Its time for an update! Were calling V0.13 the Interim Update - it adds a several things that were missing from the game and prepares the path for the major update to come. Without further ado, here are the patch notes! The game should update automatically through Steam. Please note, right now this is Windows only. Mac and Linux users - weve still got a few bugs (ha, ha) to work through for these builds. Weve made significant progress on that but just ran out of time tonight and didnt want to delay for everyone. Were confident we can get stable builds out for you lovely people in short order, so keep your eyes on the news page! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xHjECOl1TJU

Headline Features

• Challenge modes added to Rising Tide and Queen of the Hill
  • The new challenge mode introduces a new creature the beach tiger beetle larva. This critter lies buried waiting for unsuspecting victims to walk near its trap, then snatches them away in the blink of an eye!
  • They will only attack if your ants are alone, and can only be damaged for a short time after attacking. Will your colony accept the losses to get the food they need, or will they rip these ambush hunters from their burrows?
• New Freeplay map Towhead
  • Set on a small island near the mouth of a river, Towhead offers a much more intimate experience on the surface, with higher densities of creatures
  • A map option allows a periodic flooding of the lower level. This will raise your score but at the cost of possibly losing ants and resources when the waters rise
• Minor Improvements System for Formicarium colonies
  • Got spare Royal Jelly laying around the nest? Fear not, we have you covered! Minor improvements can be accessed by selecting any already purchased species from the tech tree and selecting the icon
  • The improvements start cheap and get more expensive the more you buy for a species. Each ant species has their own different improvements which complement various play styles
• What is that pesky spiders web at the back of the lab? Could someone have a look at that for us, please?

Other Features

• Main menu is now a list to make it clearer to new users what content is available
• Creatures now have various sizes and some sizes can pass through others (this has been done on a visually logical level for example beach tiger beetles can walk over most none massive things, where as a hermit crab cannot)
• Tunneling to the surface now takes multiple ants and take 5 times as much digging
• Threat system added. Some creatures attacks cause them to be a more desirable target for other nearby creatures (mostly in preparation for leafcutter update)
• Battle Arena creatures have been put into tabs based on which tier of the game they first appear

Improvements / Changes

• Creature movement has been reworked - should now have less issues, creatures should walk more centrally in corridors and should be more efficient
• Ants now reserve space on tiles they are taking food to. If all tiles are reserved they instead take the food towards the queen (until all tiles fill- they then drop food as they do now)
• Increased main menu loading speed
• Multiple minor optimisations made throughout
• Optimisation added to creatures searching for other creatures
• Multiple game assets have been optimised
• Beach texture improvements (normal and roughness masks)
• Improvements to pathfinding underground (many distance checks are now tile based rather than path based)
• All audio passed through new filters and re-recorded, female scientist audio re-recorded
• New audio lines added in some Formicarium challenges
• New audio lines added to Freeplay (start and uber spawning)
• Ubers are no longer affected by food scaling and will drop full food no matter the Freeplay difficulty
• Food size now changes slower at higher food quantities
• Queen chamber workers now have a crown icon
• Ants hatch first from queen tiles
• Food spend is now taken from random rooms rather than the order they were built
• Ants no longer drop food when attacked if combat is turned off for the group

Bug Fixes

• Tiles can no longer be tagged for dig when the game is paused
• Fixed a bug with food pickup that could cause food to be stored not on top of a tile
• Fixed an issue that would sometime cause wood ants to misfire on surface tunnels
• Stun, confuse and other status debuffs are now hidden in fog of war
• Fixed an issue where AOE attacks could be blocked if something obscured vision
• Fixed an issue where loaded part-built tiles would appear full built but with a job to build them
• Various minor bug fixes