Howdy guys! Coming at you today with an updated build that I would like to present for SAGE, so please be sure to check it out and see if you find any bugs. I fixed all the bugs that people found before, as well as added several new features. Additionally, I did some polishing of stuff that was already in the game. You can see the full list of changes below!

 ===== NEW =====

• The game now stores generated objects and information about the room, and loads them from disk, greatly improving load times on older/slower machines.
• The game checks if you've opened the chest to get the Forest Key, but haven't opened the gate yet, and if you've lost your key to the item bug the game will give you a key (item bug has also been fixed.)
• The debug overlay now shows more information about the game window and the internal resolution.
• The game now has an option to enable colorblind friendly colors for Lance's health and magic meters.
• You can now disable the Circle Meter that appears over Lance's head if you don't like it.
• You can also configure the rate at which the AutoAbility function will automatically use one of Lance's abilities.
• Additionally, you can disable the screen shake effect when Lance hits an object or gets hit.
• Furthermore, you can disable gamepad vibration on all gamepads, regardless of their individual settings.
• There's an Advanced Options menu now. However, if you go there and mess with it, and you mess up the game, that's all on you. Don't go there unless you're confident with your computer skills.

 ===== IMPROVED =====

• Slightly reduced the size of the OpenDyslexic font to make it fit in better with the scale of the game.
• Fish and Pretty Petals will no longer despawn while you're in the middle of a dialogue sequence.
• Vibration has been added where it was missing before.
• The animation for collecting a Fish Scale has been improved.

 ===== BUG FIXES =====

• Fixed grass/dirt tiles underneath the bridge.
• Fixed issues where garbage graphics would show up while drawing text.
• Title screen options submenu no longer has an option to return to the title screen *while* on the title screen.
• Fixed an issue where having HD Blur enabled would cause the title and results screen to disappear.
• Fixed an issue where, if you hadn't played the game since before the July 2020 builds, the game would crash.
• Fixed issue where the game would mistakingly remove all your items sometimes when it was saving/loading. This was due to compatibility with older save files. This unfortunately means that certain older save files won't work with Shield Cat anymore without modification.
• Fixed an issue where you could open the chest containing the key, but not actually collect the key, causing it to despawn when you leave the area and therefore making an unwinnable state. The game now only flags that the chest was opened *after* you collect the item it spawns.
• Fixed an issue where the item filter (for making it so only the forest key would show for use on the gate for example) wouldn't reset correctly, causing the item menu on the pause menu to show nothing, despite you having items.
• Fixed an issue where Lance's swimming sound would stop if he moved between areas that use an area transition.
• Fixed the Auto Ability 2 functionality - it now works as intended.
• Water vertex transformations will no longer appear to reveal the black void (the void is now water colored instead.)
• Fixed a bug where the camera scrolling position during area transitions was not rounded, causing shimmering.

 ===== Known Bugs =====

• Sometimes grass will cast a shadow on Lance, even after it has been cut.

A big thanks to the following people as well as everyone who supports me who makes this possible!

Accalia, Shadow8t4, BeepSterr, BenTheDragon, Caliburn Absolute, Chris Badger, Clover Arizona, David Wolfpaw, Spyduck, Cloud Hop, Fao, Flake, FoxyDude, Nutalie Frost, GamerRat (Jan), Gri, Goronhead, Holly Hoppet, Jyrki, Hulex Fox, Kirbizard, Kaypar, Trash, LF, LexiTheTT, Lorxus, Luna, Luna Moona the Little Kahuna , Durk Vash, Markus Joseph Kitsinger , Marlyn, Mello the Ferret, Midori, Leon P, Nenekiri Bookwyrm, Axel Husky , NovaSquirrel, Ripp_, Rix, Otarine, Cam D'Arcy, Saiai, visneKedi, Saxxon Fox, Ansel Geisel, Susan Tolias, Tabby Cromarty, Vivee, jay jorts, Kazy, keeri, megaRammy, raine, SUSHiCLAWS

Download

If you're a patron at $5 or above and haven't already, click this link to gain access:   https://roxyfoxrab.itch.io/shield-cat/patreon-access

Otherwise, you can download it from here or using the itch launcher!

This is hopefully the last build I'll be making for SAGE. If any bugs are found with it, I will only publish another build that fixes those bugs (I'm not adding any more new features until after SAGE.) I have a lot of other stuff to do as well, so I gotta focus on those things!