Update notes for v.038

Please continue to feedback to help us to refine and improve. Here are the patch notes for Release v.038:

Any change with a ‘🌊’ icon in front of change requests/fixes that have been brought to our attention by fellow players & QA. This is a large change so if you have any suggestions or you stumble upon any bugs, please let us know in the Steam forum.

INFORMATION ABOUT SAVE FILES:
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Please note, if you have any current or old saved data stored then the ongoing build updates will not necessarily translate accurately to your save files, particularly with v.038. It's a little hit and miss - some features will apply to an older save and some will not. In most circumstances, in order for the changes to take effect it may be better to begin a new game and /or save file to ensure that the latest fixes are applied accurately. Apologies for this.

INFORMATION ABOUT ONLINE GHOST MODE LEADERBOARD LEGENDS:
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Please note, if you have any current saved high score data stored then unfortunately this saved data had to be deleted as a result of the graphic upgrade. A re-engineered ocean, weather and lighting etc system has meant we have needed to recalibrate the online data. Again, apologies for this.

PATCH v.038:
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🌊 KNOWN ISSUES
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U/WATER FOG GLITCH: Appears when the surfer is perpendicular to the wave on certain angles, u/ water fog allow the player to see through to the bottom. This will be fixed.

SHORELINE WAVE COLLISION: noticeable that the surfer collision / physics does not accurately apply to the shoreline waves currently. This will be fixed.

🌊 CHARACTER CREATOR: "PS5 EDITOR BUG"
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FIXED: Fixed an issue where modifying deck-grip and fins for all three boards caused an error

🌊 GRAPHICS: CLOUDS
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R&D Investigate 3rd party packages to in order to replace custom volumetric cloud system
R&D Cloud testing: varying cloud lighting and layer tests
R&D: Research HDRI sky parameters
ADDED: Updated cloud settings, including colour, animation, positioning and intensity
RECONNECT: reconnect cloud system
ADDED: HDRI sky

🌊 GRAPHICS: LIGHTING
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R&D: Research shadows on the wave and water surface
R&D: Research character lighting
R&D: Research location lighting, dawn, midday, dusk
R&D: Research U/water scene lighting
ADDED: Shadows on the wave and water surface
ADDED: Real-time Character lighting updates in game
ADDED: Real-time Character lighting updates in character select menu
ADDED: Character cutscene lighting updates
ADDED: Real-time location lighting, dawn, midday, dusk
ADDED: U/water scene lighting

🌊 GRAPHICS: OCEAN SHADER
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R&D: Research the wave properly as it rolls across the ocean
R&D: Water shader implementation
R&D: Wave and water join implementation
R&D: World Lighting – experiment with new settings
R&D: Water colour – experiment with new settings
R&D: Shore-line waves first pass
R&D: Surfer spray values and lighting
R&D: Wave particle values and lighting
R&D: Foam: research the foam trail from the surfer in both paddle and surfing states
ADDED: Animate the wave properly as it rolls across the ocean. Requires making sure all the ocean co-ordinates plugged in to the new system properly from the Ocean Profiles
FIXED: Glitch at the top of the screen when duck diving
FIXED: Fix gaps between water and waves and implement individualized fixes per location
FIXED: Re-apply application of the correct wave sizes in the new shader
ADDED: Shore-line waves first pass added to each location
ADDED: Surfer spray values and lighting
ADDED: Wave particle values and lighting
ADDED: Foam: research the foam trail from the surfer in both paddle and surfing states
ADDED: Water colour settings to each location
ADDED: Refraction levels set
ADDED: Re-apply screen splashes
ADDED: Re-apply particle effect behind the board
FIXED: Ocean plane – general jittering needs to be removed / create new mesh for forward filler.
FIXED: SHORELINE WAVES: add shoreline waves to the scene. Andrew to go through each level and add the shoreline prefabs
FIXED: Ocean plane – collision issues in which the player passed through the first x 4 waves
FIXED: Ocean plane – add missing water sections. Create new mesh for forward filler.

🌊 GRAPHICS PHYSICS UPDATES
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FIXED: Make sure all floating objects use the new Water System ocean surface height for buoyancy
FIXED: PWC height & sinking u/water problem (ongoing)
FIXED: PWC rope & the leash were both broken (stretching out) and needed have their physics reapplied / fixed

🌊 GRAPHICS GAMEPLAY UPDATES
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FIXED: Rework the Surfers (player and AI) to use the Wave Position Texture Map so the AI can know where the next surfable wave is.
FIXED: leash animation is broken

🌊 PLATFORMS
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FIXED: FPS on PC is choppy / low
FIXED: PS5 hardware stressed as a result our software setup

ERRORS
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FIXED: Conditions Screen / Weather Tool: time of day string error
FIXED: Various load errors into Manly (initial shoreline test waves)
FIXED: Load loop Jeffrey’s Bay Contender Series > back to the main menu
FIXED: First person camera artifacts (shader issues)
FIXED: Margaret River Tour load
FIXED: Tokyo load back to the main menu
FIXED: Water plane collision problem through the waves
FIXED: Water plane – general jittering needs to be removed / create new mesh for forward filler.
FIXED: Weather Tool Fixes
FIXED: Snapper and Jeffrey’s Bay waves not rendering the particles in the correct areas on the wave
FIXED: Fix wet maps on the characters skin and costumes
FIXED: The A.I. jumping erratically on the Tour & Competition modes
FIXED: PS5 PWC Tow rope not rendering on that platform
FIXED: the error loading back to the main menu from each location (every mode)
FIXED: PS5 Character Creator: adjust lighting in the scene.
FIXED: Challenge - Simulation, edge case where for a broken surf board entering a challenge from the tour would result in a load loop.
FIXED: TOUR CUTSCENE MEMORY ISSUE: issue raised by Jay during tests

