Hi, everyone. Welcome to another week's developer's diary.

First of all, today marks the second year of Putin's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Let's turn back the clock and remind ourselves of the developer's diary exactly 2 years ago.
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1519140/view/3119310025773834317

In the beginning, many have joined the cause to support Ukraine like us. There were many great fundraisings on Steam, Humble stores, Itch, and many other places. There were many developers like me making donations to Ukraine. That was a great moment when the world demonstrated solidarity and unity, standing with Ukraine. However, as the war went on, many grew fatigued, many went silent, and many even forgot this war was still not end yet. That will not do!

Thus, let's start with this week's developer's diary with new Ukraine-related game content.
During this week's update, we got 2 new playable character variations.

The first one is an Iron General in Ukrainian Power Armor.
The armor is basically a re-texture of the Templar Power Armor with a bit of modification.
The character is based on an old image online that illustrated General Zaluzhnyi in a Warhammer 40K Space Marine armor. I cannot make the model too similar to that one of Ultramarines because of potential legal risks. And I know Zaluzhnyi is no longer the command-in-chef any more. But, that does not stop me from making this model to remember his heroic deeds at the very beginning of the war. Just like we also have another "old gentleman who likes smiles" who is still giving quests to players to close the sky. Hopefully, we can see F16 this year.

The second one is a Ukrainian Cossack. The outfit is made by Optigon and I purchased a commercial license so that it can be used in our game. Cossacks were people seek freedom from Feudal Lords in medieval. They escaped from their overlords and made their communities in Ukraine. In their communities, they decide everything important in a democratic tradition which can be quite rare in that era. As such they become a symbol of Ukraine.

Although those are just cosmetic skins with no story content related to them at this moment, maybe there will be in the future. We still have a large undeveloped area in Siberia. The original plan for that area was canceled because of Putin's invasion. But, maybe, one day, we can get a new story of that area with all those characters involved.

One more thing, just as a bonus content. We cannot just add a Cossack without also adding their iconic weapon. Thus, here we are:

No, wait. Not this guy from Metal Gear. Just the last part of his name.
So, here it is.

Shashka has been added to the game as a traditional cossack weapon.
The weapon can always cause bleeding and may also have other prefixes.
You can purchase it from several merchants in the game.

OK, that's all the Ukraine-related content of this week. My support for Ukraine will continue. This may be the longest live-operation of this game even in its almost 20 years of history. But, isn't that awesome?

Now let's cover our other content update of this week. There are 3 main parts.
1, Elemental Proficiency Books.
We now have 8 books that you can read to improve your 8 different elemental proficiencies. You can find them in the Book Store of Liu among other books. Alternatively, you can go to the Mages Guild to find another vendor who sells those books. Some enemies such as the corrupted books in the Grand Library may also drop those books.
They are not just some random books you read and forget. I intend to make fun of them. Thus, each book has its narrative in a light-hearted manner and they all seem quite mundane yet can somehow improve your elemental proficencies.
Here are some examples:

2, New Food Recipe.
It has been a while since the last update to our cooking system. So, maybe this time we shall have more recipes added to it. New recipes are mostly fish recipes so that we can make better use of our fishing system and egge recipes.
Here is one of the new fish recipes:

But, eggs? Yes, this food ingredient is finally in our game now. But, where can we get it in addition to purchasing from those food ingredient vendors?
That's a question that led to my over-complex game design. In real life, eggs are from animals that can lay eggs of course. So, in our game, we can do the same thing.

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Something seems not right. OK, to be honest, a certain North Korean human male known as Kim Jong Um cannot lay eggs. The screenshot is here because I captured a female turkey and renamed her Kim Jong Um just to make some fun. :P
So, basically, all the female bird pets in your group can now lay eggs for you periodically. (Unfortunately, we only have Turkeys in the game right now. We will get more, such as chickens, ducks, and other pets later.)
Meanwhile, all those eggs are procedurally generated and named after the pets that lay them.

