Hello, everyone!

We’ve just released a fairly big update for Heart of the Woods!

… In fact, we released five whole versions in rapid succession just now — 2.1.4, 2.1.3, 2.1.2, 2.1.1.1, and 2.1.1! (※ More on this below.)

Our apologies for the large delay in getting these versions out — various external factors beyond our control prevented us from properly releasing these updates, despite them being feature-complete for the longest time.

The main highlights of this release mostly have to do with our brand new controller UI and navigation support, which can be enabled and configured from within the game’s preference pane, as well as native Apple Silicon (arm64 / AArch64) support on macOS!

All that being said, we thank you all for remaining patient, and as always, for supporting Studio Élan across these many years!

〜 Karen/あけみ (akemin_dayo) and adirosa

Changelog for 2.1.4:

※ This is the most recent version.

This version includes all changes listed in this changelog.

On PC, it targets Ren’Py SDK versions 8.1.3.23091805 〜 7.3.5.606.

• Fixed an issue where the font path validator could potentially cause a crash when reading values from some users’ persistent save data.

Changelog for 2.1.3:

※ This version combines Heart of the Woods 2.1.2 with changes that were made in 2.1.1.1 and 2.1.1 (both of which chronologically were finalised after 2.1.2 due to external factors, despite what the version numbers may indicate).

This version includes all changes from 2.1.2, 2.1.1.1, and 2.1.1.

On PC, it targets Ren’Py SDK versions 8.1.3.23091805 〜 7.3.5.606.

• Merged all changes below.
• Made the UI more clearly indicate when a scrollbar or slider is in a selected state.
• Fixed an issue introduced in 2.1.1.1 where the “Welcome to the music room.” string would not be localised.
• Heart of the Woods now officially supports Ren’Py SDK version targets 8.1.3.23091805 〜 7.3.5.606.

Changelog for 2.1.2:

※ This is the version that is used in the physical PC releases that are currently being sold on our webstore and were offered as backer rewards on Kickstarter.

All changes made in this version are not present in Heart of the Woods 2.1.1.1 or 2.1.1.

On PC, it targets Ren’Py SDK versions 8.1.0.23051307 〜 7.3.5.606.

• The Studio Élan bootlogo has been completely recreated from the ground up using new internal tools, but this time with brand new high-resolution assets!
• Apple Silicon (arm64 / AArch64) is now natively supported on macOS, without any need for Apple’s Rosetta 2 x86_64 translation layer!
• Updated names in the credits screen and attribution in the guest art screen.
• Further clarified and improved wording in the README.
• Heart of the Woods now officially supports Ren’Py SDK version targets 8.1.0.23051307 〜 7.3.5.606.

Changelog for 2.1.1.1:

※ This is the version that is used in the upcoming SCE Sony PlayStation 5 and 4 updates for Heart of the Woods, which also includes all changes made in 2.1.1, 2.1, 2.0.4, and 2.0.3.

All changes made in this version are not present in Heart of the Woods 2.1.2.

On PC, it targets Ren’Py SDK versions 8.0.3.22090809 〜 7.3.5.606.

• Improved wording in the music room.
• Made non-user-facing minor internal changes.

Changelog for 2.1.1:

※ This is the version that is used in the upcoming Nintendo Switch update for Heart of the Woods, which also includes all changes made in 2.1, 2.0.4, and 2.0.3.

Two minor changes made in this version are not present in Heart of the Woods 2.1.2. (※ Specifically, 2.1.2 includes changes up to 2.1.1rc20, but the final version of 2.1.1 is actually 2.1.1rc21.)

On PC, it targets Ren’Py SDK versions 8.0.3.22090809 〜 7.3.5.606.

