Hey there, fellow ylanders!   The new year 2018 has just started, and we're all again fully focused on fixing issues and bringing you new content. In this Dev Diary, I'd like to summarize what issues are troubling you the most and what is that we plan to do about those. But first, let me start by telling you what you can expect in the upcoming weeks.    UPCOMING UPDATES The next major update is 0.7 "Cheerful Characters", will introduce NPCs into the game and will be released in the first half of February. Initially our idea was to have, right from the beginning, even rather advanced hostile NPCs patrolling ylands, "factions" that could fight each other with you taking a part in that fight, but the truth is that the current state of combat is plagued with many problems and needs to be fixed - there is really no point in introducing feature B, which relies heavily on feature A, until we're happy with how the feature A works - and we're definitely not.  So the first iteration of NPCs will bring you mostly friendly NPCs. You will be able to meet those randomly during your travels. Some will talk to you or even ask you to do things for them for which you might be rewarded. You will be able to trade with them - be it a lonely farmer that offers cheap vegetables or a vendor selling objects that you would have a hard time getting elsewhere. You will be able to trade with other players as well. With all this (the initial support of very simple dialogue-branching and "quests") accessible in the Editor it's only a matter of time before some of you come up with cool games for others to play. We will, as usual, have something ready for you as well  - something to show you what's possible to do.   Just to be clear - when we talk about vendors and trading, this doesn't have anything to do with the monetization. Speaking of monetization though, in 0.7 we wanted to introduce Decorations, armor skins, and some other things as well but we decided to delay those. Working on monetization-related features while the game still has a rather high number of critical bugs would be unfair and would make no sense. We hope that those of you who were looking forward to those features will understand.  
We hope you had a great Christmas holidays...wherever you decided to spend them! (Courtesy of @Frank16Gr)   MOST PRESSING ISSUES I already mentioned bug-fixing. Fixing the critical game issues is of the utmost importance to us. There are issues small and big fixed every day - most of them will be present in update 0.7, but because that is still weeks away, in a week or two we will be releasing bug-fixing update 0.6.3. Every day we go through both Steam and Ylands.com forums (and through what you send via the in-game feedback tracker) and take notes about what issues are critical and which ones happen to a lot of players. We have an internal list called "Most pressing unresolved issues" which has around ten entries that are both critical (game crashes, players are prevented from doing something with no workaround or the issues result in some very annoying behavior) and widespread. Even though programmers fix other features as well, those are the ones that haunt us, the ones that we're trying to fix asap (which, unfortunately, may not always be possible due to various reasons). Let me tell you what is currently on our list:
* Character starving to death while being offline
This has just been fixed and will be released as a part of the upcoming 0.6.3 * Game crashes during rainstorms
We are currently looking into this * Crashes when using crafting panel
So far we have been able to confirm, that it is happening with older AMD (ATI) video cards on drivers/unity engine level. If all goes well 0.7 will be released on the latest Unity engine version, and there is a chance that it might help resolve the issue. In the meantime, we're still looking into it. * Host Unreachable
This is a rather unfortunate issue. If you're among those experiencing it, first take a look here http://steamcommunity.com/app/298610/discussions/2/1620599015865077154/. The thing is that the absolute majority of possible causes resulting in this issue have nothing to do with Ylands itself (we're using Steam networking). The sad truth is that with pretty much every MP game there are some players who are experiencing this behavior because it may be caused by anything from an antivirus or firewall setting, their network topology or it can be related to their provider and as much as we would love for everyone to be able to play Ylands, these issues are something we can do nothing about. That being said we are still looking into this to make sure that there's absolutely nothing on our side which could be a reason for this as well.  * Inventory items disappearing or getting stuck between inventory slots/ outside the inventory panel etc.
We are aware of this issue and understand that it is rather annoying, but at least this gets "fixed" by restarting the game. We are planning to do some GUI-related changes, and this will get fixed along with some other issues. * Items being invisible when placing them [MP]
We are looking into this * Ladders teleporting players to odd places
This has just been fixed and will be released as a part of the upcoming 0.6.3 * Map not saving in MP for clients
This is a known issue - map doesn't work correctly outside of SP. It needs more than one simple fix. We understand, though, that it is a crucial tool and needs to work in MP as well. As soon as it is fixed, we can start working on one of the most requested features - putting notes or symbols on the map. * Player with current account in session
This one is probably the most critical one on the list. There's nothing worse than not being able to play the game you bought. We're looking into this right now. * Rain/snow getting through buildings/caves
Not really a critical one, but very annoying nevertheless since the last thing you want is to create a house to keep you warm and then see rain falling on your bed or carpet through the roof. This doesn't happen always so we are now gathering save files from those who are experiencing it so that we can fix all the possible causes. * Ship won't turn after placing certain items on it
We are looking into this * Stuck at loading MP screen
Another very nasty issue. There were several causes for this and we've already fixed some - but obviously at least one remains unfixed. * When logging back in, new character creation panel is prompted
Again, a very serious issue - players not being able to continue playing with their character. This has, for some reason, started happening lately and we're already looking into it. (please note, that while two of these issues are marked as fixed in the upcoming 0.6.3, there may be more)
DEDICATED SERVERS The last thing I will mention today is Dedicated servers. Shortly before the Christmas holidays, we started distributing DS beta among those of you who asked for it. The number of those interested was enormous - way more than we expected. Because so many of you are using it these days, in 0.6.3 we will be releasing a fix for the basic admin tools so that you can add and remove admins, kick or ban players and know who's currently online. 
Speaking of DS - everywhere you look we say that it is buggy, not optimized, with a very little support and shouldn't be used for anything "serious"... and yet we are already seeing some companies renting Ylands DS on a commercial basis. Given what I just said we consider this very irresponsible and not a good idea. And that's it for this week. The next Dev Diary will be about features that you request the most (two of which are already in the works ). Until then, you have a great time, ylanders, and stay classy!