Now, let's cook those eggs. We can get...

Fried eggs will automatically named after which egg you fried just to make it even more fun. As we can rename our pets to anything. So, you can basically fry anybody's eggs no matter that's Trump, Biden, your boss, your coworkers, your classmates, someone you hate, or someone you like. The important thing is you shall have the freedom to have all the fun. You can do all that just by renaming your pets.
There are 7 new recipes added.
And here is a bonus. As we have new cooking recipes, we shall also have a cooking-related quest. Thus, we now have a new NPC in the Marinas Town Hall. Marinas is famous for her fish. But, they are now also looking for good cooks to make fish dishes. If you are confident in your cooking skills, you can submit your fish dishes to a Fish Dishes Critic. If he likes your dishes, he will reward you. You may even get some items with "chef" prefixes. Alternatively, you can also be a trouble person to submit some poisoned fish dishes and see what will happen. :P

Now, as we just talked about food. Maybe we shall wait a bit here. Because the 3rd part may cause some uncomfortable to people.

So, let's wait for a bit.
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OK, are you ready?
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3, Poops
Errr...I told you I have warned you. :P
Alright, as not many pets can lay eggs right now. But, we have a system to passively generate resources from them. What else do most of our pets generate? After taking a few moments to think like a Palworld player, I get the conclusion that most pets at least create poops! (If you have a cat or some other pets, you know it's your duty to take care of their poops. Thus, this is the first thing that came to my mind. :P) So, now many different pets will automatically generate poops for you to use.

Wait, does that North Korean human male Kim Jong Um actually poop? Some rumor says he is a great guy so great that he never poops. I don't know. :P

What's their usage?
The first usage is quite obvious, they are biological weapons that you can throw at your enemies. (They even get a special animation for that.)
Meanwhile, they can also be used in alchemy to create some very disgusting potions to cause more mayhems.
You can also sell them to some merchants to make some profits.
Of course, there shall be more usage of those poops. Unfortunately, I failed to get all planned features added this week so we will have to get them in later updates.

One more thing, it may be annoying to see Kim Jong Um keep pooping and laying eggs every now and then. Thus, I also added control over our passive resource generation system. You can turn on/off each pet's resource generation in the character menu.

Now Kim Jong Um can no longer poop.

Alright, that's for this week. I hope everyone has fun and don't forget Ukraine is still at war.

Another thing is I will be on a business trip to Guangdong next Monday and Tuesday to handle some legal business which is my daytime job as a lawyer that I do not enjoy but it pays well to financial the game's development. Thus, the update will likely pause on Tuesday as a result of that. Sorry about that.

This week's full update log:
20240218
English
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[Butterfly]Liu's Book Store is now a location that you can teleport to. It requires you have visit this location once after this update to unlock.
[Item]It's now possible to have books that give elemental proficiency experience.
[Item]New Item: The Art of Drinking 80 Cups of Water Everyday (It provides water elemental proficiency experience.)
[Item]New Item: Guide to Travel with Wind in Typhoon Seasons (It provides wind elemental proficiency experience.)
[Item]New Item: 8 Steps to Build a Perfect Sand Castle (It provides earth elemental proficiency experience.)
[Item]New Item: Everything Is Fine in This Burning House (It provides fire elemental proficiency experience.)
[Book Store]All those new books may now randomly appear in Liu's Book Store.
[The Mages Guild]Added a book vendor that sells those elemental proficiency books.
简体中文
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【蝴蝶之翼】疁城的书店现在是一个可以被传送到的地点。需要在本次更新后访问过一次来解锁。
【物品】现在游戏中可能会出现提供元素熟练度经验的书籍。
【物品】新物品：《每天喝80杯水的艺术》（提供水元素熟练度）
【物品】新物品：《台风天御风而行指南》（提供风元素熟练度）
【物品】新物品：《建设完美的沙雕城堡的8个步骤》（提供地元素熟练度）
【物品】新物品：《在这栋燃烧的房子中一切都好》（提供火元素熟练度）
【书店】上面提到的所有新的书籍现在可能随机出现在疁城的书店中。
【法师公会】加入了一个书籍商人贩卖这些元素熟练度书籍。