New features

• Added a brand new controller UI! It can be enabled and configured from within the game’s preference pane.
  • Our new controller buttons (which will be used in all mainline Élan games going forward) are slightly modified versions of Nicolae (Xelu) Berbece’s controller buttons, which are CC0-licensed (※ public domain).
  • You can obtain a fresh copy of the original unmodified assets here: https://thoseawesomeguys.com/prompts/
  • ※ If you’d like to use the exact files and/or naming scheme found in our games, feel free to do so.
• Controller support has been completely reworked, making the game fully controller (and keyboard) navigable for both normal gameplay and UI navigation! More keyboard controls have also been added!
  • Please check the help screen for a full list of controls.
• The controller UI is now enabled by default on Steam Deck and Steam Big Picture.
• The large text size option is now enabled by default on the Steam Deck and Nintendo Switch.
• A new version of the Studio Élan bootlogo has been created, using new internal tools that allow for both higher quality and framerates.
• The game now supports arbitrarily high framerates for super smooth animations!
• Fully reworked various view layouts in the preference pane for easier UI navigation.
• Added a patch API and content compatibility validator that runs at boot for certain user-installed patches and mods.
• Added a loose file validator that runs at boot to check for certain leftover user-installed loose files that are known to cause issues.
• Added the “changeTaraCustomShirt()” console command, which lets users change Tara custom shirts easily.
  • Example: changeTaraCustomShirt(“minute”) will change Tara’s custom shirt to the specified “minute” custom shirt.
  • changeTaraCustomShirt(“off”) or simply changeTaraCustomShirt() will remove the custom shirt and restore the usual default behaviour of Tara’s shirts that change according to the current in-game moon phase.
• Added a proper bundle identifier: com.vnstudioelan.heartofthewoods
  • ※ This will be our standardised bundle identifier format going forward for all of our games.
• Added all missing Info.plist keys to the macOS app bundle.
• Added compatibility with older Ren’Py SDK runtime versions, tested all the way down to 7.3.5.606! (※ Older versions than this may work, but are untested.)
  • Ren’Py SDKs patched with the modern Steamworks API are compatible, too! (※ With this Python 3 script provided by Ren’Py: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/renpy/steam-deck-guide/main/update_renpy_steam.py and Steamworks SDK 1.55)

General improvements and bug fixes

• Fixed a crash that would occur if the user performed specific actions on older versions of the game that could result in the incorrect font path being written to persistent save data.
• Fixed an issue where certain users would end up with incorrect font size values written to their persistent save data.
• The current version of the game is now shown in the top left corner of the preference pane.
• Clarified and improved wording in the README.
• Re-centred and re-aligned certain UI elements that were previously incorrectly aligned.
• Adjusted and improved padding on UI elements.
• Fixed an issue where the dynamically changing UI tint colour (based on the current character PoV) would sometimes be inconsistently updated, leaving certain elements in the wrong colour. All UI elements are now correctly updated. No more carrots! This is now a carrot-free household!! (🌸•̀ω•́)୨✨🥕❌
• Fixed an issue where the fairy sitting on the ledge of the main menu buttons would sometimes be incorrectly aligned, especially in non-English languages.
• Sped up some UI transitions.
• Recreated many rasterised UI assets at a factor of @4x for a better experience on high-resolution and HiDPI / Retina displays.
• Fixed an issue where the auto mode delay value can sometimes default to an incorrect value of 0 (instead of 15), leading to auto mode effectively not working.
• Made many internal improvements to how trophies are handled.
• Made the state of UI elements in the first boot accessibility onboarding flow more clear to the user.
• Improved text legibility of many UI elements.
• Fixed an issue where the menu UI focus would constantly be lost every time the user navigates to another extras page.
• Restored missing snowflake UI indicators.
• Restored missing UI element alpha dimming in menus, improving legibility in many cases.
• Improved appearance of the “Now Playing” view.
• Allow keyboard / gamepad cancel button to work as expected in all applicable areas.
• Made many improvements to the save screen / load screen UI layout.
• Save screen / load screen pages now properly end at the correct maximum page value bounds, instead of continuing on forever.
• The save screen / load screen pages now wrap around when you hit each end.
• Disabled the autosave pages in the save screen to prevent players from accidentally overwriting their autosaves.
• Fixed the date formats used in save data.
• Fixed an issue where the quick menu would be visible during chapter cards.
• Made all scroll views no longer draggable, as this was somehow causing gamepad navigation to break(!?)
• Made it easier to tell when sliders, scrollbars, and certain buttons are being hovered over or selected.
• Made the game more resilient against crashes if given broken save data.
• Fixed incorrect UI element alignment for the individual character voice volume sliders.
• Improved wording to better communicate the on/off status of the “SUSTAIN VOICE PLAYBACK” and “WAIT FOR VOICE” preferences.
• Fast-skipping will now always show a confirmation prompt.
• Help text has been improved, with many more controls now correctly documented.
• Improved developer console layout.
• Fixed an issue where the bold version of Source Han Sans / 源ノ角ゴシック would erroneously be used instead of the regular version.
• Fixed an issue where the bootlogo audio could possibly end up being muted in certain cases.
• Fixed an issue where the font size selector in the preference pane would sometimes not work correctly.
• Fixed an issue where certain UI elements in certain states would be more translucent than intended.
• Improved the appearance of the accessibility self-voicing overlay.
• Improved wording of the CG gallery help text.
• Improved wording of the camera overlay help text.
• Fixed Abby’s UI colours being incorrect. (… Granted, due to the Carrot Bug™, the broken colours were never actually visible to begin with.)
• Fixed an issue where some scroll views in the preference pane would sometimes be cut off prematurely.
• Fixed an issue that would occur when calculating the amount of pages to generate for the CG and guest art galleries.
• Fixed an issue that would cause the extras screen navbar to behave incorrectly when returning from the CG viewer.
• Removed an extraneous newline in the credits screen.
• Updated credits.

