Well, it looks like we needed another 2.5.x release after all! In beta 2.5.6, we've addressed many issues and improved some player interaction like reducing item pick-up delay and increasing movement speed slightly among other things. There's still a few issues to solve (and some we are still waiting on to be fixed upstream as mentioned in the last update post), but it's likely we'll push those to 2.6.0 now. We'll keep updating the development branch nightly if you want to keep up to date with the more substantial changes that are likely to follow. We are going forward with the most requested feature, NPCs! But as always, the next major update will bring hundreds of other additions, changes, and improvements. Note: Due to one bug fix, your custom binds for mods will need to be reset.

Improvements

• Reduced the delay when picking up items (and sped up the item notifier animation).
• Added a loading animation before the splash/Unlok screen.
• Corpses will now be named what they were while alive.
• Slightly increased the player movement speed.

New

• Added a customizable bind (defaulted to escape) that will allow you to unfocus the chat bar.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed moving into an open container not closing it (and producing a weird animation). (Thanks Amax!)
• Fixed gravel piles being named compost piles when pluralized. (Thanks Mamapillar!)
• Fixed some instances of menu elements being sorted visibly if loading the menus too fast after starting the game.
• Fixed clicking mod options from mod menu not scrolling down to mod options section if you have never opened the options menu before. (Thanks Amax!)
• Fixed local modifications not detecting that they were loaded when loading a game. (Thanks Amax!)
• Fixed quickslot binds spamming themselves when held down if a specific action was selected for the slot. (Thanks KogasaGaSagasa!)
• Fixed mods being initialized again after they are uninitialized when game is reloaded. (Thanks Amax!)
• Fixed an issue where quickslot numbers/assignments would stay attached to items in multiplayer when dropping them. (Thanks blay.paul!)
• Fixed a visual glitch that kept highlighted items highlighted after crafting/dismantling until another item was hovered over.
• Corrected dismantle highlights not highlighting damaged items with a special yellow selection border.
• Fixed an issue where different torch types required different resources to be lit.
• Fixed a bug that resulted in custom player binds being reassigned to different binds when new binds were added to the game. (Thanks OnsenManju!)
• Fixed audio sliders still being operable within the pause menu.

Balance

• Heavily reduced chance to fail when planting seeds/mushrooms, and added a bonus to botany/mycology that will result in faster seed/spore germination time based on skill level.

Modding

• Fixed the reference for canDoodadSpawn taking the wrong parameter type. (Thanks Amax!)

Mods

• Developer Tools has been renamed to "Debug Tools" to reduce confusion with native "developer tools" already within Wayward.