Changelog

This page provides a log of patch notes for Castaways. The latest updates are at the top of the page, and the older updates are at the bottom of the page.

The Mobile Update (1.0.0-beta)

Mobile Update v1.0.4-beta

Castaways Mobile Update v1.0.4 - September 11, 2023

• Hide UI mode (by pressing ` key on desktop platforms) for cinematics
• Autojump now works when moving out of water to land
• You can now shift + click to move items between inventories more efficiently
• Desktop Builds for PC & Mac

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Mobile Update v1.0.3-beta

Castaways Mobile Update v1.0.3 - August 29, 2023

Added

• Added item descriptions on important items
• Added new magic generator that drops various resources
• Added join and leave messages in the chat
• Added ability to click names in chat to teleport to players
• Added ability to juice crops and grow them instantly with dabloons
• Added eligible resources and xp yields to skills help UI
• Added dialogs and better tutorial decals to help new users
• Added chat moderation tools and ability for mods to kick/ban players
• New islands now include a starter chest with important resources
• Added a breaking sound to the magic block
• Added chat bubbles back

Improved

• Improved challenges system to be smarter and allow for more player freedom
• Improved controls to be more approachable and easier to learn
• Improved crop growth timers to be more readable and useful
• Improved birthdate selector on main menu
• Skills now require challenges to be learned before sacrifices can be made
• Fish can now be caught in variable quantities of 1-3 each win
• Crops can now be harvested in variable quantities of 1-3 each harvest
• Fishing minigame now uses colorful circles instead of white squares
• Fishing minigame has been modified to be in horizontal layout
• 150% performance improvement
• Various other performance improvements

Fixed

• Fixed a bug preventing players from collecting lava at volcano
• Fixed a bug causing ore to spawn in unobtainable locations
• Fixed a bug causing doors to be unplaceable
• Fixed bug causing the crosshair to appear in UI menus
• Fixed a bug that caused chunks to corrupt and lose data
• Fixed a bug where connecting messages would get stuck in chat
• Fixed a bug where other player's held items wouldn't render
• Fixed a bug where you would be stuck fishing if competing player left
• Fixed a bug that caused fishing score to be perfect every time
• Fixed a bug with the start challenge button for the mining skill
• Fixed a bug that caused international players to be unable to connect to servers
• Fixed a bug that would cause islands to not render properly on load
• Fixed locale issue with skills UI
• Fixed locale issue with sugar cane
• Fixed lag spikes caused by unrecognized characters in chat

Removed

• Removed stone generator
• Removed countdown timer before fishing

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Mobile Update v1.0.2-beta

Castaways Mobile Update v1.0.2 - June 25, 2023

Improved

• Stone generators will now save and continue its timer when destroyed and placed again
• The lighting in the coal and iron mines is brighter for increased visibility
• Improved the mine challenge to be more friendly to new users
• Loading chunks of blocks in large worlds is much faster
• Various other performance improvements

‍Fixed

• Fixed bug that caused duplicate tiles when fishing for big fish
• Fixed bug that caused player to be stuck breaking blocks continuously
• Fixed bug that prevented players from signing up properly
• Various other bug fixes

Removed

• Removed sinking and drowning damage when swimming in water

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Mobile Update v1.0.1-beta

Castaways Mobile Update v1.0.1 - June 17, 2023

• Improved Tutorial Sequence & Challenges

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Mobile Update v1.0.0-beta

Castaways Mobile Update v1.0.0 - September 11, 2023

Added

• Launched on Android & IOS
• Added sound effects
• Factories added including: Generators, Silos, Processors & Containers
• Dabloons
• Grand Exchange
• Ports & Port Royalties
• Iron Pickaxe, Iron Axe, Iron Shovel, Iron Hoe, Iron Sledgehammer, Iron Bucket & Iron Watering Can
• Altars
• Levelling
• Abilities
• Dabloons Store
• Auto Jump
• Tutorial Sequence
• New island navigation, island leaderboard, & crafting interface
• Join codes that let you join a friend quickly and easily
• Automatic device quality adjustments to improve performance
• Added push notifications and chat death messages