Localisation improvements and bug fixes

• MelanieKit warning screens are now fully localisable.
• Toast notifications are now fully localisable.
• Removed quick menu layout behaviour that was once added to work around an issue that used to be needed for the Traditional Chinese (繁體中文) and Simplified Chinese (简体中文) localisations.
• Fixed an issue where the “SUSTAIN VOICE PLAYBACK” and “WAIT FOR VOICE” preferences would not correctly show the on/off status in the Traditional Chinese (繁體中文), Simplified Chinese (简体中文), and German (Deutsch) localisations.
• Fixed an issue where chapter names would not be localised in certain cases where they should have been.
• Fixed an issue where the fairy in the main menu would sometimes be misaligned when using a non-English language.
• Fixed an issue where certain strings may not have been fully localisable.

Scene-specific improvements and bug fixes

• Added a missing transition in Scene 1-3.
• Added a missing transition in Scene 1-7.

Changes that affect modders and dataminers

• Heart of the Woods (as well as all mainline Élan Ren’Py games going forward) no longer excludes plaintext scripts from the build archives! (There was never much of a point in doing so anyway, considering that unrpyc exists ;P)
• Made various internal improvements to the codebase, including large-scale refactoring… again.
• Added the ability to open the README, game data root directory, and game root directory from within the game itself. Look inside MelanieKit for the relevant URL schemes.
• Tara custom shirts use a completely new naming scheme now (“tara_shirt_custom_NAME_left/right”), so if your mod adds new Tara custom shirts, you will need to adapt accordingly.
• changeActiveCharacterPoVAndUpdateUITintColour(characterName) is the new method of triggering a PoV switch. The old method as well as its associated dependencies have been completely removed.
• The leftover/unused translation buttons from early UI prototypes (… and the demo) have been removed, as well as their underlying UI assets.
• Unused raster image UI assets have been removed.

Changes specific to non-PC builds

• Fixed a crash that would occur when attempting to enter the Extras menu on non-PC builds.
• Fixed textbox layout issues on non-PC builds.
• Fixed NVL box layout issues on non-PC builds.
• Fixed quick menu layout issues on non-PC builds.
• Fixed font size issues on non-PC builds.
• Fixed preference pane layout issues on non-PC builds.
• Fixed UI element rendering issues on non-PC builds.
• Fixed an issue where the extras menu would not be localised correctly on non-PC builds.
• Disabled self-voicing on all non-PC builds due to the AX TTS backend not working correctly on non-PC builds.
• Integrated all other changes and improvements made in Heart of the Woods 2.1.1, 2.1, 2.0.4, and 2.0.3.