Alpha 9 progress (PLEASE READ BEFORE POSTING)

Live streaming development at http://www.twitch.tv/underthegarden Features for Alpha 9 are listed below in no particular order:3D WORLD & NEW GRAPHICSWe have rebuilt all the levels to make use of the extra dimension and expanded the island tilesets to boot. The characters and general look will receive an overhaul while I am on it also, more on that below. Progress on the graphics (latest progress first):Ruins- https://twitter.com/Farmergnome/status/500843465261871105/photo/1 Swamp tileset- https://twitter.com/Farmergnome/status/500843868577734656/photo/1 New enemies: https://twitter.com/Farmergnome/status/480512034082017280/photo/1 building basics: https://twitter.com/Farmergnome/status/457478781892964352/photo/1 Tree climbing: https://twitter.com/Farmergnome/status/446140474118512640 rivers: https://twitter.com/Farmergnome/status/429600138584018946 walls/highground: https://twitter.com/Farmergnome/status/429524311787855872 Spiders and UI : https://twitter.com/Farmergnome/status/426227439237206016 Campfire & 4 player: https://twitter.com/Farmergnome/status/421818874862895104 Woodsman Ingame: https://twitter.com/Farmergnome/status/420168339093061632/photo/1 Brambles & Weeds: https://twitter.com/Farmergnome/status/418697124495114240/photo/1 Hub world & Water: https://twitter.com/Farmergnome/status/411164973537042432 SAME SCREEN & ONLINE MULTIPLAYERThis is where the current build really shines, we have local multiplayer working with the characters sharing the same screen and it is really shaping up nicely, we would like to redo some of major mechanics to be a little more co-operation focused.HUB WORLDWe will be implementing a "home base" of sorts where you can connect to multiplayer games and store your achievements and trophies based on level achievements and view all the new character professions you have unlocked.STORY DRIVEN STRUCTUREThe first of many missions unlockable from your hub island story book, the mission in alpha 9 is themed around washing ashore on a dire wolf infested island, we plan to make the washing ashore part and the drifting on the open sea playable sections, as well as the trek across the island to your goal. This will be the first update to introduce goals into the game and also deep sea sections and well, in the case of the first mission, a giant storm and a fishing trawler being smashed around (which we are hoping can be playable also!), and finally wrecking on the nearby island. Each alpha after we plan to add new missions quite different in content and theme, to keep it fresh.CONTROLLER SUPPORTWe will be changing up how the mouse controls works in this build also, and introducing controller support so you can have more than one person playing at any given computer screen, 4 being the max.REDOING ALL ITEMS & NEW CRAFTING SYSTEMEvery single item in the game will be rebuilt, from the ground up, to support the more free-form crafting system, you guys have been very vocal about the alpha 6 free-form crafting so we decided to take another stab at improving the item crafting, we have combed the recipe based crafting with mini-games to try and bring back some of the tactile feel from earlier alphas without sacrificing the simplicity of a recipe based system.WOLVES & SPIDERS & & BETTER AISo with the extra depth gives us extra room to do more interesting combat, and as such combat will become more of a focus in this update, with good combat comes interesting enemy AI (which was more than lacking in alpha 8). So enemies will pathfind toward you and have more than just "charge on the ground" type movements, we will be doing our best to incorporate co-op mechanics onto the enemies also, such as enemies that pin characters (much like the L4D hunter) or enemies that require teamwork to kill. The standout enemy for this update will be the wolf, they will attack at night and we will be drawing heavily from the movie "the grey" as inspiration, though we will be including a pile more new enemies to make the game more challenging.MORE TERRAIN CHALLENGESBrambles, spike pits, quicksand, swamps, inland rivers, poisonous plants and a host of other things will find there way onto the island now, we are doing our best to make the world feel alive and cover the grounds in interesting items to use to survive.SIMPLIFYING THE UIThe UI will undergo a bit of an overhaul so it works with multiple players, one of the major things people expressed dis-interest in is the free-form movement inside the inventory boxes, we will most likely move to a gridded system to fix that. The other major thing is the UI will have to work well with a controller, so adding support for that will also be important. It is going to look and act quite different from the inventory in Alpha 8 currently.FISHING & FARMINGThe major addition as far as crafting for Alpha 9 is the fishing mini-game, we will be fleshing out farming somewhat but the fishing system will be the focus for alpha 9, we will be adding in new fruits/vegies with a more mechanic/stat based approach to make them more than just health buffs also.PROFESSIONSWe will also be adding a profession system into the game so you will be able to select several preset load-outs before entering a game, giving you different statistical and skill based advantages depending on profession choice, allowing different players to optimize their party by having different strengths and unique traits. Professions for alpha 9 / alpha 10: https://twitter.com/Farmergnome/status/402378753155690497 DOCTOR- Will be primarily a healing/buff profession who can remove diseases and illnesses. Suffers from addictions though...FISHERMAN- The first crafting profession, the only profession that is able to dive, can also cross raging rivers easily now, has advanced crafting options.VETERAN- Ranged Profession that focuses mostly on gun fighting, is an alcoholic and suffers from nightmares.WOODSMAN- A stealth trapper who can distract enemies with calls and build and deploy various snares and traps.(Unlockable) HUNTER- A ranger who can wear enemies pelts and blend with his surroundings and is armed with a bolt action rifle.LEVELING SYSTEMAll the professions will represent a different character that exists on your hub island, you will be able to customize basic clothes on the character and the character will level up and gain new abilities to use in future games more you play that character profession.CHANGING UP THE WATER MOVEMENTIn addition to adding water pools, we will be changing up how ocean movement works, this has been long overdue but we have been waiting for the right time to do it, in addition to pools of water and the ocean, a major new feature will be running water (creeks and bigger rivers) that act as shortcuts through certain segments though often dangerous as well (Waterfalls!)NEW MAP SYSTEMWe will be simplifying the map system into grids to better make use of the overland travel features such as the rivers that will interconnect, the old map system was quite clunky and we hope the new one can make some improvements in that area.More to come as we discover it, but hopefully you will think these changes are worth the wait, we will do our best to get this done as soon as possible but because it is such a big change across the entire game, we feel it is safer to polish this update so all of the above is playable together rather than releasing several broken builds each few weeks.If you have any suggestions, as usual hit me up on twitter https://twitter.com/farmergnome or post something here!