This update contains a mix of fixes, various quality of life additions, and some tidy ups in the direction of supporting post launch content coming this season. There are also a bunch of items from my quality-of-life list that I hadn't got done prior to launch ticked off.

The size of the update is mostly due to a one-time moving of files around and clearing up some references. Normally updates wont be anywhere near this big.

If any of you have feedback, suggestions, or ideas about the game I’m always happy to hear them :)

Patch Notes

General

• Fixed a delay timer potentially interfering with camera reset in practice mode.
  
• Fixed ability to fight the yaw while focusing flag and an instance where it may become stuck if you mashed buttons and reset camera.
  
• Added tweaks to scoring of levels. I’ve adjusted the timing value to have a 2.5 second offset, which will mean net 10XP difference. This is to bring some later game levels into a more ideal difficulty for achieving S Ranks. The early levels I’ve so far not experienced any issues with. Always open to feedback on the levels however.
  
• Added change to waiting for players menu by showing the preset image and icon rather than a picture of the first level. This helps players joining see easier what kind of session they are in and is consistent with the join menu behavior, plus that first level picture was often incorrect as it only shows the base version and isn’t correct for hard etc.
  
• Added independent graphics quality settings to the system save game when running in ES3.1. This means that while stuff like display and frame rate settings will be shared, the quality and some of advanced settings will be only to that specific mode.

Environment

• Fixed a couple minor wall gaps on ‘See you on the other side’
  
• Added a tidy up by reducing number of materials for track pieces. This won’t affect performance in a meaningful way but will help with error prevention.
  
• Added internal changes to future support additional ground types. No new ground types are currently included.
  
• Fixed a wall gap on spin city.
  
• Fixed a wall on ‘Getting Tee’d off’ out of alignment.
  
• Added improved round corner and round end cap wall meshes. These were earlier made meshes and compared to other wall meshes I simply felt quality could be better. A positive side effect of this rework will see triangle count of these meshes be reduced by around 25%.

Interface

• Fixed an issue with displaying XP level after reaching level 5 in the scoreboard.
  
• Fixed an element pressable that shouldn’t be (and has no effect) on the stat menu. The container for holeouts had visual pressable feedback when it shouldn’t, it also has no reason to have this.
  
• Added to stats menu a stat that specifically shows how many levels excluding difficulty variations you’ve played. This is same progress as the ‘Around the World’ achievement.
  
• Added time to be displayed as part of the holeout animation when in a race session.
  
• Added dedicated graphics settings menu for when running in the ES3.1 performance mode. Given most graphical features don’t work or are simply disabled in this mode you will find less options here compared to normal. However, if your goal is to tweak to get more performance then only showing actually valid options is a huge help. Essentially this mode is low/med in terms of regular DX12 features. Shadows are supported, if you disable these via the settings you will get further performance improvements.
  
• Fixed some container text strings being incorrect on the graphics menu.
  

Discord Server

Be sure to check out the official discord server with channels for Golfing In Aether and my other various projects.