Improved

• Improved the crafting system by previewing and categorizing all available recipes
• Crafting tools will now automatically equip the crafted tool to your hotbar if there is available space
• Changed the durability of flimsy watering cans to 60 uses
• Changed the durability of flimsy buckets to 4 uses
• Dramatically improved the performance of the game with numerous optimizations
• Improved chunk loading times dramatically with numerous optimizations
• Updated the map illustration to reflect the new hub world design
• Changed the way grass is grown and dropped when broken
• Changed the amount of dirt you receive for various crops and sand when using a composter
• Coal is now introduced in mines every hour instead of every 24 hours
• Updated the texture of palm trees
• Changed the rate that crops grow by various amounts
• Changed the rate that crops wither by various amounts
• Fruit Trees will now wither if not watered consistently
• Improved the user interface to better support mobile devices
• Improved the user interface with illustrations on windows, menus, and buttons
• Improved the overall visual graphics of the game
• Improved various textures and models in the game
• Improved player movement by fixing the lerp
• Improved player input and camera controls
• Improved camera controls so you can pinch and zoom to change perspective
• Improved the balance of health regeneration and hunger usage
• Improved chat to show messages even when the full log is closed
• Improved the performance of the island brower
• Changed the default spawn so players always return to their island when reopening the game
• Improved fish spawn rates to based on player activity rather than just movement
• Improved frame rate and vsync settings
• Improved the composter behavior to only open the menu if the composter is empty
• Improved blend state animations been walking and running
• Improved various ways of moving items between your hotbar, inventory, chests, and sacks
• Improved item dropping and pickup to be smarter about intention
• Switching islands will now keep the item you previously had equipped, equipped
• Improved the sign up / sign in flow for users
• Various other performance improvements

Fixed

• Fixed various broken player animations
• Fixed various issues with animations snapping, or playing incorrectly, or not at all
• Fixed broken ocean position that caused players to swim above water
• Fixed bug where the world border was broken
• Fixed bug where you didn’t receive hunger exhaustion when placing blocks
• Fixed bug where the dirt texture not matching the grass texture
• Fixed bug where the player would get stuck at spawn points
• Fixed bug where breaking tilled dirt was slower than breaking regular dirt
• Fixed bug where durability of buckets wasn’t decreasing on fill and unfill only
• Fixed bug that caused frame lag and frame tearing issues
• Fixed bug that prevented you from taking royalties from mine chests
• Fixed bug that required you to close chests twice
• Fixed bug where chunks wouldn’t load
• Fixed bug where third person camera controls were interuppted by chat boundaries
• Fixed bug where you sometimes couldn’t place fish in a bird feeder
• Fixed bug where phantom blocks would appear when breaking blocks larger than 1 block
• Fixed bugs moving items between inventories and chests and sacks
• Fixed bug where islands would load at the wrong time of day
• Fixed bug where world interactions failed if there were two objects at the same distance
• Fixed bug with watering crops
• Fixed bug where grass does not expand vertically
• Fixed bug where wet soil wouldn’t render differently than dry soil
• Fixed bug where items would sometimes not appear in inventory after being picked up
• Fixed bug where mounting a raft while holding a fishing rod would cause you to start fishing
• Fixed bug where the text in the game would go fuzzy
• Fixed bug where the fishing line would appear or disappear during fishing minigame
• Fixed bug where mining stone from the mines left a phantom block
• Fixed bug where the watering can level would not go down when watering crops
• Fixed bug where the moon would always be up
• Fixed bug that bricked the camera if you selected a fish while in the celebrate state
• Fixed bug where interacting with a composter while holding a block would cause the block to be placed
• Fixed bug that causes player to fall ridiculously fast
• Fixed bug that prevented the player from opening a furnace
• Fixed bug that would cause coal to not spawn consistently in mines
• Fixed bug where the volcano would steal your bucket when trying to collect lava
• Fixed bug that caused players not to sink in the ocean
• Fixed bug that caused fish to disappear
• Fixed depth sorting on player names
• Fixed bug that allowed player to still move even when at 0 health
• Fixed bug that prevented you from autojumping over stairs
• Fixed bug where players wouldn’t take damage while standing in lava
• Fixed bug where you could re-enter the coal mine after it closed
• Fixed bug where the celebration animation wouldn’t play if your fishing rod broke first
• Fixed bug where fences wouldn’t connect to other fences properly
• Fixed bug where spamming a watering can could cause the player to crash
• Fixed bug where the mine royalty chest was intersected by a rock

Removed

• Removed highlights on players and rafts
• Removed stone recipe from furnace
• Removed ability to create islands by visiting the captain
• DDR style arrow based fishing mini game
• Removed rain and gloomy weather events
• Removed cross hair in first person view when on mobile
• Removed composters and bird feeders from existing islands

The Merchant Update (5.0.0-alpha)

Merchant Update v5.0.3-alpha

Castaways Merchant Update v5.0.3 - February 20th, 2023

Ahoy Castaways! The time has finally arrived. EVERYONE GETS AN ISLAND! This update allows anybody to get their own island by trading a compass with the new Captain located in the new Hub. Along with this there are a ton of new features that have been requested for a long time! We are so happy to have this out and we hope you enjoy.

