Isles of Arcana - Development Update #3

It’s been a while...

It’s been a little while since our last major development update — but there’s a good reason for that.

We’ve been hard at work on our biggest update yet! This update touches almost every part of the game. There’s new content, bosses, enemies, quests, weapons and mechanics, alongside major improvements to caves, weather, water, crafting, fishing, combat, multiplayer and world performance.

There’s a lot to get through, so let’s jump in.

New Content

There is a substantial amount of new content to discover throughout the world.

• Added new Demon Statues and Pillars
• Added Quicksand to the Desert biome
• Added a new animated Sandfall tile
• Added several new boss fight soundtracks
• Crafted items now display “Crafted by” information
• Added new quest: A Captain Adrift
• Added new Corrupted Tumors
• Added a new resource: Emberite
• Added two new weapons: Plasma Cannon and Plasma Sword
• Added a new Survival tab to Build Mode
• Added a new Bandit Cave interior
• Added the Hitching Post — horses can now be tied to one using a leash
• Added three new Undead Dwarf enemies: Ghost, Skeleton and Undead
• Added a new Warlock boss
• Killing fish outside of fishing can now reward Fish Scraps
• Added new boss: Gorkap
• Added Banana, Apple and Orange trees
• Added new shrubs and crate sprites
• Added the Ancient Altar offering table
• Dragon Shrines can now receive offerings in exchange for bonuses and blessings
• Added new quest: A Jeweller’s Masterpiece
• Added new D.A.V.E. palette variations and a dedicated control panel
• Added a new Underworld boss fight
• Added new wand sprites and three new Wands
• Added new D.A.V.E. interaction cutscenes and scanning functionality
• Added two new Dwarven Kingdom quests
• Added new enemy: Sea Horror
• Added new mini-boss: Cultist Horror
• Added new status effects
• Added a new Utility Wheel for tools
• Added new weight mechanics
• Added Bloomfire Flasks
• Added new quest: Bloom Against the Blight
• Added a new Griffin NPC
• Added a new Lockpicking mechanic
• Added new Cloak items

A More Dynamic World

We’ve also spent a lot of time improving how the world looks, sounds and behaves.

Water has received new effects and ripples, including much smoother transitions between separate water sources.

Cave generation has been overhauled, alongside new cave wall emission effects, improved lighting and collision behaviour.

Several biomes now have their own weather effects, and rain heard from indoors is now appropriately muffled.

We’ve also changed how Wells work. Wells must now be constructed over a Water Geyser, making access to water another consideration when establishing a settlement.

Ground items can now emit light, and a number of additional lighting improvements have been made throughout the world.

Most importantly, we’ve implemented new world streaming logic. This significantly improves performance when travelling quickly through the world, particularly while using Boats and Rovers.

Combat & Gameplay

Combat has received several important improvements.

Bow aiming has been completely updated, while Bombs and Dynamite now provide targeting previews so you can see exactly where your explosives are heading.

Parrying has become considerably more useful too — parried projectiles can now damage the enemy that originally fired them.

Other gameplay changes include:

• Saddles can now be removed by holding the mount button
• Improved spellcasting
• Improved Shovel behaviour
• Added biome-specific digging drop tables
• Rebalanced early-game NPCs
• Fixed stun-locking affecting certain enemies and bosses
• Added fishing while aboard Boats

Fishing, Farming & Pets

Fishing has received some much-needed improvements.

You can now see a visual indicator showing where your fishing float will land, alongside new fishing effects designed to make the entire system feel more responsive.

We’ve also overhauled the Fish, Pet and Farming Journal interfaces.

The Watering Can has received its own updated UI and new mechanics as part of our continued work on farming.

Crafting & UI

Crafting has received one of its largest interface updates so far.

You can now search Crafting menus, making increasingly large recipe collections much easier to navigate.

We’ve also added new crafting interface elements, queues and animations.

Shop discounts based on your reputation are now visible directly within item information, and the minimap has received several improvements.

On smaller maps, icons now scale appropriately rather than overwhelming the available space.

Quest NPCs also receive live minimap markers, and you can now drag the minimap beyond known map boundaries to investigate unexplored areas.

Multiplayer

We’ve made additional improvements behind the scenes to co-op stability.

Client authorisation and error checking have both been improved, helping us handle problematic multiplayer states more reliably.

Minecarts have also been improved in multiplayer, particularly when dealing with collisions and players pushing carts.

Technical Improvements

We’ve updated the game to the latest Steamworks SDK and upgraded our patching system with a proper loading bar and more robust rollback functionality.

Map creators also now have access to a new Destructible toggle for cliffs within the Map Editor.

Combined with the new world streaming system, these changes lay important groundwork for future updates.

Bug Fixes

As always, we’ve also been hunting down bugs reported by the community.

This update includes fixes for:

• The final player slot not automatically selecting the most recently saved character
• Arrow ammunition incorrectly appearing during some gun animations
• An issue with Core Instability that could prevent the quest from being completed
• A rare issue causing negative Warmth values after death
• Distant fleeing NPCs occasionally failing to react when attacked

Testing — Ready

This is a big update.

Between the new bosses, quests, enemies, weapons, world mechanics and progression systems — alongside the cave, water, weather, UI, multiplayer and performance work — this represents a substantial step forward for the game.

But with an update this large, testing is especially important.

We’d hugely appreciate your help putting all of these new systems through their paces.

Explore the new caves. Fight the new bosses. Break the crafting system. Take a Boat somewhere you probably shouldn’t. Tie up a horse. Get stuck in quicksand. See what happens.

And, most importantly, report anything that doesn’t seem right.

There’s plenty more we’re working on behind the scenes, and we’re looking forward to showing you what comes next.

-Zero