Hello Villagers!

Welcome to Village Monsters v1.1. It's been awhile!

I'm eschewing from sharing traditional patch notes because they'd be too long and, frankly, not that useful. Instead, I've broken things out into three sections: what this patch contains (generally), what this patch does *not* contain, and a brief FAQ.

To celebrate the release of v1.1 I've also put Village Monsters on a weeklong sale for the low-low price of like $5. It's the lowest price ever! So tell your friends and tell your enemies twice.

Enjoy!

What this Update Is 

In a sentence, v1.1 is what v1.0 should have been. No more, no less.

After exiting Early Access last year I created a number of patches in quick succession, but soon realized I needed to take a slower, more comprehensive approach. Unfortunately for me, life immediately got in the way and kicked me right in the nads, so things haven't gone as quickly or as smoothly as I planned.

Thankfully I'm back on track - well, mostly. Many bugs have been fixed, including a large number of blockers and crash-inducing bugs. Some features have been simplified, merged, or even cut altogether if they just weren't working right. Text, art and music have been touched up or corrected here and there.

To put a number on it, I have added, modified or deleted approximately 10,000 lines of codes and have done the same for ~425 assets (art, music, etc.) I switched from Trello to Jira and then back again, so I don't know how many tasks and specific bugs I fixed, but it's a lot.

What this Update Is Not

I have historically done a poor job managing expectations (including my own lol), so I want to properly set them this time around: v1.1 is a major new patch , but it is not a major new content update . On a scale from "General improvements to enhance the user's experience." to "Epic 30 minute video showcasing all the new features and content", v1.1 is firmly in the middle.

While there are indeed some new features / content, v1.1 was always meant to be a comprehensive bugfix effort to clean up the pitiable v1.0. My go-to mantra has been "Would this have fit the scope for v1.0 if things were done properly?", and if the answer was "No" then I've tossed it into the future v2.0 pile.

It may have taken way, way too long to get here, but the reasons for that have been well documented.

Finally, v1.1 is not a panacea for either the game or my slapdash development style. There will surely be things I need to fix or work on more, and I have already carved out time for at least two Feedback Releases to address new bugs and complaints from v1.1. As much as I tried to test things myself, there's just no predicting what players will find on their machines.

What's the Future?

Here's my (tentative) calendar for the next few months:

As you can see, I'm expecting anywhere from 1-3 feedback releases as a result of v1.1. Then it's onto v2.0, and then sometime after that is the release anniversary.

FAQ

Do I need to start a new game?

Short Answer: Yes, please do.

Long Answer: It should be technically possible to load your save and continue, but a lot has changed in the backend. It may be the game tries to load data that is no longer relevant and causes bugs or crashes. And if your save file missed an important 'flag' that didn't trigger earlier than you might miss story content.

Will there be another update / more content?
Yes. After ensuring v1.1 is stable I will move onto v2.0, which is my catchall version for anything that's new. I am aiming to have that out by early 2024, likely January or February.

v2.0 will likely be the final update to Village Monsters beyond patches and fixes.

Can I still access v1.06?
Yes. Subscribe to the Beta channel of Village Monsters by using the password "previousversion".