New Content:

• Free Islands: Any player can create their own island by going to a Hub and talking to the Captain with a Compass in hand.
• Island Levels: By placing specific blocks down (check the Island Level Page for more details), players can now raise their Island Level in order to participate in the leaderboard to win NFTs.
• The Island Selector: Press 'I' to pull up the Island Selector. This interface lets you sort by Volcanos, Coal Mines, Iron Mines, All Islands, My Islands, Island Level, Mine Level, or amount of players.
• Iron Mines: Iron Mines come on Generation 2 Islands provide players with Raw Iron.
• Iron Ingots: You can Smelt Raw Iron to create Iron Ingots which can be placed down to increase Island Level by 4.
• Iron Blocks: These can be crafted from 9 Iron Ingots and placed down to increase your Island Level by 36.
• Generator Chests: These are located at every Iron Mine and Coal Mine and allow the mine owner to earn resources passively as players use their mine.
• New Hub: This replaced the Old Hub. It is much larger and prettier than the old one and also will be the home of NPCs.
• The Captain: He sits at the end of the dock along with his ship in Hubs. He will provide any player an island in return for a compass.

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Merchant Bed Update v5.0.2-alpha

Castaways Merchant Update v5.0.2 - January 16th, 2023

Ahoy Castaways! The team is continuing to work hard on the Merchant Update! Today we are adding some highly requested decoration items to the game: the Bed and double doors. Along with this we have a few bug fixes.

New Decorations:

• Added the Bed (6 Rope + 6 Kelp + 6 Old Boots + 6 Palm Wood = 1 Bed)
• Placing 2 Palm Doors next to each other will create double doors (door handles face the same inward direction)

Bug Fixes:

• Fixed a bug causing coal to be lost when furnaces were unloaded
• Fixed a bug preventing players from watering mature crops
• Fixed a bug preventing sandstone from being used in furnaces
• Fixed a bug allowing players to bypass stack size limits in furnaces
• Fixed a bug causing some blocks with extensions to stop working when broken down

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Merchant Blocks Update Post-Release Fixes v5.0.1-alpha

Castaways Merchant Update v5.0.1 - January 9th, 2023

Ahoy Castaways! Here's a quick batch of bug fixes related to the merchant block update (v5.0.0).

Bug Fixes:

• Fixed bug causing islands to load multiple of the same block over top of themselves making the game lag
• Fix bug causing core ore to be mined and not drop coal
• Fixed bug causing doors to only open on the users browser and not for other players
• Fixed a few incorrect and outdated icons

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Merchant Blocks Updates v5.0.0-alpha

Castaways Merchant Blocks Update v5.0.0 - January 9th, 2023

Ahoy Castaways! In preparation for the release of public islands in the weeks ahead we are releasing a bunch of new blocks for players to build with (this includes doors!!!!). We are so excited to see what players build with these!

New Smelting Blocks (made with Coal in the Furnace):

• Glass (1 Sand = 1 Glass)
• Brick (1 Clay = 1 Brick)
• Polished Stone (1 Stone = 1 Polished Stone)
• Polished Sandstone (1 Sandstone = 1 Polished Sandstone)

New Crafting Blocks:

• Palm Door (2 Palm Wood Planks = 1 Palm Door)
• Clay (1 Sand + 1 Dirt = 1 Clay)
• Coal Block (9 Coal = 1 Coal Block)
• Palm Wood Planks (1 Palm Wood = 4 Palm Wood Planks)
• Sandstone (4 Sand = 4 Sandstone)
• Carved Sandstone (4 Sandstone = 4 Carved Sandstone)
• Stone Brick (4 Polished Stone = 4 Stone Brick)
• Palm Wood Stairs (6 Palm Wood = 4 Palm Wood Stairs)
• Palm Wood Plank Stairs (6 Palm Wood Planks = 4 Palm Wood Plank Stairs)
• Stone Stairs (6 stone = 4 Stone Stairs)
• Polished Stone Stairs (6 Polished Stone = 4 Polished Stone Stairs)
• Stone Brick Stairs (6 Stone Brick = 4 Stone Brick Stairs)
• Sandstone Stairs (6 Sandstone = 4 Sandstone Stairs)
• Carved Sandstone Stairs (6 Carved Sandstone = 4 Carved Sandstone Stairs)
• Brick Stairs (6 Brick = 4 Brick Stairs)
• Palm Wood Slabs (3 Palm Wood = 6 Palm Wood Slabs)
• Palm Wood Plank Slabs (3 Palm Wood Plank = 6 Palm Wood Plank Slabs)
• Stone Slabs (3 stone = 6 Stone Slabs)
• Polished Stone Slabs (3 Polished Stone = 6 Polished Stone Slabs)
• Stone Brick Slabs (3 Stone Brick = 6 Stone Brick Slabs)
• Sandstone Slabs (3 Sandstone = 6 Sandstone Slabs)
• Carved Sandstone Slabs (3 Carved Sandstone = 6 Carved Sandstone Slabs)
• Brick Slabs (3 Brick = 3 Brick Slabs)

