Mobile Unit 01 [0.3.7+0.3.6]

A new version of Emerald Woods, the chill no-combat farming, building, and exploration roguelike where you can die, is now available!

Play for free for now (online/windows) at https://slash.itch.io/emerald-woods, even using your phone! we are still in an “Earlier Access” phase, so let us know any suggestions you have in the discord.

If you like the game, you can still become an Early Supporter, and get your name into the game.

This update is actually a bundle of TWO versions, and it’s completely detached from the roadmap to 0.4, instead we worked into something magical: a complete useable mobile UI, you can now play in your phone!

I should however talk a little bit first about 0.3.6; if I were to give it a name it would be “Pleasant Melodies”. The main change it bundled was the inclusion of QuiteGecko’s very improved, longer piano tunes that make exploring the woods feel so much relaxing. It also brought back fishing in a very simplified way.

0.3.6 went a bit under the radar and unannounced, mainly because it was the first stab at the mobile UI born out of necessity to provide a way for players to play on their phones during an event where we showcased Emerald Woods; the UI worked but was very unusable, so I decided to double down on it for 0.3.7

And, basically, 0.3.7 was a lot of work to make a much more responsive mobile UI a reality; the UI was broken into pieces, so that we could relocate its fragments as needed. The onboarding was also heavily impact it to make it responsive to the different UI modes. The touch buttons are smart, appearing only when they are needed and relabeling contextually.

Another change was, both to prevent confusion as to the current interaction mode, and to save space in mobile, the building panel is now hidden while you are in construction mode. The map panel was also adapted to scale down on mobile, making it the only part of the game with impure pixel-art.

An important gameplay change was, what used to be the “inventory” of the player is now considered to be just the “toolbox”, and it’s much more limited (12 slots vs 20) BUT the backpack is now a starting item and its capacity was increased to 20. So you are basically meant to carry your “inventory” in the backpack, and just keep the tools you immediately need in your toolbox.

You can also now exit the game from the settings menu or the title screen, and there are also new options to set windowed mode / fullscreen (for both web and downloadable builds) and to turn the interactive tutorial on and off.