Final Demo Release


Whooooaaa, that's a spicy update. If you've only played the web version so far, you are in for quite a change!

Structurally, the biggest change is that the Mountain Trail is no longer accessible every day. Every third day, you have a choice of exploring the mountain trail. If you choose to go, you get time dedicated to simply exploring the trail. The farming day will happen as normal afterward you run out of trial time or return to the farm. The trail is now completely procedurally-generated, and there are tons of surprises to find there.

The other biggest change is that crops don't disappear on harvest any more. All crops will revert to seeds after harvest, not just special 'Rooted' ones. The game becomes much more about building up a farm rather than filling in holes. It feels much more satisfying, in my opinion.

The other other biggest change is the addition of a meta-game based around rebuilding a village between farms. This village will make you more powerful as you purchase upgrades there.

The other other other biggest change is the new mist... well, probably best just to read the changelog at this point.

This update has over half a year's work. I've been busy working on the Steam version of the game, hacking away and adding features for different special events like Next Fest or the Going Rogue Festival. Luckily, my trusting git log can help me track down the extensive changeset. Spoilers follow, obviously.

- As mentioned above, the trail is completely separate from the farm now. In addition, the trail is a single large maze now, and you can find the old puzzle challenges by wandering around. Currently, only four of the old eight puzzles are reimplemented for the new trail.
- Also featured in the trail: time flowers, moon flowers, seed stashes, and bee palaces.
- Possible rewards: rare potions, unlocking of new seeds / perks / blueprints, mistberries, crafting ingredients

- The farm and the trail are initially covered in magical mist. As you move around, you clear the mist so long as you have fuel in your moonlight lantern. Mist will come back overnight on the farm and cover up any crops or furniture, destroying it forever. You can prevent this with moonlamps and moon orbs, which protect an area around them. All farm starts with one moonlamp, with more available at the village, and moon orbs are always craftable.
- The farm can be explored. Hidden caches can be found underneath the mists.
- Each farm will only last 10 days now, although that time can be extended by successfully growing mistberries. These plants can be found on the mountain trail and are very difficult to grow.
- In between farms, you now travel to the village of Oncewas (pictured above) and rebuild it. Rebuilding the village will grant you upgrades and powers for your next farm.
- No more high score screen. I wasn't getting enough involvement there to justify keeping it in forever
- Arrow keys now work for movement.
- Press X to have Jay wave at you
- Elemental potions now convert rocks to elemental rocks that help (or hurt) crop growth. Elemental rocks no longer need a perk to appear
- Lots of particle effects, mouse icon animations, foliage shaders, screen shake, and other juicy updates
- UI theme overhaul, so it doesn't look like something from a game jam anymore
- Lotsa new perks. Got rid of some overpowered or useless ones.
- Inventory screen allows stack management with 'Ctrl' and 'Shift'. Inventory screen now includes 'trash' and 'drop' actions
- Rebalanced costs of upgrades so that money is much more important. Also, you'll need more money each time you visit the mountain trail.
- Speedy boots now provide a constant boost instead of requiring a button press and energy
- Bushes now appear on the farm and may be destroyed with an ax
- Probably a dozen things I've forgotten about

Lots of new things to explore. Try it out and let me know what you think!

Files

moondrop-web.zip Play in browser
Version 38 Jun 18, 2022

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