Tools Required to Break New Blocks:

• Stone Pickaxe: Coal Block
• Any Pickaxe: Brick, Brick Stairs, Brick Slabs, Polished Stone, Polished Stone Stairs, Polished Stone Slabs, Stone Bricks, Stone Brick Stairs, Stone Brick Slabs, Sandstone, Sandstone Slabs, Sandstone Stairs, Carved Sandstone, Carved Sandstone Slabs, Carved Sandstone Stairs, Polished Sandstone, Polished Sandstone Slabs

Note: any new blocks not listed here can be broken by hand

Bug Fixes/Other

• Increased scrolling speed in crafting menu
• Fixed the coin toss with the [golden coin] not working
• Fixed bug causing islands to halt when shutting down
• Fixed bug causing the game URL to be incorrect
• Performance improvements

The Homestead Update (4.0.0-alpha)

Bug Fixes v4.0.1-alpha

Castaways Homestead Update v4.0.1-alpha - January 5th, 2023

Ahoy Castaways! Today we are fixing a few bugs with seagull poop, notably players being able to push it with rafts.

Bug Fixes:

• Fixed a bug where players were able to push seagull poop using their rafts
• Fixed a bug where players would spawn below blocks and in the water
• Fixed seagull poop occasionally falling through blocks
• Fixed some instances of players dying randomly (there are still some known issues here, WIP)
• Fixed entities being able to traverse through unloaded or unrendered chunks

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The Homestead Update v4.0.0-alpha

Castaways Homestead Update v4.0.0-alpha - November 28th, 2022

• Farming
• Composting
• Bird Feeding
• Seeds, Crops, Scarecrow, Wood Hoe, Stone Hoe, Watering Can, Barrel, Bird Feeder, Worms
• Seagulls
• Day and Night cycles
• Island Permissions
• Torches
• Sacks
• Updated Hunger Values

The Island update (3.0.0-alpha)

The Island update (3.0.0-alpha)

Castaways Island Update v3.0.0-alpha - October 17th, 2022

• Jumping
• Placing and Breaking Blocks
• Islands, Coal Mines, Volcanos, Hubs
  
• Smelting
• Palm Trees, Coconuts & Sugar Cane
  
• Dirt, Grass, Sand, Stone, Stone Slabs, Stone Stairs, Palm Wood, Palm Wood Slabs, Palm Wood Stairs, Palm Wood Fence, Coal, Item Frame, Chests,
  
• The Seas now damages the player
  
• The player no longer spawns with a raft automatically unless on a hub
• Added first person camera
• Official game link changed to alpha.castaways.com

The Fishing Update (2.0.0-alpha)

The Fishing Update (2.0.0-alpha)

Castaways Fishing Update v2.0.0-alpha - July 11th, 2022

• Crafting
  
• Fishing
• Sticks & Rope
  
• Fishing Rod
  
• Added Fish: Shrimp, Seahorse, Crab, Clownfish, Pufferfish, Seaturtle, Squid, Dolphin, Shark, Whale
  
• Added Sea Junk: Kelp, Empty Tuna Can, Old Boot, Compass, Flare Gun, Rusty Old Key, Laser Pointer, Gold Coin, Milo Doll
  
• Added Weapons: Spear, Dagger, Bow, Arrow, Cutlass. Note: Weapons have no purpose until The Combat Update
  
• Health & Hunger
  
• Added Moving Camera
• Added Swimming
• Added the ability to mount and dismount Rafts

The Raft Update (1.0.0-alpha)

Castaways Raft Update v1.0.0-alpha - May 31st, 2022

This was the first iteration of the game. There was literally nothing to do but endlessly drift around the ocean and chat with anonymous players behind temporary names.

• Invite System
  
• Voice Chat
  
• Text Chat
  
• The Raft
  
• The Seas

Pre-alpha

Castaways Pre-alpha - May 26th, 2022

The base raft gameplay was internally tested, and 3 active community members at the time were invited to test the game before it became public.