20240219
English
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[Books]Moved the book name lists of all life skills books and all elemental proficiency books to two constant arrays.
[Loot]Corrupted Books may now drop elemental proficiency books.
[Book Store]Increased the number of random books the book store generates each time you want to buy books.
[Item]New Item: The Light Pollution PC and You (It provides light elemental proficiency experience.)
[Item]New Item: 2084 (It provides dark elemental proficiency experience.)
[Item]New Item: A Real Man Plays Kite in Storms (It provides thunder elemental proficiency experience.)
[Item]New Item: How to Cook Ice Cream: 1001 Failed Attempts (It provides ice elemental proficiency experience.)
[Cooking]New Recipe: Fish Cake (Flour+Water+Yeast+Salt + Any Fish)
[Cooking]When making Fruit Bread, the fruit you use will now affect more on the HP recovery rate of the final product.
[Cooking]Increased the EXP gained from successfully making bread of fruit bread.
[Cooking]New Recipe: Fish Frumenty (Any Fish + Wheat + Water)
[Cooking]New Recipe: Fish Baozi (Any Fish + Baozi Wrapper)
简体中文
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【书籍】将所有的生活技能经验书和元素熟练度经验书的书名列表移动到了两个常量数组中。
【掉落物】被腐蚀的书籍现在可能掉落元素熟练度书籍。
【书店】增加了每次你购买图书时随机图书生成的数量。
【物品】新物品：《关于我如何停止担忧并组装了一台光污染电脑这件事》（提供光元素熟练度）
【物品】新物品：《2084》（提供暗元素熟练度）
【物品】新物品：《纯爷们在暴雨天也要玩风筝》（提供雷元素熟练度）
【物品】新物品：《如何烹饪冰激凌：1001种失败的尝试》（提供冰元素熟练度）
【料理】新料理配方：鱼肉蛋糕 （面粉+水+酵母+盐+任何鱼）
【料理】在制作水果面包时，现在使用的水果种类会更大程度上影响最终产品的生命恢复率。
【料理】增加了成功制作面包或水果面包时获得的经验值。
【料理】新料理配方：鱼肉小麦粥（任何鱼+水+小麦）
【料理】新料理配方：鱼肉包子（任何鱼+包子皮）

20240220
English
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[Item]New Item: Egg
[Food Ingredient Vendors]They now sell eggs.
[Alchemy]Eggs can be used as alchemy ingredients.
[Character]Female Turkeys in your group will now lay eggs periodically. The quality of those eggs is based on their level and Max HP. (You will get a popup that says "The Pet's Name just laid an egg.")
[Eggs]Those eggs are procedurally generated, and they will be named The Pet's Name + "'s egg." (Thus, you may make fun of this mechanism.)
[Cooking]New Recipe: Fried Egg. (The name will be automatically changed to Fried + The egg's name. Thus, you can make more fun of it. XD)
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[Alchemy]When you successfully make a potion. The system shall now correctly says "Alchemizing Success!" instead of "Cooking Success!"
简体中文
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【物品】新物品：蛋
【食材商人】他们现在会贩卖蛋。
【炼金】蛋可以作为炼金原料。
【角色】你队伍里的雌性火鸡会每过一段时间为你下蛋。这些蛋的质量和她们的等级还有最大生命值有关。（你会获得一个提示现实“【宠物的名称】刚下了一个蛋。”）
【蛋】这些蛋是动态生成的，命名规则是：【宠物的名称】+"的蛋。" （所以，你可以制造一些欢乐的效果）
【料理】新配方：煎蛋（名字会自动变成煎+【蛋的名字】从而制造更多欢乐的效果。XD）
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【炼金】当炼金成功时现在系统会正确地表示【炼金成功！】而不是【料理成功！】