OPTIMISATIONS (ONGOING)
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FIXED: VRAM TEXTURES: reduce texture memory from 3G + to under 2G
FIXED: .ogg audio files exported to HDRP from new URP project
FIXED: VFX Optimisation

REPLAYS
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FIXED: We need to reimplement the waves during replays. They are now missing with the new water system

🌊 LOCATIONS
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FIXED: ALL LOCATIONS (excluding Manly) are missing key pieces of geometry and shader / materials
ADDED: U/water geometry and scenes to all locations

CHARACTER MODEL
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FIXED: Character costume wet map detection and levels broken
FIXED: Character hair wet map detection and blend shapes broken

WEATHER TOOL
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R&D: Options Menu: Weather Setting needs clouds & rain re-implementation
R&D: Wind direction needs to be reconnected / direction needs to be setup again per previous values
FIXED: Options Menu: Weather Setting needs clouds, rain, time of day re-implementation
FIXED (FIRST PASS): Wind direction needs to be reconnected / direction needs to be setup again per previous values
FIXED: Wind settings (water surface ruffle) – the physics for medium and strong waves need to be adjusted
FIXED: WEATHER TOOL DEFAULT SETTINGS (excluding Tour mode) need to be re-applied
FIXED: Random weather tool button within Free Surf
FIXED: Incorrect information displayed in the UI of the weather tool

CAMERA
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FIXED: CUTSCENE CAMERA: Default camera updated to new settings per mode
FIXED: CINEMACHINE: Tokyo cart camera is no longer working

AUDIO
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FIXED: 10 sec clock countdown audio stopped playing
FIXED: Rain / storm audio from the level did not clear at the end of a round and > into main menu.
FIXED: u/water wipeout audio did not clear and would continue to play

TUTORIAL
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FIXED: Scale down the hang loose hand image and place it correctly above the text.
FIXED: remove sprite black birds from the second wave area in the scene.

CHARACTER CREATOR
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(IN PROGRESS) CHARACTER CREATOR: Re-write
FIXED: HDRP RENDER TEXTURE PROBLEM: render texture is broken with our characters.
FIXED: HDRP CHARACTER CREATOR: We have a bunch of errors occurring in the character creator causing old bugs to reappear including:
FIXED: TOUR MODE START POSITION: fix the start position into a tour game
FIXED: END CUTSCNE TOUR MODE END POSITION: fix the end position into a tour game - Aileen’s particularly bad
FIXED: HDRP RENDER TEXTURE PROBLEM: render texture is broken with our characters.
FIXED: ONLINE DATABASE: Fix broken database & Andrew to re-import all of the A.I. again
FIXED: PC / PS5 / XBOX: Custom, Pro and the A.I. surfers need their colours adjusted

ANIMATION:
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ADDED: ANIMATION: running animation – we have had feedback that the running animation is poor. We need to improve the animation to make it look a little more natural / convincing – particularly in the upper body region.
ADDED: ANIMATION: character select scene
FIXED: AIR GRABS WIPEOUT: we had a problem where the code for wiping out from air grabs wasn’t being applied

MENU:
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FIXED: HDRP PHOTO SYSTEM: No or incorrect photos displaying for new characters and default photo image displaying for saved characters.
FIXED: PC / PS5 / XBOX: Tour and Single Session podium scenes not displaying sponsor images
FIXED: FREE SURF SCREEN: Contender Series issue where the Manly Free Surf image incorrectly rendered in each scene
FIXED: NO TRANSLATION STRING ERROR: We also have a no translation string error that is now appearing on the J-Bay opening globe cutscene.

GHOST MODE
FIXED: ONLINE DATABASE: Fix broken database & re-import all of the data
FIXED: ONLINE DATABASE: system to handle new wave. Will involve setting up a new upload build

🌊 FIXED: edge case PC specific crash bug for new saves

A.I.:
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🌊 FIXED: PWC failing to enable the A.I. to head back out to the play area after a single score had occurred

CHARACTER MODEL:
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🌊 FIXED: wet map not being applied correctly to 2 piece costumes (tops)

GAME UI (OPTIONS):
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FIXED: KPH/MPH not getting set correctly within the Options
FIXED: Graphic Settings (resolution and window mode)
FIXED: Game Difficulty for Steam clients failing
FIXED: UI: certain UI circular images appear as square images and lost their alpha

CURRENTLY WORKING ON:
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🌊 Memory management: implementation of new character creator code (near competition)
🌊 Adding more variety in the waves in the same heat or even in free-surfing (in progress)
🌊 Adding optimal take-off position for advanced users
🌊 Research adding A.I. to Free-surf along with PWC gameplay considerations (longer term)
🌊 Research adding Fan Hub to allow for custom character and Tour creation (in progress)
🌊 Steam Deck Compatibility UI issues
🌊 Research platform port options
🌊 (IN PROGRESS) PS4: PS4 testing. Set up PS4 settings correctly in order to test different water shaders

That's all for today.
The Bungarra team.