Build 26363438

From the Developer

Welcome to the Major November Update!

This update brings smoother movement, new 3D models, major Music Room improvements, new Japanese learning content, custom card artwork, new themes, and more.

The next major update is scheduled for:
📅 December 1st

Important: You do NOT need to start a new game! All changes will be available in your existing save files. Please report anything in the comment section, in the Discussions or even better, the Discord if you find any errors or bugs.

I've also received quite a bit of feedback. Several requests are already being worked on, including Steam Deck improvements, better-balanced mini-games, UI changes, and much more.

First, a bug fix:

• Fixed an issue preventing some players from loading saves with certain music settings.

As always, thank you for your support, feedback, reviews, and bug reports!

:> Light

NEW: Buttersmooth Movement! 🏃

Smooth, non-tile-based movement is now the default!

• Move freely without being restricted to tiles.

• Smooth movement across land, sea, and spaceships.

• Your character now faces the exact direction you're moving.

• Activate chests, NPC conversations, and other events diagonally from any direction.

• First-person movement now allows you to walk backwards by pressing back instead of turning.

• Interacting with the wrong objects or events can now trigger them, so watch where you're going!

Note: If your character faces the wrong direction after loading an older save or changing movement settings, go to Options and refresh your character.

NEW: 3D Model Expansion 🚀

More environments and objects are gradually being upgraded with 3D models.

New models include:

• Spaceship with extremely smooth steering and floor landing, replacing the previous sprite.

• Fishing boat with smooth steering, replacing the previous sprite.

• Computer, laptop, bed, chess pieces & a large JLPT N5 Grammar Book.

This is just the beginning! Most environments will gradually become 3D if performance is fine.

NEW: Custom Card Artwork & Japanese + Furigana! 🎴

No AI-generated artwork used!

All cards now feature custom-made artwork as PLAYNESE continues moving towards artist-created content.

• New artwork for every card.

• Updated card backgrounds.

• Revised card names and selected descriptions.

• Damage, mana costs, and gameplay effects remain unchanged.

English translations are not included on cards yet.

There wasn't enough time to implement the English viewing system. Japanese gameplay is encouraged, even when you don't immediately understand every card.

Please leave feedback on where you'd like English translations or explanations to be accessible!

NEW: Autumn Main Menu 🍁

A completely refreshed main menu inspired by autumn in Tokyo!

• New theme: 秋 = あき = Autumn.

• Additional Japanese vocabulary.

• Extra space below quiz for new artwork.

• New monthly Fun Fact.

• Furigana added to previously unsupported kanji.

• New main menu song composed by ELVgames & pegonthetrack!

NEW: Autumn Start-of-Game Menus 🚉

New introductory menus inspired by Tokyo during autumn, featuring:

• Tokyo-inspired signs and scenery.

• New theme song.

• Updated user interface.

• New quiz and Fun Fact.

• Tokyo's Tree.

• Clickable creatures and falling leaves.

• Moving train.

Other changes:

• Study Mode and Immersion Mode have been mostly removed in many areas. You can now control your study preferences through individual menu toggles throughout the game.

• New Retro Font (ON LEFT BELOW), selectable in the Options menu or during the initial setup.

NEW: Night Autumn Save / Load Menu 🌙

A new Night Autumn theme for the Save / Load menus, featuring small hidden Japanese cultural illustrations.

NEW: Hiragana & Katakana Mini-Game Improvements 📚

Special thanks to Universum on Discord for feedback that helped inspire many of these improvements!

• New Auto / Wait settings after correct and incorrect answers.

• Refreshed mini-game main menu with grouped buttons and themed shading.

• Incorrect answers now pause and display the correct answer with a short explanation.

• Word Builder no longer reveals answers beforehand.

• Word Builder now displays every kana's reading after completing a word.

• Added 20 new vocabulary words to Word Builder:

あさ (morning), よる (night), ほん (book), くち (mouth), かさ (umbrella), いえ (house), みち (road), かお (face), なまえ (name), せんせい (teacher), がくせい (student), ごはん (rice / meal), やさい (vegetables), とけい (clock), かばん (bag), くつ (shoes), しごと (work / job), でんわ (telephone), あした (tomorrow), びょういん (hospital).

Kana Order rewards:

• 6円 per perfect question.

• 12円 per perfect question with the timer enabled.

Also improved text display and ensured your saved themes and unlocks are preserved.

More mini-game improvements are included!

NEW: Jukebox Update 🎵

Improvement to music previews and theme selection!

Improved Music Previews

• Music demos no longer clash with background music or ambience.

• Previewing a track fades out the background music and ambience.

• Your jukebox song pauses during previews.

• Everything smoothly fades back in when the demo ends.

New Theme Selection Menu

The theme button now opens a dedicated menu displaying all 10 themes, each with its own colored preview card.

4 NEW Animated Japanese Themes!

Each costs 100円 in-game:

• 🏮 Matsuri 祭り: Festival lanterns float into the night.

• 🎆 Hanabi 花火: Fireworks burst behind the menus.

• 👺 Youkai 妖怪: A parade of ghosts, foxes, and tengu with glowing foxfire.

• 🌊 Ukiyo-e 浮世絵: Traditional woodblock-print artwork with rolling waves.

The 6 existing themes remain free.

Your saves, selected themes, purchased songs, and imported music are all preserved.

NEW: Major Music Room Upgrade! 🎧

The Music Room has received a massive overhaul!

The old individual music pictures have been removed. This saves disk space and eliminates the time-consuming process of creating and aligning separate pictures / furigana for every track.

