The Forest has been updated again, but this time there’s mostly bug fixes and aesthetic updates. Here’s the patch notes:

Version 0.04

Features and changes:

New A.I. behaviour, mutants will sometimes go home to sleep during day along with other new routines.
Distorted mutants can now be killed with regular weapons.
Distorted mutants more aggressive and deadly in combat and have expanded actions.
Better ambient lighting. Trees and large objects diffusely occlude skylight. (experimental)
Pause menu now actually pauses game.
Enemies use rocks more often to jump attack at player.
New female enemy type added.
Better distribution of enemies throughout the world.
Constructed bench now works and players can sit to regain energy or watch sunset.
Increased axe damage against enemies.
More variation to female cannibal models, added procedural breasts size system.
Improved Rabbit/Lizard distribution and optimized CPU usage.
Improved sky and sun look.
Improved dead cave lighting and cave 2 lighting.
Better cave textures and rock look.
Dead cave prop fixes, fixed some incorrect rock placements.
Improved load times and added loading percentage amount.
Re-balanced hunger drain.
Better cave ground with flowing water and more detailed textures.
Enemies will now push small items out of the way instead of getting stuck on them.
Dead sharks now ragdoll.
Bugs:

Fixed rain sound never going away even after rain stops.
Fixed bug where some partially built structures couldn’t be completed after loading a saved game.
Fixed animals sometimes disappearing in regular and vegan mode.
Fixed issue where you could still shoot flare gun or use other weapons when pause menu was open.
Yacht random position won’t change now or get lost when saved game is loaded
Fixed all effigies turning into arm effigy on load
Fixed E to add icon showing up if holding a rock or stick even if items not needed in building
Fixed cave drips continuing to play even when not in cave
Fixed fish swimming outside of pond near cliff section
Fixed fullness always starting at half when loading a saved game
Fixed moonlight sometimes missing completely
Fixed stick marker vanishing on loading saved game
Fixed missing collision roof of cabin
Fixed player flying in air after chopping dead bodies
Rain effigy effect should now work and will wear off after time
Cannibals spawning in villages no longer ‘pop’ when waking up
Fixed creepy female model attacks sometimes not hitting player
Fixed bug where bird landing on hand would sometimes stop axe from working
Fixed enemy head and leg pickups sometimes appearing as arm pickups

Some of these changes sound like they’ll be good for the game, but honestly I haven’t touched it, and there’s nothing really significant here that makes me want to play it just yet. I love the game, but I’m still playing it sparingly so that I don’t get sick of it before the really good stuff gets implemented (where is the co-op mode?).

One thing that I couldn’t help but laugh at was the inclusion of “More variation to female cannibal models, added procedural breasts size system.” I can hear the backlash now. Variety is good and all, but I could really care less about variation of the boob size of the fucking cannibal that is trying to eat me. I guess there’s someone out there who will appreciate being able to say “nice tits” right before they get eaten.

An article from PCGamer popped up that touched upon the game ever so briefly, and I have to say that I disagree with the author of the post. In it, he states that the problem with survival games is that developers always add in an enemy, and that the real scare-factor of the genre should be nature itself. Having played The Forest in “veganmode,” I can attest that the game is rather dull without that added enemy element, and though the author does admit that, he’s still pushing for a boring walking-simulator. The Forest is one of the first games I’ve played in a very long time that truly scared me, and that had nothing to do with starving to death. I think devs are making the right decision, adding in zombies/monsters/cannibals. Walking simulators do nothing for this gamer, at least.

#theforest #patchnotes #earlyaccess