel, expanding audiovisual feedback, optimizing performance, and addressing a large number of bugs reported during the playtest. Thank you to everyone who has shared feedback. It has helped shape the final release.
Gameplay
Balance
Reduced Immortal Harvest cost from 3 → 2.
Reduced Overflow cost from 3 → 2.
Reduced Earth Bond cost from 3 → 2.
Reduced Sniper cost from 5 → 3.
Reworked Selfless Dryad. It now reduces Island Speed by 0.1x and grants +1 Plant Limit. Moved to B4.
Sniper no longer requires charging to fire piercing projectiles. Popping Chrome now grants the piercing effect.
Buffed Overcharge from 1.4x → 1.5x.
Buffed Enhance effectiveness from 1.25x → 1.3x.
Reduced Bloomfall and Chromefall activation frequency from 18 → 20 Solar Energy.
Improved Charging Receptors so launched Crystals now properly trigger related trait synergies.
Improved Heartwise and Crystal Bomb interactions by scaling projectile spawns with produce count.
Improved interaction between Crystalline Affinity and Sniper.
Islands now become Encumbered when exceeding the Weight Limit, reducing Island Speed by 50%. Islands now only Stall after exceeding twice the Weight Limit.
Gameplay
Added a higher vertical jump when pressing Up while wall jumping.
Updated analog stick movement to better match D-Pad controls.
Prevented progression if no Sunflowers exist on the Home Island.
Prevented bubbled Consumables from expiring during the Exploration Phase.
Prevented picking up Obelisks like normal items.
Favor player victory over Game Over when merging with the Dryad at maximum Solar Energy.
Earth Bond rewards now use the same reward handling as other reward systems.
Audio & Visual
Polished Honorhelm animations on the Wisp.
Polished Hattie animations on the Dryad.
Added separate Weight Flower animations depending on whether the Windmill is active.
Added roaring effects to burning meteorites during the Elder Tree conversion cinematic.
Added particle interactions during the Chapter G Predator encounter.
Added sound effects for:
Starfall
Explosive Flora
Drop Slam
Sniper piercing projectiles
Higher-pitched hat flapping
Adjusted the HUD Dryad portrait.
Increased Relic command icon sizes.
Brightened Gamepad keybinding text.
Added explicit names to Core Plant conversion Shrines.
Extended island end locations to better hide the map boundary.
Further reduced visible seams during cinematic camera zooms.
Levels
Updated B5 puzzle.
Updated H6 puzzle.
Tweaked G3.
Cleanse meteorites with the Dryad's Solar Wave during E4.
Performance
Improved gameplay performance through additional object pooling optimizations.
Bug Fixes
Fixed random purple pop effects appearing near the Dryad in Chapter B.
Fixed several Shadow Friend introduction animations.
Fixed crashes that could occur during:
Game Over cinematics.
Skipping the B1 cinematic.
Fixed lava tile inconsistencies during the Chapter H finale.
Fixed Dryad positioning with the Elder Face in Chapter E.
Fixed detached branches caused by Earthly Resurgence and pruning interactions.
Fixed sorting between Grassball and its bubble.
Fixed the Prologue respawn camera.
Fixed Flame Orb and Archer Arrow pushing bubbled rewards unexpectedly.
Fixed background tiles failing to appear if the Wisp died during the Predator hide-and-seek sequence.
Fixed the Dryad Overweight notification appearing during cinematics.
Updated and corrected various in-game strings.
Thank you again to everyone who participated in the Steam Playtest. Your feedback has helped us polish Dryad into the experience we wanted to deliver.
See you on July 22 for the full release! 🌿