20240221
English
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[Marinas Town Hall]New NPC: Fish Dishes Critic (He comes with a unique interactive that allows you to submit any fish dishes to him. If he likes your dishes, he will reward you. Basically, it can be considered a short repeatable quest.)
[Wiki]Added a page with details of this new NPC: https://neolithia.fandom.com/wiki/Fish_Dishes_Critic(NPC)
[Cooking]New Recipe: Egg Frumenty
[Cooking]New Recipe: Steamed Egg with Minced Meat
[Cooking]New Recipe: Steamed Egg with Suspicious Minced Meat
简体中文
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【玛丽娜斯政厅】新NPC：鱼类美食评论家 （有独特交互。你可以将自己制作的鱼类料理提交给他进行评审。如果他喜欢你的料理，则会提供奖励。可以被认为是一个简短的可重复任务。）
【维基】加入了关于这个NPC的相关页面：https://neolithia.fandom.com/wiki/Fish_Dishes_Critic(NPC)
【料理】新配方：小麦蛋粥
【料理】新配方：精肉炖蛋
【料理】新配方：可疑的精肉炖蛋

20240222
English
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[Pet]You can now control if a pet shall lay eggs or not from the character menu.
[Pet]You can now pet more types of pets from the character menu.
[Pet]Cats are even more easy to capture now.
[Item]New Item: Poop (You can throw them at enemies. There will be other features of this item in the future.)
[Alchemy]Poops can be used in Alchemy.
[Pet]Many types of pets in your group now create poops periodically. The damage of those poops is depending on their MaxHP and level. Those poops are named as "[The Pet's Name]'s Poop."
[Pet]When a pet poops, there will be a popup to notify you.
[Pet]You can now control if a pet shall poop or not from the character menu.
简体中文
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【宠物】你现在可以从角色菜单中选择一只宠物是否下蛋。
【宠物】你现在可以从角色菜单中爱抚更多种类的宠物。
【宠物】猫猫现在更容易捕捉了。
【物品】新物品：便便 （可以作为生化武器丢向敌人。这个物品更多的功能会在之后添加。）
【炼金】便便可以用于炼金。
【宠物】很多种类的宠物在你的队伍里的时候现在会周期性地制造便便。这些便便的伤害数值取决于该宠物的最大生命值和等级。这些便便的名称命名方式是“【宠物的名称】的便便。”
【宠物】当一只宠物便便的时候，你会获得一个提示。
【宠物】你现在可以从角色菜单中选择一只宠物是否制造便便。

20240223
English
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[Character Customization]Added a new playable male character. (A certain general in Ukrainian power armor.)
[Character Customization]Added a new playable male character. (Cossack.)
简体中文
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【角色自定义】加入了一个新的可用男性角色造型。（某位在乌克兰动力装甲中的将领。）
【角色自定义】加入了一个新的可用男性角色造型。（哥萨克。）

20240224
English
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[Weapon]New Weapon Type: Shashka (Always can cause bleeding. May have other prefixes.)
[Hottle Equipment Store]They now sell Shashkas with "Storm" prefixes.
[Marinas]The Blacksmith now sells Shashkas with no prefixes.
[Bazaar]The Weapon Merchant now sells Shashkas with no prefixes.
简体中文
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【武器】新武器种类：沙什卡 （总是会造成流血。可能带有其它词缀。）
【霍特尔装备店】现在会贩卖带有【风暴】词缀的沙什卡。
【玛丽娜斯】铁匠现在会出售不带词缀的沙什卡。
【巴扎】武器商人现在会出售不带词缀的沙什卡。

Latest news from Ukraine:
https://pastelink.net/zujjd5ab
https://controlc.com/05076dc0