🎤 Japanese Lyrics & Reading Support

• Japanese lyrics with furigana and English translations.

• Show Meaning on Hover underline toggle.

• Customizable display modes.

• Numbered lyric columns.

• Adjustable text size.

• Hover over most vocabulary to see its meaning.

🎧 Full Music Controls

• Play, pause, stop, and volume controls.

• Auto-play and repeat.

• CD artwork and track information.

• Rewind and forward by 10 seconds.

• Display of music playback time.

• Missing music files or pictures now trigger a warning instead of crashing the game.

🧠 Vocabulary Quizzes

• A/B/C vocabulary quizzes with randomized answers .

• Earn 円 for correct answers while listening.

• Lose half the correct reward value when answering incorrectly.

• Upgrade your income.

• Optional mistake review system.

💃 Dancers & Rewards

• Purchase mini dancers at the bottom of the room.

• Receive a small bonus gift when you unlock the maximum number!

🎨 12 Animated Music Themes

Unlock and preview music-inspired themes, including static and animated versions.

Available themes:

🌸 Sakura / 🎤 Karaoke / 💖 J-Pop / 🎼 Treble Clef / 🏮 Festival (Fireworks) / 🌊 Ocean / ❄️ Snow Night (Aurora) / 👾 8-bit Arcade / 🚀 Galaxy (Flying Spaceship) / 🦢 Origami / 🍱 Obentou / ♪ Music, Live, Opera, Nature, Hell, Witchcraft, and Heaven.

🎮 Full Input Support

• Mouse, Keyboard, Controller, Steam Deck.

Your settings, themes, and upgrades are saved automatically.

Performance & Navigation

• Automatic Performance Mode on Steam Deck and lower-end PCs, reducing animations and on-screen activity.

• Room number boards added to every Music Room, making it easier to identify which floor you're on.

NEW: 12 Songs Added! 🎶

12 new Japanese songs arrived!

1. 無限

2. ひらがなネオン

3. どうして

4. 落ちていく

5. 普通じゃない

6. 君が欲しい

7. ロボットのリスト

8. 地獄へ行こう

9. 火星

10. 宝を探せ

11. 緑の処方箋

12. 終わりじゃない

NEW: Equipment & Shop Items 🧤

No AI-generated artwork used for any new item!

Four new glove sets are now available for purchase at the castle shop:

• 旅人手袋 = たびびと てぶくろ = Traveler Gloves

• 魔導手袋 = まどう てぶくろ = Sorcery Gloves

• 悪魔手袋 = あくま てぶくろ = Demon Gloves

• 氷手袋 = こおり てぶくろ = Frost Gloves

Each glove set has its own matching equipment set, but you're free to mix and match your gear!

Equipment Menu Improvements

• English labels added beneath equipment categories (e.g. 武器 = WEAPON).

• 手 (Hands) slot renamed to 武器 (Weapon).

• 本 (Book) slot renamed to 手袋 (Gloves).

More equipment slots are planned for future updates!

NEW: Main Menu Links 🔗

Steam, Discord, and YouTube now have:

• New icons, Hover descriptions, Animations. (Patreon is excluded)

IMPROVED: Day & Night Clock 🕒

Several important improvements have been made to the in-game clock!

• Your in-game date and time are now saved. Loading a game continues exactly where you left off instead of resetting.

• The clock pauses in menus, Options, Save / Load screens, and battles.

• Fixed time jumping forward after Alt-Tabbing, minimizing the game, or experiencing lag spikes.

• Fixed the clock briefly disappearing after closing certain menus.

• Sleeping after midnight now wakes you at 07:00 the same morning instead of skipping an entire day.

• Improved map performance, especially in areas with many events.

Saves created before this update will initially start at 07:00 on April 1st. From then onwards, your in-game date and time will save normally.

OTHER Improvements 🔧

• Updated loading screen artwork.

• Changed the Japanese floor-transition message from 出ます to 出る (standard form).

Continuing Development 🚧

There is plenty more being worked on! Here's a look at what's planned for December 1st and beyond.

Planned: December Major Update 🎮

NEW: Jump Button & Animations

• Jump Button!!

• Jump using SPACE on PC or the corresponding Steam Deck control.

• Charge your jumps to leap onto and over walls, etc.

• New jumping and landing sounds with varying pitches.

NEW: Better Onboarding Experience

• Improved introduction for new players.

• More options and explanations.

• In-game Wiki to explain gameplay and how to interact with different systems.

NEW: JLPT & Story Content

• New JLPT questions and stories.

• New question formats, following the Music Room's transition from individual pictures to data-driven content with customizable toggles and themes.

NEW: New Year Theme

Additional improvements:

• Exchanging selected AI-generated paintings (many of which are actual photographs) for artist-created artwork or photographs I've taken myself.

• More UI improvements.

• More learning content and gameplay features.

Known Issue / Planned Improvement

• Scorecard progress currently does not include points earned from Hiragana & Katakana Room quizzes.

• A larger Scorecard redesign is planned for a future update.

And much, much more that I can't share just yet!

よろしくお願いします！

Thank you again for supporting PLAYNESE during Early Access. Every review, suggestion, and bug report helps shape the future of the game.

Enjoying PLAYNESE? Please consider leaving a Steam review and sharing your ideas or feedback here or on Discord.

I'm developing PLAYNESE solo, and there's still a massive amount of content planned. Thank you for being part of the journey!

See you on December 1st!

よろしくお願いします！

ライト = Light 🎮