[2023] 9th Dev Journal

A lil somethin somethin: You can find the details for this event on the announcement page here.

Hello Lumia Island survivors!
Welcome to the last update for changes to Lumia Island.
As we mentioned in the 2nd Update, today’s Dev Journal will cover Pond.

As you all know, Pond is a very troublesome terrain. Because of the pond itself, it forms a giant O-shaped area with a pond in the center. It’s very wide, but because of its shape, most of it is a one-way passage, making gameplay a bit repetitive. The best way to solve an O-shaped terrain is to create a passage through the center.

Filling in the pond would solve a lot of problems, but we wanted to keep it because it is one of the most distinctive features on Lumia Island.

As the number of playable areas will grow to 20, new players may find it difficult to remember the terrain in every single area on Lumia Island. Each area, like Archery Range, Forest, Hotel, or Hospital, has its own unique characteristic, but with the change to 20 areas, we needed to make landmarks that stand out more.

For example, Research Center in the center of the map may be the first thing you remember thanks to its unique concept. Or if you're a student, School may be the first thing you think of. Once you've got a few of these areas down, you can work your way through remembering the others.

Water is also important to players' first impression of Lumia Island. Beach and Pond are often recognized first because their blue color makes them stand out. This is what we mean by landmarks being important for recognition. Depending on individual experiences, you may think of different areas other than the previously mentioned ones. However, for most players, Pond, Research Center, and Forest are the most commonly remembered areas of the current map.



So, instead of filling the Pond, we thought of ways that could make it more of a landmark.

We even considered building a bunch of bridges to improve the O-shaped terrain of Pond. However, since bridges themselves are often long, straight pathways, improvement would be too small-scale and the addition of too many bridges would make it look cluttered and strange.

After a lot of back and forth, we reached a consensus: a Launch Pad! We’ll be adding the Launch Pad from Cobalt Protocol to the middle of Pond. This will bring a lot more variability and different paths to the area. Another advantage is that, unlike other alternatives, we can keep the unique blue color on the current Minimap.





We will also install a Launch Pad to connect Pond to Cemetery. This will diversify the path that was once just a large bridge next to Pond and also help Cemetery’s left side. The current left side of Cemetery is a U-shaped terrain that isn’t exactly the easiest to navigate without crossing Research Center (unless you’re going for Tree of Life!). Now, the path to Pond will greatly increase the use of this area.





Be careful though! When using the Launch Pad, you may jump a little too far and end up in a different area than you want!

Inside Pond, the Launch Pad will open up a pathway like an “aorta” that runs through it. However, it will still need a few more improved pathways.

Previously, Stream could only be crossed with extensive mobility or by being knocked back by a Boar, but we’ll be adding a footbridge that will make crossing much easier.



Another problem with Pond is that there is limited access to all areas except Police Station.

There is also no Hyperloop, so to get to neighboring areas, you have to trudge through long pathways made up of mostly O-shaped paths. (The same goes for the Launch Pad leading to Cemetery.)

The area where the Boar was will now have a pathway to Temple. The path from Temple to Pond used to be a very long, straight path, but with the addition of this central passage, you will have more options available.




Another pathway will also be added near the path that connects to Fire Station. In the current map, this little area was most “controlled by pathways”—in other words, there was a lot of walking around pathways to get where you wanted. Between this and the central Launch Pad, you can now expect quite a bit of variation.




We will also be adding a new pathway that connects to Hospital. This area used to be a narrow path without any alternative routes, with Tree of Life and Hyperloop pretty close together, making it a notorious bottleneck when going between Hospital and Temple. With this new pathway, that issue is pretty much solved.




One thing we had in mind was having Research Center be a Safe Zone at the start of the game, then changed to a Restricted Area later on. However, we had to put that off because we needed to completely redo the algorithm for Restricted Areas. If Research Center can be opened in early game, you’ll have a lot more variety for paths in the center of the map that will allow you to come back later.



So far, we’ve talked about Lumia Island in three separate parts. However, because things are still in development, we’ve first focused on levels and pathways that will be created. In addition to everything we’ve already covered, we’re currently working on other optimization aspects as well, so detailed layouts may change and the quality of different objects will get even better!

Another big thing we’re focusing on for Lumia Island is Lightmaps. It was honestly annoying to calculate object lighting, reflections, and shadows in real-time. We’ll be making this much easier by coding lighting information separately and adding it on top. This will really lighten the load on the game settings and make the game run smoother. This lightmap will make a big difference for backgrounds, but it will serve an even bigger purpose by optimizing the UI and character models.

More information about this will be released in the update titled "Frame Report".

Next Dev Journal, we’ll be diving into another update for our characters. Stay tuned for exciting changes to even more of your favorite characters that weren’t included in the 1st Update. See you soon!

As always, thank you!

You can get WP from the Dev Journals on our {LINK REMOVED}web event page. Web Points(WP) are event points that can be obtained and used throughout the Season 9 web events